That is what I am. I heard about 1.1 after I had decided to start a new game, which I am doing at this very moment. I have barely played this game despite owning it for months but I really want to get into it. Anyone have any tips to help out a fool? As a side note I have played a few harvest moon games however they were not my bread and butter. I do recall getting a nice farm going in A Wonderful Life though.
It depends on what you want to know. My suggestion? Refine your request, or do a search on "hints," "tips," "walkthroughs," or "guides." We've got a lot to share, but we need to know what you need to know.
Hmm... Tips? as a general rule, dont try to do too much from the beginning, explore your own land, your surroundings, get used to how much your character can do at first and take it slowly! do some foraging (picking up spring onions, flowers and such), get to know the villagers and the locales. Also, you have a map (M) where you can hover your mouse to see who lives there and the "work hours" where you can enter said place. Not all areas are available but will unlock after some events (you cant rush those events, like I say, enjoy it and take your time!) Hmm... what else... oh yes! dont try to farm too much at first, after a few weeks you ll level and get better at using your tools (proficiency), you should already know a few of these things since you mentioned playing HM games before, it ll be similar! just faster and with a different aesthetic. (with some unique things like the Arcade)
Hmm okay thank you I am on my 5th day I think atm I am just doing what I can get done during the day. So far it's just me farming, foraging and fishing. Still need to learn how to use the map it's kind of weird how it works for me but definitely not a bad map. Mostly I was looking for tips on how to play the game or just overall suggestions. Things like make sure you fish everyday or something like that, one of those things you try to do everyday (in HM the mine was something I did everyday). I do apologise if my post seemed a bit generic but honestly I didn't really know where to start. Similar to the player being given too much freedom and being paralyzed by the lack of direction. Only not exactly that
Read up on crops in the wiki. Don't plant anything you can't harvest before the last day of any season. Craft chests to store things. If you have the cash buy your first backpack upgrade before you go into the mines. Go fishing, a lot, because it's a good way to earn cash even if it's frustrating at first. When the earthquake unblocks the path to the spa in the first week of summer go there when you are short on stamina and long on time. Use your hoe on the dirt in the mines to find food and artifacts. Turn in items for community center bundles when you get them so you can reap the rewards without filling up your storage. Read the wiki to find out which villagers mail you food and befriend them first. Don't give people gifts items they don't like. Upgrade your watering can the day before it rains (It's a two day upgrade timer so the first day you water your crops and take your can to Clint and the next day the rain waters for you). Take your time. Grow a fruit tree. Give Linus crops and foraged food. If you are playing for virtual friendships don't miss giving people birthday gifts. The only quests that have expiration dates come from the bulletin board and most of those are only good for two days. Collect sea shells. Build tappers for trees that are not on your farm. If you get frustrated because the days seem too short there is a time speed mod but beware, it's hard to put down after you have used it.
Oh right about fishing, if you are having difficulties, its been useful in the past to remap your "use tool" key to Q or any other key you are comfortably using, that way you can fish and handle the bar a lot easier than with clicking. (in case you hadnt already remapped it)
My only tip: The Wiki is your friend. It can tell you anything you'd want to know about anything in the game. When I first started playing I always had it handy and I took down notes on paper to keep track of the most important parts. Welcome.
The game can seem very daunting because of how open ended it is-- CA really did go out of his way to add so many activities and different ways to play, it can be hard to get a focus on the game when you first start out. But that, too can be part of the appeal, because it lets you try a variety of things and decide what you like best in the game. Farming? Foraging? Maybe exploring the mines or visiting friends in town? My advice, for starting out, is not to worry if it seems like you're all over the place at first. The game is immensely forgiving, and short of a deliberate attempt to toss away your tools and do nothing at all, you can't really mess up your game no matter what you spend time with early on. While you do have a grading at the end of two years of game-play, it in no way affects your game and you are able to get re-judged afterwards at any time if you want to up your score, so don't stress over that. For some more specific goals and advice: A good early priority is to gather 300 wood and repair the broken plank bridge to the east of the beach. The tidal pools are a great early-game income stream. Upgrading your backpack at Pierre's should be one of the first things you save up for-- the extra inventory slots it adds are a boon to your ability to get things done. If you're exploring the mines, take along plenty of food and go early enough in the day to get through five levels at a time. Each tier of five levels opens up the next elevator landing, which acts like a 'save point', allowing you to skip straight to that level of the mines when you return. Practicing fishing is easier than it seems-- even pulling up trash gives a few points towards leveling up the fishing skill, and so does the use of crab pots, when you get them. Don't stress over money! Although it seems like you're grinding for pennies at the start, it's an exponential growth curve to your income as the game progresses. Within a couple of seasons, with normal gameplay, you'll be making more money than you can ever spend. My best advice? Take the time to appreciate the little things about the game. It's not just a farming simulation; it's a rich, occasionally luminous little world of unexpected deft touches. The weather, the scenery, the flora and fauna-- CA's crafted a game where you can just relax and take it all in. Wander the woods. Watch the fireflies in the summer. Visit the Stardrop tavern and meet the locals. Decorate your home to your tastes. Explore.
