Things I wish I knew before playing Stardew Valley

Whether you're just new to the game or someone that at least has some hours in this amazing game, there are several tips or explanations that will make your Stardew valley game a little bit more fun! I tried to keep this guide as "spoiler-free" as possible.

𝙸𝚗𝚝𝚛𝚘𝚍𝚞𝚌𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗

Stardew Valley: A cute, relaxing, and honestly fun game. There are so many ways to play this game that it will be hard to make it boring for me.

My name is Shibacoco (hewwoo) and I've at least put 300 hours into this game when this guide comes out, probably around 200 are in-steam hours.
There are some things I wish I knew before putting these hours into this game.

I tried to make the guide as "spoiler-free" as possible because I simply don't wanna hold your hand playing this game. I just want to guide you with some info or tips.
If you already have some experience in the game I would recommend checking the first & last chapter out, some of these general/miscellaneous tips are facts I just found out about/important.

I will add a list of my favourite mods later into this guide & how to use them.

𝙶𝚎𝚗𝚎𝚛𝚊𝚕 𝚃𝚒𝚙𝚜

General options:
I honestly never really look at the settings, only to fix my audio or visuals. But Stardew Valley has some nice options for setting you don't want to miss:

>Tool Hit Location
There is a chance you wanted to, for example, get a pebble out of the way and accidentally misclicked onto another tile. There isn't an indicator where you actually will hit a tile.
if you check "Show Tool Hit Location" in the options you will always see what tile you will hit. Super handy (please check it off, it's a lifesaver)

引用自 Shibacoco：

The number of times I accidentally broke a crop midseason of my playthrough is to actually cry for :(

>Zoom buttons
A tad less important thing you can check off is the Zoom-Button: you can change your zoom level whilst playing the game, instead of changing it in the options. The buttons are placed under the amount of money you've got.
The arcade game's size is dependant on the zoom level you have. So I mostly crank it up before playing Prairie King and other games.



>Screenshots
If you scroll all the way down, you will find a button with a camera on it, it will take a screenshot of the place you're standing in. For example the whole farm/house. If you have no clue where it will save on your PC -> click on the "open destination" button to find all your screenshots.


Farm Types


If you start a new game, you see the different farm types you can use. Every Farm focuses on a different skill + the multiplayer map.
A short summary of the skill per map:
- Standard farm - Farming
- Riverland farm - Fishing
- Forest Farm - Foraging
- Wilderness Farm - Combat
- Hilltop Farm - Mining

Then the last two are Beach and Four Corners:
- Beach Farm:
Sprinklers do not work on sand, so there is not a lot of space to plant crops. This farm will be a tricky one if you are new to the game. But there are supply crates that wash up on this farm and a lot of places to fish.
-Four Corners Farm:
It has a bit of everything and a lot of sectioned space you can work on. So if you don't "exactly" want to work on the same area as your coop partner/you play with 3 or more players: this is a good place to start your game on.

引用自 Shibacoco：

Some guides explain to you what "the best farm" is and why you should play on it.
But I think you should go for a farm that you like instead of choosing the standard farm because you're new to the game. I for example got quickly bored of the standard layout and chose Riverland Farm as my second playthrough. Even tho I didn't optimally use the farm type by fishing a lot/crab pot usage.
Just know what you're getting yourself into: I would not recommend Beach and Wilderness as your first playthrough. Wilderness spawns monsters in the night and you don't wanna faint on your farmland.

Stardrops
One of the most important items in the game is the stardrop. It is a mysterious fruit that empowers those who eat it.
A Stardrop is a special item that permanently increases the player's maximum energy by 34 points. There are seven stardrops in the game, which together result in 508 maximum energy, nearly doubling the initial value of 270.
If you see one, try to get it immediately. You can do a whole lot more in your day with a bigger energy bar.

Tools
- When you're walking around, always hold your sword or scythe. You won't use energy when you accidentally click on your screen (this will be notified when you wake up). Also when you interact with NPC's, you won't accidentally give them an item you're holding, it will happen a lot if you don't watch out.
- You can upgrade your tools at the Blacksmith, he will take 2 days to upgrade them. Upgrade your tools when you are sure you won't need them for those 2 days. Hint: No crops grow in winter season so no farm tools are needed!

