A look at some of your starting options for planting on Spring 1

When you start the game, you're given fifteen parsnips and 500g, and with this humble beginning you amass your fortune and eventual empire. But, as with chess, which opening you use can have a substantial impact on the midgame and... *sigh*... yes, even into the endgame. King's Pawn standard opening, four-knight opening... even the fool's mate is considered by many to be an opening. And, as with chess, some are pretty strong, and others are... less so. And yes, there are some traps out there. So, which is best? That's... a more difficult and nuanced question.

First off, you have to state your goals before deciding on a starting move. What are your goals, both short and long term? Are you wanting to focus on fishing, or focus on farming, or just do a bit of everything? These questions will substantially impact what you do on your first day.

For those who want to Get Rich Quick(tm), the answer is of course to fish. And for these, you have pretty much two options. Option one is to go ahead and plant all fifteen opening parsnips. It doesn't take up that much endurance, and at least gets you Farming 1 as soon as possible. Because while fishing may be the most profitable thing to do in your first Spring... it cannot hope to compete with fields of Ancient Fruit being processed into wine weekly. So eventually, if money is your goal, you WILL need to grind out some Farming skill. And this isn't a bad way to at least get your first level up so you can get Scarecrows down for your more substantial growing in the second half of the season.

The next option is more of an all-in strat, no planting on Day 1. Sell all the parsnip seeds. Your goal instead is to try and get up to 2,000g by the dawn of the third day (and the moon crashes into Termina... oh wait, wrong game...). As such, anything that doesn't generate profit before Day 3 is essentially meaningless. In this strategy, you'll be spending Day 2 doing nothing but fishing, probably off of the pier outside of Willy's to sell him fish as your inventory fills up. You'll be wanting to level your Fishing skill up to level 2 minimum by the end of the second day, although I've seen some people get as much as Level 5. This gives you a ton of cash to play with, you can then later spam out something like Kale to grind your farming xp before the end of the month.

A potential refinement on that would be to purchase a Training Rod on Day 2 (he's gone fishin' all day on the first day) to further speed up your fishing gains.

But that's for fishing starts. What of those of us who don't particularly like fishing? Well, I've got you covered as well. There's several viable options to consider, depending on your desired level of complexity and reward.

The basic option, one that I've suggested in previous "First Spring for Newbies" guides I've written, is the 40 Parsnip opening. You clear out a 5 x 8 area (or two 5 x 4 areas), get them watered, then at 9 AM when Pierre's opens, you go and drop down every last coin you possess from your severance package with JojaCorp on more parsnips. Get all 40 planted. Once you've done that, you'll have little energy left, but a lot of time. This is perfect for foraging (you want to also try to hit Foraging level 1 as soon as possible, as well as collect the four items necessary for your Spring Forage bundle, and hopefully some Spring Onions for stamina recovery purposes) and socializing. Bring your hoe with you in case you run into a dig spot. The 250g reward for your first item turned into the museum is going to be huge. Are you going to lose a couple? Yes. Do you really care? Not really. 40 parsnips isn't enough to hit Farming 2 anyway, although it IS enough to get you much closer to that target. It also requires more stamina to water daily on Day 2 and 4 (day 3 is guaranteed rain) which might set you back in other tasks if you can't find enough spring onions to keep you going. You can either sell your parsnips, or if you already have the money for everything you need, you can eat them to recover stamina and health in the mines as you delve deeply and greedily. Just remember to save one parsnip back (and any gold-star parsnips!) for bundle completion.

The more technically challenging option is going to be 13 parsnips, 1 bean sprout, and 1 cauliflower. This is an opening that demands some pretty precise timing to hit the intended goal, which is to get the Spring Crops bundle, and the 20 Speed-Gro it provides, before the Egg Festival. This way, you can put that speed-gro on your strawberries you purchase at the Egg Festival, and get an extra yield from them, a 50% increase in profits from those 20 strawberries! This works because Crows won't show up if you have less than 16 crops planted at any given time, so as long as you sell two of your parsnip seeds you start with, you'll never have to worry about crows until you can make your first scarecrow (13 parsnips is just barely enough to hit Farming 1). You'll actually need to plant a single potato on the day you harvest your parsnips, and nothing else (lest the crows come) in order to have time for it to fully grow and be harvested before the Egg Festival. The rest of your crops can be planted the day after, when you have your scarecrow in place. The advantage of an extra 20 strawberries harvested and sold in your first spring is pretty compelling, but it's got some tight timings to get right, otherwise you've gone through all the effort for nought. However, as you are only watering 15 crops, it is less stamina intensive than the 40 parsnip opening, letting you do other things, like chopping trees (but not stumps!) for Foraging xp, instead.

On the other forums, some people suggested a 50+ parsnip opening, because that's how many parsnips it would take to get Farming 2 instead of 1 on Day 5. However, I find this to be... uncertain. Here's the thing... remember how we were talking about crows earlier? The formula for the number of crows potentially eating something is (number of crops / 16), maxing out at 4 possible crows. With 50 crops, that's already 3 crows each with their own separate 30% chance of eating something. Which makes it virtually certain that *something* is going to be eaten, possibly up to three somethings. Which means a 50 parsnip opening, in order to hit its goal of Farming 2 on harvest, is actually more like a 55 parsnip opening, and even then there's at least a chance it isn't going to work, at least in theory (although very unlikely at that point). Now, we mentioned that you can get a total of 40 parsnip seeds (including the 15 you start with) with the 500g you start with. But you're still 15 parsnips short here. At 20g/ea, that's 300g you need to get before Pierre closes his doors on day 1. That's... a pretty big ask, I feel. Especially for newer players. And remember, that's 300g you need before the end of the day, so you can't rely on the selling bin, you have to actually find something an open vendor will purchase and sell to them before they close. And still have time to get to Pierre's before he closes his door. As a speedrunner strat, it has merit, because if you don't get it, that's an easy reset without too much time invested in the run. For more casual gamers... probably best to swipe left.

