Robin's Resource Rush
| Robin's Resource Rush | |
|---|---|
| Type | Special Order |
| Board | Special Orders board |
| Giver | Robin |
| Time Limit | 7 days |
| Repeatable | Yes |
Robin runs this one as a promotion rather than a commission, and the generous part is written into the posting: the thousand pieces of wood or stone she names stay with the farmer. Nothing is handed over, nothing goes into a bin, and the gold arrives on top of a pile of raw material the farm was going to want anyway. A thousand sounds enormous and is less daunting than it reads, because the counter accepts material bought over Robin's own counter as well as material cut and mined, and because a Wood Chipper and a deconstructor both feed it. The first completion also teaches the Stone Chest recipe, which is storage built out of the cheapest material on the farm. It comes round again in later years, which makes it one of the better repeat earners on the board.
The board reads: I'm putting on a little promotion, just for fun. If anyone can collect 1000 pieces of [Resource] in a week, they'll earn a reward. And you can keep the [Resource]! -Robin
Requirements
The posting names one material, either wood or stone, and only that one counts. Hardwood is a separate item and does nothing for a wood target, so a morning in the Secret Woods is wasted effort here. The two materials cannot be mixed to reach the thousand either.
Every piece has to come in fresh after the posting was accepted. A shed holding a thousand stone is no help at all, which is the usual shock on this one, since it is the rare order where most farms genuinely do already own the full amount.
Buying counts, and that is the detail that rescues a short week. Robin sells both materials by the piece at the Carpenter's Shop, and a purchase registers on the counter exactly as a swing of the axe would. Her prices for both materials jump by several times over once the second year opens, so buying the whole thousand is affordable in a first-year run and painful afterwards. Even then, topping up the last two or three hundred over the counter is often cheaper than losing the order.
Wood from a Wood Chipper counts as well. The machine goes on sale at the Carpenter's Shop in Winter of the first year, and it turns a single piece of driftwood into a useful handful of planks in a few hours. For a farm with crab pots in the water, driftwood arrives daily for nothing, and a chipper quietly converts it into order progress.
Material pulled back out of a Deconstructor counts too, which opens the fastest route of all for a wood target. The machine returns the most valuable ingredient of whatever crafted item is fed into it, so an ordinary chest goes in and its full fifty wood comes back out. Crafting chests and breaking them down again cycles the same wood through the counter repeatedly.
The order asks for one of these, and the board picks which.
| Item | Image | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Wood | 
|
1000 |
| Stone | 
|
1000 |
Rewards
The gold is a solid payment for a week of work the farm would call ordinary, and because the material is kept, the order is pure profit rather than a trade. Selling a thousand wood or stone outright would fetch far less than the posting pays, so even a farm that hoards nothing comes out ahead.
The Stone Chest recipe arrives by post and only on the first completion. Its storage matches a wooden chest slot for slot, and it is built from stone instead of timber, which matters more than it sounds: stone is the material a mining farm drowns in, while wood is always wanted for buildings. Lining a shed with stone chests leaves the timber free for Robin's next construction. It also simply looks different, which is useful for telling one wall of storage from another at a glance.
Later completions pay the gold again without repeating the recipe, and each one leaves another Prize Ticket to be claimed from the board's box.
Finishing the order pays out all of this.
| Reward | Image |
|---|---|
| 2,500g | - |
| Stone Chest recipe | 
|
Strategy
For a wood week, start with the trees already standing. A fully felled tree gives a generous armful, and the forest, the mountain, the Bus Stop, the quarry, the railroad and the backwoods can all be cut without upsetting anyone. Breaking the stump afterwards gives the tree a chance of growing back overnight, so the same ground can be worked more than once in a week. Bombs bring down several trees at a time for anyone with explosives to spare, and a chipper running on driftwood adds to the pile without any effort at all.
For a stone week, go down the Mines and ignore the small rocks. The boulders on the upper floors give ten pieces each to an upgraded pickaxe, which is a far better rate than chipping away at ordinary stone. The Quarry is the other good ground, since its rocks respawn daily and stand close enough together that a single bomb catches several. Stone Golems and the grey slimes in the Mines drop stone on top of that, and fishing chests sometimes hold a stack.
Count on the last day being a shopping day. Working out the shortfall on the sixth evening and buying the remainder from Robin is a reliable finish, and in a first-year run the cost is trivial against the payout.
The common failure is the stockpile again: a thousand already in storage, carried proudly to the Carpenter's Shop, and a counter that has not moved. The second is confusing hardwood with wood. The third is a late start, since a week shared with a festival or a rainy day of fishing is a short week.
Notes
The timer belongs to the posting rather than to the farmer, so the full seven days only reach whoever reads the board on Monday morning. Nothing can be given back once accepted, and a lapsed promotion turns up again in a later month.
Nothing is deposited anywhere for this order, so there is nothing to recover if the clock beats it. The material simply stays on the farm, which softens a failure considerably compared with the postings that swallow their goods.
All Special Orders
Every special order from both boards, with who posts it and how long it runs.