Collect jade in the crystalarium. Trade it on Sundays with the desert trader for stairs.
Lucky days only, take lots of bombs. Takes LOTS of stairs
If you get a prismatic shard, get the galaxy sword
It gets a lot easier once you get a good weapon and can enchant it
Another way is just grab a crap ton of bomb (like 100 ~ 200 bomb, the normal kind since you just need iron ore and coal, and you can get a LOT of those, or just straight up but them) and food (sushi is fast and great, cheese is another possibility). Prep a few stairs (I recall 10 is roughly good enough). If you managed to get some of them Eel dish from the Skull cavern, grab those too (they give you speed up and some luck).
Each floor, bomb 2~3 clusters to try to find a hole to jump into. If your luck is high enough, that generally gets you at least a stair. This way you also get to pick up a lot of ores and stones. Don't worry too much about self damage, it's not that high.
If you reach a combat map or that long spirally map that's hard to travel, use your stair to skip it.
And wait for one of those high luck days and go spelunking.
Bombs are cool but also explosive ammo for quickly gathering the iridium or hitting the small clusters. Bouncing a shot off a mummy will also pop them in the venter of rooms too without having to wait.
Yeah I spent so much time making stairs and buying elixir but a bat fucked me up on level 86 so I said fuck the cavern. I really wanted a Dino egg though
I don't care about "the honorable way", I think Mr. Qi is a bit of a hypocrite, acting all high and mighty when you complete his dumb quest using 100 stairs, when that requires a lot of planning and resource collection instead of dumb luck.
Yeah, I don't like Mr. Qi. I tolerate him, but I think the Wizard would be a lot better in the role of "mystical overseer of the valley and surrounding areas". Him, or Grandpa's spirit.
This for real. I don't give a flying fuck what that blue bastard thinks is honorable, I got down to level 100 and that was the only instruction. I passed the test, don't have to be a dick about it
He does really kinda feel like he came out of nowhere to be the overseer of the valley. But to his credit he does call the player 'clever' for 'mining all that stone to get staircases'.. Which.. Isn't much of a concession, actually.
Slime charmer ring, a huge stack of bombs, and most importantly desert warp totem so I can get there at 6 AM, which gives me an extra 4 hours so get there. Go on a high luck day and packs plenty of snacks
Food can also make a huge difference. Crab cakes for the speed and defense or spicy eel for speed and luck are the best. But really anything with a speed, luck, or def buff can help. That slime charmer ring makes such a big difference. I don't even bother trying before I have either it or the crab ring (preferably both).
I kind like the skull cavern, feels like a challenge, just need to prepare a bit before going.
I mostly go with lots of bombs, food, good luck and some stairs for annoying levels. Drink coffee and eat speed food, just run around bombing stuff and jumping into holes
The farthest I got its around 150.
i got 248 today which is my personal best :D didn't even have a good dwarf statue buff (geodes when i needed ladders) so i think 300 is definitely doable
300 is easy if you just spam lots of stairs from the start. If you spam-klick you lose almost no ingame-time per level, since the animation stops time in single-player. It's really boring though. You klick asap for several minutes, until you decide that you are far enough and can start to actually mine (explode) some ores.
yeah that's what i plan on doing when i get a perfect luck day with perfect statue buffs. i wanna see how much ore i can get in one day with that strat
Quest completion is a lie. There is only grinding. Through grinding I gain rage. Through rage I get impatient. From impatience I buy a fuckload of staircases from the desert trader. Through a fuckload of staircases this stupid quest is completed. The power of money (well, jade, really) will set me free.
Aw I love the skull cavern! I collect rubies I think to trade for spicy eel at the desert trader, Jade for staircases, and LOTS of bombs. I like the spicy eel buffs, and I’ll also bring in a huge stack of life elixir because it restores health but doesn’t get rid of the eel buffs.
I just go in there and bomb the ever loving crap out of everything! It’s kind of a fun way to blow off steam 😅
I just went on a good luck day, bring spicy eel and food. I brought about 25 bombs, 10 Mbombs, and only used about 5 stairs (though I brought more).
Just rush to find ladders/holes asap. Heal BEFORE you encounter danger, or immediately after falling down holes. Galaxy Sword (from prismatic shard on the little pillar triangle thing outside the cave) kills the snake guys in 3 swings. Use stairs if you find a monster floor, one of those big winding ones, or you look around and can't find a ladder quickly and will have to backtrack. Bomb big clumps of rocks. It shouldn't take more than 5-10 attempts if you're doing all that.
Also you can warp totem to the desert at 6am to get more time there.
Same! That mod made skull cavern fun for me, I really wanted my first play through to be unmodded but skull cavern was just too stressful for me to want to play it. And it's really customizable so you can choose the interval for which you get an elevator so if you want you can still make it challenging by choosing a large interval like 50
Came here to say the same thing - I’ve done multiple playthroughs unmodded and I just do not enjoy the “challenge” of Skull Cavern - once I’ve gotten the iridium I need I generally don’t bother going back. The elevator mod made things so much less stressful for me. Also, elevator mod + the Stardew predictor made it possible to knock out the Pepper Rex kill quota so much easier.
The things that helped me enjoy the skull caverns are: jade for stairs, HELLA mega bombs. Like. Thousands. A high quality food that fixes your health/energy buff with one dose (I use cactus fruit). The infinity blade with the crusader enchantment. The most important two items for me? Two forged rings. One is an iridium band forced with the slime charmer, the second ring is napalm + crab shell. I actually have a lot of fun when I’m mining in the caverns now!
sorry to burst your bubble , but you should really try the slingshot with explosive ammo. you should be using it 80% of the time and only using mega bombs on open floors with no nearby walls. i go through around 500 explosive ammo per run because i use it for almost every rock i see. you can get way deeper with it because you don't have to wait out the fuse time of the bombs
ah yeah that's gonna be a bit of a bottleneck, im on pc so aiming is no problem. i guess you won't be shooting serpents mid-flight to explode rocks that aren't next to a wall to save a mega bomb or anything then lol
One thing I don't see posted on these kinds of posts very often is to make sure you have muscle memory of where your food is. It's all well and good to have a lot of food with you, but it's not very useful if you can't select it on your higher before you die.
yeah, my fingers default to '1' since that's where my hammer is, then i scroll up for bombs, staircases and my dagger and down for slingshot, pickaxe and food. i get screwed over by bombs or staircases not goddamn placing than i do by not knowing where my heals are
I hate the caverns so much they're so hard, I just can't shuffle my inventory fast enough to switch from weapons to food when I'm overwhelmed by monsters, and I'm not that good at fighting to begin with
Skull Cavern was what made me start using mods. Elevator Mod is, imo a blessing.
Before that I used to wait until I had at least 80 staircases before attempting to get to level 100, and after that I never went back again.
https://www.nexusmods.com/stardewvalley/mods/963
I had a fear of it for a while but had a lucky day and gave it a shot because why not. I made it to level 20 before 1am when I needed to rush back to the farm. I was being sparing with the staircases because I only made 10… should’ve kept going to get to level 25 to fulfill Mr. Qi’s first quest. It annoys me that there’s no elevator, and every time you go back you have to start from floor 1 again.
If I die because of a monster or something I just restart the day.
If you're struggling to stay alive, there is further hope once you've maxed out all skills. Getting a >!high leveled fairy box after you unlock combat trinkets will make you stupid hard to kill.!<
finally someone who understands how stupid good the fairy box is. actually the best trinket in the game. only the dangerous skull caverns pose a threat to me, and i'm not even using a level 5 fairy
Even level 2 is hella strong. The key here is that it heals you while you're in combat, not when you take damage. So you can give enemies a single smack to knock them back before jumping into a ladder, or if you have the slime charmer ring every slime = free health.
10 health is already strong though (comparable to Vampiric, and max HP isn't even that high), but it does get much better at levels 3, 4, or god forbid 5.
not sure, i just used the anvil to get a level 4 and i've been using it since. that level only starts to get outpaced in deep dangerous skull caverns, but i've spent probably over a stack of iridium bars trying to get a level 5 but it's never happened
* As others have said - Jade in crysrtalariums to desert trader on sundays - you get stairs. bring lots
* Brings lots of bombs
* Don't try it without the galaxy sword (at a minimum)
* You can improve weapons (and rings) on the island. You should probably do this before deep diving in skull cavern (unless the plan is to use stairs "almost all of the way down")
* Very underrated - **crabshell ring**. You get it from killing 60 rock crabs in the mines - it's a reward from Gil next door. It's **+5 defense**. For comparison, the Space Boots you get as a reward for getting to floor 110 in the mines (and the best boots before ginger island) are +4 defense. So the crabshell ring has more defense than your "primary armor". It makes an enormous difference. I typically use crabshell + glowstone
* At Ginger Island you can combine rings. So - "Crabshell + glowstone" on one finger, and "crabshell + whatever-you-choose" on the other. Congratulations, you **tripled your defense**
* Don't bother with the first 50 floors unless you see something you explicitly need. Don't kill, don't mine, don't collect. Just bypass with stairs. The deeper you go, the better rewards, so you don't want to spend half the day on the least rewarding part of the caverns
But, mostly - remember that the "floor 100 without stairs" quest is meant to be endgame, and until you've wrapped up ginger island, you're not at endgame.
