Basic Farming

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Revision as of 12:59, 25 May 2010 by imported>The minibus

Farming is simply spending time adventuring for the purpose of accumulating Meat or items in quantity. It is a reliable way in the game to amass a large sum of Meat, but it is very time consuming. This guide outlines simple strategies that can be used to maximize your Meat and item farming. You can find more advanced strategies, including cost-effectiveness analysis on the Advanced Farming page.

Adventures

Obviously, the more Adventures you have available, the more time you can spend farming. See Adventures and Extra Rollover Adventures for ways to get more turns. Also see Maximizing Your Rollover Adventures for examples.

Adjusting Combat Frequency

Potentially, adjusting the frequency of combat or non-combat encounters could lead to more encounters of a preferred kind. However, in practice this does not seem to be particularly cost effective (see below).

Drop Increasers

Certain items, skills and familiars can increase the amount of Meat or items that is dropped in a location. See the following pages for more information on Meat and item drop increasers and how they work:

In general, increasing Meat and item drops results in a) more Meat and b) more items to sell. You should equip non-consumable drop increasers you already own any time you are farming.

Basic Cost-Effectiveness

Note that it is possible to spend more Meat on items and effects than you gain while farming with them. Be cautious about buying extra equipment unless you're sure that the benefit outweighs the cost, particularly from The Mall. Basic cost-effectiveness is calculated by comparing the amount of Meat you spent on an item (or could get from selling it if you already have it) to the amount of Meat you could potentially gain through the use of the item. If the first number is higher, you will lose money by using the item (or you would make more if you sold it). The actual calculations for cost-effectiveness can be somewhat complex and vary by location so they have not been included here. Also see the Advanced Farming guide for more information on a cost-effectiveness comparison of certain items in a specific location. Yarrh has a site that calculates the cost-effectiveness of any given item in any given location, which can be found at Meat Calculator

Meat or Items?

A common question is whether or not to use Meat drop increasers or item drop increasers. When farming for wealth, in almost all circumstances a Meat drop increaser is the better choice. The reason for this is that there is no cap on the modified amount of Meat that a monster can give, but it can only give 1 of each item it drops. A yeti, for instance, can potentially give almost 1550 Meat to the best equipped adventurer, but it can only ever drop one yeti fur, no matter how high your item drop increasers are. The rare exception to this are areas where most monsters don't drop Meat.

Items That Drop Meat or Other Items

Some items, like an old coin purse, an old leather wallet, an ancient vinyl coin purse, a Warm Subject gift certificate and a Penultimate Fantasy chest drop Meat or items when used from your inventory. Like non-combat adventures, these items are not affected by drop increasers.

Selling Items

When you farm for items, there are multiple ways to exchange them for Meat. Some are more effective than others.

Autosell

Nearly all items can be autosold for Meat. Just go to your Inventory page and click the Sell link. However, autoselling items should be your last resort because you might be able to find a better price.

The Mall of Loathing

The first place any softcore player should check. Most items have a Mall value that far exceeds their autosell cost, and all items must be sold for at least twice their autosell cost, or 100 Meat, whichever is more. The availability of some items can exceed the demand, so some particularly common items (like items from The Castle, thanks to other Meat farmers) can sometimes be difficult to sell. Demand is usually higher for consumables such as food and booze.

Trade

If you're not in hardcore, you might consider selling directly to other players via the Trade Chat Channel. While you can find good deals here, watch out for bad deals and scams. Prices are frequently worse than the Mall, but bulk sales (with discounts) are more common. However, you might be able to find someone willing to buy items that won't sell for minimum price in the Mall and still get more than the autosell value.

Tactics

While Meat and items can be farmed from any location, some are more effective than others. Other tactics may help as well.

Low Level Farming

Locations and tactics available to lower level characters.

