Min-Max Guide / Optimal Play

[Werbenja]

Let me challenge it a bit, though. I believe a sub-optimal day 1, not only in terms of execution but also foragables and trash bins, is a crucial part of a min-max run.

As has been discussed a bit in this thread already (and can always be discussed more, of course), it really depends on what someone means by "min-max run". I'd say optimization lies on a spectrum, reflecting the amount of things and to what extent someone wants their run to be optimal. On one extreme you have the "casual runner", which probably includes everyone's first time playing the game; on the other extreme you have seed-finding, RNG-manipulating, day-resetting, bug-abusing, meticulous-planning sickos (no disrespect meant, I'm a sicko too). The important thing is that we are all, casuals and sickos, optimizing fun.

As for me, I'm a sucker for the planning side of things. As an example, I want any of my runs to have a buttload of starfruit planted on the beginning of summer. I plan for that, and any amount of RNG, controllable or not, should only affect the exact amount of starfruit, but it should still be a buttload by any metric. My strategies are not fool-proof, but reliable enough that everything should go according to plan most of the times. If it doesn't, then I reset.

As for you @Maboi, I wrongly assumed you would want to reset everyday for RNG purposes, simply because you'd do it on the first day. But I completely understand that this would get unpleasant very fast, and I respect your compromised take on the day-resetting part of optimization. Keep on optimizing your fun.

2) I water only a cauliflower to save time.

If you only care about finishing the vault bundles on the 14th, then you can safely ignore even cauliflowers planted on the 1st. They will be ready to harvest on the 14th if you skip watering a single day.

 

[Maboi]

Let me start with what concerns you, @Werbenja, as you say you're "a sucker for the planning side of things". This I respect a lot, and even find admirable. As planning is affected by how liberal your attitude towards resetting is, let me find two extremes: no resetting at all and resetting every time you think you misplayed it. You've once mentioned that you'd reset upon making a grave mistake: which is understandable. Do you try to limit the number of resets? As for me, I did a couple of no-reset runs, and they prove very difficult for me. I'm thinking of starting a new no-reset no mods run, as it seems a little too easy for my taste. Or perhaps I'm trying too hard at times :)
Resetting has also one more feature: it lets you know in advance what foragables you can get. I've made 2 attempts so far to get 3 corals and a sea urchin on day 6 to make targeted bait. I've just opened my file (after an unsuccessful day 5) and there it is. But it poses a question: should you be allowed to reset the day if you find that there's nothing there, and thus that you'd rather go to the best fishing pool asap? If you play a full no-reset, then no. If you're okay with resetting the day to know foragables in advance, then yes. It's not the easiest question to ask which attitude is "better" (no such thing as a better attitude, I know)

I have some insights concerning Zamiel's mod recommendation, if I may:

1) Display an icon that represents the current days luck - IIRC, it shows the % of daily bonus, which is invisible without the mod. It's not a big deal but still.
2) Display experience point gains & Display a dynamic experience bar that changes based on your current tool or location - though you could manually track your exp progress, it'd require a whole lot of pausing the game and calculating on the run and I simply can't imagine anyone doing so. I find the tool VERY useful (especially when on the verge of levelling up, when you don't want to, say, pick up a forage to avoid levelling two skills during one day/to be able to get full energy on two consecutive days) and perhaps this is why I think it's a little too good.
3) Highlighted jars/kegs - it's very convenient and this leads me to
4) better fertilizer mod - somehow didn't appear in Zamiel's guide but proved very useful for me, as it's not difficult to skip a spot while fertilizing/using speed grow
5) Running late - another great tool but I find it too powerful at times. Let's say you're diving into the mines and smelting. You started smelting iron around 9 and it's 10:45. That additional information about minutes may prevent you from diving before the furnaces are ready. The same can be said without the mod ofc (if you're willing to wait in-game 20 minutes, that is) but it's the more visible the more thorough you need to be. I find myself waiting a lot until 8:55 when fishing (before Willy's is open) when without the mod it's more like hit-or-miss.

As for you @Maboi, I wrongly assumed you would want to reset everyday for RNG purposes

Please bear in mind I meant "only" finding a desirable seed, not resetting upon making a mistake or due to bad luck with seeds (I always aim to get a potato and a cauliflower from the mixed seeds). There is a lot of luck involved in execution - you won't get to floor level 10 on day 5 if you can't find ladders and there are infested floors. But there is a lot of skill involved in the process as well, and day 2 fishing is what shows it best for me.

 

[Squigglyruth]

Not sure how you're going to have the money to buy 300 strawberry seeds while still unlocking the desert in the third week (while also watering 200 parsnips a day and farming ores for the strawberry sprinklers).

This is definitely possible - I've done it before now, playing vanilla without exploits. But it does rely on luck to get some rainy days during parsnip growing time, and it's tight for time and resources in early spring. It's not as easy to pull off as the straight skull cavern dive strategy, but it's great if you can manage it. It might possibly be easier in 1.6 because of the fish smoker.

What do you think about dehydrators for a minmax run?