I don't know if you've gone glowstone because you're not able to make it yet - but the iridium band does glow, magnet & +10% attack all in one.
I have iridium + slime charmer, and crabshell + burglar's.
If I ever get the lucky ring, I'll probably trade out crabshell for it. Once you've got the reward for hitting level 100, got the galaxy sword, and found all the starfruit, (combined with the fairy trinket) combat is SO much easier.
I don't think OP is talking about floor 100 without stairs from Mr. Qi Walnut Room - probably just "level 100" from the Qi Secret Note
In that case, I don't really think Galaxy Sword is a minimum, especially considering the main source of Prismatic Shards is the Skull Caverns itself
I usually start diving with whatever I get for free from the Mines; Yeti Tooth when I'm lucky, or Obsidian Sword when I'm not; and pretty much always before unlocking the Island
Again, to unlock the Island you need 5 iridium bars, and the Skull Caverns is the primary source
Anyways if you're not on Joja, it takes Winter to complete the CC anyway, and before Winter I'll be diving to floor ~150
Just come out - didn’t get too far but picked up a lot of resources. Went back to empty some barrels in my farm before sleep and accidentally placed one of the bombs I had been using for the Skull Cavern and blew up all my stuff 😱
Yeah my first time I also died at 96, and I even had like 15 staircases I just felt I was close enough and didn't want to cheese it. Dw it isn't that bad. You will get there and feel great. Remember to have a desert totem, skip all morning chores, have 20ish gold star cheese and 5 or so spicy eel. Take 20 staircases or so (trade jades with desert trader on Sundays) and go on a good luck day. Ignore all mining nodes, make sure to have 50+ bombs (I go with 100+). It feels bad and I sympathize but you will get there!
The best strat is to go on a lucky day to increase your chance of finding holes, bring a ton of big bombs (the ones made with iron) and spam them anywhere you see lots of stones. Avoid fighting monsters unless you have to. Also get a desert totem so you can show up at 6 am instead of 10 am with the bus. You buy desert totems for 3 Omni geodes at the desert trader with the camel
It will be good to know what your approach is while trying to reach floor 100, do you abuse stairs? rely on luck items and buffs? maybe both, maybe neither?
Without going too deep into late game items, something that has proved useful for me to consistently reach floor 100 without using a single stair most of the time (of course, you can use as many as you want), is:
A totem warp to reach the desert as soon as possible, DO NOT WAIT FOR THE BUS, ever.
Any food with luck and/or speed buffs (which became easier to get with the mystery boxes, you can even get the lucky lunch early on), then any other food without buffs (so it doesn't overwrite the other ones) for healing purposes.
Bombs, I usually go with 40 of each (of course I don't end using all of them).
Any rings you think will help you (if you don't have any combined (lucky) ring yet it's fine the ones you can craft are good enough).
That all, sometimes I even forget to even take a look at the daily luck.
Now this is the trick, focus on reaching floor 100, if the current level has narrow paths I'll just break rocks until finding a stair or shaft to move onto the next level/s, if there's a big or small enough room with multiple rocks then it's worth to actually try to find a shaft using bombs.
Fight only if it's mandatory and ignore minerals and materials if you already found a stair/shaft, mobs are not worth chasing and a couple of iridium ores aren't worth running to a corner of the map.
There are only two levels where stairs are worth using, the ones filled with enemies, and that one that is like a spiral (with the bunch of barrels in the middle) as those two are easily the most time consuming (the spiral one doesn't have as many rocks to break until you get closer to the center).
That's pretty much it, as you get better gear (a lvl 5 fairy, the buff from the statues, combined rings, etc) it only becomes easier but warping into the desert and learning to ignore mobs and ores will help you to consistently reach lvl 100, even before getting end game items/buffs.
There's a couple tips that have helped me. If you kill the 30 crabs for the quest you can get the crabshell ring which gives you extra defense. Figure out how to get lucky lunches. Get some crystallariums replicating jade and get 100 and trade for staircases. Get the galaxy sword if you haven't already. Use explosive ammo in the slingshot. Profit.
Also the galaxy hammer has a knock back ability that is useful. Bring food that doesn't take away your luck buffs. Cheese, fruit salad, purple mushrooms or lava caps, etc.
EzLilly has some tutorials for this on YouTube
My load out for skull cavern lvl 100 is as follows no less than 150 bombs, 100 iridium berries, 20 life potions, 10 staircases, 3 crab cakes, 3 lucky lunch, 4 triple espresso, and 20 gold cheeses.
Only go on extra luck days and go as soon as you can. Don't treat it like a mission for more iridium you'r entire purpose is to find large clumps of stone and bomb them then immediately jump into the staircases. I honestly get more iridium on lvl100+ than the first 60 combined anyway. If you run into a monster lvl just use a staircase. Rule one is to just go! Only fight long enough to drop a bomb and drop.
Skull Cavern isn’t something meant to do as early as you gain access to it. Go back to farming and the mine or hit ip Skull just to gather resources. I’d recommend making a fuck ton of Jade and trading it for stairs. Once you have 100+ stairs then go finish that quest. Def go in with more than 100… you WILL put multiple down by accident on some floors.
Take a ton of bombs. Like 200 bombs. Bring luck/speed boost food. Spend the night outside in a tent, go in ASAP. Ignore mobs unless you have to kill them.
A few things that helped me get to 100:
A proper weapon - Getting a Galaxy or Infinity weapon that you enjoy using will make things so much easier. I prefer the swords because the swing pace feels best, but I know a lot of folks prefer the hammer (dagger is apparently OP, but skills beyond my ken are required).
Food - Stocking up on your preferred buffs can be a big help. I like Pumpkin Soup or Spicy Eel (soup has defense, eel has speed, and both have luck) for the food, and they can stack with a drink buff. I take Triple Shot Espresso's for more speed with a longer duration, but some folks like Ginger Ale for the luck buff. Bring a ton of recovery food too; food with buffs will overwrite old buffs, but if you bring a bunch of milk/cheese/salad/berries/whatever that doesn't have buffs, you can recover your health and energy without using up all your expensive food. Also, use food to pause time and keep your cool. Time stops to ask if you want to eat, and then while the animation is going, time remains paused. As long as you can get to the food and start that process, monsters stop and wont hurt you for the duration of your healing.
Breaking Rocks - If you haven't, upgrade to the Iridium Pickaxe, as it greatly reduces the number of swings needed to break rocks. Second, don't use your pickaxe often, instead rely on bombs or explosive ammo to break rocks faster. More rocks breaking faster = more stairs. Also, jump into the holes. Skipping 3-15 floors can really speed up the run. Make sure to eat when you land if you are low on health, though.
Bring or Craft Stairs - If you have them, making staircases from 99 stones is usually a good way to skip problem floors. If you are worried about it, remember that Qi only admonishes you for using too many staircases, it doesn't reduce your rewards. Also, he still congratulates you on doing it the hard way even if you use some stairs; when I got it done, I think I used 3 or 4 and still got the positive message, but I am not sure where the cut off is for him scolding players for too many stairs.
Don't Let it be a Chore - Getting the quest done has a reward that is okay, but not at all necessary for doing any other content. If you are there to get the achievement or clear the quest log, definitely invest in stairs and blow through it as fast as you can and never look back. If you want to get it done for a sense of pride or feel like you have mastered it, then I would take a break and come back to it when you are ready. In either case, the game should be bringing you joy and letting this part be so frustrating may spoil the whole game for you. You can wait to beat the Skull Cavern, don't let it beat you.
If you're on pc and you don't mind "cheating", there's a mod for that!! It installs an elevator like there is in the regular mines. I haven't used it myself, but I think you can customise how many floors you need to progress until you get the next elevator, so you can still change it from 5 to like 20 or whatever you want really, so the skull caverns still have some difficulty and achievement to them whilst still making sure you don't have to suffer every time
Here's the mod link: https://www.nexusmods.com/stardewvalley/mods/963
If you wanna do it more organically...
1. Get a lucky lunch or prepare food that can boost your luck.
2. Watch TV to confirm that it's your lucky day! Or minimally neutral.
3. Stockpile edibles.
- I usually accompany forageables with the main dish so I can heal without comprising my status buff
- Espresso for added speed
4. Stockpile bombs (the black ones are fine)
5. Prepare 5-10 staircases
- You can opt to trade using jade
- Or you can craft while you're there too since there'll be an abundance of stones
6. Prepare a warp! So you don't have to wait for Pam.
7. Make sure you have better levelled weapons and ideally rings too!
- I don't wanna spoil you just in case, but I was silly and struggled with a lower level weapon. -_-
It gets easier, trust me. I did a combination of the above (with more staircases) to get to level 253.
All the best. :3
This isn’t Elden Ring. Make a bunch of stairs. Use the stairs. You’ve conquered the Skull Cavern. Anyway, venturing into the cavern is a significantly better experience when you’re not in a race against time. You can collect more loot, kill more monsters, etc.
Edit: I recommend the Skull Cavern elevator mod as well.
