DARK RANGER'S HARVEST MOON DS GUIDE Good day and welcome to my guide about harvest moon DS. It's Darkranger again and I am writing on harvest moon DS this time. Okay, the nickname is corny as all get out, but there is a long story behind it that I don't want to share here. Anyway as many of you know, the game was just released the second week of September and there aren't too many guides out for it yet. I have been playing it quite a bit since I bought it and I am starting to get a little ways into the game. So, I thought I would throw this guide together to help everyone out a little bit. If you would like to contribute any information that can be accurately verified, please feel free to email me at the address listed in the legal section at the bottom of the guide. Several of my friends and siblings have also purchased the game and we have learned quite a bit about how to find the harvest sprites and some other useful information between us. This guide will be a work in progress which means that I will update it as more information becomes available. So, without further ado here we go. !Again thanks to everyone who sends information along for the guide. This work would not be possible without all your contributions. I really appreciate your input into it. 0. Updates ------------------------------- This is just another section that I am adding to keep track of the progress of the guide as it develops. Listed below are the version numbers and the updates made during each one. v 1.00 The original version of the guide. I released this about a week after I got the game. I had enough information to provide a little useful information, but nothing all that special except the quick start mining trick. It contained basic information on crops, animals, tools, some of the buildings, how to find several of the harvest sprites and a quick section about the copy write and contact information available for the guide. v1.01 After another week or two of play, I found quite a bit more about the game. I decided it was time for an overhaul to update the existing sections of the guide with the new information I have available, and it was also time to add some new sections that I finally have enough information to construct. I added the mining and home shopping sections and updated the crops, tools, animals, and building's sections. V1.02 Another much needed update. I am adding a couple of new sections this time and finally adding some of the email input to the game. Keep it coming. Also, a new section this time is an Analytical look at harvest moon. If you have some time on your hands and want to see what makes the game tick inside have a read over it. Sorry its so long but it is a complex topic that needs explaining and exploring. I have also updated most of the major sections with new information and added the credit do some others whom without this guide would not be possible. Additionally, I added some new sections including the much requested marriage section and an outline of how to hire the sprites and their casino games. Keep the submissions coming. V1.03 Another week and another update. The guide is finally starting to take its final shape. I added a four more new sections this time on the information I had available and updated a couple of older sections. The guide is finally starting to take its final shape now that most of the major sections are in place. I will continue to update them as more information becomes available. I will also begin working on the walkthrough in the near future as well as the family life. v1.04 Another much needed update to the guide. This time I added several new sections including recipes, fishing, resource management, accessories, and a FAQ. Additionally, I updated several older sections slightly. We now have all the harvest sprites and how to unlock them and I finished updating the price list for the home shopping network. All the major sections of the final guide are now in tact except for the walkthrough, which I plan to start working on soon. This will be the last major update to the guide for a while. The walkthrough will take some time and I need to get deeper into the game before I can write a complete one. I will update some of the other sections as information becomes available periodically. But, I won't be adding any more new sections until I have a child or finish the walkthrough. Keep the emails coming thanks to everyone who contributed. You have made this guide a success. v1.05 Well, we have another update to this growing guide. I have done quite a few corrections this time. I have also update several sections including information on animals and tools. I have also finished the marriage section, though I still need to write one on family life once I have a family. I am married currently and expecting a child in about a season. I also added a section about the remaining town's people and their likes and dislikes. Finally, I got around to starting on the walkthrough for the game. It is located as the last section down below. The walkthrough is currently in it's beginning stages, but there is still some useful information there so take a look. This guide has come a long way from my original intentions of just sharing some useful information about the game. But, were getting there. Thanks to everyone who contributed to the guide keep the emails coming. I also converted the guide to a website format at . Check it out if you want to. v1.06 Hello again everyone. Another couple of weeks and another update to the ever popular growing guide of harvest moon DS. This is a simple update in contrast to the last few of them. I am adding only one new section which, deals with events in the game. I have been playing a few other games and got away from harvest moon DS for a while, but I am back now. I am also expanding the several existing sections of the guide with new information. Finally, I am redoing my legal agreement do to the confusion I have been receiving in emails over the last month. If you submitted something or are hosting this guide please take a look at the updated and revised legal section concerning the new rules. Not much has changed, but I wanted to be a little more precise this time. Also, I finished the first season in the walkthru in case anyone would like to look at it. v1.07 Well, another month gone by and another update to my growing and popular guide to harvest moon. I am sorry that it took so long, but I have been busy with the holidays recently. I have added quite a bit to the guide this time. I updated the crops, animals, and harvest sprite sections of the guide with new information and correcting the names of the harvest sprites. I also updated the marry the mermaid section and added some names to the Thanks and Acknowledgements sections. The credit given there is long overdue. If I missed you, send me an email stating what I owe you credit for. I apologize in advance if I missed you. New to the guide this time are a couple of new sections. First, I finally got around to writing the section on the 4th mine in the mining section. I am also adding a new section to the guide similar to the marry the mermaid section of the guide. This is a section to acknowledge the players who reach the bottom floor of the third mine. See the mining section and the new section "Explores of the 4th mine" for details. Also, the walkthru is now done through year 2. That required most of my typing time. I will add more to the guide in the near future. Thanks to everyone who helped make this guide such a great success. Also, check out the coming soon section to see what is up next. I still need information about families and the various children. v1.08 Well, another month gone by and another update to the guide. However, this will be the second to last update to the guide. I plan to do a final release once I have finished correcting errors and rearranging a few things for looks in a few months. To hear more about that, read the in conclusion section at the bottom of the page. Don't worry, I will still answer emails about the game after the guide is complete. As for this update, several sections have been updated or completed. The walkthru section is now down and I added the family life and in conclusion sections to the guide. I have also added updates to the Building, Mining, Glitches, and Thanks and Acknowledgements sections of the guide. Take a look around and let me know what you think take care guys until next time. Table of Contents: ------------------------------ Sections: 0. Welcome and Updates 1. Crops 2. Animals 3. Tools 4. Buildings 5. Unlocking the Harvest Sprites 6. The Harvest Sprite Casino and Medal System 7. Mining 8. Marriage 9. Shopping Network and Other Items. 10. Fishing 11. Resource Management 12. Accessories 13. Cooking and Recipes 14. Quick Start Mini Guide 15. The People of the Valley 16. Festivals and other events 17. Legal Stuff and Contact Info 18. Email questions I will not answer 19. Thanks and Acknowledgements 20. Linking to Harvest Moon Friends of Mineral Town 21. Frequently asked Questions (FAQ) 22. Glitches and secrets. 23. An Analytical Look at Harvest Moon 24. Marry the Mermaid 25. Coming soon 26. Website Version of the Guide 27. Family Life 28. Explores of the 4th mine. 29. Walkthrough 30. In conclusion 1. Crops ------------------------------------- Crops are nothing new to the harvest moon series. They are one of the best ways to make money early in the game and they can provide you with a multitude of income later in the game. Crops come in two varieties, ground crops and trees. You can buy ground crops from either the supermarket or Vesta's farm. However, you can only get trees from Vesta's farm. In order to grow crops, you need to have both the hoe and the watering can. The process is the same as it has been in the last few harvest moon games. I am going to cover the basics and provide some information on crops and profits in this section. Later, I will provide you with which crops to grow to make the most of your time and effort. For now just go with the one with the highest profit margin. The profits assumes that you harvest the bag once, but some crops regrow so, you can harvest them multiple times and make more money. Ground crops: These are the crops that you plant in the ground and they grow for one season and die off. Note, grass seed is the exception because it grows for multiple seasons and years. In order to grow on of these crops you need to take the how and plow a 3X3 area and sow a bag of seeds over it. You should also leave one space between the areas, so that you can reach all of the plants, unless you want to use the harvest team to gather the crops for you. You might also want to leave one of the outer spaces on the pattern blank so you can reach the middle crop until you get the silver watering can or better. This way you don't have to wait for the middle crop to finish growing if you want to plant the same plot of land multiple times. If you are growing a renewable crop, you probably won't harvest the center plant until later anyway. You need to water the crops for the specified number of days and then you can pick them and ship them or sell them to Van for a profit. They can also be used as cooking ingredients or as gifts. Trees: You can purchase tree sees from Vesta's farm and plant them anywhere you could grow crops. To prepare the area, plow out a 2X2 area with the hoe. Stand in the upper left hand corner of the plot and spread the seeds over the area. Make sure you leave one space all the way around the outside of the tree. Once the tree matures, nothing will be able to grow in that area anyway. You cannot plant trees right next to each other. You need to water the tree everyday until it becomes a saporling. Afterwards, you just need to let the tree grow. It takes several seasons for a tree to mature and bear fruit. Trees will only bear fruit during a specific season. They will bear fruit every couple of days, which you can ship or cook with. Generally, trees require less maintenance once they become saporling, but ground crops yield a better profit in the long run. Crop Grow time Regrow time Shipping price 1 Bag Harvest price ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Spring Crops Turnip 5 days none 60g 540g Potato 8 days none 80g 720g Strawberry 9 days 2 days 30g 270g Cucumber 10 days 2 days 60g 540g Toy Flower 13 days none 130g 1170g Cabbage 14 days none 250g 2250g Summer Crops Onion 8 days none 80g 720g Tomatoes 10 days 2 days 60g 540g Corn 15 days 3 days 100g 900g Pumpkin 15 days none 250g 2250g pineapple 21 days 5 days 500g 4500g Pink Cat FL. 7 days none 70g 630g Fall Crops Spinach 6 days none 80g 480g Sweet Pot 6 days 2 days 100g 900g Carrot 8 days none 120g 1080g Pepper 8 days 2 days 40g 360g Eggplant 10 days 3 days 80g 720g Magic Red fl 11 days none 200g 1800g Peach 250g Banana 200g Orange 200g Apples 100g Grapes 200g Grass grows in all seasons but winter and regrow every 15 days or so to make fodder for building or animal feed. You can plant any of the ground crops or trees anywhere on the map including your farm or any of the other fields available around the town. I have noticed that the crops will grow at a different rates in different areas. The table above list the time it takes for them to grow on your farm. The take another day to grow if you plant them in the many fields located around the main part of the city. They will grow one day faster if you plant them in the fields located near the waterfall in front of the dig sit. Crops will grow the fastest if you plant them in the secret field behind the waterfall. You need the Legendary Swords from the second mine to break the rocks blocking your way to the waterfall cave field. Regardless of location crops sell for the same price everywhere. Crops also have multiple levels. Crops begin at level one and can go quite high, I haven't found the upper bound on them yet, but I know they go above 10 levels. Higher level crops will ship for a lot more than their lower level counter parts. For example, level 1 sweet potatoes sell for 100g each, while level 10 sweet potatoes sell for around 8000g each. As you can see, leveling up seeds can quickly lead to a higher profit margin. However, this takes quite a bit of work to achieve. The process to obtaining higher level sees is quite simple in nature, but it takes a great deal of patience and time to achieve. The process is described in detail below. Raising the level of crops is very simple, all you need to do is plant multiple bags of seeds on the same 9 squares of land overtop of each other. The seeds you plant all need to be at the same level, and you need to plant at least two bags in order for them to advance a level. You simply water and harvest the crops in the manner described above as you normally would. However, when you pick the crops, there is a reasonable probability that some of the crops you harvest will have increased one