Pre-Quest Typical Tavern

In the Typical Tavern, before the Typical Tavern Quest is complete, the encounter "drunken rat" will always yield a rat whisker. This can be sold for 50 Meat to the Pretentious Artist once you have completed the Pretentious Artist Quest. It is very easy to get the drunken rat encounter because of the Typical Tavern layout - simply choose the same square repeatedly. Equipment, skills and effects that increase Meat or item drops will have an effect on the Meat and other items dropped by the rat, but are generally not helpful due to the flat rate at which the Artist buys whiskers. Note that if you complete the Tavern Quest you can no longer farm this location.

Cobb's Knob Treasury

The Cobb's Knob Treasury is also a good location to farm, due to the relatively high amounts of Meat, meat stacks and items dropped. Adventuring with a ten-leaf clover in this location will yield a dense meat stack (autosell value is 1000 Meat), so it is a good place for hardcore characters to go if they have lots of clovers.

Clover Farming

The Hermit will trade one to five clovers per day for worthless trinkets. These can be sold to other players. Note that some days, he does not have any at all.

The other method for obtaining clovers is to increase item drops as much as possible and farm The Orc Chasm for various scrolls and construct 31337 scrolls. These scrolls give worthless trinkets and clovers, with no daily limit.

Cobb Ingredient Farming

In Cobb's Knob you can farm dry noodles, which unbuffed you will get ~1/20 adventures (1/2 to get Knob Goblin Master Chef, ~1/10 drop), or farm reagents ~1/12 adventures (1/3 to get Knob Goblin Very Mad Scientist 1/4 for reagent). Noodles sell for 800, reliably, and reagents for 1k, reliably. Due to constant demand, prices are unlikely to drop by more than 400 Meat. Depending on your item and Meat drop rates and character power, this could be more efficient than farming the castle.

The Barrel Full of Barrels

At The Barrel full of Barrels adventurers have an excellent opportunity to pick up items with good autosell rates without having to rely on high item-drop boosts. Most of the items available from the barrel autosell for 100 Meat or more, and nothing is worth less than 30. Low-level adventurers, especially those in Hardcore, can pick up some easy Meat by spending a few adventures here, and it can even be used to burn turns of Beaten Up (providing you still have some HP). Be careful, though: an Explosion or a Mimic could disrupt your peaceful looting.

The Boss Bat's Lair

The Boss Bat's Lair is unique in that it can only be used before completing the level 4 quest. Beefy bodyguard bats drop 200-300 base Meat, one of the highest drops in the game for normal monsters (compare to yetis at ~210), certainly those available to lower-level characters. Whenever you encounter the Boss Bat, you can Run Away to keep fighting bodyguards. It is possible to obtain Harold's bell before Level 4, then use it on the first encounter of the Boss Bat, netting you at least several thousand Meat over the setup and bell adventures. If you have Transcendent Olfaction, you can easily fight bodyguard bats even more.

For Turtle Tamers

Turtle Tamers can use their unique ability to, well, tame turtles in order to get some easy meat. Just buy some Turtle pheromones at the Smacketeria, use them, and adventure. The best, easy place for this is the Woods region, in the Spooky Forest, as it can be accessed very early in the game. You will get a Sleeping wereturtle (which you can use to get a Wereturtle for yourself). Since only Turtle Tamers can get these, other people will be willing to put quite the price on one (probably 7,000 to 12,000 meat). Just go to the Flea market, check the prices, and put yours for sale for less. Once you reach level 5-6, you can do the same thing with a Syncopated Turtle (15,000 to 20,000) or a Grinning turtle (40,000 to 80,000). The latter would sell best, obviously, and this is very easy begining-of-game money for Turtle Tamers. But it should be noted, though, that only a limited number of turtle familiars may be tamed per ascension.

Mid Level Farming

Locations and tactics available to mid level characters.

The Icy Peak

The Icy Peak was formerly the most prolific area for Meat farming, but it has been much reduced since the addition of more (lower-yield) adventures in the area. Still, yetis do drop a large amount of Meat and it is still decent for adventurers who haven't reached better locations. Don't forget to trade yeti skins for hippo skins at The L33t Tr4pz0r's C4b1n before autoselling them - hippo skins are worth slightly more Meat. Increasing Meat drops is the best tactic because of the huge amount of Meat dropped by yetis and rams. One advantage to farming this area in Hardcore is that food, booze and MP restorers are dropped, as opposed to some of the other prime farming locations.