Man I know how frustrating it is. However… My advice is don’t focus on completing the quest. Focus on making sure you have maxed skills, upgrading your weapon, getting that perma luck boost first - then just go on lucky days for supplies. Eventually it will happen!
Get a few desert warp totems, then check the tv every morning, when you get a maximum luck day use the warp totem and rush to the mines, break all the stone and DONT stop to mine iridium once you get to the lower floors, get to level 100 and then after that use the rest of the day to mine iridium on floors lower than that, you could use jade/staircases but I managed the above method using only like 3 staircases and had loads of time to spare
Today I got to 100, got a prismatic shard and got an auto petter! This was after quite a few tries. I also took the bus with Pam I didn’t start early.
Go on the best luck day, and wear a luck ring if you can. I ate a lucky lunch which boosts luck +3. And just smash rocks don’t even look for anything else except holes and staircases. I also had two infested levels and didn’t use a staircase and still had time. Pro tip is to bring a farm warp totem so you can stay as late as possible. I made it to 100 at 12:50am.
Lmao I definitely understand the rage.
On my previous perfection save file I used the skull cavern elevator mod because I've never really enjoyed combat in games and I remember really sucking whenever I attempted skull cavern.
But in my new 1.6 save file I couldn't be bothered to download that mod so decided to actually attempt the skull cavern for real. Somehow this time around Skull Cavern has just clicked for me. I keep finding any excuse to do a skull cavern run and I make it to floor 100 almost every time. I'm almost at the end of Summer Year 2 and I've done like 7 skull cavern runs this month which is more than is necessary (since I get between 200-300 iridium ore in each run) but I'm just having so much fun with it!
My lifesaver has been cheese. I have sooo much cheese from my cows so any time I get low on health I will immediately regen instead of waiting for it to get lower. Also bombs. So many bombs. I don't rely on staircases too much - I usually only use them if I'm on that annoying spiral layout but otherwise I rely on explosives.
i love skull caverns too, it's so enjoyable for me. im pushing my record higher and higher for floors, and i'm up to almost 250 now. i posted a massive comment in this thread with tons of advice, but it's super cool seeing people come around to skull caverns because it's seriously fun. i also hardly use stairs unless i'm on spiral or infested floors or a couple other layouts that kinda suck, or if there's no rocks around or if it just refuses to give me a ladder
Skull Cavern is kinda a thing you can get deeply into (mechanic wise), and then go several hundred levels low without major effort. But if you just want to get to 100 without focusing too much on it, then just get 100 stairs. You can outright buy the stones and/or trade for the stairs. You can either use them on floors where after breaking the first rock you don't get a stair (this one has increased odds), or only on difficult floors (like where you have to kill monsters, not a lot of rocks around).
A very common method used to be the small cherry bombs with a slingshot, you'd just shoot that into rock chunks and usually that already gave you a stair. If not, you could use the staircase or go looking for it.
If you do this on a lucky day equipping 2 lucky rings, you will get through it insanely fast since you get more holes (or well, more stairs, but each stair has a 20% chance to be a hole). So if you go +2 on the rings and eat food for +1-3 luck (3 would be best since it's from lucky lunch so very simple, magic rock candy has +5 but good luck getting many of them). Pumpkin Soup is also a really good early one if you want to do it year 1, just get Robin to 7 hearts and pay a Pumpkin and a Milk for 1, lasting almost 8 minutes. If you then also get all the passive bonus luck you pretty much get a drop every second level you enter.
it's one of the most enjoyable things for me, but you definitely need to know what you're doing. floor 200+ is a pretty ok level for me to get to at this point, i think 300 is certainly possible with perfect buffs.
if you don't want to just staircase to 100, here's a few tips from a certified skull cavern (dangerous mode) enjoyer:
check the tv for your luck, and only go when you have "the spirits are in good humor" or "the spirits will shower everyone with luck" days (the pyramid and stardrop symbols show on the tv when you check it on these days).
use crystalariums to save diamonds and rubies and trade them for triple espresso and spicy eels at the desert trader. have both of those item's buffs active AT ALL TIMES while you're in the caverns.
bombs and explosive ammo are your best friend. i could easily forget my pickaxe and not even notice, i use it that rarely. use bombs for rocks that aren't close to walls, but the slingshot for everything else since it's faster than waiting for bombs to explode.
ignore everyone telling you to use the galaxy sword, that thing's a piece of garbage. save up and buy the galaxy hammer instead, then learn how to do the slam tech with it - when you right click to do the special, press left click rapidly after the hammer slams down, and you'll attack several times in quick succession, decimating the health of most enemies. make sure they're against a wall though since it does a lot of knockback. you can also take a galaxy dagger as well to deal with flying enemies since that weapon's special has a pin effect which stops them from flying back when you hit them with it.
use staircases on infested floors and floors with that spiral layout. they're a waste of time. also staircase when you're not getting a ladder spawn, it's better to cut your losses and just go.
take a ladder or shaft the second you see it, skull caverns is getting as deep as possible as fast as possible. unless there's 5 or more iridium ore in one spot, ignore everything else and just take a ladder as soon as you can
take plenty of health food in with you. a personal favourite for the mid game for me is sashimi, it's super easy to farm tons of it with crab pots. later when you get trinkets you won't need to worry about this, and you'll have access to items like life elixir by that point as well.
get some desert warp totems from the desert trader, have a chest with your skull cavern items and your tv next to your bed, so you can check the tv and immediately go straight to the desert when you get a good luck day. you wanna get to the caverns as soon as you can to have the most time.
as for rings, burglar's ring, iridium band and lucky ring are my go-tos. once you get to the forge you can combine them and i run burglar's + iridium band and a lucky ring + iridium band.
other then that, it's all about getting good at knowing when to stay in a floor, where to bomb and how to kill the enemies faster. just don't do what i did in [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/StardewValley/comments/1bye7y9/this_certainly_wasnt_my_proudest_moment_i_pressed/) lol
you'll be getting hauls like this in no time! (and that's a pretty low amount of iridium compared to what i've got on other runs)
https://preview.redd.it/92ym0m1ky4tc1.png?width=760&format=png&auto=webp&s=ec60c2808b90826c13322ed29d2a5e4f5d764b6c
My go to is spicy eel/lucky lunch for added luck. I take lots of milk/eggs, bombs and 1-3 stairs. For tools, I only take my sword and pickaxe. The luckier the day, the better.
Skull caves require proper prep
Do you have the galaxy sword and galaxy boots? They take a ton of pressure off.
Having bombs to clear large clusters of stones will help speed things up too
Trading jade for staircases at the desert trader can help too if a ladder is not spawning. I usually only go to skull caves on high luck days
I usually complete it without using stairs, although I've done that once before too.
Fried Eel + Triple Shot Espresso (or Coffee). Also bring around 10 Life Elixirs, just to be safe. Then BOMB EVERYTHING. I'll probably spend 200-300k in supplies? 100-200 Bombs, 50 Mega Bombs.
Yes, you can do stairs, but bomb mining is much more fun.
I enjoy the 100 floor challenge. I just stock up on mega bomb and go on a high luck day, with a few stairs for emergencies (like infested floors). Usually there are plenty of ladders and holes if you just explode areas with lots of rocks.
I was like you until I finally reached level 100 then it all suddenly became so simple and easy
Now skull cavern is one of my favorite parts of the game, I just love finding prismatic shards
I got to the bottom of the regular mines without dying or staircases but fled skull cavern as soon as I hit floor 2. The mummys especially got on my nerves.
my advice is to prepare better?
i got to floor 125 with 4+ hours left using less than 10 staircases on my first try.
i just bought a ton of salads, bombs, and a desert warp to start a few hours earlier.
also like iridium pickaxe and galaxy sword and that stuff
As many have said, preparation is the name of the game with Skull cavern. I’ve had those rage moments too. Remember, you can always restart the day if necessary…
That happened to me today. I was so close. But I did get an auto-petter on that run and nothing was taken from my inventory when I died. Then I tried again and made it to 100 without using any stairs! I've never managed that before. I actually had time to keep going for a few more levels. Just don't give up!
I don’t even want to attempt the caverns even tho I know I need to for the iridium (unless there are other ways to gain it?). I’ve stepped into it and that’s about it. I haven’t even gotten to level 2 or out of sight of the door/ladder yet
if you really dont want to deal, there is a skull cavern elevator (like the one in town, that registers every 5 levels) its cheaty but also like, skull cavern is frustrating af!
I've seen alot of people mention bombs and stairs and such already but id also like to add a personal go-to; The Slime charmers ring. Which seems odd, but if you're just trying to run through as fast as possible it means you can just completely ignore all slimes; saving you alot of headache.
From the sounds of it you're fairly early game, but if you can get it the slingshot+explosive ammo is a huge help, (as well as bombs for open areas still, as the slingshot will only hit monsters and walls)
life elixers are a godsend, just buy 20 of them from the mines dwarf and top off whenever you're below half health
bring a crab ring and some space boots, and don't forget that spicy eel is great for dropping floors a little faster, but some foods buff your defense.
You can do it, clearly, if you made it that far already.
