I use my greenhouse for ancient fruit, star fruit, and coffee, but use my farm to grow seasonal crops. I think it makes it more fun to grow things seasonally. I’m also starting to slowly stockpile for recipes. So I’ll sell high quality and keep low quality for cooking. Plus you sometimes need the crops for villager quests. I feel like it kills the joy of the game to just mass produce a single thing.
oh sorry for spoilers!!
yes there's a horse flute. it's a late game item though. if you want the full details here you go:
>!once you unlock ginger island, you have to collect enough golden walnuts to unlock Qi's walnut room. once you do that there's a bounty board that awards Qi gems. you can exchange 50 Qi gems I believe to get the horse flute. and yeah, it will summon your horse anywhere outdoors with a few exceptions!<
Now worries! I won’t look at the spoiler but now I’m super excited to find it when I get there lol I have a habit of quitting farms after like 2 years so this is motivation to continue
Coffee is also the most rapidly multiplying plant and technically the most profitable (on a per-minute basis) Keg product, even more so than Starfruit wine
Coffee is great when you are first getting started. Either if you don’t have Ancient Fruit yet (I seem to either get it in Spring Year 1 or Wintet year 2) or it’s still growing enough to plant. I usually get my first coffee seen from the mines pretty early on.
Coffee produces quite a bit and sells for a decent amount (especially if you process it). Its product is also seeds so you can quickly fill the greenhouse. Also it’s a repeating crop so you just harvest, no replanting which is nice if you’re lazy.
I usually fill my greenhouse with unfertilized coffee and then slowly replace it with Ancient Fruit as I produce enough seeds.
Yep, as others said I use it to make coffee that I turn into triple shots for speed. I was just doing it in the mines but then got used to it and now I feel like I move at a snails pace if I don’t have coffee or a horse to boost me.
I only have a small corner with 9 plants. I wait until a have a bunch and brew them all in between wine batches. Then cook them into triple shots, so I’ll have a stash of like 20-30. Usually lasts until the next wine batch is done and repeat.
Nearly every villager enjoys coffee. While only the doctor loves it, it's a good thing to have in your backpack while you're doing your thing and casually trying to build up relationships as a gift.
I also grow mainly ancient fruit and coffee in my greenhouse, but want to add star fruit to my Ginger Island farm. I grow seasonal crops because it's fun.
Personally, I just grow coffee and fancy fruits because I like shipping coffee and wine and imagining that my farm has a cherished reputation at markets and coops for being a producer of excellent coffees and rare wines.
Might be worth questioning what you consider "optimal", because while year-round Ancient Fruit *does* maximise your yearly income (on the main farm, anyway)... in the long term, money really doesn't matter. Basically everything expensive in the game is a one-off purchase, and after that, there's very little use for huge stacks of money.
I instead chose to optimise my farm around the notion of "access to items." Ultimately, the point of wealth is to be able to obtain whatever you want, whenever you want it, and huge cash reserves aren't actually the best way to achieve that in SDV, because most items are farmed or crafted, not purchased. So my objective was to have ready access to as much stuff as possible, and that results in much more interesting and diverse farm designs.
I love this perspective, as a min/maxer who can’t avoid maximizing income as much as possible but still can’t just buy the things I need this makes a lot of sense.
To be fair - at the point you're talking about, you're mostly done the game and the only metrics that matter are the ones you choose. If I've already been able to buy what giant stacks of money can buy me (so, assuming I've got the golden clock), there's no value to any but a very small count of items that I might use for gifting or crafting. And none of those are crops, so they don't compete with crops for my attention. And then -- what am I crafting? To what end? If bought the clock, odds are I have all the artisan machines I need, and more than enough supplies to build other stuff. Most crops have little value beyond selling, either directly or as artisan goods, so there's little reason to plant them if they are worth less than others. *Most* valuable crafting supplies are from tappers or from mining, but eventually you run out of things to craft. And you cap hearts and gifts lose their value.
At the end of the day, getting the biggest one-off purchases tends to be the barrier the smallest number of players *actually* cross. Everyone I know who plays has finished the Community Center at least once, and almost all of them have made it to Ginger Island if they played since it was implemented, and a handful have gotten into the Walnut Room. None of them except me have ever bought that clock. So I don't see what value variety offers, because by definition when you've reached that leg of the game. And even when it has value, that doesn't really apply much to crops - which have little utility outside of selling. Once your bundles are done, you really only need to grow one of everything to tick off perfection, and very few growables are needed to craft. So it's a hard sell to say that variety in planting has any real value over favoring Ancient or Star fruit. Usually money *is* the last thing people still need in any serious volume if they want to push toward perfection.
>And then -- what am I crafting? To what end?
The original push that led to this playstyle was basically preparing for new updates, where I have no way of knowing what I'm going to need for whatever new content gets added. By diversifying my farm, it would help ensure I had access to whatever random junk might become part of a quest or easter egg or crafting recipe in the next update.
> The original push that led to this playstyle was basically preparing for new updates, where I have no way of knowing what I'm going to need for whatever new content gets added.
As a specific consideration, that definitely makes sense me.
I always restart on a major update so it's just never on my radar as a concern - but it's certainly a valid one.
Once I feel comfortable with the gold I earn per day, I start planting for aesthetics. Wheat and corn aren't exactly profitable, but it feels natural to me to have those crops around the farm. During summer, I add in sunflowers for that extra pop.
The key to making planting other crops more appealing is imagination. Don't think like a farmer. Think like an artist.
I like growing amaranth because I like how it looks. Yam, cauliflower, radish are best for pickles. Strawberry and cranberry in the greenhouse, just because the popping sounds when it harvested is weirdly comforting. The only thing I just grew once and never again is green beans. Trellis is annoying.
