Is Riverland farm the worst of the lot?

[Panfilo]

Basic farm has the space to work with, though it's downside is that it doesn't have anything unique to it.

Hilltop farm has ore nodes which can save you a bit of time early on, though once you have the mine cart/quarry this becomes a little redundant. I found the layout to be awkward to arrange farm buildings in, as the river really disrupts usable space.

Forest farm has hardwood AND lots of mixed seeds which is helpful. You really only need to go in the secret forest for Fiddlehead ferns and a stardrop, you have everything else in your farm.

Wilderness farm has monster spawns that build your combat and loot. Seems like a popular choice for some players.

But the Riverland farm seems like the worst of the lot. I suppose it's gimmick is fishing, but the other farms have fishing ponds that are an analogue to other bodies of water. So beyond that you just have this awkward layout that shares the downsides of hilltop farm without the actual utility.

[Turtleswatter]

From experience, the frequency and type of fish in the Riverland farm are superior to the normal farm ponds. But I suppose the layout of this one is designed to make it more of a challenge, if you like that sort of thing.

[parapara42]

I liked coming back home and fishing every night, even if river fish considered most low profit or smth. And the way it is fragmented also was somewhat fun, less fencing and all.
But I am a fishing fanatic lol I think it is big part of it too.

Forest/Hill-top and Wilderness personally were much less fun for me. Though I am having a blast with four corners now ^^

[Maya-Neko]

Actually every farm is pretty much useless compared to the standard farm if you compare raw numbers, as you cut down valuable farm land for things, which you can get anyway outside the farm in at least comparable, if not higher numbers. The Forst Farm seems to be the best non-standard farm at first glance, but the things you can get there aren't that valuable as most people think (especially the hardwood. You just get it faster, but you don't need that much of it most of the time anyway)

And because of that it's better to take the farms for what they're supposed to be: a different layout to the standard farm, which might get boring after a few playthroughs for some people.

And btw: you can catch river fishes at the Riverland Farm, making it way more viable than the ponds in other farm layout and not to mention, that you can place down tons of crap bots there.

[Bizolwig]

The Trapper/Luremaster skill tree makes it so you do not need bate for the crab pots. Line the shores with crab pots to supplement your income.

Also the point of the different farm types is to give you a challenge after you have played the basic farm. yes the riverland farm is harder to play. but just think how interesting and cool a fully established riverland farm could be. some players find making a visually appealing farm just as fun as making a financially lucrative farm.

[Panfilo]

Oh I get that they exist for the sake of variety.

But I like asymmetrical balance, with the emphasis on balance. Now you could argue that usable space isn't a huge issue - while the basic farm gives a massive chunk of open space, this is mainly helpful for novice players and hardcore min maxers. All the other farms give you at least enough space to place every building somewhere and farm a bit.

Maya the main benefit of having particular resources near your farm is time, especially early game. Now you could argue the Perks only really matter early game, because once you've gotten horse/mine cart/bus you're going to gather stuff quickly anyway. But not needing to shlep somewhere just for a particular resource is convenient.

[I Kinda Fail]

I'd say it's tied with Hilltop for worst farm, but both are pretty.

Riverlands is nice if you use crab pots. Many people forget that crab pots give tons of crap fish, so you can easily make tons of quality fertilizer, so you won't need to bother processing certain crops; you can just sell like 70% silver and gold star crops and have 1 processing shed, versus selling 30-40% silver/gold crops and having 2-3 processing sheds.

Also worth noting that there's... not a huge use for money in the end-game, so there's not a huge rush to minmax your moneymaking. I love Riverlands for multiplayer farms, because you can decide who gets what islands and go from there.

[Maya-Neko]

Originally posted by Panfilo:

Maya the main benefit of having particular resources near your farm is time, especially early game. Now you could argue the Perks only really matter early game, because once you've gotten horse/mine cart/bus you're going to gather stuff quickly anyway. But not needing to shlep somewhere just for a particular resource is convenient.

Yeah, but the value of the ressources on your farm is so tiny, that you can't really argue about it "being better than the standard farm", especially in terms of the amounts of ressources you need mid to lategame or the amount of money you could generate with it.

Riverland Map: Gives you the option to save like 10-20 seconds of walking to the river in the early game, but you'll catch significantly more trash, making it still questionable, if you really want to fish there if you want to make fish your main income. The real strength here are propably crab pots, but there are other maps like the Hill-Top, the Forest or the Wilderness Farm, which do quite a good job with it as well, while giving you other benefits as well.

Forest Farm: As said above, propably the best of the non-standard-farms in terms of ressources, as it provides a good hardwood-income early on, which also could be a good wood/coal source later on. But that's really the only benefitial thing there in midgame and the forragebles and the mixed seeds are also good for a headstart. But the longer the game progresses, the worse this farm gets, as hardwood looses it's value pretty fast, especially given how much you can farm on your farm.

Hill-top Farm: The mining area is nice to have in the early game, as it helps you progress you through the early smithing in terms of copper, but from there on you're left with a pretty bad spawning area. It would take weeks if not month to even match the income of only one day of mining (the same problem as the quarry does have). The long river however gives a nice amount of potential crab pot-spaces and it just looks the best of all farm types in my opinion (which is why i play it most of the time).

Wilderness Farm: Gives you a little headstart as well with its golems, but it's not really a challange to play this map, as you aren't really swarmed with monsters and as the combat system is really simple. It propably still takes you ages to fullfill some of the adventurers guild, if you're not willing to actively farm monsters.

And that still leads to my conclusion: If you want to compare the maps in raw numbers, then no other map can be as good as the standard map, as the other maps are just good in a hyper-specific scenario. The time you're saving here is massively outscaled by the loss of potential.
That's why i say, that you should go with the standard-map, if you're just looking at profit and if you want more than just money (like aestetics or a challenge), then go with whichever farm looks funny to you.

[Panfilo]

Most people are not going to be farming on the scale that the standard map will put them ahead, though. Up until you are using more than the maximum farmable/buildable tiles of the other farm, it's slightly worse in contrast.

I hadn't thought about covering Riverland farm in crab pots, that is a clever idea. Though I'm not sure how much money you are even getting from that given most of the critters you pull up don't pay much.

[Maya-Neko]

should be ~40 (+-5) g per day per crab pot with the luremaster skill and if you sell all the converted trash or ~53 g per day with the mariner skill, if you produce the lure for it yourself or ~48 g per day, if you buy it.

And that doesn't include the Periwinkles being converted into Fertilizer

And there should be space for 300+ crab pot spots on this farm, so it's a nice passive income, but it pretty much takes forever to maintain so many pots on a daily basis^^

[ehyder]

I do not min/max, I am not interested in optimizing my farm income. And my favorite farm is the forest farm because of the forageables and early access to hardwood. And I actually like that it gives me less farming area!

[DaBa]

The point of other farms is not to give you the same, balanced experience. It never was. They exist to challenge yourself and force you to play differently. The farms don't have to all be as good as the default one, the default one is the easiest after all. And also the most boring. Playing on a hilltop farm or the riverland farm is way more interesting, because you have to deal with limited space and weirdly shaped areas.