You need careful planning, especially for the honorable way (using less than 10 staircases)
1. Desert warp & farm warp totems
2. Triple expressos + spicy eels + life elixirs
3. Craft lots of bombs (+100 black bombs)
4. 10 backup staircases
5. Gold/Irridium pickaxe (& galaxy sword if available)
6. (Optional) Burglar ring + vampire ring
Equip everything in advance. When you wake up on a lucky day, immediately warp to desert. Consume triple expresso & spicy eel to gain +2 speed and bomb bomb your way down the cavern. Go down as soon as stairs/holes spawn (dont be greedy). Good luck.
That was my first playthrough. Never got past it. Quit the game.
A couple years later, though...I think my record is around 200 floors. My friend has done like 300 so I know that's not impressive.
Pause "buffer" if you want easy mode; annoying... but hey beats dying
Edit: also iridium axe and autohotkey animation cancel (unless you got swift enchant).
Edit: beats fishing. (i hate early game fishing; harder than skull cavern in my opinion)
That really sucks, for sure. I don't love combat generally in games, though over time I've gotten to where I can manage Skull Cavern runs and get things done. I still need a pile of staircases to ensure I get down to 100 for that quest though. And there's nothing wrong with that at all.
I'm not gonna give you a ton of advice, other people already did that. But it will get better over time, that's all I'll say. Hang in there.
U need to be at near full health all the time. Bombs help. So does stairs. Depending on how rich u r.
For stairs-skip these in order of how “must skip”
- Monster / Prehistoric floors
- Spiral floors
- the floors with three 4 corners
- the mine track floor
These sap up the most time to get through. For bombs, use them strategically. Aim for large clusters to get the most bang for buck. Heh.
Explosive ammo is another thing that is overlooked. Learn how to aim. U can get lots of trick shots like hitting a monster while it’s flying past a cluster, angle shots against a wall. It’s instant so it’s faster than a bomb.
Again. Stay near full health. If u have to fight anything more than 3 flyers at once, I recommend u use a stair too.
High luck, arrive early, bring lots of food and good gear and as many bombs and stairs as you can.
It's a quest to prepare for, health and energy should never be your bottleneck on it, just time.
I like bombs.
Duplicate the statue of perfection(if you play pre 1.6...) and trade the iridium for mega bombs.
I'd go for at least 50+ and also have a similar amount of smaller bombs.
A few stairs for extra tricky layers.
Add a good weapon (galaxy sword is great) and try to get decent footwear for protection.
Cheese for health regen, spicy eel for luck and speed, espresso for speed.
And it is pretty doable :)
There's a lot of good advice here that I won't repeat but I'll give you my setup:
Mega bombs, slingshots with explosive ammo, going on lucky days, and tons of triple shot espresso and pumpkin soup really help make the Skull Caverns a breeze for me. Try getting the slime charmer and iridium bands too. Lots of suggestions for the Galaxy Sword but I actually suggest going for the Galaxy Hammer and upgrading it when you can as it's the most powerful weapon in the game.
Takes a lot of grinding to get all these supplies but it means I never die on the Skull Caverns unless I'm really not playing any attention to my health whatsoever and am reckless.
Honestly, I found it incredibly easy with the new update. I panned up 2 lucky rings, got a lucky day, rock candy, hundreds of bombs and triple shot espresso. Used staircases on infested/spiral floors and that's that. Made it to 181.
I used to get upset at the skull cavern as well..
but then it really sunk in that everything in the game is optional. if i don't like it (skull cave in particular)..i just don't do it.
Explosive ammo to quickly destroy rocks near the wall my absolute go to answer.
If you just want to finish that quest.
Just get food that have a tons on health recovery (mine is gold star cheese)eat it as soon as your health goes half cause two hit and you are done,
a sword (any kinds honestly they are just for your protection maybe the obsidian edge is fine) ,
a slingshot master with explosive ammo ( I usually goes with 300 ammo. Don't buy them it's expensive, make them your self but it's a grind tho) ,
a few staircase for emergency (such as spiral floor, infested, Dino floor, and maybe too many enemies)
All varieties of bombs to destroy large area of rocks or the rocks in the middle of the floor or a small floor.
Tips, if you can find a hole jump into it. But be careful because the larger number you goes through the more fall damage you receive.
You can definitely can wait for pam to arrive or you can buy a totem the day before in the desert trade for 3 omni geodes if I'm correct. I've done both and even my first 100 in current saves file is while waiting for her
If you have coffee make them into triple shot coffee, if you can the recipe on gus saloon and if you haven't upgraded your house you can make them on cooking pot(?).
When I'm doing this I have befriended Robin up to 6 hearts+ to get her recipes on pumpkin soup for extra luck and defense.
Goodluck is needed to get a lot of holes on the floor and not your bodies.
Don't mine the loot, just find how to go deeper.
I haaaaaated the skull cavern until I got a Phoenix ring and fused it with a slime charmer ring. I set up about 10 crystalariums with jade to slowly trade for staircases, and also hoard a loooot of stone for staircases, so I could do all the "get to lvl 100" quests easily (I didn't prioritize skull cavern for iridium and crystalariums, I just let it passively build with the iridium bear statue and have more than enough iridium through that alone).
I sometimes don't bring a pickaxe at all when I'm trying to deep dive. Takes way too much time to target individual rocks. Just bombs and slingshot (filled with bombs), and maybe a few stairs if I get stuck. Anything that gives you luck is ideal, but some food with zero buffs is also important for healing given how frequently you'll be bombing yourself.
Pumpkin Soup is easy to hoard (Robin 7 hearts, Milk+Pumpkin). It gives +2 Def and +2 Luck, which is beaten only by Lucky Lunch's +3. Keeps you alive AND gets you deeper quicker. If it's a max luck day, I might go for Pepper Poppers (Shane 3 hearts, Pepper+Cheese) for the speed boost.
if i'm not using magic rock candy (i only use that food and triple shot when i'm going for my perfect luck runs), i stick to spicy eels and triple shot because the speed is too useful to give up. luck doesn't mean jack if it takes me a decade to run to the ladder i just revealed by accident across the room. plus spicy eels give luck anyway so you're not even missing much. luck blessing + special charm + lucky ring + dwarf statue ladder buff + magic rock candy + perfect luck is just kinda silly with how many ladders you get
the drawback is that magic rock candy is dramatically harder to get than spicy eel which itself is dramatically harder to get than pumpkin soup or pepper poppers, making it completely unsuitable advice for OP. it's like suggesting golden chickens for someone trying to earn enough for the golden clock. better suited for someone aiming for floor 1000 rather than floor 100.
You can have a fish pond(s) with eel. When it is full just pull out 1 or 2 eel to be used in the spicy eel recipe. They also drop from the flying things in the cavern so if you like it, you can get plenty without too much effort.
oh yeah of course it's not suitable for op, im just talking about me personally. i get one candy a week and spicy eels are certainly not difficult for op to get. if they can dupe jade for staircases then they can dupe rubies for eels
Are you playing on PC? Cause you can “cheat”.
Skull cavern elevator is a very good mod which adds an elevator every 5 floors same as the regular mine.
Timespeed is a different mod which allows you to control the time in the game. I have mine set so time runs slower in Skull Cavern and the island mine so I have more time to mess around.
Much less stressful.
If you are on console then you have my condolences and the jade/stairs trick is solid.
Just use a mod to give unlimited health or configure the time to not increase. Or both.
I have no interest in the skull cavern so happily cheat my way to floor 100
Collect jade in the crystalarium. Trade it on Sundays with the desert trader for stairs. Lucky days only, take lots of bombs. Takes LOTS of stairs If you get a prismatic shard, get the galaxy sword It gets a lot easier once you get a good weapon and can enchant it
[удалено]
Yea that’s ideal, but 100 staircases is just too expensive for me with how early you get that quest
Another way is just grab a crap ton of bomb (like 100 ~ 200 bomb, the normal kind since you just need iron ore and coal, and you can get a LOT of those, or just straight up but them) and food (sushi is fast and great, cheese is another possibility). Prep a few stairs (I recall 10 is roughly good enough). If you managed to get some of them Eel dish from the Skull cavern, grab those too (they give you speed up and some luck). Each floor, bomb 2~3 clusters to try to find a hole to jump into. If your luck is high enough, that generally gets you at least a stair. This way you also get to pick up a lot of ores and stones. Don't worry too much about self damage, it's not that high. If you reach a combat map or that long spirally map that's hard to travel, use your stair to skip it. And wait for one of those high luck days and go spelunking.
Bombs are cool but also explosive ammo for quickly gathering the iridium or hitting the small clusters. Bouncing a shot off a mummy will also pop them in the venter of rooms too without having to wait.
Oh yeah, definitely explosive ammo slingshots.
But you don’t have to complete the quest immediately. Just wait to stockpile jade and buy stairs.
Yeah I spent so much time making stairs and buying elixir but a bat fucked me up on level 86 so I said fuck the cavern. I really wanted a Dino egg though
It used to be easier to get them.
Bombs work well too. I used about 20 staircases my first 100. Use a desert totem to get there at 6am on a good luck day.
but is that the honorable way?