The Haunted Bedroom

The Haunted Bedroom in Spookyraven Manor is a good place to farm Meat due to the frequency of Meat-generating items. With many non-combat adventures, it is possible for characters without drop increasers to still get large amounts of Meat. Most encounters either drop Meat, an old leather wallet or an old coin purse, all of which yield between 400 and 600 Meat. Combat encounters can be avoided by using the CLEESH spell, running, or can be fought for their possible item drops (wallets and purses), so it is possible for weak or poorly equipped adventurers to succeed here. Having Meat drop increasers is effectively useless in this location because all Meat is dropped from items or non-combat adventures. An item drop increaser will help make combat encounters drop the purse and wallet more often. Note that in a best-case scenario you can earn only 600 Meat per turn here, making most other locations better for a well-equipped adventurer. However, due to fairly generous stat drops in this area, it may still be a reasonable choice for those looking to level a bit more.

Meat Vortex

Using a meat vortex in combat will cause a monster to drop Meat immediately. The Meat dropped varies between 1 and the maximum amount of Meat the monster can drop and is unaffected by Meat drop increasers.

While it is theoretically possible to make a profit, it is not usually cost effective to buy meat vortices to use in this manner, and there are better techniques than to farm for them. If you already have them from farming The Orc Chasm for other items, then this is a good use for them.

Post NS-13, the Dirty thieving brigand (unlocked as part of the Mysterious Island Quest) boasts the largest amount of Meat dropped of any creature by a huge margin (averaging around 1k). This is usually enough Meat to justify buying a meat vortex in the mall (at least until prices adjust), as the average gain from the vortex use will be about 500 Meat (more than many monsters even with moderate drop increases). However, once this piece of the quest is complete you will not be able to encounter any more brigands. Also note that use of the "Vortex, then run away" strategy, while good for Meat, is less efficient when your drop increasers are high enough, due to the loss of stat gains and/or items; to get an equivalent average drop from the Castle, for example, you need a Meat drop bonus of 250% or so.

Meat vortices should be treated like temporary potions like Knob Goblin nasal spray and carefully checked for cost-effectiveness.

This place can be a nice Meat farming area. A leprechaun will be helpful. The Bull is the second-best Meat dropper in the game after the rotund duck, of which there are a limited supply each day. The Guy with a pitchfork may give less Meat, but it is still useful. This place has some non-Meat droppers. However, the items dropped here can sell for nice amounts in the mall, and they can go quite fast.

High Level Farming

Locations and tactics available to high level characters.

The Castle in the Clouds in the Sky

The Castle in the Clouds in the Sky is probably the highest yield area in the game currently... certainly without being powerful and equipped enough to go underwater adventuring. Giants all drop large amounts of Meat and items with high autosell values. Increasing Meat drops is the best tactic, but item drops will also help. Make sure you turn the Wheel in the Clouds in the Sky to position D, with the Procrastination giant guarding the door. This eliminates a non-combat adventure that would drop no Meat or items. When encountering the wheel again, leave it alone and you won't spend an adventure on it. Because of over-farming, most of the items from this area won't sell in the Mall, so expect to autosell most of them. For a detailed analysis of farming the Castle, including cost-effectiveness analysis, see Advanced Farming.

Item Farming and Olfaction

Once NS-13 was introduced, the Castle became the best Meat farming zone, and no one had Transcendent Olfaction for about 200 days. Without Olfaction, The Upper Chamber and Middle Chamber of the Ancient Buried Pyramid are the best consistent item farming zones, based on tomb ratchets, ancient vinyl coin purses, and tons of items that smash into wads.

After people began learning Olfaction, many other zones were exploited as people found them and the price of items changed. Some of these zones in the past have been:

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