NPC Happiness [v. 1.4.4.9] - How to get good discounts without moving houses?

Nobody is happy when you have to move to another house. This guide will show you a possible setup where you place your NPCs, so that they are happy, will give you a proper discount and will sell you the matching pylon.

Meta

All pictures are from the Official Terraria Wiki[terraria.wiki.gg] or made by myself.
Because the content there is available under CC BY-NC-SA 3.0, I'm allowed to use its content under the terms of mentioning the creative common.

This guide is updated to be 1.4.4.9 conform again.

This guide is also available in the following languages:

• English
  
• German

Concept and Housing

How can I make my NPCs as happy as they can get.

• I don't want to move them around.
  
• I want a pylon.
  
• I want a really good discount.

As you can see at the Wikis Happiness section[terraria.wiki.gg], the NPCs will get a discount/price modifier, when

• they have a neighbour they're liking or loving (max. 25 tiles away),
  
• the town is between 3-6 NPCs large (recommended: 2-4),
  
• a couple/triple who are neighbours live far from other NPCs (min. 25 tiles, max. 120 tiles),
  
• they live in a liked or loved biome,
  
• they are far away from the dungeon, corruption or crimson.

There are 26 NPCs and 9 Pylons.
So my idea is to focus on loving NPCs and pairing them into couples. For each pylon/town I place a couple-house (a relative large house with 2 or 3 rooms) and at least 25 tiles away (from NPC-flag to NPC-flag) another single house or a couple-house for the 4th (and 3rd) NPC.
I also focus on No-Hate. No NPC will have a NPC in their town he/she dislikes or hates. Same goes for biome preferences. In theory it should be fine to have some NPCs in the same town who dislikes each other, as long as they are not in a couple-house. But I don't put them in the same town, just to be sure.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2133078921
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2218491674
Oh and by the way. I don't care about efficient NPC placing. The teleportation is almost instant, so I could place the pylons in the room of the NPC I often want to talk to. I'm lazy, but this is no effort for me.

Comparable Factors

I will compute the happiness to calculate an average and make it comparable.
The NPC gets the folowing multiplicators:

• 0.95 for beeing in a solo- or couple-house. (actually it's the 3-6 NPC limitation) {H-factor}
  
• 0.88 for loving a character in the couple-house. {C-factor}
  
• 0.94 for liking a character in the couple-house. {C-factor}
  
• 0.88 for loving the biome. {B-factor}
  
• 0.94 for liking the biome. {B-factor}

Example

I put every couple/triple on one side of the pylon. These NPCs in this example have the same happiness, so the calculations are quite easy.
H-factor: They are living in a couple-house, so they get the factor *0.95
C-factor: The neighbour is a character they are liking, so they get the factor *0.94
B-factor: They are living in a biome they are liking, so they get the factor *0.94
HCB: Every value multiplied (0.95*0.94*0.94) results in a 0.83942 happiness.
Because I focus on happiness, I won't round it to the nearest 1%. The NPCs usually round their prices. In this example they would have a 0.84 multiplicated discount.

Side Note

One more thing, before I start pairing. I don't care about the happiness from , , and . I care about their partners happiness. I want a pylon and they should sell it!

Also some sell-inventories can get really full, like (Golf-score), (Christmas), (always full) and (Boss-progress) which causes them to sell no pylon, even when they are happy. So I might ignore them as well.

Town Pets

Place them anywhere you like them to be. They don't count as NPC to let other NPCs sell their pylon, so they are just decoration to me.

Lets pair them up:

Pairing NPCs - Cavern

HCB : 0.95*0.88*0.94=0.78584
HCB : 0.95*0.88*1=0.836
HCB : 0.95*0.94=0.893

Pairing NPCs - Desert

The town is placeable in Underground/Cavern.
HCB : 0.95*0.88*0.94=0.78584
HCB : 0.95*0.88*1=0.836
HCB : 0.95*0.88*1=0.836
HCB : 0.95*1*0.94=0.893

Pairing NPCs - Forest

HCB : 0.95*0.94*0.94=0.83942
HCB : 0.95*0.94*0.94=0.83942

Pairing NPCs - Hallow

The town is combinable/placeable in Desert or Snow.
Every NPC near gets an additional Like-Factor of "*0.94".
HCB* : 0.95*0.88*0.94*0.94=0.7386896 (Her discount is still 0.75)
HCB* : 0.95*1*0.94*0.94=0.83942
HCB* : Loves every NPC: 0.88*0.88=0.7744 (With 3 NPCs her happiness is 0.681472 with a discount of 0.75)