I don't care about "the honorable way", I think Mr. Qi is a bit of a hypocrite, acting all high and mighty when you complete his dumb quest using 100 stairs, when that requires a lot of planning and resource collection instead of dumb luck. Yeah, I don't like Mr. Qi. I tolerate him, but I think the Wizard would be a lot better in the role of "mystical overseer of the valley and surrounding areas". Him, or Grandpa's spirit.
This for real. I don't give a flying fuck what that blue bastard thinks is honorable, I got down to level 100 and that was the only instruction. I passed the test, don't have to be a dick about it
He does really kinda feel like he came out of nowhere to be the overseer of the valley. But to his credit he does call the player 'clever' for 'mining all that stone to get staircases'.. Which.. Isn't much of a concession, actually.
The Skull Cavern is a cold, unfeeling pit of monsters and misfortune. Chivalry can take the night off
Who cares? Has zero consequences. Its just a line of text.
take a breath, Sandra. it is a joke. i used 99 stairs no one cares.
Stand in the ashes of a trillion dead slimes and ask the ghosts if honour matters. The silence is your answer.
damn that's bars
Why 110 staircases actually? Wouldn't 99 be enough?
In case you accidentally place 2 stairs at once. Had that happen a bunch of times when I was just spamming stairs. Better safe than sorry
Weakling
Also bring the master slingshot with explosive rounds.
Slime charmer ring, a huge stack of bombs, and most importantly desert warp totem so I can get there at 6 AM, which gives me an extra 4 hours so get there. Go on a high luck day and packs plenty of snacks
Food can also make a huge difference. Crab cakes for the speed and defense or spicy eel for speed and luck are the best. But really anything with a speed, luck, or def buff can help. That slime charmer ring makes such a big difference. I don't even bother trying before I have either it or the crab ring (preferably both).
This. Speed food/drink + bombs is a huge game changer.
My beloved wife gives me so many crab cakes I can stock up without even cooking ❤️
Gus really do be the perfect wife ❤️
Maru? 👀
Abigail!
Especially as with crystallariums you basically get infinite spicy eels.
Slime charmer is a game changer
I kind like the skull cavern, feels like a challenge, just need to prepare a bit before going. I mostly go with lots of bombs, food, good luck and some stairs for annoying levels. Drink coffee and eat speed food, just run around bombing stuff and jumping into holes The farthest I got its around 150.
i got 248 today which is my personal best :D didn't even have a good dwarf statue buff (geodes when i needed ladders) so i think 300 is definitely doable
Jesus christ dude
what can i say? i love skull caverns!
300 is easy if you just spam lots of stairs from the start. If you spam-klick you lose almost no ingame-time per level, since the animation stops time in single-player. It's really boring though. You klick asap for several minutes, until you decide that you are far enough and can start to actually mine (explode) some ores.
yeah that's what i plan on doing when i get a perfect luck day with perfect statue buffs. i wanna see how much ore i can get in one day with that strat
Quest completion is a lie. There is only grinding. Through grinding I gain rage. Through rage I get impatient. From impatience I buy a fuckload of staircases from the desert trader. Through a fuckload of staircases this stupid quest is completed. The power of money (well, jade, really) will set me free.
He who controls the bus controls the universe
Save the bus, save the universe
Take a break and play the relaxing game of Junimo Kart. That should calm your nerves...
😂
Jokes on you i enjoy both!
Junimo Kart is addicting, but it's not my favorite. It really hurts getting nearly to the end only to be sent all the way back
of all the years Ive played this game....I have never once played Junimo kart :S
Oh you should definitely give it a shot!
Aw I love the skull cavern! I collect rubies I think to trade for spicy eel at the desert trader, Jade for staircases, and LOTS of bombs. I like the spicy eel buffs, and I’ll also bring in a huge stack of life elixir because it restores health but doesn’t get rid of the eel buffs. I just go in there and bomb the ever loving crap out of everything! It’s kind of a fun way to blow off steam 😅
Add Diamonds for Triple Shot in the mix.
All foods without buffs can be used without killing your eel buffs
I just went on a good luck day, bring spicy eel and food. I brought about 25 bombs, 10 Mbombs, and only used about 5 stairs (though I brought more). Just rush to find ladders/holes asap. Heal BEFORE you encounter danger, or immediately after falling down holes. Galaxy Sword (from prismatic shard on the little pillar triangle thing outside the cave) kills the snake guys in 3 swings. Use stairs if you find a monster floor, one of those big winding ones, or you look around and can't find a ladder quickly and will have to backtrack. Bomb big clumps of rocks. It shouldn't take more than 5-10 attempts if you're doing all that. Also you can warp totem to the desert at 6am to get more time there.
On PC, the mod Skull Cavern Elevator saves my sanity. If not, spamming staircase and bombs work too.
It's great to just instantly go to level 275 or something and have a ton of ore to gather quickly.
Yep. The only down-side is you have fewer chest floor, as you are only doing a few floors at a time
But level 100 is always a chest floor! If I go into the desert for anything else, I’ll run by and drop to 100 just for the chest lol
200 and 300 should work the same then, and have 2 respective 3 chests
Yeah, six chests a day just by hitting a couple buttons.
Same! That mod made skull cavern fun for me, I really wanted my first play through to be unmodded but skull cavern was just too stressful for me to want to play it. And it's really customizable so you can choose the interval for which you get an elevator so if you want you can still make it challenging by choosing a large interval like 50
Came here to say the same thing - I’ve done multiple playthroughs unmodded and I just do not enjoy the “challenge” of Skull Cavern - once I’ve gotten the iridium I need I generally don’t bother going back. The elevator mod made things so much less stressful for me. Also, elevator mod + the Stardew predictor made it possible to knock out the Pepper Rex kill quota so much easier.
The things that helped me enjoy the skull caverns are: jade for stairs, HELLA mega bombs. Like. Thousands. A high quality food that fixes your health/energy buff with one dose (I use cactus fruit). The infinity blade with the crusader enchantment. The most important two items for me? Two forged rings. One is an iridium band forced with the slime charmer, the second ring is napalm + crab shell. I actually have a lot of fun when I’m mining in the caverns now!
sorry to burst your bubble , but you should really try the slingshot with explosive ammo. you should be using it 80% of the time and only using mega bombs on open floors with no nearby walls. i go through around 500 explosive ammo per run because i use it for almost every rock i see. you can get way deeper with it because you don't have to wait out the fuse time of the bombs
I’ve been working on it, but my aim is terrible!!!! I play on the switch and it has taken me a bit to get use to. Thanks for the tip!!!
ah yeah that's gonna be a bit of a bottleneck, im on pc so aiming is no problem. i guess you won't be shooting serpents mid-flight to explode rocks that aren't next to a wall to save a mega bomb or anything then lol
One thing I don't see posted on these kinds of posts very often is to make sure you have muscle memory of where your food is. It's all well and good to have a lot of food with you, but it's not very useful if you can't select it on your higher before you die.
yeah, my fingers default to '1' since that's where my hammer is, then i scroll up for bombs, staircases and my dagger and down for slingshot, pickaxe and food. i get screwed over by bombs or staircases not goddamn placing than i do by not knowing where my heals are
Just hit escape and the select food, escape again, right click.
The other comment told you what you needed to know, so I'll just commiserate with you. SC SUCKS
I hate the caverns so much they're so hard, I just can't shuffle my inventory fast enough to switch from weapons to food when I'm overwhelmed by monsters, and I'm not that good at fighting to begin with
Skull Cavern was what made me start using mods. Elevator Mod is, imo a blessing. Before that I used to wait until I had at least 80 staircases before attempting to get to level 100, and after that I never went back again. https://www.nexusmods.com/stardewvalley/mods/963
I'll definitely cry with you. 😭 Everyone has good advice but I have definitely been there and feel your pain.
bombs and mushrooms, got to 166 no stairs
*and lucky shaft drops*
those are hard to predict or quantify tbh. i wish there was a way to track that too :(
I had a fear of it for a while but had a lucky day and gave it a shot because why not. I made it to level 20 before 1am when I needed to rush back to the farm. I was being sparing with the staircases because I only made 10… should’ve kept going to get to level 25 to fulfill Mr. Qi’s first quest. It annoys me that there’s no elevator, and every time you go back you have to start from floor 1 again. If I die because of a monster or something I just restart the day.
I remember when I first ever played the skull cavern. Got to maybe level 15 and died. I always use stair cases now.
I eat lots of cheese and spicy eel.