level above their standard seeds. The more bags of seeds you plant on an area, the better chance each particular crops has of increasing one level in value. Planting multiple bags of the seeds that you buy from the store will yield level two crops. Unfortunately, this is as far as you can go with the crops from the store. To advance their levels higher, you need to purchase the seed maker from the black smith. The seed maker costs 20000g and requires a piece of admit from the third mine to construct. It takes several days like upgrading a tool does, and it is then delivered to your farm. You need to purchase a maker shed before you can buy it from the black smith. You can read more about finding admit in the mining section and the shed in the building section. The seed maker allows you to turn harvested crops into bags of seeds at a 1 to 1 ratio. The transformation is instantaneous. Each crop you put in will yield a bag of seeds equal to the level of the crop. For example, a level 2 crop yields level 2 seeds. You can then take these new seed and plant multiple bags of them on the same plot of land to increase the crops one more level. Then, you can repeat the process to grow higher level crops. However, this is a time consuming process, because each time you do it you have to start growing the crops all over again. It takes several game years, so be patient with it. The secret waterfall field can be a big help here, because seeds grow faster their than on the normal farm. I will add the profit increase equation later when I break it down. Another interesting thing about crops is the ability to grow giant versions of crops in the game. I have only had this happen to me twice so far, but it's a neat addition to the game. Sometimes when you plant a bag of crops, a giant version will grow and take up for spaces on the screen. These larger crops seem to be random and rare in nature. If you are luck enough to have one, on the day that it is ready to harvest Thomas comes over and offers to take it off your hands. If you accept, you will view a short cut scene where the harvest sprites from mineral town come over and take it. Then you will find that it shipped out for several thousand dollars the next day. I don't have any idea what causes it, but it's just another neat addition to the game. As far as strategy goes, I am still out on that one. I would recommend getting your crops to the highest level you can because their shipping prices seem to grow at a geometric rate. Try to focus on crops with a short growing time and a fast regrow period regardless of price. This will allow you to upgrade their level quickly, and it will also allow you to get multiple harvests out of higher level crops without having to regrow them from seeds every time. Unlike previous games, growing speed will ultimately determine the best profit margin unless you get all the crops to the highest available level. If you have two different crops, and they are two levels apart, the higher level crop will sell for more than the lower level one. So, you want to focus on speed over shipping value. I would recommend sticking with strawberries, tomatoes, and yams for the time being. I will add more on this as the guide develops. Just another quick update, I now have the equation for the shipping prices of the leveled up vegetables. I just needed about 10 levels or so to see what it was. The shipping price for a leveled up crops is: base price * level ^ 2 Where the base prices is the shipping prices of a level 1 version of the crop and the level is the level of the seeds. For example, if I wanted to know the shipping price of a level 19 yam then I would go the following calculation. The shipping price of a level 1 yam is 100g from the table above and the level in this case is 19 so the shipping prices would be: baseprice * level^2 =baseprice * level * level =100 * 19 *19 =100 * 361 =36100g So, as you can see from this example it is pretty easy to figure out the shipping price of an upper level crop. You can multiply the result by 9 to get the shipping prices of a bag of leveled up crops. As you can see here, crops are the key to making money in the game. For example if we look at a level 100 yam it would sell for 100^3 = 1000000g, so a bag of level 100 yams will ship out for 9 million dollars. If you planted say 100 bags of level 100 yams you would make almost a billion dollars for one harvest of yams and you can harvest them 13 times in one season. It would take about 4 game years of leveling up seeds to get the quickest growing ones to level 100, but by then you should have pretty good money anyway. The Basement: The basements are another way that you can grow crops in the game. It is a useful addition to your house, because it allows you to grow crops out of season. This will allow you to upgrade your crop levels quicker than just growing crops in their own season. In order to build the basement you need to have the second house upgrade purchased. You can have up to three floors to the basement. Each floor is like the first except that the first is the only one that has a watering hole in it. In order to grow some thing in the basement, you need to have the appropriate season's sun. You can find them in the third mine and the process is well outlined in the mining section of the guide. You simply place the sun on the box on the appropriate floor and plant the crops as you normally would above ground. Multiple levels will allow you to grow crops from different seasons at the same time. The costs and construction of the basements are located in the building sections. Trees: Trees are another good source of income in that they produce fruit that you can sell or use for cooking. Trees require less maintained than ground crops and will produce fruit year after year once they mature. They can also be upgraded like ground crops, but it takes a long time because they require a long time to grow. To plant a tree, till a 2x2 area of ground and stand with the seeds in the upper left hand corner of the formation. Keep in mind, that nothing will grow in the squares surrounding a tree. So, plan your planting carefully and give them plenty of room. You can buy tree seeds from Vesta's shop for between 800g and 3000g each. Once the seeds are sown, you will need to water them for about two weeks until they grow into a saporling. Once a tree reaches the saporling state, you can stop watering it and it will mature on its own. It take two seasons for a tree to mature and another one before it will bear fruit. A tree will blossom one season before it will bear fruit. Banana and orange trees bear fruit in the summer and apple, grape, and peach trees bear fruit in the fall. A tree will bear one piece of fruit every other day. Trees really don't provide as good of a profit margin as ground crops do, however they are low maintenance because all you need to do is pick them. The fruit from trees is used in several of the recipes and make good gifts for people around town. Trees take too long to grow to upgrade them effectively. Tress will not bear fruit in the basement or behind the waterfall. 2. Animals ------------ Like all of its predecessors, Harvest moon DS. has a wide variety of animals that you can keep on your farm in order to make money and have. However, a few things have changed from the previous games. This time, you don't start with barns for most of the animals you get. You have to build your own before you can buy animals. See the building's Section for the price and requirements to construct the buildings. The wood cutter will make all of them for you if you have the right amount of money and material. The game's touch screen also adds a more impressive interface with the touch panel gloves to caring for the animals. You can now pet, milk, and wash your animals with the tough panel gloves rather than only the other tools if you prefer. Just a side note, I prefer to focus on Crops rather than animals, so I haven't kept track of how long it takes them to mature. It takes a week or two for them to grow into adult form and start producing milk, eggs and wool, ect. I will provide you with the information that I have available. You can move your animals outside on days with nice weather if you want too. If there out on rainy weather or in a hurricane or blizzard they will often get sick. This will also happen if you forget to feed them inside. If they are outside for several hours, chickens and ducks will find food on their own and cows will eat mature grass if there is any. Otherwise you will need to return them to the barn and give them food in their food box. Cows and sheep eat fodder which you can grow or buy from yodel ranch. Chickens and Ducks eat bird feed which you can buy from the poultry farm. If your animals get sick, you can cure them with animal medicine, otherwise they will die after a few days. Note, I usually leave my animals inside and just feed them. That way they won't get sick unless their is a storm. You can have only a limited number of animals on your farm. Each animal requires a shed to live in. Each shed holds a total of 4 animals. You can have a total of 7 animal sheds which means you can have a total of 28 animals at any given time. Note, you also need a pond to buy ducks. You can get new animals by buying them from one of the farms or having the ones you have reproduce. You can get a new chicken by placing an egg in an incubator and letting it hatch. This is cheaper than buying them from the farm. It takes 3 day for a bird to hatch and a week for it to mature into an adult. I don't really know how long it takes cows and sheep to reproduce. It's better to just buy them as adults from the ranch. The miracle potions only save you 1000g and they end up tying up one of your mature animals for a few weeks. During that time period it still needs to each but won't produce anything. So, they end up costing you more money than they are worth. Listed below are the types of animals and some information about them Dog: You start with the dog and give him a name at the games beginning. You can throw him or pet him with the touch panel gloves to raise his affection rate. Also, you can train him with the ball that Thomas gives you on the first day. He will play fetch with you. Supposedly, he will chase away wild dogs from your land at the end of the day. Otherwise, he is pretty useless. Cat: You also begin the game with the cat. It can be picked and thrown and petted with the touch gloves. It's basically a worthless animal. I just ignore it because it severs no probative value. Horse: Tanaka brings you a horse after you ship about 1200 items through a shipping box. You can pet it with the touch gloves and brush it with the brush. You can ride it around the valley, which is faster than walking, but slower than the teleport stone. It can also be used to ship items anywhere in the valley. Chickens: They are bought from the poultry farm or hatch from eggs. Chickens need to be feed bird feed once a day. They can be thrown or petted with the touch gloves to increase their affection rating. As their affection increases, the quality of their eggs will also increase. Small eggs sell for 50g, medium for 60g and large for 100g. Ducks: Ducks are similar to chickens in every way accept they cost more to buy and require a pond before you can purchase them. However, their eggs sell for more than chickens do. Small 80g, medium 100g and large 150g. Ducks will only lay eggs every other day. You can also purchase a manoise maker to increase the selling value of eggs slightly. It is made by the blacksmith with adamant from the third mine for 20000g. Or, you can use oil to make it in the kitchen. I don't have the maker's yet, so I will disclose their shipping prices in a future version of the guide. Cows: you buy cows from the yodel ranch for 5000g each. They need to be feed fodder once a day and you can brush them and talk to them to increase their affection ratings. You can milk them when they mature with either the touch panel glove or the milker. The selling value of their milk increases with their affection rating. small 100g, medium 150g, large 200g. you can also get makers for cheese and yogurt to increase profits slightly. Sheep: Sheep produce wool that you can sell and have to be shorn once a week. They eat and have their affection increased like cows do. You can use the touch panel gloves to wash and shear them, or you can shear them with the clippers. The wool sells as follows small 100g, medium 400g, and large 500g. There is also a yarn maker to increase their selling prices slightly. The selling value of animal produce increases along with the affection rating of the animal. You can make an animal happier by brushing it, talking to it, and taking it outside. You can also use the touch panel minigames to increase the level of the products produced by sheep and cows by scoring high on the minigames. Birthing new animals: You can have your animals give birth to off spring in several ways. This is required to unlock several of the harvest sprites later in the game. To have a chicken or a duck reproduce, you simply need to put one of their eggs in the incubator located in the bird shed. It takes a 3 days to hatch and a week to become a productive adult. Sheep and cows are a little more complicated. You need to impregnate them with a miracle potion from the yodel ranch. Then you need to walk up to the animal you want to make pregnant and use the potion on it. The next day the animal will be moved to the special pregnant box in the barn. You will need to put feed in the special box while the animal is pregnant or it will become sick. Sheep and cows stop producing milk and wool while their pregnant. It takes 3 weeks for a baby to be born and another week to grow into an adult. Afterwards, it takes another week before it will start producing milk or wool. This is a waste of time and money in the game when it comes to cows and sheep. It is more beneficial to just buy adult animals to begin with. However, your sheep or cows need to reproduce 15 times to unlock one of the sprites. Baby animals gain affection faster than their parents do. The animal festival: There is an animal festival each season other than the winter for a particular type of animal. You can only enter one animal in each festival each year. In order to win the festival you need to have 9 to 10 affection hearts on your animal. If you win your animal will increase one level and the products it produces will sell at a higher value. Additionally, your animal's offspring will also start at the same level as its parent. This can be used to increase the productivity value of your animals on the farm. The animals start on level 1 and go all the way to 100 supposedly. You cannot level up a particular animal more than once. Upgrading the milker and sheers: One thing that I recently found is that the milker and sheer's can upgrade to higher