I'm not sure if they're worth the extra resource cost if the aim is just to process the strawberries. My wood normally goes to make tappers at that point in time, and my fire quartz saves me coal when making refined quartz for quality sprinklers. That said, wood is cheap, and the sprinklers are made by mid spring so there is time to make dehydrators after that. Coal seems to be more plentiful in 1.6 (based on the one game I've played). So this might be good use for any fire quartz coming out of skull cavern in late spring whilst the strawberries are growing.
To make the most of it, you'd have to pick Artisan profession, which would affect strategies for summer.

 

[Miketsukami]

Not sure how you're going to have the money to buy 300 strawberry seeds while still unlocking the desert in the third week (while also watering 200 parsnips a day and farming ores for the strawberry sprinklers). Of course, if you don't mind delaying the desert bus until after the first strawberry harvest, then it's all good. You probably won't have enough money to go nuclear with starfruit on summer... If you also don't mind that, then just go nuclear with blueberry instead, which should synergize nicely with the dehydrators (and get no extra benefit for deluxe speed-gro, if you already have the farming level 10 agriculturist profession from all the strawberry). But then again, if your long term goal is ancient fruit, you might as well place all the blueberry on seed makers (which, believe it or not, increases the net worth of the blueberries on average), for that 0.5% chance of ancient seeds. Given the absurd amount of berries you should be getting each harvest, you should consistently get ancient seeds, because the seeds makers is very fast at processing. I did this once on patch 1.4 and I was able to plant a little more than 1500 ancient seeds on the first day of year 2, with enough kegs to ferment them weekly.

The watering part definitely can be a pain; however, getting the gold specially after 1.6 is not hard because with the bait maker catching almost only catfish on rainy days or only bass on sunny days is really easy, additionally they can have their sell price doubled by using the fish smoker. I'm just not sure the dehydrators are worth it this early since I won't have mystic trees and mushroom logs by the time I'm done with the strawberries. The dehydrators would stay unused for a while after that.

I'm not sure if they're worth the extra resource cost if the aim is just to process the strawberries. My wood normally goes to make tappers at that point in time, and my fire quartz saves me coal when making refined quartz for quality sprinklers. That said, wood is cheap, and the sprinklers are made by mid spring so there is time to make dehydrators after that. Coal seems to be more plentiful in 1.6 (based on the one game I've played). So this might be good use for any fire quartz coming out of skull cavern in late spring whilst the strawberries are growing.
To make the most of it, you'd have to pick Artisan profession, which would affect strategies for summer.

So not proccessing the strawberries would still be better to not affect summer?

 

[Maboi]

I'd like to second what @Werbenja says about flounder bait - it's not worth it, and fishing by the ocean after Day 2 isn't either. What's worth mentioning is that Day 6 is sub-optimal for getting the bait maker in a classic CC run, as you need to trigger the cutscene sooner or later, and I fail to see the benefit of waiting with it. Day 5, after turning in the pickaxe, seems the best, provided you a) had money to buy 300 wood and 15 additional iron ore (or however much you lack, not to forget 25 for iron pickaxe Day 7) The last time you're at the beach before Day 5 is on Day 3, and if there are required forages already then you have all the reasons to hit the beach on D5, it is as simple as that and it could be added to the Guide.

River jelly seems a rather good source of energy to me. Since days 3-5 are spent fishing mostly without targeted bait, you're almost guaranteed to get +3 jellies by the end of day 5. They fetch the same as iridium quality chubs with Angler bonus (125g) but provide 10 energy more (75 compared to chubs' 65). That said, you could save some chubs for later (for unlocking the vault or early SC runs) at the price of fewer fish smokers - but only in theory. It's either Sea or Cave jelly that you'd struggle with.


Some thoughts or minor strats that may come in handy:
1) Since money on Day 2 is a bottleneck, utilising Day 1 should be done to its fullest.
a) Eating leeks and chopping down the trees is more profitable than selling the forage alone - provided you have time to fell 2 trees.
b) I'd propose a slightly different route D1: after felling 9 trees and making a chest around 8:20, leave the farm at 9:00-9:10. Try to shake all the trees on your way - after level 1 foraging, they'll have the chance to drop a seed. Search the forest and meet Jas at 11:06 when she leaves her room. Then, Leah, Haley, Sam, Penny, then to the shop: Abigail, Pierre, Marnie. Don't forget to sell forages and tree seeds. Then George and Evelyn, then Alex (should stand outside with his rugby ball) then Pam, who should be near. Then Gus and Elliot. Forage the entire beach - it should be doable after selling the forages. Then Clint and Shane. Then the bushes behind Jojamart, and try to catch Maru (going up). Then to Jodie and Catherine, go down for Emily, and while heading home catch the little boy and Harvey. It should be slightly after 3pm in comparison to 4pm from Zamiel's guide.
c) In my route, you need 1 chest in the forest and 1 by the mountain lake (I skip the chest in the mines/move the one from near the lake later) plus a scarecrow on day 7 but wood for it should be obtained on D6. This means any surplus of wood over 100 D1 could be shipped without any worry, and it'd help to hit 1800g D2.
2) As @Werbenja said: you can skip watering the crops D2 and you will still be able to get a cauliflower just in time to unlock next bundles. This, however, is slightly risky, as it's one more day without a scarecrow.
3) I'd rather fish longer D2 than forage the beach (before 9am) and the reason's simple: getting Fiberglass rod causes snowball effect of providing more fish exp, more money, and, on rare occasions, fishing level 5, which provides 25% more money.
4) Buying 500 bait is a waste of money. You need no more than 200 from D2 morning to D5 dusk, and even this is probably an overkill. If on D5 it turns out you can't make the bait maker - just buy some more bait from Willy. My bet is 150 bait bought on D3. Additionally, saving fish from D2 makes it easier to hit 15 000 earned on D5 and enough money for the bait maker as well. Hitting 15k lets you open 2 letters, with 500g each (provided you play as a female) which helps to: get money for iron pickaxe upgrade and to save fish for smoking.
5) Sell the cheapest-per-head fish first to save as much smoke-able fish for later.
6) It might be useful exp-wise to buy a random targeted bait from Willy on D2 if it could help you get perfect catches by making consecutive hits more predictable - this way the pool of patterns is lower. This, however, was not tested and I can't assure it'd work.
7) Save the lowest quality catfish/largemouth basses/bullheads for bait maker. You can keep it in the chest (by the pool of water) for D5. I assume saving 1 is optimal if you are to struggle with meeting ends on D4, and saving more when you do not.

