Creator Response Problems Identified in Reviews

Valimure

Tiller
I've been seeing more and more reviews come out for the game lamenting its difficulty and reliance on chance, which is unfortunate; I think it was said plenty of times that this game was never intended to be the relaxing experience the video game is, but after playing a few dozen times at this point I can certainly understand some of these frustrations and have some ideas for how to possibly deal with them as house rules or future print editions. At the core of the problem is how much more difficult this game becomes with only one or two players, but there's definitely also some frustration with just how much luck the game requires.

1. Grandpa Goals

Many reviews talk about how unbalanced some grandpa Goals are, and I completely agree. It's a blessing to flip over a "make friends" goal because you need to do that anyway to complete bundles. Same goes for having the "build buildings" and "raise animals" goals together, which pair nicely. Mining and museum goals, however, could do with some rebalancing. Reaching the bottom of the mines becomes virtually impossible in a one or even two person game; this should really be changed to "Descend in the mines x3" so that it only becomes the full 12 levels when you have 4 players. Minerals and artifacts also feel difficult to come by in the game unless you get lucky with an event or foraging, so perhaps doing away with some of the repeat fish in the fishing bag and replacing them with mineral / artifact fishing chests might help. Lastly, buildings and animals should have a scaling cost for players. I feel like the base amounts are a bit too much for a single player game, but are absolute chump change when it comes to a 3 or 4 person game. Gathering the materials is always more of a worry than the money needed to actually build things.

2. Fishing

As said before, there are just too many fishing tiles in here. I appreciate the desire to include all the fish in the game, but it becomes difficult to cycle through them when you're hunting for specific fish. There's plenty of opportunities to thin the numbers down, and I've actually removed a lot of the duplicate fish that appear in more than one location (like some of the crab pot fish like snails, or largemouth bass) from the bag. A house rule I've also started using is that, just like trash, if you don't catch anything while fishing you can remove a fish tile of your choice from the board. Even then, we've still had a few three / four player games where we were waiting and hoping to finally pull a legendary fish from the bag to win the game, so perhaps even allowing players to remove two fishing tiles from the track on a failed catch would be more beneficial.

3. Season Deck

A. This can really make or break a game. There are simply too many cards here, and I've had it all: games where we were just pelted with crows and Joja tiles every turn, as well as games where it was nothing but gifts and rain. I definitely enjoy some randomness here and it makes the game feel fresh every time, but perhaps there might be ways to help players out a bit. One idea is to "rate" the difficulty of each card with a certain number of stars (1-3) so that players looking for a challenge would use all of the cards to create their deck, but for normal games you'd remove 3* cards and for an easy game you'd remove both 2* and 3* cards.

B. Some festivals could really use a buff. I honestly feel like, in most cases, Festivals hurt more than they help. There's a couple that give you a *chance* for something good to happen, but a 1/6 chance to get 5 gold or complete a bundle doesn't feel great when you fail the roll, costing you a chance to sell items, water crops, or trigger gift icons. I'd much rather get guaranteed free eggs for each player or a quality pumpkin than have a slim chance at something better.

4. Trim Down the Decks

A. Variety may be the spice of life, but it really does feel like the entire spice cabinet got put into the game. I'd estimate we only ever get through a few cards in each deck on each playthrough, if that. Again, I completely understand and appreciate wanting to represent different parts of the game, but there are so many event and item cards that just feel lackluster compared to others. Some epic items feel completely useless at the stage of the game you get them. Ancient Fruit, Prairie King Arcade System, Return Scepter, the Minecart, and the Horse all feel lackluster. Many items that require actions to use, like the Pet Bowl or Wild Seeds, have never been used in a single playthrough of mine and feel like a waste of space. Just like the fish, I think decks could also be trimmed by getting rid of repeat versions of items and only keeping one, like the Bombs, Torch / Campfire, Scarecrows, Hay / Animal Products, Beer / Coffee / Field Snack, etc.