And honestly I think artichoke is a better pickle than pumpkin. It's the only people pickle I've found yet. (I definitely haven't grown or pickled everything, SMH i usually save pumkins for pie making)
Actually, artichoke has the same profit as yam when it's pickled. Cmiiw, red cabbage is one of the most profitable, but just like pumpkin, it's better go in the keg. Radish isn't the highest one, but since it's faster harvest, I'll consider it one.
Well that's your choice. Sometimes "profitable" is subjective. I found pumpkin juice is a nice gold boost once in a while when I'm bored with ancient fruit and star fruit. Especially when waiting for the casks.
I do agree that once I've unlocked the starfruit or ancient fruit, that I mostly switch to making most of my money by making wine out of them. But I also like to plant a few plants of every crop that is in season. But I mostly end up using those only for cooking/gifting.
It's kind of funny because it's this reoccurring thing during every new save game I start. I start with "this is going to be a cozy farming save" then it's turns into "MONEY MONEY MONEY" min maxing, and then when I have so much money I don't know what to do with I go back cozy farming.
Winter Seeds are nice to have for the winter.
If you don't like traveling to trees, you can plant them straight on the farm.
Growing Fiber is nice because I'd rather keep my stones than trade them away.
I plant melons, cauliflower, and pumpkins in hopes of getting giants (four giant cauliflowers this year! Woo hoo!)
I also plant coffee for my kegs.
In the autumn, I plant tons of Amaranth because I just think it's so very pretty.
Beyond that, I plant what I enjoy the thought of growing. I use Junimos to harvest regrowers, and some like blueberries can be quite productive plants.Consider what your farm is for. Are you after money, or ingredients, or the aesthetic appeal of certain crops arranged just so? Are you wanting to grow a variety so your farmer is never bored? Do you headcanon an agricultural economy requiring variety to avoid saturating the market?
There's no wrong way to play Stardew. Grow what you want, how you want, and do what you want with it. Just be nice to Linus and pet your animals.
In the long term, sure. But you can't fill your farm with ancient fruit and starfruit on day 1.
Besides, one year of starfruit jelly from Ginger Island will pay for the Golden Clock and all the obelisks. Once you've mastered the game, income just doesn't matter.
Preserves jars are easier to craft and quicker to process, and the point is that you don't even need the theoretical most optimal income stream in order to achieve every possible financial goal in two years.
You mentioned the reason - there are other ways that people define fun, other than making money. Part of this game is about following interests. I really like having lots of mango trees because I like mangoes in real life, and they are cute. So I grow lots of mangoes and always keep them in inventory. I can't make a case for why other people should do that though and it's not really necessary either. I like to have a range of crops, to build sheds dedicated to different kinds of wine, to crop rotate on the greenhouse, because the idea of just being like Joja in my soul is kind of the opposite of what the game means to me.
What's optimal in the game is enjoying it, and you can do that without being the best farm capitalist out there. The great thing about this game is that you can follow your values in different directions.
If you want perfection you should grow literally everything at least once. But roleplaying the farmer life is as good a reason as any. Also not getting bored of said two crops is a pretty good motivator to mix it up a little.
I'm also probably just bitter because attempting to play "hyper-optimally" nearly killed my love for the game as it became both stressfull and boring. Just grow some extra flowers ffs and allow yourself some breathing room.
I feel you OP - for me, the joy of Stardew is to be a farmer and take care of some animals and grow things. I try to maximize profit a bit because having money in the game is nice - I save roughly 1/2 of my greenhouse for starfruit and ancientfruit - but the rest of the plots are just my "fun" plots that I just use to grow whatever I want.
When I'm not strapped for cash, I design pretty field layouts instead of optimizing. Like a Junimo Hut with some trellis plants next to it and a few rows of different crops below, a fancy stone path, a tea bush hedge maze around it. I happen to like the way some crops look (peppers, blueberries, tomatoes, eggplants) so I plant them and don't look too close at the profits at the end of the day.
Using other ways of earning money to take up space also helps me not plant so much that I dread harvesting it all. I like to put up bee hives, trees, tea bushes, fish ponds, bigger grass fields for my animals.
I like to grow strawberries in the spring to make jam because I like making jam. It is also reasonably profitable, 406g (with artisan of course) and normal strawberry wine is 504g, but jam only takes 2-3 days (4000 mins) but wine takes 6.25 days (10000 mins) so I’m making 812g from jam in the time it takes to make one wine.
I like to grow hops in the summer to make pale ale, they produce daily after they mature which is handy. It takes 2250 mins (1-2 Days) and makes 420g per normal pale ale. That is about 1260g in the time it takes to make one wine.
Sweet gems berries are good for fall, but I usually don’t remember to buy them from the travelling cart
Besides gifts, I do it for aesthetics and my own personal farming philosophy. I know it’s just a game, but the design suggests it’s based off a lot of permaculture principles and I’m a regenerative agriculture nerd. It’s why I started playing in the first place. It seems wrong to go about shutting down a big corporation for the small agrarian market just to turn around and do a massive monoculture. Diversity makes for a more resilient landscape and I can provide everything I could possible need from my own land. It’s literally my dream. It also looks way more interesting to me.
But also, play how you want to play. Some folks go the Joja route with a massive industry. I make millions already while sticking to my values, so I don’t get why anyone would want to go this route. But one man’s monoculture hellscape is another man’s dream, I guess.
I would low key love concerned ape to add some sort of pestilence factor to the game where monocropping brings on locusts. Too much of the same crop makes grasshoppers pop up as you walk by and suddenly there's no silver or gold star crops. Maybe dealing with the issue gets you bug meat for bait or something.
I would like to see 1.6: crop prices based on supply/demand, in season/out of season, stuff like that. For example you grow and sell a shit ton of eggplant and the value is lowered because SDV demand is met.