Be good to your parents and smile as often as you can. Always try something once, and never say no to something good. Also, wear sunscreen.
Watch your energy meter and the time. Early on, you use up energy very easily. It's better to stay around the farm (after you've spent money on seeds). Plant, break stones, chop down some trees. You get the ability to make field snacks right from the start, so be sure to use forage for acorns, pine cones, and maple seeds on your property. (They'll also appear when you cut down trees, so cut down a variety.) Field snacks are a great, cheap and early way of replenishing energy. You may also want to place a few torches on your property, just in case you're out late doing work, and don't keep a careful watch of the time. If you're out past 1 AM, you won't be healed and energized when you awaken in the morning. If you're out past 2 AM, you keel over and are brought back by someone--usually Jojo's folks, who charge you quite a lot for the privilege, even if you were at the front door of your home. Everybody has their own playing preferences, but as for mine: I would suggest ignoring fishing until winter. It has a poor initial return, and the mini-game has an inverse difficulty level. Fishing can be fun once you get it going, but you don't need that at first, and all the time it requires is better spent on the farm. Similarly, while the mines are challenging to explore, you get just as much mining skill from breaking rocks on your property, so do the latter, first. Build up a few levels of mining, and you won't lose quite as much energy every time you swing that pickaxe. When you do try out mining the first time, stick close to the exit door which drops you down a level. Break up a few stones, and switch quickly to your weapon when you're next to a monster. Keep plenty of field snacks handy. Note that the elevator stores a floor marker every five levels, which means that once you get to level 5, you can always jump back to that floor without having to go down four separate flights of stairs, first. Animals are useful primarily for what they produce. They aren't anywhere near the moneymaker crops are, so I would suggest ignoring them for your first year or two. You should be able to buy from the merchant to the south of your property (or get via gifts) the animal-based products you need for the city center bundles. (You will want to check the center out, just to see what's like, early on. Shouldn't take much time to go and get back.) Buy up strawberry seeds at the fair in the middle of Spring. They're a great repeating crop, best planted on the first days of the season. Save them up for next year. Buy blueberries to plant early in Summer, and Cranberries to plant early in Fall. You can certainly buy other seeds, but these will become your early- and mid-game cash crops, especially when you hit Farming Level 4, and get the ability to make preserve jars. You improve your rep with each of the townfolk by a mix of talking to them regularly, and giving them gifts. Check the wiki to find out what gifts each likes, because these vary greatly. It can take quite a bit of time to find them all, so the best way to catch them together is at the various festivals. Be sure to talk to everybody there before you speak with the mayor and set off the main event. As a secondary source to find people, go to the tavern at night. It's moderately busy, especially on Saturdays. The better they like you, the more inclined a resident is to give you items and recipes. Explore. The countryside has a lot to offer of interest. Foraged objects change per season, but can also pop up at anytime. Artifacts, buried under squiggly worm-type objects in the soil, also can appear at any time. Visit your neighbors' homes. Some run businesses on their properties. Look around for the occasional secret passage. Talk to everybody you see. Have fun. Never forget that.