There was also a Tulip Opening which basically focused on Tulips not as a cash crop, but as something to consume for stamina as you do your early mining dives, but since tulips actually generate less xp than parsnips do, that's also not exactly something I'd suggest for newer players, as you can get Spring Onions and, after the Egg Festival, Salmonberries to help you grind out those mining levels.

In short: those who wish to fish may want to hold off on farming until they've got some cash in their pocket to really explode onto the farming scene. However, for those of us more casual players, there's the 'standard' 40 parsnip opening, or the more technical 13 parsnip 1 green bean 1 cauliflower opening. The rest of the strategies I've seen bantered about are either heavily RNG dependent (something to be avoided in a guide, in my opinion), or cater to niche strategies.
 

Tom

Rancher
[lots of really great stuff]
Just one minor correction and a comment.

Correction: Your lone potato can be ready with a day to spare if you plant it on Spring 6. There was a bug in earlier versions that sometimes delayed harvest. But that seems to have been fixed. Plant Potato on Spring 6, and you can harvest on Spring 12, actually a day ahead of your required late-night run to the Community Center on Spring 13 with your Spring Crops Bundle for your Deluxe Speed-gro reward. Bear in mind your Cauliflower won't be ready until Spring 13, so really you could wait until Spring 7 to plant your Potato and Kale. Yay! Two days of vacation!

Comment: I'd call planting exactly 15 Parsnip on Spring 1 a "balanced" or "flex" start more than a "fishing" start. It depends on what you do with your 500g and every other gold you can raise. You could do a fishing start using it for early rod purchases. Or you could boost your Foraging by using it to buy energy Salads to chop tree tops, repair the beach bridge, and forage the tidal pools the morning of Spring 2.
 
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Just one minor correction and a comment.

Correction: Your lone potato can be ready with a day to spare if you plant it on Spring 6. There was a bug in earlier versions that sometimes delayed harvest. But that seems to have been fixed. Plant Potato on Spring 6, and you can harvest on Spring 12, actually a day ahead of your required late-night run to the Community Center on Spring 13 with your Spring Crops Bundle for your Deluxe Speed-gro reward.

Comment: I'd call planting exactly 15 Parsnip on Spring 1 a "balanced" or "flex" start more than a "fishing" start. It depends on what you do with your 500g and every other gold you can raise. You could do a fishing start using it for early rod purchases. Or you could boost your Foraging by using it to buy energy Salads to chop tree tops, repair the beach bridge, and forage the tidal pools the morning of Spring 2.
A valid point, however I like to make sure I'm good by doing the turn-in the day before so I don't have to do it during the two hours I have left when I get back from the festival. That's a detour that will cost time that one can ill-afford, especially when the clock already starts ticking at midnight.
 

Odin

Moderator
Staff member
Lots of great ways to get the most out of your first spring! Thanks for putting this together!
 
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Tom

Rancher
I like to make sure I'm good by doing the turn-in the day before
Spring 12 DSG? Careful. No can do. Please edit. I can delete this reply if you want.

1. You may be remembering wrong (or you mean you would like to if you could). Cauliflower takes 12 days to grow. 1+12= 13. Your Spring 1 Cauliflower isn't ready until the morning of the Egg Festival (Spring 13).

2. Potato grows in 6 days. So even planted on Spring 6, it's still ready on Spring 12 unless you are forgetting to water.
 
Spring 12 DSG? Careful. No can do. Please edit. I can delete this reply if you want.

1. You may be remembering wrong (or you mean you would like to if you could). Cauliflower takes 12 days to grow. 1+12= 13. Your Spring 1 Cauliflower isn't ready until the morning of the Egg Festival (Spring 13).

2. Potato grows in 6 days. So even planted on Spring 6, it's still ready on Spring 12 unless you are forgetting to water.
Huh... so it is indeed. Odd, I could've sworn I'd managed on the 12th somehow. Maybe I just had a bug with the watering, or I had a fairy show up and hit it without noticing or something.

Very well, updating to reflect this. Thanks for catching that.
 
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Shar

Farmhand
I got SDV in March when Corona virus showed up. Lost my job and all that so plenty of time on my hands to play this practically every day. Have read a lot on strats since then, and watched let's play videos on YouTube (which is something I've never done with any other game). I've come a long way since my first day with my first farm.
I used to primarily be a farmer in the early game trying to decide between kale, potatoes, cf or tons and tons of parsnips but that changed eventually, like it has for many of you.
I'd say I'm no different with fishing and mining nowadays in spring so I can be more efficient with sprinklers and crops as the first year goes on.