 

[Squigglyruth]

So not proccessing the strawberries would still be better to not affect summer?

It depends what you are trying to do. Processing the strawberries won't have a negative effect, but to sell them for full profit you will want artisan profession, and that choice is an interesting one that may be differently weighted in 1.6.

If you want to grow starfruit the first summer, you can get three crops in using DSG. With artisan profession or farming level <10, the first crop has to be planted and watered on summer 1. If you have agriculturalist, it doesn't need to go in until Thursday 4th. The guide linked from this thread cuts the difference, planting on the 2nd at farming level 6th but getting agriculturalist for later crops, which is smart.

The timing of this used to be really significant for getting the DSG, which you buy from the desert on Thursdays - because Pam doesn't drive to the desert on spring 25, and before 1.6 you couldn't drive yourself. So without agriculturalist, the DSG had to be bought on spring 18th, giving a hard deadline for unlocking the bus on 17th. So, for a number of playthroughs now I have chosen agriculturalist to give me more leeway on the timing. This is unnecessary in 1.6, because the DSG can be bought on spring 25th. So no need to choose agriculturalist and hold off selling processed goods.

I am wondering if artisan is now the better choice if you can get it by the start of summer (which is possible with the strawberry route). It will allow starfruit wine (and/or pale ale) to be sold immediately in summer. It would also allow the full profit from dehydrated strawberries or blueberries, and a massive profit from any smoked fish.

In a traditional min-max route, most of the money in summer will come from skull cavern dives. The extra money from drying your strawberries would be insignificant in comparison. But in this game, quick turnaround of money into infrastructure snowballs fast, so the gain from selling kegged artisan goods in summer rather than fall might make a long-term difference.

 

[Maboi]

So without agriculturalist, the DSG had to be bought on spring 18th

Why can't you use a desert warp totem on 25th of spring to get DSG then? Even if you want to omit SC runs, you can reset floor 1 for the specific floor with Carbon Ghosts, who drop omni geode, and you need only 3 of them to exchange for the totem.

 

[Squigglyruth]

Why can't you use a desert warp totem on 25th of spring to get DSG then? Even if you want to omit SC runs, you can reset floor 1 for the specific floor with Carbon Ghosts, who drop omni geode, and you need only 3 of them to exchange for the totem.

Yes, that would work. You would easily have enough omni-geodes just from the normal mines and from fishing. I don't know why I never tried that!

...possibly because I could unlock the bus in time for spring 18 anyway within my strawberry pathway; but that was tricky, and the warp totem would have been a better choice. I had somehow got stuck in the mindset that I couldn't get the DSG on 25th - I'm sure I'm not the only old player who was thinking that.

In 1.6 this doesn't matter anyway. You can drive yourself to the desert on Spring 25 these days.

I have been inspired to try out a strawberry run in 1.6, starting on the Riverlands farm (to use the fish smoker). With no exploits.

Aims:

• Farming 6 by at least Monday Spring 15.
• 300 strawberries planted by Tuesday 16th and watered by quality sprinklers (so at least 38 quality sprinklers).
• Desert bus unlocked by spring 17.
• Oak tapper farm established in spring.
• Farming 10 by the end of spring or sooner, to allow Artisan. (This follows from the rest.)
• Fishing 10 by the time I have artisan.

All of which I have managed before now. But I am wondering whether the combination is easier now in 1.6, using the improved fishing.

My question is: how much profit can I make by the end of summer Y1, whilst still working towards early CC completion?

 

[Squigglyruth]

Some thoughts or minor strats that may come in handy:
1) Since money on Day 2 is a bottleneck, utilising Day 1 should be done to its fullest.
c) In my route, you need 1 chest in the forest and 1 by the mountain lake (I skip the chest in the mines/move the one from near the lake later) plus a scarecrow on day 7 but wood for it should be obtained on D6. This means any surplus of wood over 100 D1 could be shipped without any worry, and it'd help to hit 1800g D2.
3) I'd rather fish longer D2 than forage the beach (before 9am) and the reason's simple: getting Fiberglass rod causes snowball effect of providing more fish exp, more money, and, on rare occasions, fishing level 5, which provides 25% more money.
4) Buying 500 bait is a waste of money. You need no more than 200 from D2 morning to D5 dusk, and even this is probably an overkill. If on D5 it turns out you can't make the bait maker - just buy some more bait from Willy. My bet is 150 bait bought on D3. Additionally, saving fish from D2 makes it easier to hit 15 000 earned on D5 and enough money for the bait maker as well. Hitting 15k lets you open 2 letters, with 500g each (provided you play as a female) which helps to: get money for iron pickaxe upgrade and to save fish for smoking.
5) Sell the cheapest-per-head fish first to save as much smoke-able fish for later.