𝚃𝚒𝚖𝚎𝚜/𝙳𝚊𝚢𝚜/𝚂𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚘𝚗𝚜

A quick explanation of how time works in this game:

Day cycle:

• A maximum day cycle is 20 in-game hours, going from 6 am till 2 am.
  
• You will faint after 2 am, so go to sleep on time.
  
• Opening a chest/menu etc pauses your clock (it will blink on the upper right of your screen). In multiplayer the game will never be paused, the time will continue.
  
• A 20h in-game day is equivalent to 14 minutes and 20 seconds (so its almost 43 IRL seconds per in-game hour)
  
• Spoiler after finishing the normal mines: Normal Skull cavern levels take 54 seconds instead of 43 for an hour.

Week Cycle:
Stores**:

Name	Regular days open
Marnie's ranch	Wednesday till Sunday
Carpenter's shop	Every day except for Tuesday
Fish shop	Every day except for Saturday when it's not raining
Pierre's	Every day except for Wednesday
Traveling cart	Friday + Sunday

**All shops (and buildings) are all closed on festival days.

TV channel days:

Name	Days streaming
Weather report	Every day; checks the weather for the next day
Fortune teller	Every day; checks the luck of this day
Living off the land	Monday + Thursday, tips about the game
The Queen of sauce	Wednesday + Sunday, Wednesdays are re-runs

引用自 Shibacoco：

Don't forget to check the TV on the right days, I'm still missing some Queen of sauce recipes

Season Cycle:

• One season is 28 days, so plan out your crops in these 28 days.
  
• On the Calendar you can see on what day an NPC their birthday is, and their yearly festival days.
  
• Winter is the only season crops won't grow (outside).

𝚃𝚒𝚙𝚜 𝚙𝚎𝚛 𝚜𝚔𝚒𝚕𝚕

Farming:

Veggies & Fruits

• Scarecrows are important, you don't want your crops to be eaten by crows. Check that every
  crop is in range of your scarecrow. ( recipe > farmer skill 1)
  
• Sprinklers exist and they can help you a lot with watering your crops so that you won't be
  exhausted in the early morning of energy depletion.
  
• Before a new season starts I always look up the profits a crop gives me so that I can buy the right seeds on day 1. I like to plan my days out but you don't really have to do it.
  
• At the Egg festival you can buy strawberry seeds for next year, strawberries bring good profit so it is recommended.
  
• Make a chest per season and put the veggies & fruits in there. I always put a max of 5 per crop in it. You never know when you need it for a quest or something else.

Animals:

• Animals live in a coop or a barn, coops are cheaper and the better starting building. The building is made by the carpenter shop, and the animals are bought by Marnie.
  
• Animals give better quality products if you pet them every day & give them food.
  
• Hold a piece of hay while holding right-click to pick up eggs to prevent the dialogue to start.
  
• There are two types of food you can give to the animals: grass and hay. The animals eat the grass by themselves if you let them outside. Hay you can buy from Marnie or store it in a Silo.
  
• Never sell your animal products straight, almost every product can be made into an artisan product (cheese, mayo).

引用自 Shibacoco：

Since update 1.6, grass will stay through the winter months! However, keep in mind that harvesting it will yield less hay than before. To make the most of it, build a silo to store the hay you collect from the grass using your scythe.

If you're running low on silos, you can always take advantage of the fodder port in your barn or coop. Simply empty the silo and stash the hay in a chest as a backup food source for when the silo gets depleted. A single full silo can only sustain up to 8 animals throughout the whole winter season

Foraging:

• Don't sell the forage items, most of them are good gifts for the NPC's. It is the easiest way to get relationship levels higher.
  
• Chopping the stumps of trees are mostly not worth it if you don't have enough energy, you don't get a lot of EXP and wood from it. Chop it when you have spare energy left.
  