But the one thing I do that's different and I've never seen any similar strategy talked about is on spring 1. I leave the 15 parsnips alone and plant later in the year after getting my farming up (greater chance of gold quality by then). I know they're cheap and all that but that's not why I do that.
First day you can't fish or mine and not much to do before energy is gone.
So I start by clearing the farm in front of my house enough for 15 spots and then chopping trees for one chest. By now, I have wood, stone, fiber and mix seeds. I take the fiber, mix seeds, hoe, pickaxe, axe and scythe and head south. I clear the entire forest area of debris. If it's around 3pm, I'll go look for spring onions too. If closer to 4, I beeline to Pierre's. I buy one bean and 2 tulips (no particular reason for tulips other than they're cheap, can be used for gifting or kept up for bees later on). I then clear the weeds by the community center, around Emily's house, behind joja, etc and in no particular order. If my inventory gets too much, I drop things near the center of town to come back and pick up later.

I go back to the farm with the 3 purchased crops and between 10-20 mix seeds (often on the lower end but occasionally get super lucky). I plant enough to have 15 total crops.
I've never not had at least one cauliflower and one potato (usually more) along with plenty parsnips.
And with all the individual pieces of wood I cleared, it's just shy of a second chest so I get the rest at the farm to finish that to use as my fishing chest the next 4 days.
Once the second chest is built, the 15 crops watered, my energy is practically depleted. If I would have a handful of mis-hits in the day, it'd be really close to having to eat something but that generally doesn't happen.
Then I take only my hoe and go explore the back pass, the mountain lake and down to the beach to collect any forage and worms. If I dropped anything from earlier, pick that up now too.

At the latest, I get farming 1 on day 7 instead of day 5 with just these crops. Then from day 2 on, it's a combination of fishing and mining till egg festival. I usually water at night because if it's a fishing day, I want to get to the mountain lake asap for more largemouth bass opportunities before they disappear at 7pm. Also, somewhere in the 2nd week, I'll plant either 10 or 20 spring seeds for added forage xp when harvesting and keep that up till end of spring. This helps to get the bonus salmonberry (level 4?) and get to level 10 fairly quickly. Not to mention the added gold the seeds bring in when crafted.

At the egg festival, I do the strawberry thing (approximately 200), make a quick run to CC after for the 20 dsg and so on. At this point, I do water a lot for the next part of the season but by the end of spring, minecarts are done, desert is unlocked, sprinklers in place and over 150 starfruit can be bought for summer 1 and ready to start farming iridium.
After the first strawberry harvest, I'm level 6 farming at a minimum so if I plant the initial 15 parsnips now with fertilizer, 5 should be gold. If I wait till the 24th and do it, 5 will definitely be gold quality. Hasn't failed yet for me but I don't think it can be counted on in every playthrough, depending on luck.

I guess this became tldr when that wasn't my intention. Just wanted to mention my mix seed strategy on spring 1 and over explained it I guess.
 

Boo1972

Farmer
I got SDV in March when Corona virus showed up. Lost my job and all that so plenty of time on my hands to play this practically every day. Have read a lot on strats since then, and watched let's play videos on YouTube (which is something I've never done with any other game). I've come a long way since my first day with my first farm.
I used to primarily be a farmer in the early game trying to decide between kale, potatoes, cf or tons and tons of parsnips but that changed eventually, like it has for many of you.
I'd say I'm no different with fishing and mining nowadays in spring so I can be more efficient with sprinklers and crops as the first year goes on.

But the one thing I do that's different and I've never seen any similar strategy talked about is on spring 1. I leave the 15 parsnips alone and plant later in the year after getting my farming up (greater chance of gold quality by then). I know they're cheap and all that but that's not why I do that.
First day you can't fish or mine and not much to do before energy is gone.
So I start by clearing the farm in front of my house enough for 15 spots and then chopping trees for one chest. By now, I have wood, stone, fiber and mix seeds. I take the fiber, mix seeds, hoe, pickaxe, axe and scythe and head south. I clear the entire forest area of debris. If it's around 3pm, I'll go look for spring onions too. If closer to 4, I beeline to Pierre's. I buy one bean and 2 tulips (no particular reason for tulips other than they're cheap, can be used for gifting or kept up for bees later on). I then clear the weeds by the community center, around Emily's house, behind joja, etc and in no particular order. If my inventory gets too much, I drop things near the center of town to come back and pick up later.

I go back to the farm with the 3 purchased crops and between 10-20 mix seeds (often on the lower end but occasionally get super lucky). I plant enough to have 15 total crops.
I've never not had at least one cauliflower and one potato (usually more) along with plenty parsnips.
And with all the individual pieces of wood I cleared, it's just shy of a second chest so I get the rest at the farm to finish that to use as my fishing chest the next 4 days.
Once the second chest is built, the 15 crops watered, my energy is practically depleted. If I would have a handful of mis-hits in the day, it'd be really close to having to eat something but that generally doesn't happen.
Then I take only my hoe and go explore the back pass, the mountain lake and down to the beach to collect any forage and worms. If I dropped anything from earlier, pick that up now too.

At the latest, I get farming 1 on day 7 instead of day 5 with just these crops. Then from day 2 on, it's a combination of fishing and mining till egg festival. I usually water at night because if it's a fishing day, I want to get to the mountain lake asap for more largemouth bass opportunities before they disappear at 7pm. Also, somewhere in the 2nd week, I'll plant either 10 or 20 spring seeds for added forage xp when harvesting and keep that up till end of spring. This helps to get the bonus salmonberry (level 4?) and get to level 10 fairly quickly. Not to mention the added gold the seeds bring in when crafted.