I agree with all these things.

1) Definitely use day 1 to its fullest. But this doesn't mean use all your energy at the start of the day.
I normally just cut down 4 trees at the start of day 1, and clear a couple of wood from my planting area to get up to 50 so I can make a chest. That gives me flexibility in how to spend the rest of my energy. I make sure to use it all up by the end of the day. But timings can really make a difference here.
I like your adjusted run to meet villagers, but I don't know if the aim is to meet them early in the day? I would rather meet them efficiently, whilst collecting all forage and every little bit of fibre. I feel good on day 1 if, at the end of the day after meeting all villagers, I am wondering whether to eat a spring onion in order to chop more pine trees. (I sell the other forage, or keep it to become spring seeds.) It's easy to meet all the villagers on day 1 - I might do another post for my preferred route and method for day 1. The priority is money ahead of day 2, but it's easy to also do the friendship.

1c) Absolutely with the chests! I don't ever sell wood (except for the one I need for perfection). But if you can move your lake chest to the mines on day 5, that is great. I can do this about half the time.

3) I have never made it to fishing 5 on day 2. I spend as long as possible fishing on day 2, and I have often made it to fishing 4 by the end of the day. I guess I'm not superb at fishing.
We should say though that it's not easy even to get the fibreglass rod before 5pm when Willy closes on day 2. I wonder if this is the main problem that players run into when they try to follow these guides?

4) I agree: no need to buy that much bait. I stay at the beach until the last minute (4.50pm on day 2) and then spend my money on a fibreglass rod and bait. (I might have already bought the rod.) I normally get 100-200 bait. Probably the low end, but that's ok, because I keep fishing it up after that. I don't normally need to go back to Willy for a week or so after that. And I also agree that most fish shouldn't normally be sold until you have fishing 5. I think you need to buy the bait on day 2 and not go back, if possible.

5) Yes. Sell as little as you need to for your strat.

6) It might be useful exp-wise to buy a random targeted bait from Willy on D2 if it could help you get perfect catches by making consecutive hits more predictable - this way the pool of patterns is lower. This, however, was not tested and I can't assure it'd work.
7) Save the lowest quality catfish/largemouth basses/bullheads for bait maker. You can keep it in the chest (by the pool of water) for D5. I assume saving 1 is optimal if you are to struggle with meeting ends on D4, and saving more when you do not.

I tried buying 8 catfish bait for 40 gold each on day 2. I didn't use them until I was level 5 - about 5pm on day 3. Before that time I had been using normal bait, and had caught a couple of gold catfish. The bait gave me 2 chances to hook catfish, 1 chance for a smallmouth bass, and 4 trash, and then I got cross and quit out. In my mind when I bought the bait, that was 8 catfish, since I am good at catching those at level 5. This has also put me off getting an early baitmaker.

 

[Maboi]

The bait gave me 2 chances to hook catfish, 1 chance for a smallmouth bass, and 4 trash, and then I got cross and quit out.

You won't get smallmouth bass in the Cindersap forest (down from the farm) and you can also see that catfish rate with targeted bait is roughly 90%. You can check it watching, for example, Captain Canadia's 1.6 longplay/stream (I believe it was after day 8). I myself can attest to this - one rainy day (I was lucky to get a rainy D6 last time) gave me over 45 catfish. I still have them in my chest, if you want a proof.

EDIT: It's day 11 of the stream.

I have never made it to fishing 5 on day 2.

My last no-reset run gave me a Sea Jelly at 8:50, bubbles from 7am to 9am and some other good luck things, like some lucky perfects on halibuts. This does not prove my skill for I was lucky indeed. But regardless of luck I always hit level 4 on D2 and that can probably be said about majority of runs of more or less skilled players (save for unlucky trash hits runs). My point is: lvl 5 D2 is a very optimistic assumption.

I normally just cut down 4 trees at the start of day 1,

I cut down 9 to assure I hit level 1 foraging for the chance to get higher quality foragables/to shake trees on my way to the town.

 

[Squigglyruth]

You won't get smallmouth bass in the Cindersap forest (down from the farm) and you can also see that catfish rate with targeted bait is roughly 90%. You can check it watching, for example, Captain Canadia's 1.6 longplay/stream (I believe it was after day 8). I myself can attest to this - one rainy day (I was lucky to get a rainy D6 last time) gave me over 45 catfish. I still have them in my chest, if you want a proof.

I was fishing in town just under Jodi's house and a bit to the left. This is the place I normally fish out gold catfish on day 3. I definitely didn't get 90% catfish from the 8 bait I bought on day 2. As I said, I got 3 catfish bites out of the 8 with the catfish bait before I quit. Maybe that was incredibly bad luck? But I waited to have fishing level 5 before I used it. I guess I'm not convinced by using catfish bait so early.