• A Field snack is a handy crafting recipe for energy in year 1, it is made with 1 Acorn,1 Maple Seed and 1 Pinecone. You mostly have those in your inventory anyways when chopping wood.
  
• Salmonberries grow in spring 15-18 in a lot of bushes scattered around the map. Don't skip these days in year 1, if you get all the bushes in year 1 you can have 58 salmon berries per day. So optimally you can have 232 salmonberries in spring.
  
• The same situation is happening with blackberries in Fall 8-11. And lastly, during the last two weeks of fall, maple trees drop hazelnuts instead of maple seeds.

引用自 Shibacoco：

If you really want to optimize your salmonberries in year one, you can try to get foraging level 4 before berry season. you will pick up 2 berries instead of 1. A maximum of 464 salmonberries can be harvested. Salmonberries are good (jelly/wine) gifts, and for an easy snack for energy/health

Fishing:

• Most of the fishes appear at a specific time/place and season. So if you want a specific one, I recommend looking it up beforehand.
  
• The best tackle is the Trap Bobber, it's cheap and won't sabotage you while reeling it in (unlike other ones)
  
• Bait is made by bug meat, so never sell your bug meat and craft bait out of it.
  
• Hold bait while harvesting from crab pots to prevent accidentally picking them up & reloading them in one go.
  
• Some food makes your fishing level higher for a limited time, so eat those dishes when trying to fish harder-to-catch fish.

Combat & Mining:

• Always bring food with you, for health or energy.
  
• Pay extra attention to your health/energy/time when you're in the mines, sometimes I get too concentrated on mining/combat that I would forget the time.
  
• Holding C will allow you to spam weapon swings faster than manually clicking. This can make weapons such as daggers much more effective in combat.
  
• If you find yourself in a new level of the mines where it takes one more hit to break the stone: upgrade your pickaxe. It is a nice indicator of when to upgrade your pick.

𝙼𝚒𝚜𝚌𝚎𝚕𝚕𝚊𝚗𝚘𝚞𝚜

Some handy random tips:

• Holding down right-click for planting/harvesting crops instead of left-clicking makes everything faster and less tedious.
  
• Shift-click to buy an item gives you 5, ctrl-shift-click gives you 25. I mostly hold the button down, but this trick is handier than counting to 20.
  
• In multiplayer: staying in bed, while waiting for your coop partner to sleep recharges your energy slowly.
  
• Instead of clicking yes to a prompt, you can click on the Y key to say yes & ESC for no
  
• Don't donate your Dino egg immediately, it's a type of coop animal.
  
• The community centre icon will blink if you hover over an item that is still present in a bundle.
  
• You get a sashimi recipe from befriending Linus, Sashimi is super easy to make (one fish) and recharges a lot of energy.
  
• put the tappers on the bus-stop trees instead of your own farm.
  
• You can put hats on your horses
  
• If you lose your scythe, and you can't find anywhere. You will probably find it in the fridge.
  

[MissME0W]

this was so helpful! ty this guide :D

[DanDanDoom]

Nice guide owo

[Shibacoco]

I've gone through all the comments on this guide and made some updates to address the outdated information from version 1.6. I truly appreciate all the input! It's wonderful to see everyone's unique tips and the cooperation within this community! Thank you! (I wish I could tag you all...)

[SpaceGirl07]

Wow! Great guide. I have one small update, as one of your statements is outdated as of 1.6.
I am quite happy to announce that the grass does NOT disappear in winter anymore! However, if you scythe it, it gives you a lot less hay than if you were to harvest in other seasons. But it doesn't go away anymore! Yay!

[Surebrec]

tysm, i really needed this

[<3Starlight Wolf Goddess<3]

shiba coco do u got a mod list yet if so can u send me it pls and also teach me how to mod stardew valley bc idk how

[Cloudy]

great job :)

['Beluga']

i like the picture for the guide gib mod list :)

[olivia]

things i wish i knew: should've never married anyone but one person lo

[eadroime]

You can triple the cost of salmonberries and blackberries once you give the bear in the Secret Woods some maple syrup!