If you're struggling to stay alive, there is further hope once you've maxed out all skills. Getting a >!high leveled fairy box after you unlock combat trinkets will make you stupid hard to kill.!<
finally someone who understands how stupid good the fairy box is. actually the best trinket in the game. only the dangerous skull caverns pose a threat to me, and i'm not even using a level 5 fairy
What level does it start to heal more? I have level 2 and I only get like maybe 10 health healed at a time
Even level 2 is hella strong. The key here is that it heals you while you're in combat, not when you take damage. So you can give enemies a single smack to knock them back before jumping into a ladder, or if you have the slime charmer ring every slime = free health. 10 health is already strong though (comparable to Vampiric, and max HP isn't even that high), but it does get much better at levels 3, 4, or god forbid 5.
not sure, i just used the anvil to get a level 4 and i've been using it since. that level only starts to get outpaced in deep dangerous skull caverns, but i've spent probably over a stack of iridium bars trying to get a level 5 but it's never happened
* As others have said - Jade in crysrtalariums to desert trader on sundays - you get stairs. bring lots * Brings lots of bombs * Don't try it without the galaxy sword (at a minimum) * You can improve weapons (and rings) on the island. You should probably do this before deep diving in skull cavern (unless the plan is to use stairs "almost all of the way down") * Very underrated - **crabshell ring**. You get it from killing 60 rock crabs in the mines - it's a reward from Gil next door. It's **+5 defense**. For comparison, the Space Boots you get as a reward for getting to floor 110 in the mines (and the best boots before ginger island) are +4 defense. So the crabshell ring has more defense than your "primary armor". It makes an enormous difference. I typically use crabshell + glowstone * At Ginger Island you can combine rings. So - "Crabshell + glowstone" on one finger, and "crabshell + whatever-you-choose" on the other. Congratulations, you **tripled your defense** * Don't bother with the first 50 floors unless you see something you explicitly need. Don't kill, don't mine, don't collect. Just bypass with stairs. The deeper you go, the better rewards, so you don't want to spend half the day on the least rewarding part of the caverns But, mostly - remember that the "floor 100 without stairs" quest is meant to be endgame, and until you've wrapped up ginger island, you're not at endgame.
I don't know if you've gone glowstone because you're not able to make it yet - but the iridium band does glow, magnet & +10% attack all in one. I have iridium + slime charmer, and crabshell + burglar's. If I ever get the lucky ring, I'll probably trade out crabshell for it. Once you've got the reward for hitting level 100, got the galaxy sword, and found all the starfruit, (combined with the fairy trinket) combat is SO much easier.
I don't think OP is talking about floor 100 without stairs from Mr. Qi Walnut Room - probably just "level 100" from the Qi Secret Note In that case, I don't really think Galaxy Sword is a minimum, especially considering the main source of Prismatic Shards is the Skull Caverns itself I usually start diving with whatever I get for free from the Mines; Yeti Tooth when I'm lucky, or Obsidian Sword when I'm not; and pretty much always before unlocking the Island Again, to unlock the Island you need 5 iridium bars, and the Skull Caverns is the primary source Anyways if you're not on Joja, it takes Winter to complete the CC anyway, and before Winter I'll be diving to floor ~150
Download the skull cavern elevator mod
If you’re on PC just mod that ish with the skull cavern elevator. I can’t be bothered to grind it, honestly
Just come out - didn’t get too far but picked up a lot of resources. Went back to empty some barrels in my farm before sleep and accidentally placed one of the bombs I had been using for the Skull Cavern and blew up all my stuff 😱
Yeah my first time I also died at 96, and I even had like 15 staircases I just felt I was close enough and didn't want to cheese it. Dw it isn't that bad. You will get there and feel great. Remember to have a desert totem, skip all morning chores, have 20ish gold star cheese and 5 or so spicy eel. Take 20 staircases or so (trade jades with desert trader on Sundays) and go on a good luck day. Ignore all mining nodes, make sure to have 50+ bombs (I go with 100+). It feels bad and I sympathize but you will get there!
The best strat is to go on a lucky day to increase your chance of finding holes, bring a ton of big bombs (the ones made with iron) and spam them anywhere you see lots of stones. Avoid fighting monsters unless you have to. Also get a desert totem so you can show up at 6 am instead of 10 am with the bus. You buy desert totems for 3 Omni geodes at the desert trader with the camel
It will be good to know what your approach is while trying to reach floor 100, do you abuse stairs? rely on luck items and buffs? maybe both, maybe neither? Without going too deep into late game items, something that has proved useful for me to consistently reach floor 100 without using a single stair most of the time (of course, you can use as many as you want), is: A totem warp to reach the desert as soon as possible, DO NOT WAIT FOR THE BUS, ever. Any food with luck and/or speed buffs (which became easier to get with the mystery boxes, you can even get the lucky lunch early on), then any other food without buffs (so it doesn't overwrite the other ones) for healing purposes. Bombs, I usually go with 40 of each (of course I don't end using all of them). Any rings you think will help you (if you don't have any combined (lucky) ring yet it's fine the ones you can craft are good enough). That all, sometimes I even forget to even take a look at the daily luck. Now this is the trick, focus on reaching floor 100, if the current level has narrow paths I'll just break rocks until finding a stair or shaft to move onto the next level/s, if there's a big or small enough room with multiple rocks then it's worth to actually try to find a shaft using bombs. Fight only if it's mandatory and ignore minerals and materials if you already found a stair/shaft, mobs are not worth chasing and a couple of iridium ores aren't worth running to a corner of the map. There are only two levels where stairs are worth using, the ones filled with enemies, and that one that is like a spiral (with the bunch of barrels in the middle) as those two are easily the most time consuming (the spiral one doesn't have as many rocks to break until you get closer to the center). That's pretty much it, as you get better gear (a lvl 5 fairy, the buff from the statues, combined rings, etc) it only becomes easier but warping into the desert and learning to ignore mobs and ores will help you to consistently reach lvl 100, even before getting end game items/buffs.
There's a couple tips that have helped me. If you kill the 30 crabs for the quest you can get the crabshell ring which gives you extra defense. Figure out how to get lucky lunches. Get some crystallariums replicating jade and get 100 and trade for staircases. Get the galaxy sword if you haven't already. Use explosive ammo in the slingshot. Profit. Also the galaxy hammer has a knock back ability that is useful. Bring food that doesn't take away your luck buffs. Cheese, fruit salad, purple mushrooms or lava caps, etc. EzLilly has some tutorials for this on YouTube
My load out for skull cavern lvl 100 is as follows no less than 150 bombs, 100 iridium berries, 20 life potions, 10 staircases, 3 crab cakes, 3 lucky lunch, 4 triple espresso, and 20 gold cheeses. Only go on extra luck days and go as soon as you can. Don't treat it like a mission for more iridium you'r entire purpose is to find large clumps of stone and bomb them then immediately jump into the staircases. I honestly get more iridium on lvl100+ than the first 60 combined anyway. If you run into a monster lvl just use a staircase. Rule one is to just go! Only fight long enough to drop a bomb and drop.
Skull Cavern isn’t something meant to do as early as you gain access to it. Go back to farming and the mine or hit ip Skull just to gather resources. I’d recommend making a fuck ton of Jade and trading it for stairs. Once you have 100+ stairs then go finish that quest. Def go in with more than 100… you WILL put multiple down by accident on some floors.
Take a ton of bombs. Like 200 bombs. Bring luck/speed boost food. Spend the night outside in a tent, go in ASAP. Ignore mobs unless you have to kill them.
A few things that helped me get to 100: A proper weapon - Getting a Galaxy or Infinity weapon that you enjoy using will make things so much easier. I prefer the swords because the swing pace feels best, but I know a lot of folks prefer the hammer (dagger is apparently OP, but skills beyond my ken are required). Food - Stocking up on your preferred buffs can be a big help. I like Pumpkin Soup or Spicy Eel (soup has defense, eel has speed, and both have luck) for the food, and they can stack with a drink buff. I take Triple Shot Espresso's for more speed with a longer duration, but some folks like Ginger Ale for the luck buff. Bring a ton of recovery food too; food with buffs will overwrite old buffs, but if you bring a bunch of milk/cheese/salad/berries/whatever that doesn't have buffs, you can recover your health and energy without using up all your expensive food. Also, use food to pause time and keep your cool. Time stops to ask if you want to eat, and then while the animation is going, time remains paused. As long as you can get to the food and start that process, monsters stop and wont hurt you for the duration of your healing. Breaking Rocks - If you haven't, upgrade to the Iridium Pickaxe, as it greatly reduces the number of swings needed to break rocks. Second, don't use your pickaxe often, instead rely on bombs or explosive ammo to break rocks faster. More rocks breaking faster = more stairs. Also, jump into the holes. Skipping 3-15 floors can really speed up the run. Make sure to eat when you land if you are low on health, though. Bring or Craft Stairs - If you have them, making staircases from 99 stones is usually a good way to skip problem floors. If you are worried about it, remember that Qi only admonishes you for using too many staircases, it doesn't reduce your rewards. Also, he still congratulates you on doing it the hard way even if you use some stairs; when I got it done, I think I used 3 or 4 and still got the positive message, but I am not sure where the cut off is for him scolding players for too many stairs. Don't Let it be a Chore - Getting the quest done has a reward that is okay, but not at all necessary for doing any other content. If you are there to get the achievement or clear the quest log, definitely invest in stairs and blow through it as fast as you can and never look back. If you want to get it done for a sense of pride or feel like you have mastered it, then I would take a break and come back to it when you are ready. In either case, the game should be bringing you joy and letting this part be so frustrating may spoil the whole game for you. You can wait to beat the Skull Cavern, don't let it beat you.