My last no-reset run gave me a Sea Jelly at 8:50, bubbles from 7am to 9am and some other good luck things, like some lucky perfects on halibuts. This does not prove my skill for I was lucky indeed. But regardless of luck I always hit level 4 on D2 and that can probably be said about majority of runs of more or less skilled players (save for unlucky trash hits runs). My point is: lvl 5 D2 is a very optimistic assumption.

I agree that L5 fishing on day 2 is unlikely.
L4 is achievable. If you manage to get the fibreglass rod on day 2, you will probably hit level 4 fishing.

I cut down 9 to assure I hit level 1 foraging for the chance to get higher quality foragables/to shake trees on my way to the town.

Yes, that makes sense. But honestly, how much monetary difference does that make? Cutting down just 4 trees takes a lot less time. I normally hit foraging 1 on my run round the forest before meeting Jas. I guess it's neither here nor there for day 1 strategies.

 

[Werbenja]

Some developments, I see. Let's go at it by parts.

Do you try to limit the number of resets?

Not really, because I usually don't make the same mistake twice in a row. If, after playing it out, I see that what I planned for a day is too much and I don't have enough time, I just lower my expectations for the day and try again. For example, my recent foray into digging 969 spots for the second planting of starfruit while also harvesting 699 starfruit from the first batch and getting the magic rock candy on Summer 11th. I tried it and I just couldn't do it all, so I skipped the magic rock candy (and I'm sure I'll regret it at some point).

Resetting has also one more feature: it lets you know in advance what foragables you can get.

Would you believe me if I told you that, in a situation where I looked for forage and didn't find any in a specific place, I actually go back to the same place when resetting, redoing my exact steps? Because I do. You could say it's not the same because I would be move more efficiently, knowing there is nothing to grab, but I do it anyway.

I have some insights concerning Zamiel's mod recommendation, if I may:

1) Display an icon that represents the current days luck - IIRC, it shows the % of daily bonus, which is invisible without the mod. It's not a big deal but still.
2) Display experience point gains & Display a dynamic experience bar that changes based on your current tool or location - though you could manually track your exp progress, it'd require a whole lot of pausing the game and calculating on the run and I simply can't imagine anyone doing so. I find the tool VERY useful (especially when on the verge of levelling up, when you don't want to, say, pick up a forage to avoid levelling two skills during one day/to be able to get full energy on two consecutive days) and perhaps this is why I think it's a little too good.
3) Highlighted jars/kegs - it's very convenient and this leads me to
4) better fertilizer mod - somehow didn't appear in Zamiel's guide but proved very useful for me, as it's not difficult to skip a spot while fertilizing/using speed grow
5) Running late - another great tool but I find it too powerful at times. Let's say you're diving into the mines and smelting. You started smelting iron around 9 and it's 10:45. That additional information about minutes may prevent you from diving before the furnaces are ready. The same can be said without the mod ofc (if you're willing to wait in-game 20 minutes, that is) but it's the more visible the more thorough you need to be. I find myself waiting a lot until 8:55 when fishing (before Willy's is open) when without the mod it's more like hit-or-miss.

For the first mod, you can configure it to just show something equivalent to the fortune teller, only giving you an idea of how lucky you are in a day. I prefer it like that.

For the other 4 mods, I completely agree that they are powerful and could be considered more than quality of life mods. They represent, in essence, the introduction of information that the game doesn't give you (or doesn't give you properly, in the case of fertilizer). Although I don't agree that every bit of information should be given to the player at all times, I like to choose what information is given to me as a player, and I am very receptive of information that can be easily conveyed in game and that can be promptly understood, such as the ones given by these mods. I couldn't care less what are the developers' intention when it comes to this. But hey, that's only me.

What's worth mentioning is that Day 6 is sub-optimal for getting the bait maker in a classic CC run, as you need to trigger the cutscene sooner or later, and I fail to see the benefit of waiting with it. Day 5, after turning in the pickaxe, seems the best

Does that mean you gave up on the idea of reaching mines level 20 on day 5 to try fishing cave jelly the next day? Doing that and making sure to have 5 copper bars by 3pm (probably earlier, because you need to swing by Robin's) seems very inconsistent, but I lack the experience to back it up. Given that you mentioned upgrading the pickaxe on day 5, and not the axe, I assume you really gave up on the fish smoker. Also, did you get to the point where you had to decide to upgrade or not your pickaxe to gold?

• 300 strawberries planted by Tuesday 16th and watered by quality sprinklers (so at least 38 quality sprinklers).
• Desert bus unlocked by spring 17.

Sorry, I still don't see how that would happen. 30 000g for the strawberry seeds, plus 42 500g for the bus, plus however much time/money necessary for 38 quality sprinklers? All in hand by Spring 16th, losing at least 8 hours to attend the egg festival? Does the extra income from river fishing in the rainy days you need for the 200 parsnips really allow that? What grade of pickaxe do you have by then? Maybe I'm missing something, or maybe I just suck at the game. Either way, I would love to see that caught on tape, I am genuinely interested in seeing that.