B. Streamline the map cards. As was said before, descending in the mines is a pain. You're already relying on a dice roll to even get what you need, so it feels like there's too many map cards that are just extremely punishing. Although staircases can be crafted using stone, it would make players feel more in control if there's at least a *chance* at getting a staircase on every card. There's only 25/40 cards that have staircases, and then you also have to factor in how many have staircases on statistically unlikely rolls like Junimo / Stardrop or Stardrop / Stardrop. 18/40 cards is also a pretty slim chance for bug meat, which really makes catching crabpot fish or completing the boiler room bundle (which happens to get revealed last) a pain. Being unable to find enough bug meat has cost me several games at this point.

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Just to reiterate, this thread is NOT to say I personally don't enjoy the game. I think it captures the essence of Stardew well and is actually a ton of fun to play, but I definitely do understand the frustration by just how much is left up to chance, rather than player agency, in the game. Curious to hear anyone else's thoughts and ideas, or the house rules you've come up with. It's always fun seeing how new games evolve over time to give a better player experience, and I'm sure Stardew will be no exception.
 
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Valimure

Tiller
Oh, I also forgot to mention one of the easiest ways I've found to make the game more manageable: use multiple game mats. I've lost all 3 of the games I played with only a single player mat. Between resource management and trying to complete 10 goals in 32 actions, it feels quite nearly impossible without a lot of good luck. Instead, I "pretend" there are multiple people playing the game and move each pawn separately. It's a lot easier to manage the game when you have 2 or 3 mats / pawns in front of you to work with.
 

Colito

Board Game Designer
Staff member
Thanks for posting this! It's good feedback for me to chew on.

I definitely hear you about player count. What I think is happening is that, with more players, the chance is being flattened by probability. There are more rolls and draws, so you can better distribute good and bad ones. I enjoy playing the game solo but it's really best when I can collaborate with other players.

I will keep these suggestions in mind, thanks!
 

Valimure

Tiller
Thanks again for all you do Cole! Hope this didn't come off as too harsh. One of my gaming groups and I really do enjoy it and play it quite regularly at game nights - you did a great job!

I hear that about the probability. The game becomes so much less punishing when you have more chances, and it's also super useful to be able to put people on opposite ends of the board to accomplish tasks on the same turn.

I'm excited to see how the game continues to evolve!
 

Colito

Board Game Designer
Staff member
Not too harsh at all! It's always a little tricky to process feedback, but yours here is highly constructive which I appreciate a lot. And it helps to bring into focus improvements that could be made.
 

Gewitsch

Greenhorn
1. Grandpa Goals

Many reviews talk about how unbalanced some grandpa Goals are, and I completely agree. It's a blessing to flip over a "make friends" goal because you need to do that anyway to complete bundles. Same goes for having the "build buildings" and "raise animals" goals together, which pair nicely. Mining and museum goals, however, could do with some rebalancing. Reaching the bottom of the mines becomes virtually impossible in a one or even two person game; this should really be changed to "Descend in the mines x3" so that it only becomes the full 12 levels when you have 4 players. Minerals and artifacts also feel difficult to come by in the game unless you get lucky with an event or foraging, so perhaps doing away with some of the repeat fish in the fishing bag and replacing them with mineral / artifact fishing chests might help. Lastly, buildings and animals should have a scaling cost for players. I feel like the base amounts are a bit too much for a single player game, but are absolute chump change when it comes to a 3 or 4 person game. Gathering the materials is always more of a worry than the money needed to actually build things.
I completely agree with the difficulty of grandpa goals. I posted here Hardest Grandpa Goal my hardest challenge. The problem with those goals is that every action counts so much that you have to be a Magnus Carlsen and think several Turns ahead and that reduces the fun of playing the game with only planning the best out of the current day.