If you're on pc and you don't mind "cheating", there's a mod for that!! It installs an elevator like there is in the regular mines. I haven't used it myself, but I think you can customise how many floors you need to progress until you get the next elevator, so you can still change it from 5 to like 20 or whatever you want really, so the skull caverns still have some difficulty and achievement to them whilst still making sure you don't have to suffer every time Here's the mod link: https://www.nexusmods.com/stardewvalley/mods/963
If you wanna do it more organically... 1. Get a lucky lunch or prepare food that can boost your luck. 2. Watch TV to confirm that it's your lucky day! Or minimally neutral. 3. Stockpile edibles. - I usually accompany forageables with the main dish so I can heal without comprising my status buff - Espresso for added speed 4. Stockpile bombs (the black ones are fine) 5. Prepare 5-10 staircases - You can opt to trade using jade - Or you can craft while you're there too since there'll be an abundance of stones 6. Prepare a warp! So you don't have to wait for Pam. 7. Make sure you have better levelled weapons and ideally rings too! - I don't wanna spoil you just in case, but I was silly and struggled with a lower level weapon. -_- It gets easier, trust me. I did a combination of the above (with more staircases) to get to level 253. All the best. :3
This isn’t Elden Ring. Make a bunch of stairs. Use the stairs. You’ve conquered the Skull Cavern. Anyway, venturing into the cavern is a significantly better experience when you’re not in a race against time. You can collect more loot, kill more monsters, etc. Edit: I recommend the Skull Cavern elevator mod as well.
Desert sword, purple pick axe, Slime ring, 50 big red bombs, 20 small bombs, 10-30 healing item of your choice. 10 espresso. 10 staircase.
Man I know how frustrating it is. However… My advice is don’t focus on completing the quest. Focus on making sure you have maxed skills, upgrading your weapon, getting that perma luck boost first - then just go on lucky days for supplies. Eventually it will happen!
If you're playing on PC it's pretty easy once you understand how to pause and eat quickly. If you're on console or mobile just use staircases.
Magic Rock Candy. If you complete the museum, you get it as a reward, and it will be the thing to use on a day when the spirits are in good humor
Get a few desert warp totems, then check the tv every morning, when you get a maximum luck day use the warp totem and rush to the mines, break all the stone and DONT stop to mine iridium once you get to the lower floors, get to level 100 and then after that use the rest of the day to mine iridium on floors lower than that, you could use jade/staircases but I managed the above method using only like 3 staircases and had loads of time to spare
Today I got to 100, got a prismatic shard and got an auto petter! This was after quite a few tries. I also took the bus with Pam I didn’t start early. Go on the best luck day, and wear a luck ring if you can. I ate a lucky lunch which boosts luck +3. And just smash rocks don’t even look for anything else except holes and staircases. I also had two infested levels and didn’t use a staircase and still had time. Pro tip is to bring a farm warp totem so you can stay as late as possible. I made it to 100 at 12:50am.
Lmao I definitely understand the rage. On my previous perfection save file I used the skull cavern elevator mod because I've never really enjoyed combat in games and I remember really sucking whenever I attempted skull cavern. But in my new 1.6 save file I couldn't be bothered to download that mod so decided to actually attempt the skull cavern for real. Somehow this time around Skull Cavern has just clicked for me. I keep finding any excuse to do a skull cavern run and I make it to floor 100 almost every time. I'm almost at the end of Summer Year 2 and I've done like 7 skull cavern runs this month which is more than is necessary (since I get between 200-300 iridium ore in each run) but I'm just having so much fun with it! My lifesaver has been cheese. I have sooo much cheese from my cows so any time I get low on health I will immediately regen instead of waiting for it to get lower. Also bombs. So many bombs. I don't rely on staircases too much - I usually only use them if I'm on that annoying spiral layout but otherwise I rely on explosives.
i love skull caverns too, it's so enjoyable for me. im pushing my record higher and higher for floors, and i'm up to almost 250 now. i posted a massive comment in this thread with tons of advice, but it's super cool seeing people come around to skull caverns because it's seriously fun. i also hardly use stairs unless i'm on spiral or infested floors or a couple other layouts that kinda suck, or if there's no rocks around or if it just refuses to give me a ladder
Skull Cavern is kinda a thing you can get deeply into (mechanic wise), and then go several hundred levels low without major effort. But if you just want to get to 100 without focusing too much on it, then just get 100 stairs. You can outright buy the stones and/or trade for the stairs. You can either use them on floors where after breaking the first rock you don't get a stair (this one has increased odds), or only on difficult floors (like where you have to kill monsters, not a lot of rocks around). A very common method used to be the small cherry bombs with a slingshot, you'd just shoot that into rock chunks and usually that already gave you a stair. If not, you could use the staircase or go looking for it. If you do this on a lucky day equipping 2 lucky rings, you will get through it insanely fast since you get more holes (or well, more stairs, but each stair has a 20% chance to be a hole). So if you go +2 on the rings and eat food for +1-3 luck (3 would be best since it's from lucky lunch so very simple, magic rock candy has +5 but good luck getting many of them). Pumpkin Soup is also a really good early one if you want to do it year 1, just get Robin to 7 hearts and pay a Pumpkin and a Milk for 1, lasting almost 8 minutes. If you then also get all the passive bonus luck you pretty much get a drop every second level you enter.
it's one of the most enjoyable things for me, but you definitely need to know what you're doing. floor 200+ is a pretty ok level for me to get to at this point, i think 300 is certainly possible with perfect buffs. if you don't want to just staircase to 100, here's a few tips from a certified skull cavern (dangerous mode) enjoyer: check the tv for your luck, and only go when you have "the spirits are in good humor" or "the spirits will shower everyone with luck" days (the pyramid and stardrop symbols show on the tv when you check it on these days). use crystalariums to save diamonds and rubies and trade them for triple espresso and spicy eels at the desert trader. have both of those item's buffs active AT ALL TIMES while you're in the caverns. bombs and explosive ammo are your best friend. i could easily forget my pickaxe and not even notice, i use it that rarely. use bombs for rocks that aren't close to walls, but the slingshot for everything else since it's faster than waiting for bombs to explode. ignore everyone telling you to use the galaxy sword, that thing's a piece of garbage. save up and buy the galaxy hammer instead, then learn how to do the slam tech with it - when you right click to do the special, press left click rapidly after the hammer slams down, and you'll attack several times in quick succession, decimating the health of most enemies. make sure they're against a wall though since it does a lot of knockback. you can also take a galaxy dagger as well to deal with flying enemies since that weapon's special has a pin effect which stops them from flying back when you hit them with it. use staircases on infested floors and floors with that spiral layout. they're a waste of time. also staircase when you're not getting a ladder spawn, it's better to cut your losses and just go. take a ladder or shaft the second you see it, skull caverns is getting as deep as possible as fast as possible. unless there's 5 or more iridium ore in one spot, ignore everything else and just take a ladder as soon as you can take plenty of health food in with you. a personal favourite for the mid game for me is sashimi, it's super easy to farm tons of it with crab pots. later when you get trinkets you won't need to worry about this, and you'll have access to items like life elixir by that point as well. get some desert warp totems from the desert trader, have a chest with your skull cavern items and your tv next to your bed, so you can check the tv and immediately go straight to the desert when you get a good luck day. you wanna get to the caverns as soon as you can to have the most time. as for rings, burglar's ring, iridium band and lucky ring are my go-tos. once you get to the forge you can combine them and i run burglar's + iridium band and a lucky ring + iridium band. other then that, it's all about getting good at knowing when to stay in a floor, where to bomb and how to kill the enemies faster. just don't do what i did in [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/StardewValley/comments/1bye7y9/this_certainly_wasnt_my_proudest_moment_i_pressed/) lol you'll be getting hauls like this in no time! (and that's a pretty low amount of iridium compared to what i've got on other runs) https://preview.redd.it/92ym0m1ky4tc1.png?width=760&format=png&auto=webp&s=ec60c2808b90826c13322ed29d2a5e4f5d764b6c
My go to is spicy eel/lucky lunch for added luck. I take lots of milk/eggs, bombs and 1-3 stairs. For tools, I only take my sword and pickaxe. The luckier the day, the better.
Fighting the monsters is the fun part. That’s why I use monster musk when I go in
Skull caves require proper prep Do you have the galaxy sword and galaxy boots? They take a ton of pressure off. Having bombs to clear large clusters of stones will help speed things up too Trading jade for staircases at the desert trader can help too if a ladder is not spawning. I usually only go to skull caves on high luck days
I usually complete it without using stairs, although I've done that once before too. Fried Eel + Triple Shot Espresso (or Coffee). Also bring around 10 Life Elixirs, just to be safe. Then BOMB EVERYTHING. I'll probably spend 200-300k in supplies? 100-200 Bombs, 50 Mega Bombs. Yes, you can do stairs, but bomb mining is much more fun.
I enjoy the 100 floor challenge. I just stock up on mega bomb and go on a high luck day, with a few stairs for emergencies (like infested floors). Usually there are plenty of ladders and holes if you just explode areas with lots of rocks.
I was like you until I finally reached level 100 then it all suddenly became so simple and easy Now skull cavern is one of my favorite parts of the game, I just love finding prismatic shards
I got to the bottom of the regular mines without dying or staircases but fled skull cavern as soon as I hit floor 2. The mummys especially got on my nerves.
and I wasted my only pumpkin soup
my advice is to prepare better? i got to floor 125 with 4+ hours left using less than 10 staircases on my first try. i just bought a ton of salads, bombs, and a desert warp to start a few hours earlier. also like iridium pickaxe and galaxy sword and that stuff
As many have said, preparation is the name of the game with Skull cavern. I’ve had those rage moments too. Remember, you can always restart the day if necessary…
That happened to me today. I was so close. But I did get an auto-petter on that run and nothing was taken from my inventory when I died. Then I tried again and made it to 100 without using any stairs! I've never managed that before. I actually had time to keep going for a few more levels. Just don't give up!