I was fishing in town just under Jodi's house and a bit to the left. This is the place I normally fish out gold catfish on day 3. I definitely didn't get 90% catfish from the 8 bait I bought on day 2. As I said, I got 3 catfish bites out of the 8 with the catfish bait before I quit. Maybe that was incredibly bad luck? But I waited to have fishing level 5 before I used it. I guess I'm not convinced by using catfish bait so early.

The possible reason for that was your fishing spot. Take a look at the attached image: fishing to the south on any of the two tiles marked with X (or any to the left of the leftmost one) guarantees fishing zone 5 after fishing level 4 with max casts. Did you fish in any of these spots? If so, you should have gotten way more catfish than you did. Or just fish in the forest, which allegedly has a tiny bit higher chance of hooking catfish.

 

[Maboi]

I was fishing in town just under Jodi's house and a bit to the left. This is the place I normally fish out gold catfish on day 3.

And it's definitely up to you to fish there, though it is inferior to Cindersap forest river. I wonder why you'd fish there if you can have a lot better results (be it with or without targeted bait) just about 20 in-game minutes from there.

Does that mean you gave up on the idea of reaching mines level 20 on day 5 to try fishing cave jelly the next day?

Yes. With all due respect it seems more convenient to stockpile on fish and only then begin the quest for the smoker. In my current route, it's D11 when you get copper axe for hardwood. Before that, you get iron pickaxe on D9, which gives you slightly less than two days of mining to reach as deep as possible. My goal for D5 is floor 10 to grind copper while smelting bars, buying wood for the bridge, getting backpack upgrade and 16 kale seeds, buying 40 iron ore, (fortunately) grabbing 1 sea urchin and 3 corals, then heading to the lake with at least one lowest quality bullhead resting still in the chest there. Since you can't smelt iron bars before 7pm, you can't target largemouth bass D5 either, unless you buy a copper ore D1, then save 2250g at max for iron ore to be bought on D3 after coming back from Willy, then smelting them while catching catfish D3. I'm not a big fan of buying a copper ore D1 because of how hard it can be to afford the rod D2 but that's still a possibility.

Also, did you get to the point where you had to decide to upgrade or not your pickaxe to gold?

Yes, but copper axe seems more valuable to me since it lets you get the hardwood needed for smokers. It's a tight squeeze to buy the vault and saving you some thousands seems reasonable in my opinion. Keep in mind I didn't do tests on what is more efficient way of progression (and I doubt it's possible to measure it since the two ways: gold pickaxe vs copper axe differ greatly. Rushing the mines with the gold pickaxe may be better on condition that you don't struggle with money for the vault - if you got at least one rainy day after getting bait maker, this MAY be the case. But in most of the runs I've had it's not.

 

[Werbenja]

Yes. With all due respect it seems more convenient to stockpile on fish and only then begin the quest for the smoker. In my current route, it's D11 when you get copper axe for hardwood.

But is it worth it to craft a fish smoker only on the 11th, though? I think I've said it in this thread before, but let's say the price for unlocking the fish smoker is 2000g for the copper axe upgrade plus 10000g for the recipe. In that case, you'd need to smoke 80 iridium largemouth basses just to break even, considering coal bought from Clint. This is without taking into account the 5 copper bars (which you'll need for basic sprinklers) and the opportunity cost of actually acquiring the hardwood and the jellies (which is harder to estimate the cost for, but how long would it take? At least 1 day to craft 3 smokers?). All that for a machine that I might not even use after day 14? Can you actually smoke all the fish you stockpiled and use the money from them on the 14th? I hope the answer is yes, because I wanna use it.

---

Something else I've been thinking: if I want to finish the vault bundles by the 14th, I need to plant a bean starter no later than the 4th. When is the best time to buy and plant that? I figure I would buy it on the 3rd, after buying the single copper ore, and planting it on the beginning of the 4th.

 

[Maboi]

At least 1 day to craft 3 smokers?). All that for a machine that I might not even use after day 14?

I'm afraid it seems like it. I also second what you said about opportunity cost for jellies (which is significantly higher if you manage to get early bait maker). I'd like to attach a screenshot of my fishing experience (Day 6 to 8)

I had one lucky rainy day (D6) and bubbles for about an hour. My D7 was worse than usual, as I didn't ship 14120 but 13970 D4 (due to a miscalculation) which meant having 1 iron less than needed and smelting the bar by Clint's from 9 to 11 am (I did give Lewis a gold-star parsnip though) so I cast my rod no sooner than 1pm. I got around 15 largemouths then but I'm positive you can get 20, maybe even 25 (without bubbles) in a single D7 (it's a unique day since you either visit the wizard or are unlocking the bundle tree by CC cutscene. Either way you're later than you'd be on D8) You can count it all to make sure but I'm positive I could already buy the vault if I were to unlock it. But let's say you're not as lucky and you don't get a rainy day between 6 and 8. Let's assume 20 largemouths and 15 bullheads a day (this is on condition of getting the bait maker on D5) D6 fish alone assure you can buy iron pickaxe upgrade and 25 copper ores for an upgrade (I assume it's better to upgrade something in our spare time since we still have to visit Clint to claim the tool). Combined together, Days 7 and 8 leave you with 40 basses and 30 bullheads, which nets you 18750 after getting L10 fishing perk. and hitting L10 is possible on D8. I usually hit it around 12am but during this run it was at 4pm, which means there's some leeway/margin of mistake involved. My fish estimations are purposefully lowered to avoid being too optimistic so you may as well get more than that - and thus be closer to 42500 for the vault.
Here I reach the point when I'm considering buying a crab pot to unlock the minecart and vault bundle trees earlier. Since you'd hit L10 fishing on D8, you need to sell fish to Willy on D9 to afford a tool upgrade. This also buys you some time to forage the beach. Luck plays an integral role in the process but it's us who can use it to our advantage.