At the egg festival, I do the strawberry thing (approximately 200), make a quick run to CC after for the 20 dsg and so on. At this point, I do water a lot for the next part of the season but by the end of spring, minecarts are done, desert is unlocked, sprinklers in place and over 150 starfruit can be bought for summer 1 and ready to start farming iridium.
After the first strawberry harvest, I'm level 6 farming at a minimum so if I plant the initial 15 parsnips now with fertilizer, 5 should be gold. If I wait till the 24th and do it, 5 will definitely be gold quality. Hasn't failed yet for me but I don't think it can be counted on in every playthrough, depending on luck.

I guess this became tldr when that wasn't my intention. Just wanted to mention my mix seed strategy on spring 1 and over explained it I guess.
I recently started my 2nd farm and I also started with an emphasis on foraging. Now, in my case I’m trying a foraging run- my goal is to avoid buying supplies, except for what I can’t forage or make like trellis plants. Shar’s experience is the same as mine. It’s been pretty fun and I’ve gotten a lot further then I would have thought. I think there are a lot of people who would enjoy starting by foraging. Especially in the forest farm layout.
 

Tom

Rancher
clearing the farm
[snip]
clear the entire forest area of debris
Can you confirm that you mean only Scything weeds (zero energy use) insofar as is possible?

I'll go look for spring onions too
PSA: Use your Screenshot tool! No "go looking for".


At the latest, I get farming 1 on day 7 instead of day 5 with just these crops
Intriguing. I was wondering about that. I assume this is a high probability, not a certainty. I'd be curious to have an idea of the risk of failure since I assume you agree it's a good idea to expand your plantings significantly on Spring 7. Can you give a field size estimate for Spring 7, Spring 13, and Spring 24?

Also, somewhere in the 2nd week, I'll plant either 10 or 20 spring seeds for added forage xp when harvesting and keep that up till end of spring.
Isn't that (watering) a steep energy investment in light of the opportunity cost of getting to Kegs (Farming 8) as early as possible in the Summer? What's your analysis of that energy vs the cost and benefits of chopping trees?

"I do the strawberry thing (approximately 200)"
Wow! You are going big and still getting "sprinklers in place"! (You may be a good gamer!) What Sprinklers or Watering Can upgrades are you using? And when are you getting them?

Overall:
1. Can you give a general idea of your mining progression? An approximate date for each 10 or 20 floors?
2. Can you give favorite tool upgrade dates? (Vincent's BDay, before Egg Festival, etc; specify tool, of course)
3. Why Starfruit when Hops is so cheap? Economizing on Kegs? Selling some pre-Keg Starfruit?
 
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Shar

Farmhand
Hi Tom

Can you confirm that you mean only Scything weeds (zero energy use) insofar as is possible?
No, I do everything, the weeds, the plentiful stray logs and occasional rocks. You only get into problems with energy if you have a handful of mis-hits. Otherwise it's fine. This is how I get my 2nd chest to take with me for fishing the next day. It saves time later getting wood off your farm and doesn't deplete my energy if I'm only planting and watering 15 crops at most on day 1. Close but not enough to eat anything.


PSA: Use your Screenshot tool! No "go looking for".
Yeah, I do use this at times but don't overuse. Most often I use when deep in skull mines if getting an early ladder/pit and want to see if there's much iridium deeper inside that particular level.
I also edit my player file to 60% (the zoom feature) so I see more of every area when above and underground when traveling thru. Game only allows for 75% zoom thru the UI but it can be configured lower.

Intriguing. I was wondering about that. I assume this is a high probability, not a certainty. I'd be curious to have an idea of the risk of failure since I assume you agree it's a good idea to expand your plantings significantly on Spring 7. Can you give a field size estimate for Spring 7, Spring 13, and Spring 24?
Week 1 - generally just the 15 crops from mixed seeds, bean starter and 2 tulips. Whatever gets harvested gets replanted with more mix seeds and whatever random crop they give me.
Week 2- I'll add a patch of at least 10 (maybe 20 if rng was good in week one) spring seeds.
If I've found coffee and/or ancient seeds, they go in the ground too. The 9 cauliflower from the museum reward get planted whenever I get them. Oh, and rice shoots get planted as I get them.
Week 3- strawberries galore - whatever I can afford upwards of 200. I try to keep 20-30 spring seeds if I can, but off to the side where a scarecrow is not necessary. Usually takes me 2 weeks instead of one to get thru this batch of spring seeds since I won't water them daily.

Isn't that (watering) a steep energy investment in light of the opportunity cost of getting to Kegs (Farming 8) as early as possible in the Summer? What's your analysis of that energy vs the cost and benefits of chopping trees?
It might be but it takes a while to get kegs anyways. And I don't think you're gonna be able to keep up a 1-1 keg to crop ratio long term. I got to farming 8 by the 2nd strawberry harvest which was late spring so I don't think it hurt me overall.
And as I said, I'll water at night if fishing that day because largemouth are the most profitable on sunny spring days and they're gone @7pm. Even if mining that day, I'll water at night just in case I'm close to that next elevator level in the mines, which I can do at 8pm but if it was closing in on 2am, I'd be in trouble. I made sure the watering and mining and chopping for sprinkler/keg materials are symbiotic.