It's kind of hard to mess up, but if you want to save time here are some tips: - Don't neglect fishing, it may be tough at first but its worth training, save the trash received in a chest - Always check each of the TV channels every day, especially the cooking channel - I wouldn't recommend spending too much money on the items and materials Marlon, Clint and Robin sell - Pay attention to the season and which items are available in it, seasonal items required for the community center can be a pain to get - Craft quality sprinklers with your extra bars, its almost always better to use them in accumulative gain than saving them - Try not waste a day planting on Wednesday, buy seeds at Joja Mart if Pierre's shop is closed - Add a tapper to at least one of each tree type, Maple, Evergreen, and Oak - Put at least one Crab pot in each fishing area, the ocean and river, and fill it with bait daily if possible - Don't forget to dig up the roots/stems/worms (they have an animation) in the ground http://stardewvalleywiki.com/List_of_Best_Gifts_by_Villager
Well, it depends on what you're going for. If you're going to earn as much profit as possible then blueberries in the summer and cranberries in autumn of the first year will give you quite a nifty sum. Some other advice: Loot your neighbours trash cans for possible food or minerals (though when they're not looking, otherwise your friendship points till lower) Speaking about friendship points, the more hearts they have, the more stuff they will give. Also dig with your hoe whenever you come across three worms wriggling in the dirt around the valley, and make sure to donate different minerals to the museum in order to get rewards. If you don't like lightning destroying your stuff, then build alot o' thunder-antenna-thingies.
After a cutscene, talk to the people involved, if they're still around. Sometimes they have unique dialogue that relates to the cutscene (in one case, this prevented me from disliking a character). Check the traveling cart (west of Marnie's ranch) every Friday and Sunday. Items to look for include: (1) Rare seeds (these grow in the Fall for a huge profit); (2) Sprinklers; (3) any items you need for bundles that might otherwise take a long time to get (in particular, if you choose to have mushrooms rather than bats in your cave, buying fruit can speed you in completing the Artisan bundle and getting the Greenhouse). Your farm has two alternative exits-one on the south leading directly to the forest and one on the north leading to a path the the mine (this is faster than going through town). These will likely be blocked by debris at first, so you'll need to clear a path to them using your axe and pickaxe. Don't forget that the seasons only have 28 days, not 30 or 31. Also, the day you plant the seed doesn't count, so if you plant, say, a Cauliflower (12 days to grow) on Spring 17 (and don't use Speed-Gro), it won't grow before Summer and your investment will be lost. Along the same vein, if you know a multi-harvest crop won't produce again before the end of the season, you can forgo watering it (you may want to go ahead and destroy it with your axe so you don't get confused)-just remember that Corn does survive into the Fall. When harvesting your crops, select an inedible item like wood or stone on your hotbar. If you have your axe or pickaxe selected, you might accidentally use it on a plant, destroying the plant. If you have an edible item selected, a misclick will instead bring up the "Eat this X?" confirmation box, which is harmless, but annoying. If you want to pause the game to measure something (e.g. Scarecrow placement) without time passing, but don't want to bring up the menu because it obscures too much of the screen, you can instead try to eat an item. The "Eat this X?" confirmation box will pop up, pausing the game without obscuring much of the screen (and you can always say "No" if you don't want to actually eat the item in question). I'd recommend choosing something expendable just in case you misclick. In the Spring try to grow a gold-star Cauliflower (this requires fertilizer and some luck; you'll definitely want to plant more than one) and save it for the Luau. This yields the best results (granting a decent friendship boost with all villagers), and is easier to get than the other items that do so. However, you don't need to jump straight into Cauliflowers; it's probably better to start with cheaper crops and work your way up (also, see below). Try to donate at least 5 items to the Museum (which gives you 9 Cauliflower seeds) by Spring 16 and 15 items by Summer 15; otherwise, you won't be able to plant the seeds you're given as a reward. Also, once you've donated 60 items to the Museum, you'll be able to buy an Iridium Sprinkler every Friday, which is very useful (it costs 10,000 gold, but you should have plenty of money by then).
Find a good place for your chests. They're seriously annoying to move, since you can't pick them up while there are still items inside. 'E' opens the menu/inventory. I mean this seriously, since I somehow missed out on it and it took me forever to figure it out. You can also check out what you need for the bundles (as well as your progress) if you're working on the Community Center, which is useful. Also, concentrate on the greenhouse bundle. Otherwise, if you miss out on crops, like for the quality crops bundle, you'll have to wait a year. Befriend the Wizard if you want to change your outfit. Keep an eye on the calendar, which is by the bulletin board at Pierre's. Birthdays are an easy way to befriend the villagers. Don't judge a villager until you're friends with them. Haley, for instance, does go through quite a bit of character development. The villagers are also just a really fun aspect of the game. Clint will sometimes post a request to bring him ore. The requests are worded weirdly, though, since you can't just bring him the ore if you already have it, you have to mine the ore after accepting his request. BUILD MAYONNAISE MACHINES. Especially if you end up needing to rely on Marnie for hay. A normal chicken egg is worth 40g, hay costs 50g, meaning you'll lose money otherwise (it took me a year to realize this). Save earth crystals if you haven't unlocked them yet. On that note, harvest all of your hay before the beginning of winter. It dies when winter starts. Save up your extra stone, especially if you're into mining. You'll need it for the Skull Cavern. Don't die in the mines if you can avoid it. Otherwise, you'll lose some of your items and forget about the last few levels of the mine, so you won't be able to get there with the elevator.