Pairing NPCs - Jungle

The town is placeable in Underground/Cavern.
HCB : 0.95*0.88*0.94=0.78584
HCB : 0.95*0.94*0.94=0.83942
HCB : 0.95*0.94*0.94=0.83942

Pairing NPCs - Mushroom

HCB : 0.95*0.88*0.94=0.78584
HCB : 0.95*1*1=0.95
HCB : 0.95*1=0.95 (I could put him into the Forest for a 0.893 happiness, but that would collide with my No-Hate concept.)

Pairing NPCs - Ocean

HCB : 0.95*0.88*0.94=0.78584
HCB : 0.95*1*0.94=0.893
HCB : 0.95*1=0.95 (I could put him into the Snow for a 0.893 happiness, but if is living with him in a couple-house...lets say it wouldn't work out very well.)

Pairing NPCs - Snow

HCB : 0.95*0.88*0.94=0.78584
HCB : 0.95*0.88*1=0.836
HCB : 0.95*0.88=0.836 (Yay! The only NPC who loves and hates biomes.)

Pairing NPCs - Universal

The Universal is a special one. It can be placed anywhere. But I'm focusing on loved biomes, so I will only compare Desert and Snow.
The town is placeable in Underground/Cavern.
Putting them in a Snow-Biome results in AVG()=0.83771
HCB : 0.95*0.88*1=0.836
HCB : 0.95*0.94*0.94=0.83942
Putting them in a Desert-Biome results in AVG()=0.83942
HCB : 0.95*0.88*0.94=0.78584
HCB : 0.95*0.94*1=0.893
So I'm gonna put them in a Snow-Biome.

Conclusion

The overall average happiness for every NPC is: 0.839217293

You have a different setup? Let's compare the average values! I don't think that my setup is optimal, but it should still be a very good one.

The best part is: I don't have to move my NPCs around, I get my pylons and get a good discount.
And what I also like is, that I can even use all pylons during the NPC-respawn-time after killing or for Skeletron or WoF.

Different Offers of Purchase

The sells different solutions (blue or green) when she is in a Hallow or when she isn't in one. You can make a temporary Hallow with Pearlsand Blocks which are also easy to remove. (Or you use a fast pickaxe and solid Hallow Blocks.) She also sells different crafting stations in many different bioms. Fortunately you can also find these crafting stations in various chests, so with a bit of luck you don't have to move her around.
Which might be an issue is the . He sells different paintings in each biome. Fortunately he is the only one who loves to travel.

Graveyard related items are easy to get. Just put 7 tombstones near the following NPCs and they sell you additional stuff:
, , , , , , and .

The can sell you additional stuff when you're in a "secret seed"-world 05162021. But I don't consider it and don't go into details, because it only happens there.

[GhostlyCoyote]

This is very helpful! I’m the kind of person who feels bad if I put NPCs who dislike each other together, but working it out from scratch with spreadsheets sounds painful

[mavv | she/they]

Really like this guide; wish there were pairings for pre-hardmode.

[VIVIMANCER]

Thanks for the guide. Although i don't like the happiness setup cuz i'm lazy, it's great to see someone putting their time into learning it and making a guide to help others

[smol]

[smol]

tbh idk also

[PapierKeks]

@Mistakes were made... I don't see how you come up with that.

[smol]

racism?

[PapierKeks]

@some_random_guy You mean pairing Mushroom? Sure :D
H-factor: Should be clear. Living in a couple-house = *0.95

Guide: Everything else apart from the Love/Like and Dislike/Hate definition gets the default factor = *1. And because he doesn't mind living with Truffle in a Mushroom-Biome, he gets the factor *1 on both C-factor and B-factor. But who cares :D He doesn't sell anything anyways.

Truffle: According to the wiki: Truffle "loves" the Guide and "likes" the Mushroom-Biome, so it gets the following factors:
C-factor = *0.88 for loving the neighbour, B-factor = *0.94 for liking the biome
See Comparable Factors and Example for more details ;)

[Mr.RandomGuy]

Instructions unclear: lost brancells with the 0.95*0.88*0.94=0.78584 and the 0.95*1*1=0.95

[Sonic de Marte]

good