levels. You can do this by milking or sheering your animals with the touch panel gloves. They will increase slowly over time. As they do, they can actually generate 99 milk or wool per sheering or milking. They can also raise the selling price of product several levels which ship for more money. Fences and Keeping Animals Outside: If you keep your animals outside in good weather, it will increase their affection and allow them to feed themselves rather than forcing you to do it. Chickens and ducks will find food on their own after being outside for about 5 hours. The Cows and Sheep can graze if you have mature grass for them to eat. You need to be careful though, because there are several things that can harm your animals outside. The first is the weather. If it is going to be a rainy or snow day outside the next day you should put your animals back in the barn to avoid having them get sick. Using the bell and the red cloak can help you herd them back in and out of the barn. You should never leave cows or sheep out during the winter because there is no grass for them to eat during that season. You should also keep your animals fenced in outside. You can use either processed lumber, stone, or gold lumber for this purpose. You can also use rocks or branches that are not collected to make natural fences. They work just as well. Fencing the animals serves two purposes. First, it keep the animals where you can find them so that you do not have to wander all over your farm if you want to put them back in the barn. The second purpose this serves is that it protects them from the wild dogs that can visit your farm in the evening. If the wild dogs get to your animals, they can cause them to get unhappy or sick. However, fences will keep them away from the animals. Also, leaving your dog outside late at night will help to keep the wild dogs away. A thanks goes out to ROKER2000 who prompted me to include this information in the guide. That is all there is to the animals in the game. It is really the traditional system with the added features of being able to level up animals and the touch panel mini games. Overall, Natsume really outdid themselves this time. 3. Tools --------------------------------- Tools allow you to perform work on the farm such as clearing the land, watering crops, caring for animals, or gathering resources. They are of cardinal importance to the game. Listed below are a description of the tools I have accumulated so far and their purposes and upgrades. You can only upgrade the six main tools in the game. Many of the tools such as the brush and milker don't have upgrades and only function at the first level. To upgrade a tool, you need to gather ore from the first mine and contact the black smith. The levels of upgrades are as follows: copper 1000g 1 day silver 2000g 2 days gold 3000g 3 days mystrile 4000g 4 days In addition to having the required ore and money to upgrade the tool, you also need to have worked the tool to a certain experience level by using it repeatedly or performing work with it. In order to upgrade a tool, you need to call Gary and Sabina when the blacksmith is open, 11:00 to 4:00 except Thursdays and holidays, and provide them with the ore and money. You cannot upgrade a tool if you lack the experience to do so. You can view your current experience by touching your character's head portrait on the progress report screen. The days are cumulatively spent but the money is not. For example, it only takes one day to go from silver to gold level, but it still costs 3000g to upgraded the tool. So, you may want to go straight to mystrile to avoid wasting money. Be aware that while a tool is being upgraded, you will not be able to use it. To use a tool at a higher level, hold down the Y button and release it at the desired interval. Using a tool at a higher level burns more stamina and fatigue, but it generally does more work than using the tool at the first level repeatedly would. Tool List Hoe: You begin the game with this tool in your possession. It can till soil to prepare it for planting or be used to dig in the mines. It begins by tilling one square in front of you. Each level you advance it up to mystrile will increase the number of squares tilled in front of you in a straight line by one. You can only till one square at a time in the mine or dig site. The Blessed hoe tills three rows by 5 squares. The mythic level does 5 rows by 10 squares in front of you. Axe: You begin with the axe at the beginning of the game. It is used to chop tree branches and stumps to gather lumber. At first you can only cut branches with it. Increasing its level allows it to cut stumps by charging it up multiple times. The higher the level you have, the less swings it takes to break a stump into lumber. The mystrile axe can cleave a stump in one chop. The blessed and mythic levels allow you to cut all the branches and stumps around you in one swing. The mythic axe has the longest reach. Watering Can: The watering can is used to water your crops. It can be filled at any body of water or the watering hole on your farm. The number of squares it holds and waters depends on its level. material capacity waters Iron 30 1 square in front of you copper 45 3 squares in front of you silver 60 6 squares in front of you gold 90 9 squares in front of you Mystrile 150 15 squares in front of you blessed 255 54 squares in front of you mythic 255 252 squares in front of you Hammer: You begin the game with the hammer and it has several uses. It can break rocks to acquire stone for building. If you upgraded it, the hammer can break boulders and even larger rocks into stone for building material. Like the axe, the more you upgrade the hammer, the more few swings are required to destroy boulders. The blessed and mythic levels allow you to break all the rocks around you in one swing. This includes the very large stones by the mine, but not by the waterfall or on top of the hot springs. You can also use the hammer to dig though rocks in the mine and unplowed plowed land. Sickle: You begin the game with the sickle. The sickle is used to cut weeds and mature grass to make fodder. As you upgrade it, it will cut more spaces. material cuts iron 1 space in front of you copper 2 spaces in front of you silver 6 spaces in front of you gold 9 spaces in a arc around where you are standing mystrile 2 rows around where you are standing Blessed 6 rows around where you are standing Mythic 9 rows around where you are standing Fishing Pole: To acquire the fishing pole, go to Galen and Nina's house around noon on a Saturday. You will view a short cut scene where Galen found an old fishing rod and is passing it onto you. The fishing rod allows you to catch fish in any body of water on the map. The more you upgrade it, the better the quality of fish that you can catch with it. The blessed and mythic fishing poles allow you to catch higher level fish. The mythic rod fully charged can catch pirate treasure and fossils. The are found on the beach during the summer and fall respectively and ship for 10000g and 5000g respectively. The following tools cannot be upgraded. Brush: You can buy it from the blacksmith. You can use it to brush your horse, sheep and cows to increase their affection rating. Milker: This is also bought from the black smith. It allows you to milk your cows with or without the touch panel gloves. Shears: These are purchased from the blacksmith and allow you to shear the wool from your sheep to harvest it. Bell: You also purchase this from the blacksmith. When you ring it, it calls all of your sheep and cows to where you are standing. It comes in handy for moving them inside and outside quickly. Touch Panel Gloves: You can purchase these from either of the animals farms for 1000g. They allow you to interact with your animals on the touch screen. You can pet the dog, can, horse, chickens cows, sheep and ducks to increase their affection with them. They allow you to wash your animals to increase their affection rating by equipping them at the same time as the brush. They allow you to milk your cows by combining them with the milker. Finally, the allow you to shear your sheep by equipping them with the sheers. The touch panel gloves are a basically a minigame that you can use to increase the affection rating of your animals based on your score with them. They will also yield higher level produce if you are proficient at the minigames with them. Seeds: These are purchased from either the supermarket or Vesta's farm. They vary in price and grow into crops that you can sell. See the crops section for details. Animal Medicine: This can be purchased from any of the animal farms. It cures an animals sickness when you forget to feed them or leave them out in the rain. They keep sick animals from dying, so its a good idea to keep some on hand. Miracle Potions: There are two types, one for the cows and one for the sheep. These allow you to have your mature animals have offspring. They are pretty self explanatory. Use them next to the animal and it will become pregnant. It takes a few weeks to give birth during which time your animal won't produce items to ship. Legendary Sword: The legendary sword is found on the 255 floor of the second mine after you clean out all the monsters on the bottom floor. You need to have at least one of your tools to the mystrile experience level before you can get it. You don's have to have the tool upgraded, you simply need enough experience to upgrade it. The sword is used to destroy the large rocks blocking the way to the secret field behind the waterfall. You can destroy them by equipping the sword and walking up next to them. Next, just push the A button and you will trigger a short scene that will destroy the rocks. The sword is also useful as a weapon in the mines and can be used to cut weeds, grass, and crops. I have found some of the cursed tools. They are located on various floors in the third mine. The requirements to find and upgrade them can be located in the mining section. 4. Buildings --------------------------------------- As the game progresses and you upgrade your farm, there are several buildings that you can buy from Gotz the wood cutter. You need them to store materials and to house your animals. You cannot buy animals for your farm until you have sheds to house them in. So, buildings are a very important part of building your farm up. You can place an order for a building over the phone like you would to order any other service. Gotz is available from 11:00 am to 4:00 pm and is closed on Saturdays and holidays. You can only have him constructing one building at a time and it usually takes him two days to construct anything. So plan your time carefully when you order buildings and expand the farm. You can build each of the available buildings out of any one of four different materials with a few exceptions. You can either gather the material for the building yourself, or you can buy it from Gotz or the Yodel farm if you want fodder buildings. You can also use any material besides fodder to make fences to keep your animals in and wild dogs away from them on the farm. Fodder is the cheapest building material but it is also the least sturdy. You can buy it from yodel farm or grow and harvest grass. Fodder buildings are relatively cheap to construct, but they can also fall apart in rainy or even sunny weather. The only benefit is their cheap cost. Next, you can build structures out of wood. They are a little more expensive than fodder buildings, but they can hold up in most normal weather situations. However, they can still sustain damage in a hurricane or blizzard. You can obtain wood by cutting trees and stumps or by purchasing it from Gotz. Be aware that any animals in a building are killed if a building collapses so choose a good building material. Here are their purchase prices. fodder 20g lumber 50g stone 200g gold lumber 100000g The third and probably most economic option is stone. Stone is very strong and will only risk sustaining damage in a heavy storm with a small possibility. It offers stability and is still an affordable option. You can obtain stone by purchasing it or by breaking stones and boulders with the hammer. The final choice is to build things out of Gold Lumber. Gold lumber is indestructible, but at 100000g a piece it really isn't affordable. You can buy it from Gotz or complete Thomas's winter request to get one piece. Listed below are all of the buildings I have found to date and their uses and costs. You can only have one of any specific building unless its and animal or a bird shed. In that case you can have a combined total of 7 of the two of them, which allows you to have 28 different animals. Overall, stone is the best building choice if you can afford it. I have included a table that show the number of pieces and the costs to expand purchasing the materials and providing them yourself. House: You begin the game with a small house and you can expand it twice. Your house is indestructible and constructed of lumber. You cannot expand it using other materials. Once you unlock the second harvest sprite channel, and buy a few items from the TV shopping network. The option to expand your house becomes available from Gotz. You can expand your house twice, which is necessary to open new items to buy from the home shopping network. You need to buy the table before you can get the first upgrade and the kitchen before you can buy the second. It is also required to get married later in the game. House Upgrades provide own material purchase from Gotz 1st upgrade material required 200 stone 33000g 43000g 2nd upgrade material required 700 stone 115000g 150000g Bird and Animal sheds: These buildings are required to house your animals on the farm. They are basically the barns from the previous harvest moon games. Each of them can hold up to four animals and come with a place to feed them. Bird sheds hold ducks and chickens while animal sheds hold sheep and cows. They also each have a place to retrieve feed if you have a silo and an indoor shipping bin. The Bird sheds also have an incubator where you can place eggs to increase the number of birds you have. You can have a total of 7 sheds for a total of 28 animals. Material Provide your own Buy it from Gotz Bird shed requires 420 pieces of material. fodder 500g 8900g lumber 5000g 26000g stone 10000g 94000g gold lumber 100000g 42100000g Animal shed requires 500 pieces of material fodder 680g 10680g lumber 6800g 31800g stone 13000g 101300g gold lumber 130000g 50130000g Silo, Lumber, Stone, and Gold Lumber storage: These small structures each holds a specific type of material you gather. The silo holds fodder and the rest of them hold what their name implies. You can put material in them and remove it when needed. Basically they just give you a place to store material outside of your ruck sack. Each of them requires 100 pieces of material to build Material Provide your own