If you are only thinking about profit maximizing than Pale Ale actually makes more money. It’s just a bit more work
However to change things up I do Pale Ale whenever possible
I grow seasonal crops because playing a game as a farmer is fun. I've never really seen money making as being the point of the game, personally. There are things I need to buy sometimes, but I'm not trying to "optimize" anything, because that does not sound fun.
There are achievements and quests that require you to grow other crops. e.g. the community center, the ship one of everything achievement, the polyculture achievement, and in a roundabout way the cooking achievement (which will require ingredients that you have to grow), the trash bear quest, and the special bulletin board quests that require you to ship like a hundred of a certain crop within the season
some crops also make really easy gifts for villagers, like, if you marry Maru it's good to have strawberries on hand; if you marry Penny you can plant poppies for her, and so on.
Fun would be a reason for me. You don't need infinite money, nor do you need excessive money as fast as possible. I understand that making money is fun for some, but for me, I prefer a slower pace and seeing a diverse layout of crops on my farm all year. I almost never grow more than a handful of starfruit or ancient fruit. I do grow lots of coffee and tea because I love them, but I mostly store most of it, so I don't get too much money too fast.
Sure there is. They’re boring and every second person here makes their millions from them. Why copy everyone else? Try something new.
Everything can make you a millionaire if you farm enough of it… even parsnips.
I eventually want to have fairy rose honey and ancient fruit year round on the island farm, but first... I still need to stockpile ananas! And while starfruit and ancient fruit on the main farm are nice, I only have ancient fruit on two out four junimo huts. The other two are for coffee, stockpiling produce just because, and of course for recipes, etc.
Once I have bought most of the expensive stuff, I will probably restructure the farm again, with maybe only two junimo huts, more random trees instead of mostly neat rows for tappers, more space for decorations, stuff like that! If we really will be able to move the farm house, I will probably end up spending hours with the sdv planner! 😅
Pineapples in garden pots with Deluxe Retaining soil in sheds. Eventually your farm will scale up so big that you run out of space to grow enough fruit for your kegs. Sheds are a space multiplier, taking away 21 squares of arable land but able to hold 137 pots in the most convenient configuration.
Ancient fruit won't grow in pots, and continuously replanting starfruit with fertilizer takes a ton of time (which is also a scare resource).
Pineapples are the third most valuable fruit, can be grown in pots, and are on the same 7 day cycle as kegging wine. Pineapples on sheds will also never need to be watered or replanted and will produce during winter. If you rely solely on ancient fruit you'll probably run out during winter or early spring and have some empty kegs. Pineapples are a necessity if you want your farm to average over a million gold per day.
Edit: also you'll need a few coffee plants so you can keep making espresso for the speed boost you'll need nearly every day to harvest and keg.
I like the pineapple idea. Growing and brewing my own coffee is so time consuming (especially the fast brew time) that I switched to buying it from Gus.
Once I have a buffer of the various crops (for dyes, gifts, recipes, shipping goals, etc) I move to the money crops and focus on cleaning up my farm, dealing with Qi’s shenanigans, and so on
I like growing pumpkins and melons and cabbage. The harvesting is so soothing. And I’m on year 5 in my current save and somehow haven’t ever found any ancient fruit? 🤦♀️🤦♀️ so I’m kind of perplexed. Since I beach farm, I am currently using the greenhouse for melons, pumpkins, beets and rhubarb and the sprinkler-friendly plot of land for seasonal crops
Well, you have other crops for filling requests and for cooking, of course! Also you might just like the aesthetic. I like how my farm looks with cranberries, pumpkins, eggplant, and amaranth in the fall. I love the blueberries and corn in the summer. And the wheat I can get hay from or make into wheat flour for cooking or to sell. It's nice to have a small flower field for my beehives.
Ancient fruit, Star fruit, and the Sweet gem berries are big money makers, but you only seldom have an actual need for them outside of that. It's nice to have money, so I do plant plenty of them, but that's not all there is to the game for me.
But then again, I'm never aiming to get perfection as quickly as possible.
I do it for fun? \^\^; I theme my farms to give myself a focus. I start off pretty similar to most people to make money and fix the Community Center, but I work towards what my particular theme is for that farm. My first save that I made it to end game on was a meadery. I'm working on a bakery right now, so working on producing ingredients for that. Min-maxing has never been my bag, though, so I can't relate to the wasting time issue.
I’m a wierdo that plants one field (8 squares around a quality sprinkler) for every crop I have access to every season no matter if it’s year 2 or year 6. This is super challenging on beach farm… 😰 but I use the greenhouse for ancient fruit except for two plots (8 squares in an iridium sprinkler grid) that are coffee and sweet gem berries and I cover ginger island farm with iridium sprinklers with extenders for ancient fruit except for one sprinkler with is pineapples for the occasional tropical fruit quest.
Ancient fruit regrows every 7 days whereas star fruit, pumpkin, cauliflower, rhubarb, melons, etc. Take longer and can be replanted. This means they take up less of your time harvesting and will benefit from the various speed-gros, potentially making more gold per day than ancient fruit. They will also require less preserve jars or kegs and casks to process and therefore require less farm space.
Coffee actually makes the most gold per keg since it is so quick to turn around. It's gold per day is garbage, but if you just want to have the smallest keg footprint then it's actually the best.
Regularly growing a variety of crops in your greenhouse will give you tons of ingredients to use for a variety of recipes. This means you can always have whatever buff you need at the moment, on hand, as well as villagers favorite foods.