I don't know how often I chop trees in spring really. It's just as necessary. I try to do the bridge at the beach before week 2 or 3. I also, in this particular game, had plenty of gold to buy wood from Robin as needed. I bought at least 20-25k in wood thru summer to keep making the kegs. No way would I have been able to find, let alone chop so much wood.
Additionally fyi, I plant acorns to the left of that area by Marnie's. Usually have ~20 there before the end of spring. And I plant a couple at the bus stop too, also tap the ones already there instead of chopping them. Those are actually the first few I tap, the oak and maple ones there.
And I plant maple along the back pass and oak in that area above Robin's. Not more than 7-8 of these each.

Wow! You are going big and still getting "sprinklers in place"! (You may be a good gamer!) What Sprinklers or Watering Can upgrades are you using? And when are you getting them?
I don't have sprinklers down in time at all for strawberries. As I mentioned in my previous post, a whole lot of watering takes place after the egg festival but again, I give myself about 4 hours at night to do this. Any time left over goes to chopping till I pass out or go to bed.
But once the season changed, I had 25 quality sprinklers for my starfruit and other summer crops in my current game.
I'll only have a copper watering can for the initial strawberries (have to keep my pickaxe and axe upgraded too). But by end of spring it's a steel water can as long as I get one rainy day. And then I wait to upgrade out further because my crops will have sprinklers. I'll get the gold can sometime before fall and won't have iridium can till the end of winter. I never felt the need to have it upgraded faster. I prioritize upgrading my pickaxe to gold once my water can and axe are copper (before end of spring), and once the pickaxe is gold then I do both those other ones to steel (last week of spring or early summer?). Then it's pickaxe to iridium followed by whatever I'm in the mood to upgrade. My hoe is always lagging behind. I had everything iridium before year two, the hoe somewhere in the last week of the first year.
I didn't have more than 300 crops in any planting season that first year but by the time winter was ending, I had 24 iridium sprinklers going for what eventually became ~600 winter seeds the last week. I've seen more done on YouTube and read as much in various SDV forums.


Overall:
1. Can you give a general idea of your mining progression? An approximate date for each 10 or 20 floors?
2. Can you give favorite tool upgrade dates? (Vincent's BDay, before Egg Festival, etc; specify tool, of course)
3. Why Starfruit when Hops is so cheap? Economizing on Kegs? Selling some pre-Keg Starfruit?
Um, iirc, I finished the regular mines 3rd week of spring and shortly after purchased the vault room in the community center to fix the bus. I don't know when I hit certain floors of the mines - just wanted it completed when I knew I would have the money to fix the bus.
I talked about my tool upgrades above, vaguely probably but I don't recall the specifics. I've been toiling around with this method for a few new games. This particular game is the first I've taken into the 2nd year cuz it's going so well (currently late spring year 2). I don't really start a day over unless I've died in SC thru my stupidity (or maybe ego) thinking I won't need to eat yet and then getting swarmed or something.
Starfruit over hops mainly cuz I don't want to harvest so many hops daily the last 2+ weeks of summer. I may get tons more hops for my second summer because it looks like I'm close to getting the junimo huts so they can harvest for me. Plus seeing a field of starfruit for once was pretty cool. I did get about 15 hops plants the first summer which still amounted to a good amount of pale ale when processed (I've sold a bunch so don't recall the exact amount).

Right now in the last week of spring year 2, the community center is done, I have 2 deluxe sheds full of kegs, my basement is full of casks, preserve jars placed randomly around the house, my greenhouse has 80 ancient fruit and around 40 other crops (combination of coffee/starfruit and gem berry) along with 14 fruit trees, coop upgraded to ducks and barn with pigs, got lucky with 2 auto grabbers in SC treasure rooms so 50k saved there, my field has ~200 ancient fruit, 200 strawberries, 200 rhubarb, 10 flowers for bees, coffee and 60ish assortment of other spring crops.
I'll take this game to at least the end of year two to see how well I did. Atm, I'm using the 10% faster crop skill but in winter I'll change again to the 40% artisan good skill and sell all my wine and the other artisan goods.
This is my best game yet but I'm not comparing myself to anyone else out there. I've seen some amazing things people do and just try to incorporate a little bit here and there to my game while having this discussion.
 
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Purrrrfect

Greenhorn
Woah, interesting guide for newbies like me.

I haven't acquired the game yet but I'm already preparing my short and long term stuff. And this will definitely do!

Thanks for this *sigh* extensive but quite useful guide, it's quite appreciated.

And yes, I'm new. Hehe.

Greetings and good day.
 

Tom

Rancher
Thanks, Shar. I'm trying to figure out your Spring. I figure either you have the Timespeed mod (which I don't gather is the case), or you are a very good gamer and you aren't fishing at all in Spring (which works fine for the Community Center). All you are doing is mostly watering and mining.

Week 3- strawberries galore - whatever I can afford upwards of 200.
This is amazing to me. 200+ watering in Spring. I truly am lazy, I guess. I've been keeping it to 80-120

And I don't think you're gonna be able to keep up a 1-1 keg to crop ratio long term.
This made my jaw drop. But seeing further down your approach, I think I understand better. My approach has been to ramp up Kegs like 20 on Summer 14, 40 on Summer 21, 60 on Summer 28, etc. And I try to keep my total field down to well under 500 long term. In my current file I am at 360 outdoors on Y2 Spring 1. I don't intend to go much bigger than that.