Buy it from Gotz Silo, Lumber, Stone shed fodder 200g 2200g lumber 2000g 7000g stone 4000g 24000g gold lumber 40000g 10040000g Gold Lumber shed fodder 3000g 4000g lumber 20000g 25000g stone 40000g 60000g Gold lumber 100000g 10100000g Mushroom Shack: The mushroom shack is another little building that you can get from Gotz. The shed allows you to plant and grow mushrooms similar to the wild ones you find in the fall. The process is pretty simple. Inside the shed, there are several platforms. You need to place a piece of lumber on each of them and then you need to plant mushroom seeds on them. Next, you need to water the mushrooms for about two weeks, when they will first start to grow. The type of mushrooms you get are vary from the toadstools to the truffles. Once you harvest them, if you continue to water them they will regrow at a much faster rate than their initial growing time. Basically, it's just another way to get a renewable crop to grow. A thanks to Kayla D for the information provided here from her email. It requires 320 pieces of material to construct Material provide your own Buy it from Gotz fodder 1000g 7000g lumber 10000g 25000g stone 35000g gold lumber 200000g 30200000g Pond: The pond allows you to buy and raise ducks on your farm. It also allows you to store the fish you catch. Finally, it is a requirement of you want to Mary Leila the Mermaid. It can only be made from stone and requires 600 pieces and 100,000g if you provide the material and it costs 220,000g if you buy the stone from Gotz. Maker Shed: This shed allows you to store the makers that you can purchase from the black smith. Each maker costs 2000g and requires adimante from the third mine and three days to make. They will increase the shipping value of your crops and animals produce or allow you to make seeds out of your crops. You need the second house upgrade and an animal barn to purchase the maker shed. Once the shed is built, you can buy makers from Gary. They cost 20000g and require 5 days each to make. They also require a piece of adimante to construct from the third mine. The maker's allow you to ship items for higher profits or cooking. Then important one is the seed maker that allows you to upgrade your seed levels. It requires 360 pieces of material. Material provide your own Buy it from Gotz fodder 5000g 10200g lumber 30000g 48000g stone 60000g 132000g gold lumber 600000g 36600000g Basement: The basement allows you to grow crops out of season. You need the appropriate seasons sun from the third mine to grow crops. You also need the second house upgrade to purchase it. I don't recommend building it out of anything but stone, because the losses of your crops will be devastating if it collapse. The second and third basement will also be destroyed if the first falls. You need the second house upgrade before you can buy it. It requires 400 pieces of material and costs 400000g to build from stone if you buy the material from Gotz. The second and third upgrades each take 999 pieces of stone to buy and cost 950,000g and 3,200,000g to build respectively. They are the same as the first basement except they lack a watering hole. Having more than one basement will allow you to grow more crops or crops from different seasons at the same time. The Cottage: The cottage is a building that you can have constructed on the island once you buy it from Thomas. See the glitches and secrets section about acquiring the island. The cottage is bear except for a bed and small table. You can spend the night there if you wish, but it really serves no other purpose other than making the island look nice. The prices of constructing it are given below. Thanks goes out to hiya_who_r_u for bringing it to my attention that this building was not in the guide and collecting the prices for me. The prices listed include the costs of the material purchased from gotz. It takes 999 pieces of material to construct and two days to build. fodder 1020000g lumber 10050000g stone 20200000g g. lumber 300000000g I am now sure that all the buildings are included in the guide you can have a total of 28 if them in all. Thanks to everyone who helped with this section of the guide. 5. Unlocking Harvest Sprites ---------------------------------------- The harvest sprites were sent to another world by the witch princess in order to look for the harvest goddess. You can bring them back by doing various things on the farm and return them to your world. Some of them require you to do a specific task several times while others just require you to stand examine a specific square. Anyway you look at it, it takes a lot of work to get them all back. It is rather unlikely that you will find them all, but you should try to return all of them that you can. It takes 60 of them to find return the harvest goddess, and you have to find all of them in order to Mary her. Additionally, the harvest sprites can help you work on your farm. In order to get them to work, you need to go to their tree and talk to Guts their leader. You can then hire a team to help you on your farm for a couple of day to do a specific task. In order to hire a team, you need to have medals to exchange for their services. You can buy medals from Roller at 10g each or you can gamble them up playing poker, black jack, or a memory game when you unlock the dealers for each of the game. Roller also runs a shop that you can exchange medals for items and Jet runs a shop at the tree that sells some other useful nick knacks. Also, the harvest sprites function at the new TV on the submenu with channels about everything you can learn about farming. Overall, they are one of the main objectives of the game and make it a lot easier to play and enjoy. Listed below are all the sprites we have found so far and what is needed to find them. Let me know if anything is incorrect. I will be listing the harvest sprites by their team. You need to find 60 harvest sprites to unlock the harvest goddess and some are easier than others. A very special thanks goes out to ExpertatFF for the additional sprites he has provided. I added a few more of my own. Thanks to everyone who contribute. We now have them all. Note: Examine means to push the A button while facing the edge of the indicated object. Casino/Store team Guts: Leader of harvest sprites in charge of hiring out groups. Unlock: He is around from the begging of the game. Jet: He runs the store that sells various items in exchange for money. Unlock: Examine the crate on the second floor of the inn where Van has his shop Roller: Sells medals for money and exchanges medals for items Unlock: Cross the bridge to Vesta's farm on the 8th of spring. Jackie: Keeps you from leaving the valley Unlock: Try to leave the valley by taking the path leading to mineral town Tep: He is the Black Jack Dealer at the Casino Unlock: Examine the chimney thing outside inner inn in the fenced off area Jum: He is the memory game dealer Unlock: Examine the front of the fountain in front of the villa. Hops: He is the poker dealer. Unlock: Examine the well next to the bar. Baby: The white harvest sprite, he can be given gifts to up his affection towards you. Unlock: Examine the large pot to the left of the harvest sprite counter in the tree after you unlock 60 or more other harvest sprites. TV Channel team Channel 1: Reports the next day's weather. Unlock: He is unlocked at the beginning of the game Channel 2: This is the TV shopping network. Unlock: Buy at least one item from the supermarket every day for 10 days. Channel 3: Gives you information about the harvest sprites Unlock: Find 20 harvest sprites Channel 4: Gives you information about farming. Unlock: ship out 300 of the same item (upper bound)or so I am not sure about the exact number. Channel 5: Allows you to change background music Unlock: Buy five records Channel 6: Tells you about festivals coming up during the season Unlock : go to three festivals Channel 7: This shows a variety of shows that can be useful for finding recipes and other things Unlock: Get 100 friendship points with one person in town. Channel 8: This channel has tutorials about how to play the game. Unlock: The channel is unlocked when the game begins. Channel 9: It is a quiz show supposedly. Unlock: Ship 100,000 of the same item. Animal Team This team brushes and feeds your animals. From here on, I am just going to list their names and how to unlock them. Red Ribbon: Have 10 adult cows Woody: Ship 300 animal products Liane: Ship 500 animal products Essa: Ship 1000 animal produce Betty: Shear a sheep 100 times with the touch panel gloves. Chamy: Sheer a sheep 300 times with the touch panel gloves Ole: Sheer a sheep 700 times with the touch panel gloves Sue: Milk a cow with the touch gloves 100 times Magic: Milk a cow 300 times with the touch gloves Bali: Milk a cow 700 times with the touch panel gloves Mick: Have 10 chickens or ducks Woohoo: have 20 chickens or ducks Harvest team: Collects resources on a specific area. Oran: Give Thomas what he wants when he gives you his winter request for an item. It triggers a cute cut scene Bran: Cut 100 pieces of wood Decoy: Cut 250 pieces of wood Woody: Cut 500 pieces of wood Piere: Bread several stumps between 15 - 20 Tilus: gather 100 stone Stony: gather 250 stone Rosh: gather 500 stone Alpen: Break 5-7 boulders Rocky: Break 15-20 boulders Valie: Use the Mystrile Axe once Fen: Have the cursed hammer blessed Animal Team Brush and Pet's Animals Canary: Have your sheep or cows give birth 15 times. For the next few sprits, you need to pet, throw, or talk to your animals without the touch panel gloves X times. Referred to as happy up animals from here on out. Kali: Happy up animals 50 times Johnny: Happy up animals 350 times Brushy: Happy up animals 900 times Mouton: Pet your pets with the touch gloves 50 times Boohoo: Pet your pets with the touch gloves 100 times Canal: Pet your animals with the touch gloves 300 times Meow: Pet your animals with the touch gloves 500 times Beta: Wash your animals with the touch gloves 50 times Aiylee: Wash your animals with the touch gloves 100 times Pompon: Wash your animals with the touche gloves 300 times Zoo: Wash your animals with the touch gloves 500 times Harvest Team: Harvest crops and wild plants Forest: Use the mystrile sickle once Fraw: Ship around 1000 items Ridge: Ship around 5000 items Ali: Ship 10000 items Cady: Ship 30000 items Paddy: Ship 500 items Veggie: Put something into your basket Kevin: ship an item using the horse Kamar: ship some cabbage Moor: Ship pineapples Vail: ship some peppers Mathew: Have the cursed sickle blessed Fishing team: Catches and ships fish. Blue: Fish in the hot springs near the circus * Rod: Fish in the hot springs near the goddess spring * Poolo: catch 50 fish ** Fry: catch 500 fish ** Paige: catch 1,000 fish ** Gigi: catch 5,000 fish ** Reese: catch 10,000 fish ** Tricky: catch 50,000 fish ** Sammy: have cursed rod blessed Fisher: use the mystrile fishing rod Yacht: fish in farms pond Fisher: Use the mystrile fishing pole Riveriara: Fish in your farms watering hole *See FAQ to see how to unlock the two springs ** You can have the fishing team catch the required number of fish for you. In fact, it would be nearly impossible to get the larger numbers without them. You still need to catch the final fish at each bench mark yourself to unlock the sprite. Heal team: recovers stamina. To use them, use up all of your stamina and talk to them. Then will recharge a little of it. Violette: Use the hot springs by the circus 200 ** Nette: Use the heal team 100 times * Whitney: Use the heal team 500 times * Juna: Use the heal team 750 times * Sante: Use the heal team 1000 times * Anime: Eat 30 pieces of colored grass Powery: Eat 80 pieces of colored grass Whitney: Eat 150 pieces of colored grass koto: Buy something to drink at blue bar Souly: Have 50 drinks at blue bar Carrie: Use the hot springs near the goddess pond 200 times ** Sacci: Use the hot springs near the goddess pond 500 times ** * Use the healing team means to have them restore your stamina. **Each use of the hot springs must be at least an hour in length. Watering Team: waters your crops. Choriori: Water 1000 squares of crops personally. Walter: Water around 5000 squares. Rainy: water 10,000 squares Joro: water 30,000 squares Patty: water 50,000 squares Misty: Fill up the watering can somewhere between 9 and 12 times Roli: Use the Mystrile watering can Maddie: Have the cursed watering can blessed Karaf: Examine your watering hole Ceruleano, Eviran and Owen: You apparently need to water a random square someplace in the valley. The mythic watering can help with this. Well, now we have all of the sprites listed here. I had quite a few emails that just game me one sprite. The major contributor is listed above, but I am trying to get the guide out in an expedient fashion. Not everyone who contributed is listed here or in the thanks and acknowledgement section. I didn't have time to sift through 700 emails looking for the names this time. Rest assured your contributions were appreciated and I will have your names here in the next update. Thanks again to everyone who contributed to making this section a success. 