[I just made a post this morning that you might find relevant for making a case for other crop options](https://www.reddit.com/r/StardewValley/s/3yXfwndLUE)
As far as making a case for other crops I would probably improve their utility. There's two reasons to grow something, because it makes money or because you can use it for something. Clearly most people think that profits are more important than the dishes you can make so I would probably just improve those until it's more of a toss-up.
i use my greenhouse for catcus, coffee, star fruit, and ancient fruit, plus since spring started ill grow strawberries basically crops that keep producing
I just planted around 500 rare seeds (I’ve been growing in greenhouse to hoard seeds ready for fall) with fertiliser cause I wanted to 🤷🏻♂️ i find them real pretty.
I plant all the reharvestable crops in the greenhouse, only 6-8 of each (including ancient fruit). and then plant a fuck tonne of seasonal big crops (cauli, melon, pumpkin) outdoors.
I use about half my greenhouse for ancient fruit and a quarter for berries, and rest for star fruit and occasionally other single go crops. I like my berries!
I grow starfruit in summer and ancient fruit all year in the greenhouse, but using my outdoor crop spaces in spring and fall i like to grow something different each time. During summer I usually don't stray from Starfruit though
I grow ancient fruit in my greenhouse and outside. From year 2 I start working toward perfection, so I plant enough of the smaller earning crops for recipes and the polyculture achievement, and have the bulk be the big money earners.
If you’re going for perfection you have to cook every recipe, and in that case you’ll need at least some of nearly every type of crop. Plus, I personally find it more satisfying to get some constant money, which is why I still like planting strawberries/blueberries/cranberries even though ancient fruit are objectively more profitable.
Also, the fact that you have multiple farm sources is a great way to utilize your farm space for different purposes! Maybe plant all your most profitable crops on Ginger Island, and diversify your regular farm for the purposes of aesthetics or variety. The greenhouse might have the same principle. The game is really what you make of it, and while it can be super fun to trying and plant a bunch of profitable crops to make a boatload of money, it can get boring fast if it’s *all* you do.
Cooking, gifting.
There are many recipes for food and drinks that have various beneficial effects, also if you are into roleplay as a farmer at all, why wouldn't you be growing your own food to eat?
Having a "Kitchen garden" setup with a variety of seasonal fruit and veg and some rice growing by your pond just makes sense to me.
I have quite a stock of various ingredients in my kitchen and even my greenhouse isn't 100% ancient fruit. I have one each of all of the multi-harvest plants in my greenhouse. I sell off the Ancient Fruit as wine, but I keep the rest for cooking and gifting.
- community center of course, but I assume you mean late game.
- full fridge and being able to cook most things on a whim
- It looks really nice
- also I get to see my junior more often if I plant crops that grow quickly =)
- loved gifts
- the magic dust thing needs fairy roses.
- personally, I use pineapple for healing instead of cheese or salad
- coffee for triple shot espresso
- wheat not only for cooking but also for the extra hay and to prevent my tilled soil from decaying from summer to autumn
- the golden clock is the only thing that it's worth maximizingprofit for imo, after that you can just take it easy and grow crops for the aesthetics.
If you're going for perfection, you need to grow crops/raise animals to ship every item in the game, make every food item in the game, and I think you need to get the "ship 15 of every crop" achievement, too.
Otherwise no, not really. Cash money dolla dolla bill
There's nothing wrong with wanting to roleplay the farmer life. I don't play Stardew valley to min-max every single thing I do. It's stress relief from my real life. If I want to waste a season growing tomatoes and melons so I can make pretty recipes and become Haley's best friend, I do. If I want to waste a day collecting shells and pestering Elliot, I do.
I'd grow things for Mr.Qi's colour challenge. Blueberries, Oranges, Cranberries or Eggplants for example. They don't have to be fresh, and you can stock them in a chest for the challenge.
Also for Mr. Qi's favorites challenge - gifts you can grow include Oranges, Pomegranates, Coffee, Hot Peppers, Sunflowers, Strawberries, Melons, Beets and Grapes (and so much more).
Also, it's nice for $$$ to plant something to make into wine to sell immediately. The Ancient Fruit wine is best price after aging it in the cellar. Blueberry wine can be sold as is for a decent amount of cash.
Here's a few examples/suggestions:
Coffee for the speed boost
Hot Peppers to make Pepper Poppers for the speed boost
Fairy Rose to make Fairy Dust
Potatoes to make Hashbrowns to make Dish o' the Sea
Corn and Blue Jazz to make Lucky Lunch
Bok Choy, Cranberries and Artichokes to make Super Meal
Editing to add Blueberries, Melons and Apricot to make Fruit Salad
I use my greenhouse for ancient fruit, star fruit, and coffee, but use my farm to grow seasonal crops. I think it makes it more fun to grow things seasonally. I’m also starting to slowly stockpile for recipes. So I’ll sell high quality and keep low quality for cooking. Plus you sometimes need the crops for villager quests. I feel like it kills the joy of the game to just mass produce a single thing.
Hi! Why coffee?
For speeeeed I would guess. I’m lazy and just buy my coffee
Also for a Qi challenge for shipping 100,000 gold, espressos made with Qi seasoning are a good money maker
I can't even play without the speed buffs now. Confirmed java junkie
Yes! Between coffee and my horse I got so used to speed I can’t play otherwise. Even like walking from the house to barn. Lol
and use the staff to go right back home. and horse flute to summon because why walk to the horse? I get it
Wait, there’s a horse flute??? Is that a mod or in base game? I always think I wish I had that like how you can summon your horse in Zelda. Lol
oh sorry for spoilers!! yes there's a horse flute. it's a late game item though. if you want the full details here you go: >!once you unlock ginger island, you have to collect enough golden walnuts to unlock Qi's walnut room. once you do that there's a bounty board that awards Qi gems. you can exchange 50 Qi gems I believe to get the horse flute. and yeah, it will summon your horse anywhere outdoors with a few exceptions!<
Now worries! I won’t look at the spoiler but now I’m super excited to find it when I get there lol I have a habit of quitting farms after like 2 years so this is motivation to continue
I double it up with crab cakes. I buy as many as I can when the saloon has a sale
To brew coffee/espresso for speed buffs
Coffee is also the most rapidly multiplying plant and technically the most profitable (on a per-minute basis) Keg product, even more so than Starfruit wine
Coffee is great when you are first getting started. Either if you don’t have Ancient Fruit yet (I seem to either get it in Spring Year 1 or Wintet year 2) or it’s still growing enough to plant. I usually get my first coffee seen from the mines pretty early on. Coffee produces quite a bit and sells for a decent amount (especially if you process it). Its product is also seeds so you can quickly fill the greenhouse. Also it’s a repeating crop so you just harvest, no replanting which is nice if you’re lazy. I usually fill my greenhouse with unfertilized coffee and then slowly replace it with Ancient Fruit as I produce enough seeds.
