The Value of Accessories in Sunshine Islands

First of all, I would like to state that ALL of my Sunshine Islands Guides have been updated and contain much more information than they did yesterday. In fact, rather to my chagrin and embarrassment, I found that the General Guide contained some early misconceptions still in certain sections (even though the correct information was given in others!) so those have been corrected. I wish I had more time to edit, but there are so many details still to be added to all the guides. You always can contact me if there's a contradiction anywhere but I would be happier if my Guides didn't contain any of those.

I wrote a number of new sections for each of the guides including the General Guide. In the process of completing the Accessories List, I wrote a section on the value of the various Accessories.

Harvest Moon games tend to have a common foundation and many of the Accessories will be familiar to veteran players. Their 'value', however, may vary according to the game you are playing. I remember how excited I was when I first encountered the Witch Princess Earrings in HM DS. To have an Accessory that would restore BOTH Stamina and Fatigue seemed too good to be true!

Well, in fact, it IS too good to be true in Sunshine Islands. Here are the sections from my General Guide that deal with Accessory Effects.


Accessory Effects

As you have four slots in which to equip tools and/or accessories, you can equip more than one Accessory that has the same type of effect, making the effect cumulative. For example, when you purchase the Medium Harvest Goddess Pendant, you can equip it WITH the Small Harvest Goddess Pendant. The cumulative effect of both Pendants will be almost the same as that of the Large Harvest Goddess Pendant. The most significant difference is the need to use two slots instead of one. What this means in practical terms is that you may wish to use your Orichalcum to purchase a different type of Accessory in the early stages of the game, while continuing to use the Small and Medium Harvest Goddess Pendants to achieve maximum Stamina.

Unfortunately, the Witch Princess Pendants are a little disappointing. Although they increase both Maximum Stamina and Fullness, the actual degree of their effect is far less than that of the Harvest Goddess and Kappa Pendants. If you wish to be able to own a Godhand or one of the two Rings that alter the flow of time, however, you must buy all the Witch Princess Pendants first…

My own experience has shown that the best early configuration is to equip the Small and Medium Harvest Goddess Pendants with the Small Kappa Pendant, leaving one slot free for any Tool. When you can afford to purchase the Medium Kappa Pendant, exchange it with the Small Kappa Pendant. Increasing maximum Stamina has far more practical advantages than any increase in maximum Fullness.

The Small Kappa Pendant with the Medium Kappa Pendant will increase Maximum Fullness almost to the same extent as the Large Kappa Pendant would if equipped alone. As previously stated, however, increase in Maximum Stamina is more useful than increase in Maximum Fullness. As you only have 4 slots for equipment, it is far better to use the Small and Medium Harvest Goddess Pendants together with a Medium Kappa Pendant than to equip two Kappa Pendants.

Once you have Small and Medium Harvest Goddess and Kappa Pendants, you should collect 60 Orichalcum in order to buy the Large Harvest Goddess Pendant. When this has been achieved, you can equip the Large Harvest Goddess Pendant in one slot and the Small and Medium Kappa Pendants in two of the others, leaving one slot as always free for a Tool. When you have these accessories equipped, you will be in a fairly strong position in terms both of Stamina and Fullness. The considerable increase in your Energy Bars will aid you immensely in your exploration of the Mine.
Ultimately, when you have collected another 60 Orichalcum, you can obtain the Large Kappa Pendant and divest yourself of the Small and Medium versions.

Accessories that you no longer want or need either can be stored in your Beauty Box or sold to Chen. For the most part, their resale value is fairly low. The Small W. Princess Pendant, for example, can be sold for 1500G.

A vital Accessory that is sold by Chen instead of Charlie is the Teleport Stone, sold for 100,000G. It becomes available at Chen’s Shop as soon as you have 100,000G in your total earnings.

Effects of other Accessories

For those who are excited by the marketing descriptions of the various Earrings and Friendship Pendants, it may be useful to know how effective each actually IS in improving your life. You then may understand why I recommend the Pendants above the Earrings in terms of Stamina and Fullness effects.

Pendants increase the actual Bars in terms of potential Maximum Stamina and Fullness. The Earrings simply restore increments of Stamina and Fullness to your existing Energy Bars.

The Small Harvest Goddess Earrings, for example, restores 1 point of Stamina every half hour. The Medium Harvest Goddess Earrings do the same in half the time. The Large Harvest Goddess Pendant restores 1 point of Stamina every 3 minutes. If that sounds good to you, reflect for a moment on the value of Food in comparison. The actual effect of 1 point of Stamina is the same that you would obtain if you consumed a bag of flour raw. In other words, it is negligable. At the same time, remember that these Accessories MUST REMAIN EQUIPPED in order to function. Do you really have an empty equipment slot that could not be employed more profitably?
The Witch Princess Earrings may appear to be the ultimate Accessories with their description of having the power to restore BOTH Stamina and Fullness but their actual function for each is less practical than the Harvest Goddess and Kappa Earrings.

The Small Witch Princess Earrings restore 1 point of Stamina and 1 point of Fullness every TWO HOURS. Can you wait that long for the effect of a raw bag of flour??? The Large Witch Princess Earrings, which require a total of 100 precious Orichalcum to create restore 1 point of Stamina and 1 point of Fullness every half hour. In other words, it is an expensive Accessory that does very little even in the space of half an hour.

Friendship Pendants at first glance might be mistaken for the resource of the lazy or anti-social player but in fact, if you do not EARN Friendship through your own actions, the Pendant will not do it for you! What the Friendship Pendants do is augment the Friendship that your own actions have earned. The Small Friendship Pendant will give you a 20% boost whenever you earn any Friendship points. The effect of the Medium Pendant is a 50% boost and the Large Friendship Pendant increases Friendship Points by 100%. In other words, the Large Friendship Pendant doubles the value of any action you undertake, whether it is speaking to an individual or giving him/her a preferred Gift. This Accessory actually can be valuable, especially if you equip it before you embark on your daily ‘meeting and greeting’ rounds of the Islands.