Something else I've been thinking: if I want to finish the vault bundles by the 14th, I need to plant a bean starter no later than the 4th. When is the best time to buy and plant that?

Day 1, sadly. D3 is Wednesday and you can't buy it then, and losing time on D2 for the bean is not worth it. Since money is so hard to come by early, you could plant all mixed seeds, count how many parsnips there are, and then plant up to 14 parsnips total (13 for lvl1 farming and 1 if the crow were to eat your crop) and ship the rest of the seeds D1. Funnily enough NOT finding an artifact D1 is a good thing as well, as you'll need this early coal from treasure chests anyways.

 

[Maboi]

Now, judging from my experience, getting crab pot bundle done is more viable than it was in 1.5, all thanks to deluxe bait, which you are likely to get a bit from treasure chests while fishing D2-4. If not, then it can be bought on D5, if you are to try my route. The only luck-reliant thing in this run is hoping for all required items needed to make a bait maker on D5, but let me sort things out.

D1: meeting everyone, shipping +200 fiber and all forages (unless there's a surplus but it's unlikely) apart from spring onions. Saving wood (unless there's +100 of it thanks to many spring onions) and stone (save for one piece for Willy on D2) and shaking trees on our way through the farm and the town. Planting mixed seeds, carrot seeds, and up to 14 parsnips (the number can be decreased by carrot seeds and mixed seeds that gave us parsnips) NO bean bought.

D2: NO watering. Rushing to the beach and fishing with bamboo pole until we can buy the fiberglass rod. Keep in mind that catching sea jelly means we only need 1800 to buy the rod, as hitting lvl 1 fishing is faster (and sea jelly unlocks lvl 2 fishing shop, if eaten). This way it's more optimal to stick to bamboo pole - unless we dont' feel comfortable with the low bar. Sometimes it seems to me that new "record length" fish provide you with higher quality of the fish - with every pole but training rod. This is important because a perfect catch of an anchovy with lvl 1 fishing can give us at least gold star fish. Also, bamboo pole gives chance to catch a flounder or a halibut - which net a fair amount of g. Buying bait should be done in a single trip, if possible. Fishing on the right pier is good at first - but then it's better to go left from Willy - around the "longer" plank (after getting fiberglass rod) and to put a chest right next to us. It doesn't matter that it stands in villagers' paths - they don't pass this way before we can pick up the chest on D3. Another tip for faster reaction to the "!" while fishing is holding LMB until we can hear the message/see the exclamation mark. Clicking and releasing the hold is longer than release alone. Taking all fish with us, save for around 600-700g to buy some more bait for D3 and D4.

D3: We drink cola if possible and rush to the river in cindersap forest, leaving around 8:20. Check the right side of the beach for bait maker reagents. If they're ready, consider buying 300 wood and 15 iron ore on D5.Then we sell the rest of the fish, empty the chest and take it to the river, buying a piece of copper ore if needed. I suggest eating sea jelly after lowering energy to 182 or lower. This should be slightly before hitting lvl 5 fishing. This helps with quality of fish - level 6 fishing assures that non-perfect-max-cast is a gold star quality, while perfect is iridium. Nothing new here aside from additional sea jelly usage.

D4: water, make a chest, chop down trees if needed for the chest, fish until 12:40am, ship to get 15620 (10370 if you don't want to/can't unlock the bridge on D5). This will be enough to get: 2000 for pickaxe upgrade, 2000 for backpack upgrade, 3750 for 5 iron bars, 1120 for 16 kale seeds which we'll plant on D6, and 1500 for a crab pot. Buying crab pot now gives us 4 days before going to the mines with iron pickaxe on D9. Depending on our luck with beach forages, we'd need 1-3 freshwater (mountain lake/river) fish to get the crab pot bundle. Since getting one is around 33%, and we have 4 days, it's likely to get 2 different fish from the pot.

D5: water the crops and head to the mines without a chest, hit F10, farm F11 for copper, smelt bars until it's around 1:30pm. 2pm is too late. Buy 300 pieces of wood (if you chose to make a bait maker) then head to Pierre's and upgrade backpack, buy 16 kale seeds and a bean starter if convenient, and any extra seeds you need for spring crop bundle. Then head to Clint and smelt however much is needed. Buy 25 (or 40 if you chose to make a bait maker) iron ores. Upgrade the pickaxe. If convenient, buy crab pot afterwards. Put it by the lake, put deluxe bait inside, smelt iron bars.

That's how I see the first 5 days really. Feel free to challenge this.

 

[Werbenja]

Feel free to challenge this.

Oh, I shall.

Day 1, sadly. D3 is Wednesday and you can't buy it then

Or I could bite the bullet and pay the whopping 15g extra to purchase the bean starter from JojaMart on day 3. That's half the sell price of a basic herring caught on day 2, but I think I'll manage.