6. The Harvest Sprite Casino and Medal System ---------------------------------------------- I was originally going to make this section part of the harvest sprites section. But the more I thought about it, the more that it seemed to require its own section. A special thanks goes out to Andrew who inspired this section with a lengthy email that he sent me. The email points out that this is another way to make money quickly early in the game. However, I have tried it and I have found that digging through the second mine will yield a better profit in the long run. The tricks mentioned here can generate about half a million gold in two to three hours worth of work off of dumb luck. A run of the mine stopping at every floor divisible by three or five will yield 8 to 9 hundred thousand gold. But, this is another option. However, I do like the idea of adding a section discussing the sprite casino and medals. But I want to take a more structured and complete approach than the email outlined. I am using some of the information from Andrew's email here, but I am going to add some more of my own thoughts and format to the plan here. So, here we go. Harvest moon DS takes quite a bit from the system that was developed and introduced in mineral town. One of the items that made mineral town so popular was the fact that the harvest sprites could help you work on your farm. Hiring the harvest sprites in mineral town allowed you to increase the productivity of your farm by not having to do all the work yourself. The sprites could do work faster and more efficiently that your character could. They could also get to places you couldn't, for example they can pick crops in the center of a formation without cutting one of the plants down to reach them. This meant that you wouldn't have to sacrifice a plant on crops that regrow. Well, the harvest sprites are back and better than ever, but there were quite a few changes to the system. This section is going to go through them. Well, the first major change begins with the number of harvest sprites available in the game. Mineral town had only seven that could perform one of three jobs. Harvest Moon DS has quite a few more at 101 possible sprites and they can serve even more functions in this game. But, the system you use to hire them is a little different this time around. First, there are several teams of twelve sprites each that perform a specific task and this time you need to unlock them by doing various activities on your farm and around the valley. A compiled list of the tasks is in the previous section for several of the sprites. Also, this time you need to pay the harvest sprite teams with medals that you can buy or win at the tree where they live. The price depends on the number of days you want to hire them for and which team you hire. The experience system for increasing a sprite's productivity is still in place. A harvest sprite will become more proficient at their job as they perform it over time. The new harvest sprite hiring system is based on a currency of medals. You can obtain medals either by buying them from roller or winning them at the casino. Medals cost 10g each, but it is easier to win them if you are patient. Once you have medals purchased, you can go choose a team to hire by talking to Guts in the front lobby of the tree. You can only hire one team at a time and you cannot hire a team until you have unlocked at least one sprite from the team. This means that you cannot distribute the work load as easily as you could in mineral town between the sprites, so choose which team you want to hire carefully and plan on doing the rest of the work yourself. The sprites have a lot more diversity in the jobs they can do in Harvest Moon DS, but they can only do one job at a time. Not all of the sprites can work on your farm. Some of them work in the casino and serve as the TV station hosts. Guts hires out the teams and Jet also runs a small store in the tree next to guts where you can buy several accessories and the records for the fifth channel. The items and their prices can be found in their respective sections in this guide. I will have the accessories section up hopefully in the next update. The Teams: There are a total of 7 different teams of harvest sprites you can hire to work on your farm. The cost of hiring each team varies and you can only hire one team at a time. I have grouped their unlocking requirements in the previous section by team. However, I want to give a more detailed explanation of how each team functions here. Note, the harvest sprites will no longer work on festival days. Healing Team (purple): The healing team is useful if you need to recover stamina and fatigue and don't have the hot springs unlocked or have the funding to purchase bodygizer and turbojolt. To use them, hire the team from Guts and select an area on the map. Go to that area and you will find them standing in a central location in that area. Speak to one of them and they will tell you that they can heal you by 10%. Then they will restore 10 points of stamina and fatigue. You can use them multiple time in one day. You just need to wait a game minutes for their powers to recharge. The more experience they have, the quicker their powers will recharge. If you have quite a few of them, it is possible to get healed multiple times without waiting. Just talk to different ones. Harvest Team (Green): The harvest team does just what their name implies. The go around the map and harvest items that can be shipped. The will collect wild foraging items like colored grass as well as any ripe crops you have in the selected area. The will begin the first area you selected and then move on to the next area after they finish with the first one. They start out only able to handle a few bags of crops each, but as their experience increases, they can handle more and more crops. They are essential to making a large profit from shipping out crops. Animal Feeding and Collecting Team Red.: There are two teams that can take care of the animals in harvest moon DS. This team feeds your animals and collects and ships anything that they produce that is ready to ship. They are helpful if your animals are happy and you have a lot of them. You can select different spaces, but since all of your animals are on your farm you will likely be selecting there more often than not. Animal Brush and Pet Team (Yellow): This is the second animal team. They will brush and pet your animals each once a day. They are useful if you need to raise the affection level of your animals without tending to them yourself. Be careful though. You still need to feed your animals and collect their products yourself if you hire this team to work for you. Collection Team (orange): When you hire the collection team, they will go to the area's you selected on the map starting with the first area you picked. Their purpose is to collect the fodder, lumber, and stone locate in those positions on the map. They will clean an area out and move onto the next area. The amount of material they can collect depends on their experience. They are useful if you don't have the time or stamina to collect building materials yourself. Watering Team (Light Blue): The purpose of the watering team is to have them water your crops. They can handle multiple areas of the map and follow the same progression as the harvest team. The amount of crops they can water is dependent on their experience. The more they have the more crops they can water. They are helpful when you want to conserve stamina on watering crops. You can hire them intermittently with the harvesting team to make efficient work of harvesting your crops. Fishing Team (Deep Blue): The fishing team collects and ships fish from the area you select on the map. They are useful if you want to expand your list of the fish in the game and they allow you to make a profit just by hiring them. You will want to spread their area's out from week to week as you hire them to catch different types of fish. The level and number of fish each sprite will catch and ship increases as they gain experience. You will notice that they require a good number of fish to unlock. You can hire the team to gather the fish for you, but you need to catch the last fish in each interval yourself to unlock the next sprite. For example, if you wanted to unlock the 1000 fish sprite, even if the team caught 2500 fish, you would still need to get 2501 your self to unlock the next sprite. You can only unlock one sprite per fish you catch, so if you need to unlock two sprites you will need to catch 2 fish yourself. Medals and the Casino: The new system for hiring the sprites works on medals rather than giving them gifts and razing their affection like in mineral town. You can buy medals directly from Roller for 10g each or you can win them from the casino games. Note, you must unlock Roller and each of the dealers before you can play their specific games. Roller also runs a small store where you can exchange medals for seeds, accessories, and some pamphlets that reveal some of the recipes and the shipping prices of the level 1 crops. A summary of the games is give below. Poker: Dealer Hops: There are three games that you can gamble medals at and poker is the first from the left. You need to unlock Hops before you can play poker. To begin the game, speak to Hops and select play poker. Then select the number of medals you want to bet by using up and down on the control pad. You can bet between one and 10 medals on each game per hand. Once you place you bet, push the A button to begin the hand. You will be dealt five cards to make your starting poker hand. The deck consists of 52 normal cards and one wild card joker. You will win medals on a pair or better. After the cards are dealt, the game will highlight a winning hand if you have one, at this point you can discard any of the cards and draw more. The joker is a wild card and can serve as any card in the deck. The payouts are as follows: one pair: break even two pairs: 2 to 1 three of kind: 3 to 1 straight: 5 to 1 flush: 10 to 1 full house: 20 to 1 4 of a kind: 50 to 1 straight flush: 100 to 1 royal flush: 100 to 1 Note: N to one means you win N time your bet. I.E. 2 to 1 means you win twice your bet. If you get a winning hand, you can play another minigame to go for double or nothing or pocket your winnings. The strategy you want to use is pretty simple. First, if you have a winning hand, i.e. a pair or better on the start keep the winning hand and redraw the rest. If you don't have a winning hand, look at your cards and try to get one. It's tempting to hold the hire cards, but don't. A pair is a pair and Aces have the same pay out as a pair of twos. You want to look either for cards that are connected for a straight or save whatever suit you have the most cards in the go after a flush. If you have the same number of each, go after the straight because it has a higher probability of coming up than the flush. This is a mathematical fact. The straight will come up 3:2 roughly over the flush. Black Jack: Dealer Tep: Black jack is a simple casino game where you try to get as close to 21 as you can with cards. You have two options, you can either hit and draw another card or stand and keep your current total. Your goal is to get closer to 21 than the dealer without going over. Number cards are worth their face value and face cards are worth 10. An ace is worth 11 unless it would put you over 21 in which case it is worth one. The dealer plays the same rules as real casinos, which means that it stops drawing cards when its score is 17 or higher. The strategy is simpler really, you want to hit until you have 16 or more. When you pass that mark, the probability is that you will more likely bust than hit under 21. Black jack pays 2:1 Memory: Dealer Jum: Memory is just like the game we all played as kids where their are a bunch of face down cards and you try to find matching pairs turning two cards over at a time. You can see what your opponent turns over, so if you match a card you can find its partner from memory hence the name of the game. You and the computer alternate turns turning over two cards at a time. If you get a pair you get another turn until you miss. Whoever has the most pairs wins. The computer uses a simple strategy. First, it turns over a random new card. Then if it know where the match is it will take it and repeat this process. Otherwise it will choose a second random new card and try to get luck. You should follow the same plan of action. It will sometimes give you the option of who goes first. Your odds are better if you go second. Just trust me here, the mathematical proof is too long for this guide and is over most people's head to begin with. Double or nothing games: If you win the first of the three games, you have the option of trying to go for double or nothing as part of two minigames. They are listed below. High Low Draw: This game begins by showing you two cards, one face up and one face down. You goal is to decide whether the face down card is higher, lower, or the same as the face up card. If you select correctly, you will get double the medals you have won so far. If you select incorrectly, you will lose all the medals you have one for the hand. Just pick the side of the card that has the greatest odds of winning. 9-A choose low, 2-7 choose high and the 8, go with your gut. This game is the better choice for the double up. High Draw: This game is another double up minigame. Its pretty simple, you are shown one face up card and 4 face down cards. You then try to pick a down card that is higher than the face up card. The number of winning cards depends on the size of the card face up. You will lose automatically if an Ace comes up and you don't get an Ace in the draw cards. The other game is easier because you always have a chance to win. Okay, now that each of the games are outlined here, it's time to explain the best strategy for making medals. To start with, you cannot win all that many medals for just betting 10 and winning a minigame. To make a great deal of medals, you need to play the double up game and win several times in a row. To begin with, but about 100 medals and save your game. If you run out of medals, just reload your game and start over. This way you won't have to worry about buying medals again. The following strategy is based on Andrew's Contribution and partially on my own experience working with this idea mathematically and trial and error. Thanks for the idea Andrew. Alright, I am going to give some of the actual odds of winning. You can verify these by doing some high level math. I have and you can take my word for them. I did this a while ago, so I can guarantee these are within about two percent. Start playing poker! The help on the game boy and the strategy above will show you what to do. If you play black jack, using any strategy and the computer follows the Vegas casino style, you will only win 44% of the time in the first place. There are several good books on the market that explain this probability well. Playing the memory game, you will win about 52% of the time if you go second and 48% if the computer makes you go first. Again, this is a simple problem but it involves a probability matrix that I don't want to explain here. However, with a joker in the deck, the odds of you getting a pair or better without drawing cards is 58% roughly and if you follow the strategy above, the odds of winning are about 66%. You should always bet 10 medals, the goal is to get to the high low double up game. Also, look at the payouts above, black jack will always pay 20 medals and memory will pay 100 at most. However, Poker can outdo these payoffs quite a bit by hitting 4 of a kind or better. So, clearly poker is the best choice. Okay, once you get to the double or nothing game, you want to start playing the high low double up several times in a row. By winning several times in a row at the double up, you can quickly earn a good deal of medals. 