Needless to say, I do keep a 1:1 Keg ratio. I process and sell all nearly immediately.

I got to farming 8 by the 2nd strawberry harvest which was late spring so I don't think it hurt me overall.
Well, that's the benefit of so much watering. I haven't upgraded a Watering Can since my early saves, and my aims aren't very high. I'm happy to have 20k rolling in every couple of days with Pale Ale mid-summer and start all my animals then. I do repair the mine carts in late Spring. My main goal is generally to repair the Greenhouse as close to mid Fall as possible. Hops seems like a super easy way to do that for me.

I do everything, the weeds, the plentiful stray logs and occasional rocks. You only get into problems with energy if you have a handful of mis-hits.
One tip I've picked up you may benefit from is avoiding any wood but tree tops until you unlock Tappers. This gets your Oak Resin going for the least energy investment.

For what it's worth, what I've been doing lately to rush Tappers is going all out on tree tops (buying Salads with forage proceeds) Spring 1 and 2 to repair the bridge on Spring 2 to forage the tidal pools while I level up Fishing 5 on Spring 2-4/5. This gives me big income for small field with Pale Ale. Where I could maybe improve is laying off of the fishing to let myself water more.

Um, iirc, I finished the regular mines 3rd week of spring
Does this mean Floor 80+ or Floor 120? Floor 120 would pretty much require zero fishing days and zero time spent chopping wood, I am assuming (which is fine). I am also assuming your Farming, Mining, and Combat skill is through the roof with your Fishing and Foraging skill sort of not.

Thanks for all the answers and discussion!
 
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Shar

Farmhand
Thanks, Shar. I'm trying to figure out your Spring. I figure either you have the Timespeed mod (which I don't gather is the case), or you are a very good gamer and you aren't fishing at all in Spring (which works fine for the Community Center). All you are doing is mostly watering and mining.
No time distortion mod. I use 3 mods...
1- one that counts time down to the minute, instead of 10 minute increments. Can't stop, slow or change time with it though - it's just a more accurate assessment of time, which I prefer.
2- informative mod that keeps me from going to the wiki to look up stuff. The info is all within the UI instead. Price of goods buying and selling which helps me calculate values on the fly, gifting info, etc.
3- an xp bar for each skill as I use it, so it switches from farming to mining to combat as I select a tool and it dings when something levels up.


I fish a ton in spring, so much that I'm usually level 10 within the first 8-10 days. It's how I make money to finance my entire spring from the egg festival on. Watering 200+ crops does take time but by the time I have that many crops, I have a copper watering can that makes it more efficient. Prior to buying all the strawberries, I'm watering 25-30 crops at most, which takes no time.
You stand in one spot and can rotate around to water the 9 spots around you. Move and repeat.

I guess one thing I've never seen in a YouTube video is watering with a copper can the way I do it. Maybe that's where the efficiency comes? I'm sure there are people who do it the same way but I've not seen it yet.
Again, you stand in one spot vertically (not horizontally). You can water the 3 spots below or above you, and then water in the same direction the 3 directly to the left and right of you, without moving. Just move your cursor to highlight the adjacent rows (think this only works on pc).
You then move 3 squares over and do that again.

xxxxxxxxx
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So if that's your field, you stand above the 2nd x, water the 3 crops below you and to either side. Move above the 5th x and then 8th x and repeat. (Once you get quality sprinklers, you place one in the middle of each group of 9 after harvesting that crop out.)
I've not even seen speed run videos of people doing this but I think it should be known method of watering as compared to moving to each crop or group of crops separately which is the method I've seen from a dozen or so youtubers. Also watering vertically is way more efficent than horizontally.
Hope my explanation made sense.



For what it's worth, what I've been doing lately to rush Tappers is going all out on tree tops (buying Salads with forage proceeds) Spring 1 and 2 to repair the bridge on Spring 2 to forage the tidal pools while I level up Fishing 5 on Spring 2-4/5. This gives me big income for small field with Pale Ale. Where I could maybe improve is laying off of the fishing to let myself water more.
I don't chop most stumps until I get a gold axe. The only exception being stumps in the middle of my crop field. I don't buy food from gus. All the food I need is either chubs, salmon berries or spring onions in the early game, cactus from the desert and crab cakes or spicy eel from SC. Even the food I get in the mail, I'll regift or sell unless it has a farming or fishing bonus, in which case I use on the day of primarily doing that respective task.

Does this mean Floor 80+ or Floor 120? Floor 120 would pretty much require zero fishing days and zero time spent chopping wood, I am assuming (which is fine). I am also assuming your Farming, Mining, and Combat skill is through the roof with your Fishing and Foraging skill sort of not.

Thanks for all the answers and discussion!
Floor 120.
I wish I had kept my stats but from my memory, fishing was level 10 before the middle of spring, farming level 10 early in summer if not end of spring (that many strawberries give amazing xp), with mining, foraging and combat being the next 3 to level 10 - all sometime before end of summer. I promise you, no cheats or glitches or anything like that. As I've said in another post, this is my best run to date as I've been tweaking my gameplay every game to maximize efficiency.
On any activity in the first two weeks of spring, I spend the whole day at it, whether it be fishing or mining. I water and chop only at the very end of days. I pick up every forage item on my route but don't specifically go looking for any in a zone I'm not moving thru.
And I don't mind passing out outside if I've leveled up that day, because I'll wake with full energy the next day. I also keep less than 100g on me in the early game too (often zero) since I'm not buying much of anything. Quest rewards and selling the occasional gem/fish) gets me a fiberglass rod with bait (and tool upgrades) which are my main spring purchases until the egg festival. I sell majority of my fish after level 10 for the 50% added profit.