2. Fishing

As said before, there are just too many fishing tiles in here. I appreciate the desire to include all the fish in the game, but it becomes difficult to cycle through them when you're hunting for specific fish. There's plenty of opportunities to thin the numbers down, and I've actually removed a lot of the duplicate fish that appear in more than one location (like some of the crab pot fish like snails, or largemouth bass) from the bag. A house rule I've also started using is that, just like trash, if you don't catch anything while fishing you can remove a fish tile of your choice from the board. Even then, we've still had a few three / four player games where we were waiting and hoping to finally pull a legendary fish from the bag to win the game, so perhaps even allowing players to remove two fishing tiles from the track on a failed catch would be more beneficial.
Here I disagree, because the real problem is the combination of all fishes in one line. The video game especially had crab pots and a fishing rod to seperate that. The worst thing is not being able to get at least one fish per day, when you chose the fishing rod. The second problem beside this is to combine one line for all three locations. You can't normally move from one fishing location to another so using two actions at one location is not really helping.

Maybe instead of giving reroll chance, the fishing rod could adds heart, junimo and then bugmeat to the roll?

Overkill would be 6 lines with Fish/crab pots for all 3 locations, but represents better the video game.

3. Season Deck

A. This can really make or break a game. There are simply too many cards here, and I've had it all: games where we were just pelted with crows and Joja tiles every turn, as well as games where it was nothing but gifts and rain. I definitely enjoy some randomness here and it makes the game feel fresh every time, but perhaps there might be ways to help players out a bit. One idea is to "rate" the difficulty of each card with a certain number of stars (1-3) so that players looking for a challenge would use all of the cards to create their deck, but for normal games you'd remove 3* cards and for an easy game you'd remove both 2* and 3* cards.

B. Some festivals could really use a buff. I honestly feel like, in most cases, Festivals hurt more than they help. There's a couple that give you a *chance* for something good to happen, but a 1/6 chance to get 5 gold or complete a bundle doesn't feel great when you fail the roll, costing you a chance to sell items, water crops, or trigger gift icons. I'd much rather get guaranteed free eggs for each player or a quality pumpkin than have a slim chance at something better.
I am with you on this one. The standard Deck already doesn't feel beginner friendly. Your idea is nice and I hope something like it comes to the board game.
Some festivals definetly feel lack lustering. You should be happy having one event. I had the idea that a festival is not a day per se, but rather a extra card that is just put into the deck beside 4 other cards.

4. Trim Down the Decks

A. Variety may be the spice of life, but it really does feel like the entire spice cabinet got put into the game. I'd estimate we only ever get through a few cards in each deck on each playthrough, if that. Again, I completely understand and appreciate wanting to represent different parts of the game, but there are so many event and item cards that just feel lackluster compared to others. Some epic items feel completely useless at the stage of the game you get them. Ancient Fruit, Prairie King Arcade System, Return Scepter, the Minecart, and the Horse all feel lackluster. Many items that require actions to use, like the Pet Bowl or Wild Seeds, have never been used in a single playthrough of mine and feel like a waste of space. Just like the fish, I think decks could also be trimmed by getting rid of repeat versions of items and only keeping one, like the Bombs, Torch / Campfire, Scarecrows, Hay / Animal Products, Beer / Coffee / Field Snack, etc.
Here I have mixed feelings.
The idea behind epic items should be an epic effect that can turn the tables, but right now there are only some epic items you really wish for and the luck factor is so high that you would never rely on it. Wild Seeds and the action usage can be sometimes useful, when you use them to gather forage materials. From my understanding you can perform this action anywhere and therefore Marnie is not ... lonely.

B. Streamline the map cards. As was said before, descending in the mines is a pain. You're already relying on a dice roll to even get what you need, so it feels like there's too many map cards that are just extremely punishing. Although staircases can be crafted using stone, it would make players feel more in control if there's at least a *chance* at getting a staircase on every card. There's only 25/40 cards that have staircases, and then you also have to factor in how many have staircases on statistically unlikely rolls like Junimo / Stardrop or Stardrop / Stardrop. 18/40 cards is also a pretty slim chance for bug meat, which really makes catching crabpot fish or completing the boiler room bundle (which happens to get revealed last) a pain. Being unable to find enough bug meat has cost me several games at this point.
With Mining there comes the beginner problem. Without the upgraded version of the pickaxe and/or the mining profession you have to be extremely lucky, because like you said it is not helping getting empty results, when the team needs ore's. Upgrading the watering can/Hoe after summer is sort of useless.
 
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