4 wins in a row will yield at least 160 medals and about 7 will yield a 1000 medals or more. If you have more patience, you can win even more medals into the upper thousands, but keep in mind the odds of you getting more than three right in a row are less than 50% The point where you choose to stop is up to you. I usually stop if I win a thousand or more. Save each time you win a bunch, so you don't risk a major set back. You will likely have to play between 25 and 30 hands of poker to win 1000 medals, but this will only take a few minutes and can save you a lot of money in the long run. Andrew made an interesting point in his email. If you have the patience to put together 65000 medals, Roller has the animal cape accessory that he sells. You can buy it and sell it to van for more than half a million dollars. You can then repeat this process by buying more cloaks to make more money. Either way this is a very efficient way to get medals. It takes a little trial and error to get the hang of, but I doubt you'll want to buy medals ever again after you figure it out. Just another useful side note, while this trick is profitable and does work. It is time consuming and relies heavily on luck to make money. If you are willing to win the double up 17 times in a row, you can buy the cloak outright, but this is risky and terribly taxing on patience. It takes several hours to get that lucky usually. I have only been able to do it once. I still recommend the mine trick over this route to make easy money. While it takes a little longer, it is garneted to work and if you stop on every floor divisible by 3 and 5 it will usually yield between 800,000g and 1,200,000g per run. More than double the money from this trick. Still, it is a good alternative if you hate digging in the mine. Thanks again for the trick Andrew. 7. Mining ---------------------------- I think it was about time that I put in a section on mining with mining trick in the ministart up guide below. Be sure to take plenty of provisions with you into the larger mines. They are perilous, and without supplies you will find yourself required to return to the surface or collapsing from being out of stamina. Harvest Moon DS is home to a number of different mines each containing a different materials. There are four mines in all. Each of the mine entrances are located at the dig site, however you cannot enter the until you trigger an small event with carter to open them. In order to view this event, you need to go to the dig site between 9 and 11 pm on any game day other than a festival. All you need to do is walk into the dig site during the appointed time and make sure you have your hammer with you. Carter will greet you and tell you that he has found a hollow space behind the wall and asks to borrow you to use your hammer to open it. You will then go to the back wall and open the passage way to each mine with you hammer. Note, you can only open one mine per day and you have to meet specific requirements to open each of the other mines. I will comment on each of the mines below. There are some similarities between the mines, but there are specific items that are unique to each of the mines including the ores found and some of the items found in the ground. The digging mechanics are the same for all the mines. You can dig in the rocks for the different ores with your hammer, and you can till the soil on the floor with your hoe. Regardless of the level of your tools, each use of the tool will only allow you to open one space or break one stone. Once you break a stone, open or dig on the ground, you might find an item or an ore that you can store in your runk sack, eat, or throw if you don't want it. When you break rocks with the hammer, you can find nothing or some type of stone. Stones vary by each mine, except junk ore that looks like three gray lumps. This is a worthless stone that is found in all the mines that sells for 1g. When you dig around with the hoe, there are a number of things that you can find. The first and most common is that you won't find anything and you will need to continue looking. Next, you can find a bag of gold which is worth a small random amount of money. You can also find black grass which can be eaten to restore a small amount stamina and fatigue or can be shipped to ship later. You can also retrieve cursed tools and accessories located on specific floors on the third mine. I will talk about these below. However, the two primary things you are looking for with the hoe are the stairs or holes in the floor. A set of stair will allow you to descend on floor lower into the mine. The upward stairs allow you to return to the surface of the mine at any time. Just walk over them and select the return to surface option. The holes will drop you a random number of floors lower into the mine. The distance of the fall depends on which mine your in and random luck. You will lose stamina from the fall, however, if you have at least one point of stamina remaining, you won't lose any fatigue from a fall. Thanks to the new runk sacks size and stackability, mining can be a very profitable career option. Especially in the second mine. Use the following sequence of moves to find whatever you are looking for on the current floor. When you first arrive on a floor, save the game on the first diary. Next, kill any of the monsters on the floor (see below.) The dig up the floor using the hammer and hoe and memorize where anything that you are looking for is located. Next, reload the game and gather any of the valuable items on the floor and leave the rest. Also, it's important to make sure you know the location of the way onward before you proceed. Then, open the way onward and save on the second file. Then you want to go down to the next floor and save the file in the first diary. Then repeat this process on the next floor. You can also continuously load the first file if you are unhappy with where a hole drops you to. By reloading the file, you can control you decent with quite a bit more accuracy and more speed than digging up the stairs on each floor. Fighting: New and unique to harvest moon DS is the enemies that live in the mines. There is finally some fighting to be done in a harvest moon game, yeah. Well, not really, all the enemies really do is get in the way and deplete your stamina. Each time an enemy touches you will lose one point of your stamina or fatigue if your stamina is depleted. You can defeat any of the enemies by hitting them repeatedly with the sickle, axe, hoe, hammer or the legendary sword. The sword works the best, defeating enemies in few hits than the other tools, but it also uses more stamina than the other tools. The others all do the same damage, but the sickle swings the fastest and is probably the second best choice for a weapon. Listed below are some of the many enemies in the game. "hits", represents the number of times you need to strike an enemy with a tool to defeat it. The sword will deliver equivalent damage of three hits with another tool. Bugs: Bugs come in different varieties and are located in the second and third mine. They move back and fourth across the floor in a strait line either horizontally or vertically. Killing them is optional, because they are actually quite easy to dodge if your patient with them. Small Bug: moves horizontally, hits 1 Big Bug: moves vertically, hits 1 Animals: There are several musters that are basically dark versions of the animals you can raise on your farm. Unlike the bugs, they are difficult to evade and you will likely have to kill all of them. They move in a strait line towards you taking the shortest available path. If you run around for a little while, it is possible to get them to follow you in a group. That way, you can conserve energy by hitting several of them simultaneously with the big hoe. They are listed below. They all move in the same way, the stronger ones tent to move faster than the smaller ones. Keep this in mind when trying to group them together. Dark Chick: hits 1 Dark Chicken: hits 2 to 3 Dark Duck: hits 3 to 4 Dark Sheep: hits 3 to 5 Dark Cows: hits 4 to 6 Individual mines: Dig Site: Okay, its technically not a mine, but this is the best place for it. It is the room located to the right of Carter's tent where you unlock all of the entrances to the mines. You can dig up items here with the hoe to ship or use as gifts. Digging her is the same as the mine. You can save and dig up the floor to find the items. Then you can load the game and dig from memory to conserve stamina. The floor reradomizes itself each time you enter and leave the mine. It's a good place to make a little money when you are first starting out in the game. Listed below are the available items you can find and sell. Item: price ----------------------------- Suntan lotion 43g Skin lotion 40g Face pack 47g Dress 50g Bracelet 2000g Necklace 2000g Earrings 2000g Broach 2000g 1st Mine: The first mine has no requirements to unlock other than viewing the cut scene with Carter. It is the shortest of the mines having only 10 floors and it contains the ores needed to upgrade your iron tools to levels between copper and mystrile. It also contains junk ore, the black grass, and the bags of gold. The mine has both stairs and holes that you can use to descend. A hole will descend one floor in this mine. There are no enemies located in this mine accept the one dark chick located on the 10th floor. You need to defeated it in order to open the second mine. Items: floors price ------------------------------------- junk ore: any 1g copper ore: any 15g silver ore: 3 and down 20g gold ore: 6 and down 25g mystrile: 10th floor 60g black grass: any 10g bag of money: any 10g-100g 2nd Mine: The second mine is the equivalent of the winter mine in mineral town. It contains some of the most valuable stones in the game and is the source of income in the quick start guide. To open the second mine, you need to dig your way down the 10th floor of the first mine and defeat the dark chick there. You also need to trigger the event above with Carter a second time. The second mine is home to all the dark bugs and also the dark chicks and chickens. So, fighting is a little more cooperative here. The second mine is home to the most valuable selling gems in the game. The mine has 255 floors this time and a hole can drop you anywhere between 1 and 10 floors deeper into the mine. Descending takes a little more patience and control than in the first mine, but not all that much. Use the above trick and it is pretty easy to manage. The floors in the second mine vary in size based on their numerical values. Most of the floors are a fixed size one screen in size. These are easy to search, but most the valuable items are located on the larger floors. The next size floor are horizontally the same as the first floors, but they are three times the vertical size. They are any floors divisible by 3 such as 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, ect. A valuable pink diamond or more is located on each of these floor greater than 100. The ones greater than 200 can have as many as four of them. The final floor size is huge and about 9 times the size of the smallest ones. These occur on floors divisible by 10, i.e. 10, 20, 30, ..., 100, 110, ect. These floors contain alexandrite, which is another high selling item. They can have multiples of them. The final feature worth noting about the second mine is the final bottom floor. It is home to the maiden and the legendary sword. When you arrive, you need to kill all of the enemies on the floor with any tool you have. Once you defeat all of them, the big rock at the top of the screen will open leading you into the room containing the maiden. The first time you enter her room, she will give you the legendary sword. It is a tool you need in order to open the secret field behind the waterfall. You also need to retrieve it in order to open the third mine. Note, div means floor divisible by. Items: floor price -------------------------------- Ruby: any 75g Emerald: any 80g Topaz: any 70g Peridot: any 68g Agate: any 62g Amethyst: any 60g Agate: any 32g Firefly ST: varies 60g moon stone: any 55g sand rose: any 50g Diamond 101 and up 100g pink diamond div 3 >100 10000g Alexandrite div 10 >100 10000g 3rd mine: The third mine is not as profitable as the second mine, but it is home to some of the most valuable items in the game. In order to open the third mine, you must retrieve the sword from the second mine on the 255th floor as well as triggering the event with Carter a third time. The third mine had 999 floors and dropping through a hole will lower you between 1 and 100 floors at a time. Be careful, because you can pass out from a long drop if you stamina is low or your fatigue is high. The third mine has the same enemies as the second, with the addition of the dark ducks, cows and sheep. It also has a stronger version of the bugs on the lower floors. The floors in the third mine differ by depth rather than divisibility. The first 300 are the small one screen size. The floor 301 to 990 are the long vertical rooms like the 3 divisible rooms in the second mine. Finally, the last few floors are the largest size available such as the divisible by 10 floors in the second mine. The third mine is not home to very profitable selling ores like the second, but it is home to the cursed tools and accessories and the valuable mythic stones need to upgrade the blesses tools. Mine three also contains the adimante needed to make the makers. Simply collect a piece of it and call the black smith to have a maker produced. They all cost 20,000g and take 3 days to produce. They can help you increase your profits greatly. You need to build a maker shed in order to purchase the makers. The third mine also contains all of the ores from the first mine, and they can be found on any floor. It also has the suns needed to grow crops in your basement. Items: floor price ----------------------------------------- Admit any 50g Oricalco any 50g Spring Sun: floors ending in 1 1g Summer Sun: floors ending in 2 1g Fall Sun: floors ending in 3 1g Winter Sun: floors ending in 4 1g Mythic Stone: div 10 <250 20000g Note: The mythic stones are much scarcer than the pink diamonds and alexandrite in the second mine. So, its better to go to the second mine if you want money. The mythic stones are required to upgrade the blessed tools to the mythic level. Doing so, costs 50,000g and requires 3 days from the black smiths shop. The mythic stones will not appear until you have all six of the cursed tools blessed. Cursed Tools: There is a set of cursed tools located on the early floors of the third mine. To find them, you need to dig them up with the hoe like your looking for the stairs. You will often have to dig up rocks and plow under them to find them. The cursed tools won't appear until you have upgraded all your iron tools to the mystrile level. The floors they appear on are random and it can take some time to find them. Be careful when you find them, if you equip them you cannot remove them without the aid of the church, which costs 1000g each time you wish to remove them. You can get them blessed for 100000g each by calling the church as well. Blessing a cured tool removes the curse and turns it into a blessed tool. We now have all the floors to the cursed tools and accessories. Thanks for the info Bryan Ng The cursed tools are located randomly on floors: 24, 35, 48, 52, 68, 71, 87, 99, 106, 118, 124, 135, 142, 153, 162, 178, 185, and 197. Try alternating every other floor while you search to find the tools with a higher probability. Cursed accessories. There are several