No doubt the Witch Princess will be very cross with me for slagging off her Earrings, but however elegant they may be, they really are not worth their weight in Orichalcum...

At least, that is my experience...

Maximum Energy Levels in Island of Happiness

This information is included in my General Guide, but so many players have emailed me about their difficulty in sustaining their energy levels in the Mine that I thought it might merit a post.

The way to boost your Maximum Stamina and Fullness in IoH is by equipping Accessories made by Charlie. The best combination, in my own opinion is the Large Harvest Goddess Pendant and the Large Kappa Pendant.

I did not find the Earrings at any size to be particularly helpful. Yes, they will restore a tiny fraction of Stamina or Fullness or, in the case of the Witch Princess Earrings, both Stamina and Fullness, as time passes, but the amounts are not very significant. Of the three types of Earrings, the Large Witch Princess earrings probably are the most useful, but really not to the point of taking an equipment slot in place of a more desirable accessory such as the Turbo Shoes.

(With four equipment slots, equipping both Large Harvest Goddess Pendant and Large Kappa Pendant ALL THE TIME will give you only two free slots at any given time. I use the top slot for active equipment or Teleport Stone and keep the Turbo Shoes in the bottom slot, with the Large Harvest Goddess Pendant and Large Kappa Pendant to the left and right.)

In fact, initially I had hoped that the Large Witch Princess Pendant would be the equal of the combination of Large Harvest Goddess Pendant + Large Kappa Pendant, but this is far from the case. You do need to purchase it in order to unlock the Godhand but once purchased, I never used it. When equipped in the place either of the Large Harvest Goddess Pendant or the Large Kappa Pendant, it actually REDUCED total Stamina or Fullness. When equipped in place of BOTH, my total Stamina and Fullness both were reduced.

The Large Kappa Pendant and Large Harvest Goddess Pendant give you the maximum Stamina and Fullness capacity. Remember that, when equipped, they only increase the size of the Energy bars. They do not fill them with energy!

It is very important not to unequip either of these accidentally even for a moment as, when you do, your actual energy levels will disappear with the disappearance of the extra capacity. Re-equipping the accessory afterwards will increase capacity again but will not fill the bar!

In my General Guide, I explain how a player can equip both the Small and Medium Harvest Goddess Pendant to increase Stamina capacity until he/she is able to purchase the Large Harvest Goddess Pendant. The amounts of increased Stamina capacity given by each are added together to give you the largest capacity available until you are able to purchase the Large Harvest Goddess Pendant.

I find that increased Stamina capacity is far more vital than increased Fullness capacity in IoH. Fullness diminishes slowly as time passes. Stamina can diminish very quickly through use of tools or falling through pitfalls in the Mine.

Once you set 3 Green Wonderfuls in your Hammer and in your Hoe, mining itself no longer will use ANY Stamina, but falling through a pitfall still will decrease Stamina according to the number of floors through which you fall.

If you are not pressed for time (in real life), you can avoid pitfalls once your Hoe and Hammer can be used without decreasing your Stamina and go through the Mine solely through the stairs, but that really is time-consuming.

There is two situations when it may be to your advantage to go through the mine floor by floor, using only the stairs:

1. When you have reached Floor 50, and you still need Orichalc for Accessories. Once you have mined all the Orichalc on Floor 50, you may wish to use only the stairs to descend until you reach Floor 75. Between Floors 51-74, you should be able to find at least 1 Orichalc on each Floor.

If you have set Orange Wonderfuls in your Hammer and Hoe, the number of items you obtain each time you find a gem/ore, Black Grass/Lithograph is multiplied according to the number of Orange Wonderfuls in the Tool. The maximum appears to be 9, giving you 10 gems/ores each time you split a rock. Charlie will not allow me to set more than 9 in my Hammer, even though I have empty available slots.

As you usually are guaranteed at least 5 Orichalc on Floor 50 alone, and sometimes as many as 8, you can obtain 50 to 80 Orichalc in a single visit to Floor 50 with 9 Orange Wonderfuls in your Hammer. It is not as useful to set that many Orange Wonderfuls in your Hoe, but if you are at a point in the game where you have more Wonderfuls than you really need, by all means do so, making every strike for Black Grass one that nets you 10 Black Grass instead of 1.

Note that the same strategy can be used with respect to Adamantite. Find as many as possible on Floor 25. From Floors 51-74, Adamantite as well as Orichalc can be found on each of those floors, so if you use the stairs to mine on each floor, you should be able to find quite a few Adamantite for Makers, even if you have no Orange Wonderfuls in your Hammer.

2. When you have reached Floor 250. From that point onward, you can find EVERY special item in the rocks on each floor until you reach 255. To maximise the number of Mythic Stones, Orichalc, Pink Diamonds, Alexandrite and so on that you can take home from a single trip, you may wish to mine each of those floors.

Mining for Mythic Stone on Floor 100 should give you at least 5 and sometimes as many as 8. With 9 Orange Wonderfuls in your Hammer, you would obtain 50-80 from that Floor alone. From Floors 251-254, you should be able to find another 5 at least without any Orange Wonderfuls in the Hammer. That would give you another 50 with 9 Orange Wonderfuls in your Hammer.

This strategy makes it possible for you to obtain all Accessories as well as a Mythic Refrigerator as early as possible in the game.

It is useful with respect to obtaining the Adamantite needed for all Makers, although you may wish to have the Makers built BEFORE you have the opportunity to obtain more than one Orange Wonderful!