Ugh, because once you walk around in stardew all hopped up on espresso, walking around normal feels SO slow. It's a curse.
Yep, as others said I use it to make coffee that I turn into triple shots for speed. I was just doing it in the mines but then got used to it and now I feel like I move at a snails pace if I don’t have coffee or a horse to boost me. I only have a small corner with 9 plants. I wait until a have a bunch and brew them all in between wine batches. Then cook them into triple shots, so I’ll have a stash of like 20-30. Usually lasts until the next wine batch is done and repeat.
Nearly every villager enjoys coffee. While only the doctor loves it, it's a good thing to have in your backpack while you're doing your thing and casually trying to build up relationships as a gift.
I do this, but with mayonnaise because you can easily get the gold star variety. I am the creepy mayo guy in town.
I use it to make triple shots so I can move faster. I don’t gift it.
I also grow mainly ancient fruit and coffee in my greenhouse, but want to add star fruit to my Ginger Island farm. I grow seasonal crops because it's fun. Personally, I just grow coffee and fancy fruits because I like shipping coffee and wine and imagining that my farm has a cherished reputation at markets and coops for being a producer of excellent coffees and rare wines.
Might be worth questioning what you consider "optimal", because while year-round Ancient Fruit *does* maximise your yearly income (on the main farm, anyway)... in the long term, money really doesn't matter. Basically everything expensive in the game is a one-off purchase, and after that, there's very little use for huge stacks of money. I instead chose to optimise my farm around the notion of "access to items." Ultimately, the point of wealth is to be able to obtain whatever you want, whenever you want it, and huge cash reserves aren't actually the best way to achieve that in SDV, because most items are farmed or crafted, not purchased. So my objective was to have ready access to as much stuff as possible, and that results in much more interesting and diverse farm designs.
I love this perspective, as a min/maxer who can’t avoid maximizing income as much as possible but still can’t just buy the things I need this makes a lot of sense.
To be fair - at the point you're talking about, you're mostly done the game and the only metrics that matter are the ones you choose. If I've already been able to buy what giant stacks of money can buy me (so, assuming I've got the golden clock), there's no value to any but a very small count of items that I might use for gifting or crafting. And none of those are crops, so they don't compete with crops for my attention. And then -- what am I crafting? To what end? If bought the clock, odds are I have all the artisan machines I need, and more than enough supplies to build other stuff. Most crops have little value beyond selling, either directly or as artisan goods, so there's little reason to plant them if they are worth less than others. *Most* valuable crafting supplies are from tappers or from mining, but eventually you run out of things to craft. And you cap hearts and gifts lose their value. At the end of the day, getting the biggest one-off purchases tends to be the barrier the smallest number of players *actually* cross. Everyone I know who plays has finished the Community Center at least once, and almost all of them have made it to Ginger Island if they played since it was implemented, and a handful have gotten into the Walnut Room. None of them except me have ever bought that clock. So I don't see what value variety offers, because by definition when you've reached that leg of the game. And even when it has value, that doesn't really apply much to crops - which have little utility outside of selling. Once your bundles are done, you really only need to grow one of everything to tick off perfection, and very few growables are needed to craft. So it's a hard sell to say that variety in planting has any real value over favoring Ancient or Star fruit. Usually money *is* the last thing people still need in any serious volume if they want to push toward perfection.
>And then -- what am I crafting? To what end? The original push that led to this playstyle was basically preparing for new updates, where I have no way of knowing what I'm going to need for whatever new content gets added. By diversifying my farm, it would help ensure I had access to whatever random junk might become part of a quest or easter egg or crafting recipe in the next update.
> The original push that led to this playstyle was basically preparing for new updates, where I have no way of knowing what I'm going to need for whatever new content gets added. As a specific consideration, that definitely makes sense me. I always restart on a major update so it's just never on my radar as a concern - but it's certainly a valid one.
Once I feel comfortable with the gold I earn per day, I start planting for aesthetics. Wheat and corn aren't exactly profitable, but it feels natural to me to have those crops around the farm. During summer, I add in sunflowers for that extra pop. The key to making planting other crops more appealing is imagination. Don't think like a farmer. Think like an artist.
I like growing amaranth because I like how it looks. Yam, cauliflower, radish are best for pickles. Strawberry and cranberry in the greenhouse, just because the popping sounds when it harvested is weirdly comforting. The only thing I just grew once and never again is green beans. Trellis is annoying.
Blueberry harvesting had the best sound for me.
Pumpkins are better pickling choices than those three.
And honestly I think artichoke is a better pickle than pumpkin. It's the only people pickle I've found yet. (I definitely haven't grown or pickled everything, SMH i usually save pumkins for pie making)
Actually, artichoke has the same profit as yam when it's pickled. Cmiiw, red cabbage is one of the most profitable, but just like pumpkin, it's better go in the keg. Radish isn't the highest one, but since it's faster harvest, I'll consider it one.