cursed accessories located in the third mine. They are found and blessed in the same mannerism as the cursed tools. Again thanks Bryan NG. The accessories are located on floors: 324, 335, 348, 352, 368, 371, 387, 399, 406, 418, 424, 435, 442, 453, 462, 478, 485, 497, 724, 735, 748, 752, 768, 771, 787, 799, 806, 818, 824, 835, 842, 853, 862, 878, 885, and 897. The nine of them are randomly distributed among all these floors, so finding them will take some time. 4th mine: Well, it has been quite a while and I am finally getting around to talking about the 4th and final mine in the game. The beast is here if you have the strength and determination to attempt the most complex labyrinth in any game ever released! Ha Ha Ha Ha !!!!!!! Okay, now that I got that out of my system lets get down to the fourth mine in practical terms. The first thing to mention about it is that it is quite difficult to open, but I finally managed to with a little help from mbruns2 who brought a requirement to my attention. In order to enter the 4th mine you must complete 4 requirements. First, you must dig all the way down to the bottom of the third mine and clean out the bottom floor of enemies. Gee, this is sounding a little familiar by now. The second thing you need to do is dig all the way down again to the 255 floor of the third mine and clear out all the enemies there as well. This will allow you to enter Keria's room where you must trigger her heart event by giving her ultimate curry (see recipe section for the recipe.) Finally, you need to trigger the mine unlocking event with Carter late at night or early in the morning as always. That is a lot of work for the little bit you get out of the 4th mine in the game. Okay, now you have it open, so what do you do with it? The 4th mine is similar in structure to the last three with several major changes. The first major change is that the mine contains 65535 floors. The largest number a standard integer will hold on a computer 2^8 -1 = 65535 because you have floor 0. Also, you will notice when you get a lot lower into the mine that the floors are much larger that they have been in any of the other mines. For example, one of the lower floor I entered was 10 time the size of the floor at the bottom of the third mine. Really, the 4th mine is very similar to the first 3, but it is just a much larger scale area to explore. The rewards are not as great as you think they are and the hardships to get them are very difficult as I will describe later in this section. But, there is one very important reason for running the 4th mine. "BECAUSE IT'S THERE" Fighting: The combat mechanics are the same as in the third mine as for fighting enemies. However, you should be aware that there are more enemies in the mine and they are stronger and more powerful than in the first 3 of them. The dark cows and sheep you faced in the bottom of the third mine are quite prevalent on certain floors in the mine and there are a few new enemies to watch out for. The first is a new type of but who is much stronger than the previous ones. The second is the dark hero's, which are a dark copy of your character who appear on every floor divisible by 100. The each require about 10 to 25 hits of the sickle to kill. They get stronger as you get deeper into the mine. Be prepared to fight for your life to stay alive. The turn off the power and load the game trick to kill the enemies can help but consumes a great deal of time. Traversing and Searching the mine: Digging down through the mine and looking for the good stuff is done in the same mannerism as it is in the other mines. Dig down to a floor; save your game; clear out the floor; remember where things are; load your game; collect the good stuff and move onward. However, there are a few new thing you need to be aware of. First, the holes can drop you up to 300 floor at once this time. So, aiming your destination can be frustrating and time consuming if you want a specific floor. Also note that a deep drop will quick drain your stamina and fatigue and you will be under attack almost instantly when you arrive. You need to keep a large stock of healing supplies handy and not be afraid to use them. Also note, that the floor sizes are quite large at some points in the mine, so exploring them takes a while. Rewards and Secrets of the Mine: The mine is a lot of work and expense for the few rewards that it offers. However, there are a few things here that cannot be found anywhere else in the game. The first secret I need to reveal is that on any floor ending in 00 (i.e. 100, 1000, 15500, 22600,ect) if you kill all the enemies on the floor, Mayor Thomas will appear. He will offer to sell you restorative items at exuberant prices. However, you will need to buy them at some point if you want to seriously reach the bottom floor of the mine. You can also find many of the gemstones and ores located throughout the other mines in the game. However, these are not the primary reward. The fourth mine is home to a unique collection of 9 magical balls. Can you say Natsume ripped off DBZ. Anyway, if you collect all nine of the balls you get a special reward. You can only have one of each of the balls at any given time. Each type of ball is found in the rocks on specifically numbered floors. The first ball can be found in rocks on floors ending in 10. The second on floors ending in 20. The third on floors ending in 30. 4 on 40, 5 on 50 . . . 9 on 90's. You get the idea. Note that a ball appearing is not always guaranteed. It is random just like the cursed tools and mythic stones. So, it can take a while to collect a complete set. When you find the 9th ball, the harvest goddess will appear and grant you one of three wishes of your choice. They include giving a lump sum of money, removing the curse from a cursed item, making everyone in the town like you better, ect. You can figure them out they are pretty self explanatory. However I will comment on one is that she gives you a present that is needed to complete the shipping list if you want to marry her. Alternatively, if you leave it in your rucksack, it will up the rating of your farm by one point for each day you leave it in your ruck sack. Once you are granted a wish, the balls are removed from your inventory and you can begin collecting them again. Oh hurray! Preparations: Digging though the 4th mine is time consuming and resource draining. You will need to arrive there first thing in the morning if you want to have enough time in a game day to dig it all the way down. The second thing you will need is the sword along with the hammer and hoe. The sword drains stamina quicker than the other tools, but it is the best fighting weapon you have in your arsenal. You will need it to bring down the cows and sheep as well as the dark heroes. They just drain too much strength if you use the normal tools to fight them. Also, you will want the truth ring to keep an eye on your stamina and fatigue. Additionally, you will need to bring about 1200 BodigizerXL and 800 TurblojoltXL with you if you want to make it. I know that seems like a lot to buy, but you will go through them believe me. The other resource you will need to bring with you is about 10,000,000g so that you can buy supplies from Thomas at any available time. The final resource you need to realize traversing this mine takes is time and patience. You should know ahead of time that this mine is a major time commitment and will cause you a lot of stress. I only collected the balls 4 times total on my way down the mine, but it still took a while. The mine is enormous, it is more than 65 time the size of the third mine just in floor numbers and the searching takes a great deal longer especially when you get deeper into the mine. It took me 34 and 1/2 hours of real time to get to the bottom without stopping very often. The fighting and looking for the hole alone are very time consuming. Be aware that you will be spending lots of money on Thomas not because you want to, but because you have to. And you will die frequently after dropping 200 or more floors from being attacked when you land. This takes a great deal of patience and commitment to reach the bottom. I spent almost 30 million on supplies on the way down the mine, but I was thorough on my explorations. Conclusion: The forth mine is a real pain in the butt and it is really not worth the trip except for 2 reasons. You may just want to visit the 1st 1000 floors or so to get the wish balls and check it out. However, there are two neat rewards for digging all the way to the bottom. The first is that the fourth mine represents the greatest challenge in any harvest moon game to date. When you complete it you get the satisfaction that you can brag to your friends that you did it. The second is that there is an event that you get to see with a reward of its own. I am not going to spoil it here. If you want to see it you need to dig your own way down to the bottom of the mine. The other thing you get for getting to the bottom of the mine is a chance to get your name in this guide. For the next 4 month, (Jan - April 2007) if you can reach the bottom of the 4th mine. You can send me an email letting me know that you reached it. You need to include a detailed description of the event that takes place at the bottom of the mine to prove that you reached it. I want at least 10 to 12 sentences worth of good information. I will be the sole judge of success on it. If I am convinced that you succeeded, I will add your name to that section of the guide as a final reward for you efforts. Good luck and happy digging. Darkranger. P.S. I will not reveal the event. So, don't even ask. 8. Marriage ----------------------------- This is probably the longest overdue section in the guide. Unfortunately, it has take quite a while to put this together from scratch. Between my brother's and myself, we have been chasing down and courting all of the main women in the game. We have found all the primary heart events for the main women that we can marry. However, we can only each marry one girl, so I cannot comment on the married life with each of the different women beyond the ones we marry. What I can add here is an outline of the marriage system and the heart events to each of the other girls. I haven't actually chosen my bride yet, but I will update this section as more information becomes available. If anyone would like to help it would be appreciated. Getting married in harvest moon is on of the oldest side objectives in the game. The process has evolved a bit, but not all that much has changed. You choose the girl that you want to marry and give her gifts to build up her affection rating towards you. Then once her happiness level is high enough, you give her the blue feather and purpose. If she accepts your proposal then you are married and you can begin a new life with her on your farm. Harvest Moon DS haze a wide variety of women to choose from. There are five primary girls you can marry from the valley and four special brides that you can also marry. Additionally, if you link the game with Friends of Mineral Town or More Friends of Mineral Town, (see linking section) you can date and marry one of the girls from mineral town. Be aware, that doing so will cause you to move to mineral town and end your game. You can only give gifts to the mineral town girls on the days they visit the valley on their days off. This brings the game up to 14 potential brides to marry, which is quite a few heart events to track down. The marriage system is pretty simple to understand. Each of the girls begins the game with an affection rating of zero for you. You can raise their affection ratings by giving them gifts. If they like the item, their affection rating will grow between 100 and 800 points a day based on their liking of the item you give them. If you give them something they don't like, litter anywhere but your farm, let one of your animals die or propose too soon it will cause their affection rating to go down some. Only the first item you give them each day will increase their affection rating, so choose wisely. Negative items and actions will still cause their rating to drop. Also, all the points you get from giving them the gift won't come when you first give it. If you give them something good, you will have to wait until the next day before the last 100 to 300 points will be added to their affection rating. You may want to buy the friendship bracelet from Roller for 5000 medals. It will allow you to see the girls affection rating when you talked to them with it equipped. It can be helpful in tracking your progress. You can keep track of the girls affection level with the bracelet above or by watching their heart change color. The color of their heart is based on the number of love points they have. 0-10000 black 10000-19999 purple 20000-29999 blue 30000-39999 green 40000-49999 yellow 50000-59999 orange 60000 and up red You can propose to a girl when you have their heart at the red level or higher. So, it can take quite a while to build up the 60000 affection points. You need the blue feather to propose. It will become available for 1000g at Karen's Store when you reach the 50000 affection point level. In addition to getting the points up there are some additional requirements you need to meet before you can get married. First, you need to have the big bed from the home shopping network. It will become available in the rotation of the items after you buy your second house upgrade for 10000g. Secondly, you need to have returned the harvest goddess from the other world where the witch princess banished her. In order to do this, you need to have unlocked 60 of the harvest sprites. See the harvest sprite section for the details of how to unlock them. Finally, you also need to purchase the blue feather from the store and get the girl's affection rating up to 60000 points by giving her gifts. It is also helpful if you view each of the girl's heart events. Strategies: Getting married is quite an ordeal in Harvest Moon DS. But it is a bench mark and adds a great deal of fun to the game. Unlocking the girls heart events and giving them gifts to increase their affection requires you to know their schedule and likes and dislikes. But, I am going to take all of the guess work out of it for you. Well, at least as much as I can. While I have most of this information, it is a lot to keep track of and annoying to keep looking up. So, let me suggest something simpler. Each girl's favorite item will give them 800 love points a day. However, all of the valley girls and the mineral town girls also like diamonds, which can be found on the floors divisible by 10 greater than 200 in the 2nd mine. Two out of every three rocks on those floors will have a normal diamond in them. So, if you are using the mining trick to make money anyway, strip-mining those five floors entirely will usually yield about 100 diamonds. Giving a girl a