I've found there's no wrong way to play this game as long as you're having fun with it and I personally have been for 5 months now. Started out derping my way along with lots and lots of room for improvement. My journey from then to now has been a ton of fun so I keep playing. Concerned Ape made a fantastic game and I can't wait to see what 1.5 brings.
 
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Tom

Rancher
Mods: Wow! I love those mods! I am going to try them. Can you give me the names?

Mixed Seeds: I am also going to try Mixed Seeds to give me more money to chop trees on Spring 1 and get down to the beach early on Spring 2, repair the beach bridge, fish like mad until level 5 (Spring 4 or 5), and expand fields on Spring 7.


My doubts:
Prior to buying all the strawberries, I'm watering 25-30 crops at most, which takes no time.
Ahh. I think this explains it mostly. This and your can upgrade and watering procedure. I had imagined a LOT bigger watering burden. Other than that, I can tell (to reach The Mines floor 120) you are a very good gamer as opposed to a non-gamer like me. Or you are rushing to Floor 120 while I am taking my time to enjoy the goodies and only caring about Floor 80+ (gold ore!) around Spring 26.

Watering last: I like your strategy of watering last and using the Wild (Spring) Seeds as a "flex crop" you can sacrifice if you overstay The Mines just a bit. Am I understanding that right?

Food: I think Salad from Gus or Trout Soup from Willy is generally cheaper than eating fish or Wild Horseradish. Somebody could check me on that.

SDV: Stardew Valley is an amazing feat of beauty. I am continually amazed that ConcernedApe could put together that art, music, economy, AI, etc. I find it hard to believe.
 
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Shar

Farmhand
Mods: Wow! I love those mods! I am going to try them. Can you give me the names?
1- Running Late
2- Lookup Anything
3- UI Info Suite

I found out about them from a youtuber named redtouch8. Check out his min/max playthrough thru the first month or so. He's more advanced and hardcore than me but I got some good ideas from his style of play. A couple people in his comments also shared their modified spring "let's play" after getting ideas from his strategy. Their videos were also entertaining - names were something like brandiganbtw and quagersal. This was all with v1.4.

Mixed Seeds: I am also going to try Mixed Seeds to give me more money to chop trees on Spring 1 and get down to the beach early on Spring 2, repair the beach bridge, fish like mad until level 5 (Spring 4 or 5), and expand fields on Spring 7.
I only chop around 4 tree tops spring 1. Enough to make my first chest. All the other wood I get is from the individual logs lying around as debris on my farm and forest/town. Spring 1 is the only day that it makes sense to me to chop that many individual logs because you can't mine or fish and you'll have the extra time. What else you gonna do productively with those game hours? And it completely clears up all the debris in the forest and in town in one go, along with the weeds and rocks. I get a second chest out of these pieces of wood. The weeds I clear on this day give me the mix seeds that I plant that night when I get back to my farm. As long as I get 100 wood to make 2 chests and seeds to plant 15 crops, I'm set for day 2. I don't go for more than this because then you run into energy problems.
It's another week before I have the 300 wood for the beach because the next 3 days I fish, fish and then fish some more. But that's just me. I'll chop in small doses here and there which adds up. Getting the 300 wood earlier might be helpful though.


Ahh. I think this explains it mostly. This and your can upgrade and watering procedure. I had imagined a LOT bigger watering burden. Other than that, I can tell (to reach The Mines floor 120) you are a very good gamer as opposed to a non-gamer like me. Or you are rushing to Floor 120 while I am taking my time to enjoy the goodies and only caring about Floor 80+ (gold ore!) around Spring 26.
Ha, I turned 50 last month and I've been jobless for 4+ months so I can practice efficiency here. My reflexes ain't what they used to be and with sdv, it's more about efficient gameplay than being twitchy. I generally play turn based games otherwise and like the strategy aspects of everything I play.
With stardew, I want to be efficient with the clock and make each minute count. That's where I find it challenging and entertaining now. I played casually at first and enjoyed that too but once that ran its course, I had to change my mindset to this to keep it going. Otherwise I'd have moved to another game by now. I can play for 10 in game years and do everything slowly but that's too easy - now I just want to see how efficient I can be too.

Btw, I don't think I exactly rushed to floor 120. I still hit every gem/mineral ore on every floor. On the spiral floors (19,59,99 I think), I'd go to the middle to get all the barrels. On the train track levels, I always got the coal before leaving. And then once I got to 120, I farmed dust sprites for the burglar ring before going to skull cavern for the first time. That didn't take as long as I thought it would.

Watering last: I like your strategy of watering last and using the Wild (Spring) Seeds as a "flex crop" you can sacrifice if you overstay The Mines just a bit. Am I understanding that right?
Yep, that's correct.