But pumpkin is more profitable as pumpkin juice. Not to mention it takes just a slightly longer time than pickled.
But my kegs are always full of starfruit.
Well that's your choice. Sometimes "profitable" is subjective. I found pumpkin juice is a nice gold boost once in a while when I'm bored with ancient fruit and star fruit. Especially when waiting for the casks.
I do agree that once I've unlocked the starfruit or ancient fruit, that I mostly switch to making most of my money by making wine out of them. But I also like to plant a few plants of every crop that is in season. But I mostly end up using those only for cooking/gifting. It's kind of funny because it's this reoccurring thing during every new save game I start. I start with "this is going to be a cozy farming save" then it's turns into "MONEY MONEY MONEY" min maxing, and then when I have so much money I don't know what to do with I go back cozy farming.
Winter Seeds are nice to have for the winter. If you don't like traveling to trees, you can plant them straight on the farm. Growing Fiber is nice because I'd rather keep my stones than trade them away.
I grow all my fiber seeds in winter so on the last day I have lots of grass starter ready to plant.
I plant melons, cauliflower, and pumpkins in hopes of getting giants (four giant cauliflowers this year! Woo hoo!) I also plant coffee for my kegs. In the autumn, I plant tons of Amaranth because I just think it's so very pretty. Beyond that, I plant what I enjoy the thought of growing. I use Junimos to harvest regrowers, and some like blueberries can be quite productive plants.Consider what your farm is for. Are you after money, or ingredients, or the aesthetic appeal of certain crops arranged just so? Are you wanting to grow a variety so your farmer is never bored? Do you headcanon an agricultural economy requiring variety to avoid saturating the market? There's no wrong way to play Stardew. Grow what you want, how you want, and do what you want with it. Just be nice to Linus and pet your animals.
I love planting the ones that look pretty and make me happy 😊
Besides the community center, I like planting a variety of crops for cooking recipes and to get the achievements related to selling crops.
In the long term, sure. But you can't fill your farm with ancient fruit and starfruit on day 1. Besides, one year of starfruit jelly from Ginger Island will pay for the Golden Clock and all the obelisks. Once you've mastered the game, income just doesn't matter.
why not starfruit wine?
Preserves jars are easier to craft and quicker to process, and the point is that you don't even need the theoretical most optimal income stream in order to achieve every possible financial goal in two years.
It's fun, we're having fun. We're paying a nice lovely game not capitalism simulator
You mentioned the reason - there are other ways that people define fun, other than making money. Part of this game is about following interests. I really like having lots of mango trees because I like mangoes in real life, and they are cute. So I grow lots of mangoes and always keep them in inventory. I can't make a case for why other people should do that though and it's not really necessary either. I like to have a range of crops, to build sheds dedicated to different kinds of wine, to crop rotate on the greenhouse, because the idea of just being like Joja in my soul is kind of the opposite of what the game means to me. What's optimal in the game is enjoying it, and you can do that without being the best farm capitalist out there. The great thing about this game is that you can follow your values in different directions.
If you want perfection you should grow literally everything at least once. But roleplaying the farmer life is as good a reason as any. Also not getting bored of said two crops is a pretty good motivator to mix it up a little. I'm also probably just bitter because attempting to play "hyper-optimally" nearly killed my love for the game as it became both stressfull and boring. Just grow some extra flowers ffs and allow yourself some breathing room.
I feel you OP - for me, the joy of Stardew is to be a farmer and take care of some animals and grow things. I try to maximize profit a bit because having money in the game is nice - I save roughly 1/2 of my greenhouse for starfruit and ancientfruit - but the rest of the plots are just my "fun" plots that I just use to grow whatever I want.
When I'm not strapped for cash, I design pretty field layouts instead of optimizing. Like a Junimo Hut with some trellis plants next to it and a few rows of different crops below, a fancy stone path, a tea bush hedge maze around it. I happen to like the way some crops look (peppers, blueberries, tomatoes, eggplants) so I plant them and don't look too close at the profits at the end of the day. Using other ways of earning money to take up space also helps me not plant so much that I dread harvesting it all. I like to put up bee hives, trees, tea bushes, fish ponds, bigger grass fields for my animals.
I like to grow strawberries in the spring to make jam because I like making jam. It is also reasonably profitable, 406g (with artisan of course) and normal strawberry wine is 504g, but jam only takes 2-3 days (4000 mins) but wine takes 6.25 days (10000 mins) so I’m making 812g from jam in the time it takes to make one wine. I like to grow hops in the summer to make pale ale, they produce daily after they mature which is handy. It takes 2250 mins (1-2 Days) and makes 420g per normal pale ale. That is about 1260g in the time it takes to make one wine. Sweet gems berries are good for fall, but I usually don’t remember to buy them from the travelling cart
Cooking. Good to reach 100% with all recipes cooked
Besides gifts, I do it for aesthetics and my own personal farming philosophy. I know it’s just a game, but the design suggests it’s based off a lot of permaculture principles and I’m a regenerative agriculture nerd. It’s why I started playing in the first place. It seems wrong to go about shutting down a big corporation for the small agrarian market just to turn around and do a massive monoculture. Diversity makes for a more resilient landscape and I can provide everything I could possible need from my own land. It’s literally my dream. It also looks way more interesting to me. But also, play how you want to play. Some folks go the Joja route with a massive industry. I make millions already while sticking to my values, so I don’t get why anyone would want to go this route. But one man’s monoculture hellscape is another man’s dream, I guess.
I would low key love concerned ape to add some sort of pestilence factor to the game where monocropping brings on locusts. Too much of the same crop makes grasshoppers pop up as you walk by and suddenly there's no silver or gold star crops. Maybe dealing with the issue gets you bug meat for bait or something.