As for the Clint ore requests, there's a little trick. If you have ore stashed in a chest, go to that chest and single click the ore until you have hit the number needed. The ore entering your inventory, one at a time (very important, don't click half the stack and think it'll count, it won't, it has to be one at a time) is all that the game needs. then dump the ore back into the chest, keeping that space clear. You don't have to have it on you when you talk to Clint to complete the quest. Also, not sure if it's been mentioned, but watch the tv every day. You can check what the weather will be for tomorrow, what your luck will be like for the day, useful tips from Living Off the Land, and Recipes as well. If you miss a recipe, there's a small chance you can catch it in a re-run, but most likely you will have missed out and have to wait 2 years (I think) to catch it again. This is annoying when you're trying to get the Cooking achievements. calendar is important, too. It can be tedious going back and forth to Pierre's just to check it. Once you find yourself with 2 grand and nothing to hold on to it for, go to Robin's and buy a calendar from her to hang in your house. I put it by the tv in the beginning and the by the bed after upgrades so I can check it first thing in the morning.
Hey all I have been reading this thread as I have been playing Stardew Valley and it has been VERY helpful. I doubt I can keep my save once 1.1 hits but these are all good things to practice for if the patch breaks my save. I think I have a good enough handle on the game now so you don't have to keep posting here XP just wanted to say thank you. It's nice when a community can give great advice especially to someone like me. My sister barely needed help since those Harvest Moon games I mentioned? They belong to her and I would borrow them.
While I agree that berries are a great cash crop, I'd actually plant the Strawberries in Year 1; you get fewer harvests, but you can reinvest the profits immediately, which actually gives a larger return in the long run. Also, you can always keep back some of the Strawberries to use in the Seed Maker for 1-3 seeds each, and plant those in the second Spring. But really, if you work hard to make a profit, you should be making plenty of money by Year 2 anyway. A general tip is that farming gives a great return on investment, and having money or resources sitting around gives no return on investment. So try to spend all your money unless you're saving for something specific (e.g. the Stable) or already have as many crops as you're willing to handle. If you want to make money, reinvest, reinvest, reinvest.
Your first year is all about growth. Not just in growing crops, but growing your financial stability. As a general plan of attack: Day 1: buy up extra parsnip seeds. This should give you a total of 40. Plant them all. Day 5: Plant more parsnips and potatoes. And a green bean. Before Day 15: get the five artifacts/gems to Gunther for the Cauliflower seeds. Egg Festival: Buy up Strawberries. Plant them in the ground *IMMEDIATELY* that evening, before you go to bed. You can set up the ground before going to the festival. When your first batch of strawberries comes up, use them to buy more potatoes. Notice that nowhere in here did I say 'buy a backpack upgrade'. It is tempting. It is VERY tempting. However, it's two thousand gold that you can plow (pun intended) back into your farm to reap greater rewards. Your first spring is going to have the biggest impact on how your farm develops over the first year. Mistakes made early on can snowball. Likewise, good decisions made early on can also snowball. Also, if you are worried about the Community Bundles that you are about to unlock, you can check my guide here. Warning: here there be spoilers.
Early on you can work on your farm in the morning till you run low on energy, then go into town and talk to the villagers, explore the area for forage, etc. Try to get 5 minerals or artifacts to Gunther as early in Spring Year 1 as possible -- the reward is 9 cauliflower seeds which definitely saves you money. If you plant your crops in a 9x9 square, you can stand in the middle and water all of them without your character having to move around; if you haven't already done so activate the "Show Tool Hit Location" in the Options menu. 1.1 isn't going to change a lot for someone in an early stage of their save -- it will add new farm maps which you'll need a new save to use, but for your first time through I think it's better to work with the original map anyway.