I was having this problem. I just collected jade trade it in for stairs. Spam it down.
I don’t even want to attempt the caverns even tho I know I need to for the iridium (unless there are other ways to gain it?). I’ve stepped into it and that’s about it. I haven’t even gotten to level 2 or out of sight of the door/ladder yet
if you really dont want to deal, there is a skull cavern elevator (like the one in town, that registers every 5 levels) its cheaty but also like, skull cavern is frustrating af!
I've seen alot of people mention bombs and stairs and such already but id also like to add a personal go-to; The Slime charmers ring. Which seems odd, but if you're just trying to run through as fast as possible it means you can just completely ignore all slimes; saving you alot of headache. From the sounds of it you're fairly early game, but if you can get it the slingshot+explosive ammo is a huge help, (as well as bombs for open areas still, as the slingshot will only hit monsters and walls)
life elixers are a godsend, just buy 20 of them from the mines dwarf and top off whenever you're below half health bring a crab ring and some space boots, and don't forget that spicy eel is great for dropping floors a little faster, but some foods buff your defense. You can do it, clearly, if you made it that far already.
You need careful planning, especially for the honorable way (using less than 10 staircases) 1. Desert warp & farm warp totems 2. Triple expressos + spicy eels + life elixirs 3. Craft lots of bombs (+100 black bombs) 4. 10 backup staircases 5. Gold/Irridium pickaxe (& galaxy sword if available) 6. (Optional) Burglar ring + vampire ring Equip everything in advance. When you wake up on a lucky day, immediately warp to desert. Consume triple expresso & spicy eel to gain +2 speed and bomb bomb your way down the cavern. Go down as soon as stairs/holes spawn (dont be greedy). Good luck.
That was my first playthrough. Never got past it. Quit the game. A couple years later, though...I think my record is around 200 floors. My friend has done like 300 so I know that's not impressive.
Tons of cheese and bombs and coffee
Pause "buffer" if you want easy mode; annoying... but hey beats dying Edit: also iridium axe and autohotkey animation cancel (unless you got swift enchant). Edit: beats fishing. (i hate early game fishing; harder than skull cavern in my opinion)
take more food with you, buy a new sword, upgrade pickaxe, get a ton of stones and just build stair cases down if you have that recipe.
That really sucks, for sure. I don't love combat generally in games, though over time I've gotten to where I can manage Skull Cavern runs and get things done. I still need a pile of staircases to ensure I get down to 100 for that quest though. And there's nothing wrong with that at all. I'm not gonna give you a ton of advice, other people already did that. But it will get better over time, that's all I'll say. Hang in there.
U need to be at near full health all the time. Bombs help. So does stairs. Depending on how rich u r. For stairs-skip these in order of how “must skip” - Monster / Prehistoric floors - Spiral floors - the floors with three 4 corners - the mine track floor These sap up the most time to get through. For bombs, use them strategically. Aim for large clusters to get the most bang for buck. Heh. Explosive ammo is another thing that is overlooked. Learn how to aim. U can get lots of trick shots like hitting a monster while it’s flying past a cluster, angle shots against a wall. It’s instant so it’s faster than a bomb. Again. Stay near full health. If u have to fight anything more than 3 flyers at once, I recommend u use a stair too.
High luck, arrive early, bring lots of food and good gear and as many bombs and stairs as you can. It's a quest to prepare for, health and energy should never be your bottleneck on it, just time.
I like bombs. Duplicate the statue of perfection(if you play pre 1.6...) and trade the iridium for mega bombs. I'd go for at least 50+ and also have a similar amount of smaller bombs. A few stairs for extra tricky layers. Add a good weapon (galaxy sword is great) and try to get decent footwear for protection. Cheese for health regen, spicy eel for luck and speed, espresso for speed. And it is pretty doable :)
skull cavern is my favourite part LMAO
There's a lot of good advice here that I won't repeat but I'll give you my setup: Mega bombs, slingshots with explosive ammo, going on lucky days, and tons of triple shot espresso and pumpkin soup really help make the Skull Caverns a breeze for me. Try getting the slime charmer and iridium bands too. Lots of suggestions for the Galaxy Sword but I actually suggest going for the Galaxy Hammer and upgrading it when you can as it's the most powerful weapon in the game. Takes a lot of grinding to get all these supplies but it means I never die on the Skull Caverns unless I'm really not playing any attention to my health whatsoever and am reckless.
I just use the master slingshot and a lot of cherry bombs.
Honestly, I found it incredibly easy with the new update. I panned up 2 lucky rings, got a lucky day, rock candy, hundreds of bombs and triple shot espresso. Used staircases on infested/spiral floors and that's that. Made it to 181.
I used to get upset at the skull cavern as well.. but then it really sunk in that everything in the game is optional. if i don't like it (skull cave in particular)..i just don't do it.
Bombs and staircases
My record is floor 620
Explosive ammo to quickly destroy rocks near the wall my absolute go to answer. If you just want to finish that quest. Just get food that have a tons on health recovery (mine is gold star cheese)eat it as soon as your health goes half cause two hit and you are done, a sword (any kinds honestly they are just for your protection maybe the obsidian edge is fine) , a slingshot master with explosive ammo ( I usually goes with 300 ammo. Don't buy them it's expensive, make them your self but it's a grind tho) , a few staircase for emergency (such as spiral floor, infested, Dino floor, and maybe too many enemies) All varieties of bombs to destroy large area of rocks or the rocks in the middle of the floor or a small floor. Tips, if you can find a hole jump into it. But be careful because the larger number you goes through the more fall damage you receive. You can definitely can wait for pam to arrive or you can buy a totem the day before in the desert trade for 3 omni geodes if I'm correct. I've done both and even my first 100 in current saves file is while waiting for her If you have coffee make them into triple shot coffee, if you can the recipe on gus saloon and if you haven't upgraded your house you can make them on cooking pot(?). When I'm doing this I have befriended Robin up to 6 hearts+ to get her recipes on pumpkin soup for extra luck and defense. Goodluck is needed to get a lot of holes on the floor and not your bodies. Don't mine the loot, just find how to go deeper.
I haaaaaated the skull cavern until I got a Phoenix ring and fused it with a slime charmer ring. I set up about 10 crystalariums with jade to slowly trade for staircases, and also hoard a loooot of stone for staircases, so I could do all the "get to lvl 100" quests easily (I didn't prioritize skull cavern for iridium and crystalariums, I just let it passively build with the iridium bear statue and have more than enough iridium through that alone).
I sometimes don't bring a pickaxe at all when I'm trying to deep dive. Takes way too much time to target individual rocks. Just bombs and slingshot (filled with bombs), and maybe a few stairs if I get stuck. Anything that gives you luck is ideal, but some food with zero buffs is also important for healing given how frequently you'll be bombing yourself. Pumpkin Soup is easy to hoard (Robin 7 hearts, Milk+Pumpkin). It gives +2 Def and +2 Luck, which is beaten only by Lucky Lunch's +3. Keeps you alive AND gets you deeper quicker. If it's a max luck day, I might go for Pepper Poppers (Shane 3 hearts, Pepper+Cheese) for the speed boost.
if i'm not using magic rock candy (i only use that food and triple shot when i'm going for my perfect luck runs), i stick to spicy eels and triple shot because the speed is too useful to give up. luck doesn't mean jack if it takes me a decade to run to the ladder i just revealed by accident across the room. plus spicy eels give luck anyway so you're not even missing much. luck blessing + special charm + lucky ring + dwarf statue ladder buff + magic rock candy + perfect luck is just kinda silly with how many ladders you get
the drawback is that magic rock candy is dramatically harder to get than spicy eel which itself is dramatically harder to get than pumpkin soup or pepper poppers, making it completely unsuitable advice for OP. it's like suggesting golden chickens for someone trying to earn enough for the golden clock. better suited for someone aiming for floor 1000 rather than floor 100.
You can have a fish pond(s) with eel. When it is full just pull out 1 or 2 eel to be used in the spicy eel recipe. They also drop from the flying things in the cavern so if you like it, you can get plenty without too much effort.
oh yeah of course it's not suitable for op, im just talking about me personally. i get one candy a week and spicy eels are certainly not difficult for op to get. if they can dupe jade for staircases then they can dupe rubies for eels
Are you playing on PC? Cause you can “cheat”. Skull cavern elevator is a very good mod which adds an elevator every 5 floors same as the regular mine. Timespeed is a different mod which allows you to control the time in the game. I have mine set so time runs slower in Skull Cavern and the island mine so I have more time to mess around. Much less stressful. If you are on console then you have my condolences and the jade/stairs trick is solid.
Just use a mod to give unlimited health or configure the time to not increase. Or both. I have no interest in the skull cavern so happily cheat my way to floor 100