diamond will increase her affection by 700 points. This is another good reason to use the mining trick, because it gives you a cheap and abundant source of gifts to give to the girls in the valley. As for finding the girls, it can take a few days of following them around to get their schedule down pat. However, there is an easier way to find them to give them gifts. Go to the casino and buy the teleport stone from Roller for 1000 medals. It will allow you to go anywhere in the valley for two stamina by touching the stylis on the map for two points of fatigue. It really is a useful item for saving on travel time. You can get the necessary medals for 10000g or by getting them from playing the minigames and gambling the up. Once you have the teleport stone, giving gifts to the girls is an easy task. Just teleport to their residence before 7:00 am and give them the gifts. Then you can teleport back to the farm and get on with your work for the day. This will cost you 4 fatigue points, but it makes tracking the girls down easily. Heart Events: Each girl also has 4 heart event that you can view while you are courting them. I am not sure if it is necessary to see all of their events in order to get married. However, it makes it easier to marry them. During each event, you will be give a couple of choices in the dialogue. Use common sense and choose the option that best suits the girl you are trying to marry. Each heart event you choose the correct path for will add between 1400 and 4000 points to the girl's affection rating. Choosing a path against their wishes can cost you points so be careful. Listed below are each of the girls and the heart events that I have found so far. The color of the heart is the minimum heart color you need to trigger the event. You can trigger past events and the events need to be triggered in order. I have all the events for the valley girls, but I don't have all the heart events for the special girls or the mineral town girls. They only visit the valley once a week, which makes it difficult to build up their affection quickly. So, I only have the first two events for each of them. If anyone has more information than what I have here please send it me and I post it here with credit of course. Valley Girls: There are five normal girls that you can marry from the valley. I have all of their heart events listed here. I only have the time and days that I triggered them. You can probably assume that the events can be triggered under similar conditions within one to two hours of their listed times. I am trying to nail them down a little tighter, but it will take some time. If the day is not specified, it means that we have triggered it on different day and that the days seems to be unimportant. Name: Nami Nami is the first of the valley girls that you can marry in the game. She has a well traveled and diverse personality. She lives at on the second floor of inner inn. She spends her early days and evenings at the inn and travels around the valley the rest of the day. Nami doesn't like diamonds like the rest of the girls. Stick with flowers or items from the dig site with her. Heart Events: Black: Go to inner inn on a rainy day and ring the bell in the front lobby. Nami will come out and talk with you. Purple: Go to the inn around 10:30 am and Nami will trigger an event where she discusses your farm and her views on farming with you. Blue: After Nami's heart turns blue, she will visit your farm and trigger another scene. This happened for me on a Monday, buy my associates each had it happen on a different day of the week. Yellow: Exit your house on a clear day Nami will ask you on a short date. Muffy: Muffy lives and works at the blue bar in town located just down the road from inner inn. She can be found there in the early evening to giver her presents. She also likes to hike down to the beach in the morning. She loves apple pie and jewelry from the dig site, but you can give her diamonds from the mine as well. She is one of the easier girls to marry. Black: Go to the blue bar around 4:00 in the afternoon and Muffy will ask you what type of girls you like. Choose her type to increase her affection. Purple: I triggered this event on a rainy Tuesday around 10:20 in the morning. Muffy talks to you and asks your advice. Blue: Go to the blue bar around 6:00 pm. Muffy will be there with a new drink that she wants you to try. Yellow: Exit your house on a clear day in the morning and Muffy will be there to ask you on a short date. Celia: Celia is another of the easiest girls to marry in the game. She lives on Vesta's farm and can be found there during most of the day. She wanders up to the goddess spring from time to time, but for the most part she sticks to the farm. Her favorite gift is any type of cake or curry rice, but diamonds or flowers will also work well with her. Black: Visit Celia at her house around 6:20 pm and you will trigger this event. She is helping Vesta with the dishes and shatters a plate. Just be honest. Purple: Go to the Harvest Goddess's pond behind the harvest sprite tree around 5:00 pm. She will talk to you and asks you to walk home with her. Blue: You can trigger this event by visiting Dr. Hardy's house before 9:00 in the morning on a rainy day. It triggers a short scene discussing health. Yellow: Go to the blue bar in the evening when Celia is there having a drink. It triggers a rather interesting little cut scene. Flora: Flora lives in the dig site with Carter. She spends most of her time at the dig site. In fact I don't think I have ever seen her cross the river. Flora likes diamonds and flowers. Black: Enter the dig site at about 11:30 at night. Flora will come in and think you are a strange looking person. Just let her get closer and see you aren't a threat. Otherwise you get to see how a strong a working girls is. Purple: Go to the inner in around noon. Flora will be there wanting Ruby to give her favorite drink. She is unhappy to hear they are out of it and goes to blue bar to get some. Blue: Enter the right side of the river below the dig site around 11:20 pm on a clear day. Flora will take you on a treasure hunt that will end in unlocking the first of the hot springs by the circus. Yellow: Go to the dig site on a clear day in the late evening. Flora will give you a good look at her deepest insights into life. Lumina: Lumina is a sweet and spoiled girl as well as Romanna's daughter. She lives in the vista and will take a walk up to the harvest goddess's pond during the afternoon. She likes relaxation tea and diamonds Black: Enter the villa around 6:00 pm and you will find Lumina and Romanna arguing over the old lady's health. Purple: After you get the DVD player, Lumina will show up at your farm and ask you how it works. Blue: Go to the harvest goddess pond during the afternoon around 5:00 on a clear day. Lumina has lost her necklace and wants to enlist your help in locating it. Yellow: Go to Lumina's room around 9:30 pm. You will find her waiting for van to arrive with her own DVD player. But when he arrives, he will be sold out. Support you girl friend's wishes. Mineral Town Girls: I have linked the games together and the girls have come over on their days off. However, I can only give them each one gift a week, so they haven't been keeping up with the other girls thus I have only found the first two heart events for each of them. However, if you continue to increase their affection rating I am sure the remaining events will be easy to find. Just follow them around the valley for a day and you should have it. Keep in mind if you marry one of these girls, your game will end because you move to mineral town. Ann: Ann is the daughter of Doug who owns the inn in mineral town. She will visit the valley on Fridays once you connect a friends of mineral town cartridge into your other slot. She visits inner inn and hangs out with Ruby when she visits. She likes anything with cheese in it and diamonds. Black: Head to the inner inn on a Friday around 2:00 pm. You will trigger a cut scene where Ann is helping Ruby cook. Purple: Head to the inn around 3:00 pm. on a Friday It was raining when I triggered this event. Ann is in town and she has bought a few things and discusses her business with you. Blue: If you leave your house on a Friday afternoon, she will show up and ask you on a walk. You will go to the pyrotechnics house. Yellow: Go to the blue bar in the early evening on a Friday. You will get to watch Muffy and Ann duke it out over a stupid topic. Ellie: Ellie is the nurse from mineral town. She tends to hang out at the villa helping Romanna on her days off. She visits the valley on Wednesdays. She likes diamonds and flowers. Black: Pass out on a Wednesday and Ellie will come by and help you recover your strength. Purple: Head over to the villa around 5:00 on a rainy Wednesday and you will find Ellie there helping Romanna. Blue: Go to Romanna's room at the villa during a Wednesday afternoon. You can trigger an event where Ellie helps to nurse Romanna's ailing health. Yellow: Exit your house early in the morning and you will find Ellie there to give you Elli leaves as a gift. She also teaches you the recipe for them. Mary: Mary is the daughter of the herbal gist in mineral town. She works in the mineral town library and will visit the valley on Mondays. She usually hangs out at the villa with Lumina. Like Lumina she likes relaxation tea and diamonds. Black: Enter the villa around 10:00 am on a clear Monday and Mary will say hi to you and tell you a little about herself. Purple: This one is a little tough to trigger. You need to have the mushroom house and have mushrooms growing on a Monday. Enter the hut around 10:00 in the morning and Mary will come in and ask you about how the mushrooms are growing. Blue: Grow a giant crop of some kind in your field and she will come by and view it during the morning. Yellow: You will find Mary at the dig site investigating the myth of the legendary sword. She read about it somewhere in a book and is nagging Carter about it. Potpourri: The girl named after the wild herb who lives on the chicken farm. Sorry, but she really needs to get a new life. Potpourri will visit the valley on Sundays and you can find her hanging out on your farm. How convenient. She usually talks to Tanka about farming during the day in his house. She likes flowers, Omelets, and diamonds. Black: Step outside your house on a Sunday morning and she will appear and thank you for all your business from her store. After all your her only customer. Purple: Go to Tanka's house around noon on a Sunday and you will find Potpourri there studying about farming with him. She really needs to get a life. Blue: During the late afternoon and a Sunday when she visits, go to inner in. It was raining when I triggered this. Rick and her are having an argument about chickens. He thinks she studies them too much. Yellow: Head into the back kitchen in inner inn during a Sunday afternoon and you will find her there. She and Ruby are cooking up some weird dish that Potpourri's mother gave them the recipe for. Karen: One of my favorite girls from mineral town. She runs the general store and is also the heavies drinker in town. Karen visits the valley on Tuesday and hangs out at ... you guessed it blue bar and on Vesta's farm. She also wanders around the valley a little bit. Karen likes Pizza and Diamonds. Black: Go to Vesta's farm on a Tuesday around 4:00 pm and you will meet Karen. She will introduce herself and explain her friendship with Purple: Go to the blue bar during the evening on a Tuesday. You get to attempt to drink Karen under the Table. She has had plenty of practice though. Blue: Go to the second floor of the in on a Tuesday night and she will invite you to go on a short date with her. The two of you will walk around the valley and talk about your lives. Yellow: Visit the blue bar again on a Tuesday evening and Karen will talk about her real feelings with you. The Special* Girls: The other girls that you can marry in the game take a good deal of work to get. These are more for the true fans of the game who like a little extra challenge in their lives. These 4 women require years of work and commitment to tie the knot with. I don't have all that much on them, but I will share what I have. As usual if anyone has the information and would like to submit it I will add it and give credit. Thanks to hmgardian for the information here. Harvest Goddess: The Harvest Goddess is probably one of the hardest to Marry in the game. Before you can even get started you need to unlock her by bringing back 60 of the harvest sprites. Then you can give her gifts at her spring by throwing in items to up her affection rating. She likes strawberries the best and doesn't care for diamonds like the rest of the girls. The manual includes that you must also ship one of each sellable items and rescue all the harvest sprites before she will marry you. If you have the patience, dedication, and determination required to marry her I wish you the best of luck. To date I have only unlocked her black heart event. Black: Unlock 60 harvest sprites and the goddess will say tadaa and introduce herself. Purple: You need to walk 10000 steps with the pedometer, ship 10000 items, and catch 10000 fish. You also need to reach the bottom of the first mine. Once this is done throw an item into her spring to trigger the event. Blue: You need to unlock all 9 harvest sprite channels and throw an item into her pond to begin the event. Yellow: You need to be in your fifth year or later and you need to have given her more than 500 gifts to trigger the event. To trigger it, throw an item into her pond. Note: Once she reaches the red heart level, throw the feather in to propose marriage to her. Witch Princess: The Witch Princess lives in the small shack next to the Villa and is the one responsible for sending the harvest goddess and the sprites away in the first place. She is supposedly easier to marry than the goddess, but she is still pretty tough. Her favorite gift is red grass. The manual adds that you need to pass out 100 times and neglect several of your sick animals before she will even consider marrying you. Again good luck to those of you who want to marry the games first real villain. I have only found her black heart event. Black: Enter the witch princess's home early in the morning. You will find her casting a spell and she will ask you whether or not you like the harvest goddess. Answer no and her affection will increase slightly. Purple: You need to have been very mischievous to open this event. You need to have let 50 of your sick animals die, offered poison at the harvest festival at least 5 times, littered 100 times, tried to leave the valley at least 10 times and passed out 5 times. If you have done so, you need to go the harvest goddess spring after you free the goddess to trigger the event. Blue: Go the witches house during the day. Yellow: You