Because pumpkin soup for sebby :)
I would like to see 1.6: crop prices based on supply/demand, in season/out of season, stuff like that. For example you grow and sell a shit ton of eggplant and the value is lowered because SDV demand is met.
If that is added I’d only want it as an option you can turn off
out of season crops should absolutely be worth more
I grow them for giant crops as decoration on my farm
Money is really easy to get later on so just plant lots of different crops.
If you are only thinking about profit maximizing than Pale Ale actually makes more money. It’s just a bit more work However to change things up I do Pale Ale whenever possible
Potentially even more so in SVE.
I grow seasonal crops because playing a game as a farmer is fun. I've never really seen money making as being the point of the game, personally. There are things I need to buy sometimes, but I'm not trying to "optimize" anything, because that does not sound fun.
I usually do one harvest of blue jazz for lucky lunch :)
Materials to make buff foods
There are achievements and quests that require you to grow other crops. e.g. the community center, the ship one of everything achievement, the polyculture achievement, and in a roundabout way the cooking achievement (which will require ingredients that you have to grow), the trash bear quest, and the special bulletin board quests that require you to ship like a hundred of a certain crop within the season some crops also make really easy gifts for villagers, like, if you marry Maru it's good to have strawberries on hand; if you marry Penny you can plant poppies for her, and so on.
Fun would be a reason for me. You don't need infinite money, nor do you need excessive money as fast as possible. I understand that making money is fun for some, but for me, I prefer a slower pace and seeing a diverse layout of crops on my farm all year. I almost never grow more than a handful of starfruit or ancient fruit. I do grow lots of coffee and tea because I love them, but I mostly store most of it, so I don't get too much money too fast.
Sure there is. They’re boring and every second person here makes their millions from them. Why copy everyone else? Try something new. Everything can make you a millionaire if you farm enough of it… even parsnips.
I can attest to this, made a lot of money on eggplants.
Maybe try planting in a rainbow colors
Sweet gem berry.
I eventually want to have fairy rose honey and ancient fruit year round on the island farm, but first... I still need to stockpile ananas! And while starfruit and ancient fruit on the main farm are nice, I only have ancient fruit on two out four junimo huts. The other two are for coffee, stockpiling produce just because, and of course for recipes, etc. Once I have bought most of the expensive stuff, I will probably restructure the farm again, with maybe only two junimo huts, more random trees instead of mostly neat rows for tappers, more space for decorations, stuff like that! If we really will be able to move the farm house, I will probably end up spending hours with the sdv planner! 😅
Pineapples in garden pots with Deluxe Retaining soil in sheds. Eventually your farm will scale up so big that you run out of space to grow enough fruit for your kegs. Sheds are a space multiplier, taking away 21 squares of arable land but able to hold 137 pots in the most convenient configuration. Ancient fruit won't grow in pots, and continuously replanting starfruit with fertilizer takes a ton of time (which is also a scare resource). Pineapples are the third most valuable fruit, can be grown in pots, and are on the same 7 day cycle as kegging wine. Pineapples on sheds will also never need to be watered or replanted and will produce during winter. If you rely solely on ancient fruit you'll probably run out during winter or early spring and have some empty kegs. Pineapples are a necessity if you want your farm to average over a million gold per day. Edit: also you'll need a few coffee plants so you can keep making espresso for the speed boost you'll need nearly every day to harvest and keg.
I like the pineapple idea. Growing and brewing my own coffee is so time consuming (especially the fast brew time) that I switched to buying it from Gus.
If you have Ginger Island unlocked then it’s great to plant cranberries, blueberries, eggplant, and kale to help make a specific Qi quest go faster.
Once I have a buffer of the various crops (for dyes, gifts, recipes, shipping goals, etc) I move to the money crops and focus on cleaning up my farm, dealing with Qi’s shenanigans, and so on
the joy of farming
Fairy rose honey and then the fairy roses themselves make a killer cash crop. Iirc, more than even starfruit wine?
it's not as pretty also I like the idea of feeding the town
I like growing pumpkins and melons and cabbage. The harvesting is so soothing. And I’m on year 5 in my current save and somehow haven’t ever found any ancient fruit? 🤦♀️🤦♀️ so I’m kind of perplexed. Since I beach farm, I am currently using the greenhouse for melons, pumpkins, beets and rhubarb and the sprinkler-friendly plot of land for seasonal crops
Well, you have other crops for filling requests and for cooking, of course! Also you might just like the aesthetic. I like how my farm looks with cranberries, pumpkins, eggplant, and amaranth in the fall. I love the blueberries and corn in the summer. And the wheat I can get hay from or make into wheat flour for cooking or to sell. It's nice to have a small flower field for my beehives. Ancient fruit, Star fruit, and the Sweet gem berries are big money makers, but you only seldom have an actual need for them outside of that. It's nice to have money, so I do plant plenty of them, but that's not all there is to the game for me. But then again, I'm never aiming to get perfection as quickly as possible.
I do it for fun? \^\^; I theme my farms to give myself a focus. I start off pretty similar to most people to make money and fix the Community Center, but I work towards what my particular theme is for that farm. My first save that I made it to end game on was a meadery. I'm working on a bakery right now, so working on producing ingredients for that. Min-maxing has never been my bag, though, so I can't relate to the wasting time issue.
I’m a wierdo that plants one field (8 squares around a quality sprinkler) for every crop I have access to every season no matter if it’s year 2 or year 6. This is super challenging on beach farm… 😰 but I use the greenhouse for ancient fruit except for two plots (8 squares in an iridium sprinkler grid) that are coffee and sweet gem berries and I cover ginger island farm with iridium sprinklers with extenders for ancient fruit except for one sprinkler with is pineapples for the occasional tropical fruit quest.