Food: I think Salad from Gus or Trout Soup from Willy is generally cheaper than eating fish or Wild Horseradish. Somebody could check me on that.
Both salad and trout soup are over 200g. Pretty sure iridium chubs are less than that. They give 65 energy iirc but you get so many of them, that you won't eat them all and can still sell the extra if needed. Any difference would be negligible imo and eating the fish saves money in the long run cuz you're not buying the food. I don't eat forageables because they sell for a decent chunk of change when crafted together as seeds. Or you can plant the seeds which in turn will make more which you can either re-plant or sell. I did this in winter, and my initial 4 winter seeds (crocus, crystal fruit, and the other two) were crafted together to create hundreds by the last week.

Here's a couple pics of my current farm. Not sure of exact dates but one is middle of winter year one with the winter seed strategy. The other is early spring year two with my strawberries, ancient fruit, etc.

Lastly, hope nobody thinks I hijacked this thread or forum. Just discussing the game with a similar minded individual. I never post this much on the internet, especially in one day. Am primarily a lurker online and don't even create accounts on forums but sdv is pretty cool so I joined here.
 

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Tom

Rancher
1- Running Late
2- Lookup Anything
3- UI Info Suite
Thanks. I tried 1 and 3, and I like them. I will try 2.

Conventional wisdom on the number crunching is that buying Salad or Trout Soup is cheaper than eating most fish. Let's check:

1596600643136.png


It looks like Chub and Smallmouth Bass aren't much more expensive to eat than Salad if you aren't a Fisher profession yet. It also looks like a valid rule of thumb is you can and possibly should trade your fish for Salad (especially if you are a Fisher or Angler). Oh, and don't eat Wild Horseradish!

Tom
 

Shar

Farmhand
Conventional wisdom on the number crunching is that buying Salad or Trout Soup is cheaper than eating most fish. Let's check:

View attachment 1108

It looks like Chub and Smallmouth Bass aren't much more expensive to eat than Salad if you aren't a Fisher profession yet.
I've heard the same but my personal opinion is the opportunity cost to leave the task you are doing to run to the saloon is not worth it. And as the chart shows, the difference from eating a chub in the early game to selling it and buying a salad to eat instead is negligible. I could catch over 5 more fish or get deeper in the mines in that same time. I think I rarely find myself around the saloon during its business hours especially since he doesn't even open till noon.
Once you're level 10 angler, there's enough free food you've obtained from spring onions, salmonberries, cave carrots, etc that I personally still don't want or need to buy food.
 
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Tom

Rancher
I've heard the same but my personal opinion is the opportunity cost to leave the task you are doing to run to the saloon is not worth it.
Yeah. This is significant. It's false economy (or a major priority decision) in the first week to run anywhere but straight to your task of the day (that's why I hedged with "can and possibly should"). This reminds me that I want to see a thread on calendaring early tool upgrades.

Because of this I usually eat Trout Soup while I am leveling up fishing Spring 2-4. But it's good to know that some fish are cheaper than Trout Soup (which is of course more than just food).

This is also why I fish the pier through Spring 4: corals, sea urchins, rods, bait, gold (at the shop), and Trout Soup handy.
 
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Zaphira

Sodbuster
I haven't read all of the text above. Just wanted to share my 'usual' start into a new game:

1. make room for planting the 15 parsnips
2. collect enough wood for 1 chest and put it in front of house
3. clear much gras and weed for 'mixed seeds' -> plant them
4. collect all stuff you can gather outside the farm. Running around all maps with low energy doesn't matter for collecting or greeting the villagers. Go to beach and sell everything I find. (some of the flowers and berries can be used as gifts, some I sell) Bring collected stuff to towncenter for reward and new bundles opening up.
5. buy some seeds at Pierres. 2 beans, 2 cauliflower, 2 potatoes, some more parsnips and other stuff. Keep what's needed for town center and/or taskboard-quests.
5a. make sure to get 5 gold-parsnips at the end of the month
6. keep money to buy the first bag-upgrade as soon as possible
7. do taskboard-quests if possible. Good for friendship, money and skills if fishing and collect ore.

Clear out debris (and only the trees needed for space), to get more wood for chests, scarecrow and other things. Collect treeseeds (when possible) and make these bars to eat and restore energy. Don't clear all of the trees. Let them stand for a chance of a mushroom tree in autumn. There are many trees in the woods.

Go to mines, collect every jewel and ore, fight as much flies and maggots (from lvl 10+) to have a chance on an 'ancient seed' for the museum to get the seed and recipe. Plant ancient seed(s) as soon as possible for money. If you leave the mine and re-enter the mobs and stuff is reset.

Fish what's needed and if your luck is bad (see TV) because mines are no good idea then. Keep trash for recycling machine later.

That's about what I do in the first season. After that everything goes very fast. Build coop, get eggs, make Mayo and sell. Then build barn, make cheese and sell. Upgrade coop, buy one duck and start breeding ducks. They sell for 5200 with all hearts. Upgrade tools to get to the secret wood as soon as possible for the hardwood and build stable to get around faster.
@friendship: collect everything, give on Tuesdays to everyone at Pierres around noon. (find out who likes what) and Friday evenings at the saloon.

Select the bats for the cave because they have a high chance for dropping some of the rare fruits (pomegrenade, peach for towncenter).
In summer, make lots of 'wild summer-seeds', they sell for 55g a piece. Thats 550 gold with 3 the things collected in summer.

The last four games I started on different maps (woods, water, ore, 4-corners) got me the 'Statue of perfection' at the end of year 2.
 
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