The only luck-reliant thing in this run is hoping for all required items needed to make a bait maker on D5

What about infested floors on day 5? In the first 11 floors, only floors 6, 7, 8, 9 and 11 can be infested, but it can still happen. If it happens, then you have a high chance of not having 5 copper bars by 1:30pm. It's specially bad if floor 11 is infested, since then you can't farm ores there at all.

By the way, how consistent are you with day 5 mining, even without infested floors? I did this route on patch 1.5 and remember it being very tight, possibly leading to resets. That was one of the reasons I opted this time around for leaving the pickaxe upgrade to day 6 (the other two reasons being that I wanted to mine more on day 5 to reach floor 20 for fish smokers and that checking the beach on day 6 gives you more chances for tide pool forage). This also allows you to fish until passing out on the 4th, since you don't need to ship anything that day.

Sometimes it seems to me that new "record length" fish provide you with higher quality of the fish - with every pole but training rod.

That is interesting and should be tested. If it is true, then this plus sea jelly might mean the end of the training rod at 9am.

Fishing on the right pier is good at first - but then it's better to go left from Willy - around the "longer" plank (after getting fiberglass rod)

Where exactly? At the westernmost point of the horizontal strip of plank right in front of Willy's shop? Then I agree.

level 6 fishing assures that non-perfect-max-cast is a gold star quality, while perfect is iridium.

The wiki says you can cast your line 5 tiles to the south already at fishing level 4. Shouldn't that be enough to hook the best quality fish at max casts, then?

and 1500 for a crab pot. Buying crab pot now gives us 4 days before going to the mines with iron pickaxe on D9. Depending on our luck with beach forages, we'd need 1-3 freshwater (mountain lake/river) fish to get the crab pot bundle. Since getting one is around 33%, and we have 4 days, it's likely to get 2 different fish from the pot.

I think going for a crab pot makes sense if you didn't get a cauliflower from mixed seeds on day 1. Otherwise, 1500g just seems too much for an already gold-starving day 5. I'd much rather pay the devil corporation 75g on a bean starter, thank you very much.

 

[Maboi]

What about infested floors on day 5?

This is true - if you get an infested floor then you're very unlikely to get the copper and reach F10. So far I haven't got an infested floor on D5 (6 runs, no infested floors. I didn't use the same seed for the runs)

By the way, how consistent are you with day 5 mining, even without infested floors?

On my best day, I reached F10 before 11am. On my worst day, I reached it at 11:40. Keep in mind I use screenshots to plan my moves (slow but seems better to me because you don't need to worry about UI covering a part of the map). So as for me, I can effectively reach F10 by 12pm unless I'm super unlucky. I agree, though, that it's far less stressful to try your route - the only problem I can see is possible early infested floors, since extra fishing before iron pickaxe gives you a chance to get a better weapon.
EDIT: On my second thought, 11:40 was one of worse days but the worst was probably 12:30. I still managed to smelt 2 bars before leaving but I can't recall whether I reached Willy or not, sorry.

Where exactly?

left from here, chest on the right

The wiki says you can cast your line 5 tiles to the south already at fishing level 4. Shouldn't that be enough to hook the best quality fish at max casts, then?

I'm telling you from my experience after playing a lot of days 3. I don't know why you get silver-quality non-perfects when being lvl 4 - but I'm 100% sure you stop getting them after reaching lvl 6 fishing. It stops for good. Check it yourself or see some min-maxers' vids, don't rely on my opinion only :)

I think going for a crab pot makes sense if you didn't get a cauliflower from mixed seeds on day 1

My goal was to "free" bundle trees from the absolute minimum of D14. In the spring crops way, you can't unlock the minecart before D14. Not that it's necessary - but it speeds up reaching the mines and the mountain lake. The former's needed for F120 and the skull key (I'm yet to decide whether it's better to farm dust sprites or not) and the latter gives you money on non-rainy days, which are more likely to happen. Minecarts save you time and thus make you more effective. In my current run, I managed to unlock minecarts on D11, so they're available from D12 onwards. Cons? Probably coming to CC twice.

 

[riklaunim]

Anyone did level 20 mines fishing instead of lake in spring? Probably worse gold-wise as ghostfish has a low sell value but is high on energy so it would be mostly to keep for later use. If you get a few stonefish it could even out a bit, especially with fish smoker on river farm.

 

[Maboi]

Anyone did level 20 mines fishing instead of lake in spring?

Checked it, just to leave no doubts. With targeted bait on a sunny day, you're guaranteed to get +20 largemouths and +15 bullheads for a whole day of fishing. Let's take a more grim scenario: you perfect-catch only 50% of your largemouths and 75% of bullheads, giving you 10 iridium largemouths and 10 gold ones, 11 iridium bullheads and 4 of lower quality. This, with Angler perk, nets you 8397g, or the equivalent of 12,44 gold-star stonefish. The problem is, you have no way of assuring the bite rate for stonefish - targeted bait doesn't work on them as well as on common fish. From my experience, you are barely able to catch ONE stonefish for 6-10 pieces of stonefish bait. Ghostfish are more common but are useful only for energy - and the amount of trash you are likely to get during fishing there only adds up to the off-putting, if you ask me.

tl;dr: F20 fishing is not worth it.