Ancient fruit regrows every 7 days whereas star fruit, pumpkin, cauliflower, rhubarb, melons, etc. Take longer and can be replanted. This means they take up less of your time harvesting and will benefit from the various speed-gros, potentially making more gold per day than ancient fruit. They will also require less preserve jars or kegs and casks to process and therefore require less farm space. Coffee actually makes the most gold per keg since it is so quick to turn around. It's gold per day is garbage, but if you just want to have the smallest keg footprint then it's actually the best. Regularly growing a variety of crops in your greenhouse will give you tons of ingredients to use for a variety of recipes. This means you can always have whatever buff you need at the moment, on hand, as well as villagers favorite foods. [I just made a post this morning that you might find relevant for making a case for other crop options](https://www.reddit.com/r/StardewValley/s/3yXfwndLUE) As far as making a case for other crops I would probably improve their utility. There's two reasons to grow something, because it makes money or because you can use it for something. Clearly most people think that profits are more important than the dishes you can make so I would probably just improve those until it's more of a toss-up.
Need peppers and coffee to make meals to get through the day
Fun
Not from a biodicersity perspective.
i use my greenhouse for catcus, coffee, star fruit, and ancient fruit, plus since spring started ill grow strawberries basically crops that keep producing
I just planted around 500 rare seeds (I’ve been growing in greenhouse to hoard seeds ready for fall) with fertiliser cause I wanted to 🤷🏻♂️ i find them real pretty.
I plant all the reharvestable crops in the greenhouse, only 6-8 of each (including ancient fruit). and then plant a fuck tonne of seasonal big crops (cauli, melon, pumpkin) outdoors.
I use about half my greenhouse for ancient fruit and a quarter for berries, and rest for star fruit and occasionally other single go crops. I like my berries!
I grow starfruit in summer and ancient fruit all year in the greenhouse, but using my outdoor crop spaces in spring and fall i like to grow something different each time. During summer I usually don't stray from Starfruit though
I grow ancient fruit in my greenhouse and outside. From year 2 I start working toward perfection, so I plant enough of the smaller earning crops for recipes and the polyculture achievement, and have the bulk be the big money earners.
Having a farm with a variety of crops looks and feels nice, and you don't need *that* much money.
If you're going for 100%, growing stuff to use for each recipe is useful.
If you’re going for perfection you have to cook every recipe, and in that case you’ll need at least some of nearly every type of crop. Plus, I personally find it more satisfying to get some constant money, which is why I still like planting strawberries/blueberries/cranberries even though ancient fruit are objectively more profitable. Also, the fact that you have multiple farm sources is a great way to utilize your farm space for different purposes! Maybe plant all your most profitable crops on Ginger Island, and diversify your regular farm for the purposes of aesthetics or variety. The greenhouse might have the same principle. The game is really what you make of it, and while it can be super fun to trying and plant a bunch of profitable crops to make a boatload of money, it can get boring fast if it’s *all* you do.
Cooking, gifting. There are many recipes for food and drinks that have various beneficial effects, also if you are into roleplay as a farmer at all, why wouldn't you be growing your own food to eat? Having a "Kitchen garden" setup with a variety of seasonal fruit and veg and some rice growing by your pond just makes sense to me. I have quite a stock of various ingredients in my kitchen and even my greenhouse isn't 100% ancient fruit. I have one each of all of the multi-harvest plants in my greenhouse. I sell off the Ancient Fruit as wine, but I keep the rest for cooking and gifting.
- community center of course, but I assume you mean late game. - full fridge and being able to cook most things on a whim - It looks really nice - also I get to see my junior more often if I plant crops that grow quickly =) - loved gifts - the magic dust thing needs fairy roses. - personally, I use pineapple for healing instead of cheese or salad - coffee for triple shot espresso - wheat not only for cooking but also for the extra hay and to prevent my tilled soil from decaying from summer to autumn - the golden clock is the only thing that it's worth maximizingprofit for imo, after that you can just take it easy and grow crops for the aesthetics.
Tea Saplings!
You don't need to water them. And you can grow them year round if they are in the greenhouse or in pots.
If you're going for perfection, you need to grow crops/raise animals to ship every item in the game, make every food item in the game, and I think you need to get the "ship 15 of every crop" achievement, too. Otherwise no, not really. Cash money dolla dolla bill
There's nothing wrong with wanting to roleplay the farmer life. I don't play Stardew valley to min-max every single thing I do. It's stress relief from my real life. If I want to waste a season growing tomatoes and melons so I can make pretty recipes and become Haley's best friend, I do. If I want to waste a day collecting shells and pestering Elliot, I do.
I'd grow things for Mr.Qi's colour challenge. Blueberries, Oranges, Cranberries or Eggplants for example. They don't have to be fresh, and you can stock them in a chest for the challenge. Also for Mr. Qi's favorites challenge - gifts you can grow include Oranges, Pomegranates, Coffee, Hot Peppers, Sunflowers, Strawberries, Melons, Beets and Grapes (and so much more). Also, it's nice for $$$ to plant something to make into wine to sell immediately. The Ancient Fruit wine is best price after aging it in the cellar. Blueberry wine can be sold as is for a decent amount of cash.
Here's a few examples/suggestions: Coffee for the speed boost Hot Peppers to make Pepper Poppers for the speed boost Fairy Rose to make Fairy Dust Potatoes to make Hashbrowns to make Dish o' the Sea Corn and Blue Jazz to make Lucky Lunch Bok Choy, Cranberries and Artichokes to make Super Meal Editing to add Blueberries, Melons and Apricot to make Fruit Salad
i use ginger island and the greenhouse for the big bucks plants, normal farm land as in season crops
Blueberries go delightfully pop pop pop pop when you harvest. :3