Tropical Fish
| Tropical Fish | |
|---|---|
| Type | Special Order |
| Board | Special Orders board |
| Giver | Willy |
| Time Limit | 7 days |
| Needed | Ginger Island unlocked, Island Resort built |
| Repeatable | No |
Willy asks for a haul of island fish, five each of three species that live nowhere but the water around Ginger Island. It only turns up on the board once the beach resort has been built, which puts it firmly in the second half of a run. The gold is modest, and the point of taking it is the aquarium Willy sends over: a tank wide enough to hold a small reef inside the farmhouse. All three fish bite in every season and at every hour, so the whole job is a single sunny day with a rod and a boat ticket. The one thing that can sink it is geography, because one of the three swims in a cove that has to be found before it can be fished.
The board reads: There's nothin' like tropical fishing... To keep the art alive, I'm offering a reward for whoever can bring in a good island haul.
Requirements
The resort is the gate. Leo's parrot wants a walnut before anything opens, the turtle on the path west wants ten more, the ruined farmhouse wants twenty, and the beach resort itself wants twenty on top of that. Building the resort is also what clears the rubble at the east end of the beach, and that is how Pirate Cove becomes reachable at all.
Stingray live only in the cove. The way in is a set of planks on the right-hand side of the star-shaped tide pool, leading into what looks like solid rock. They are the hardest of the three to land, a heavy sinker that drags the bar downwards, so a rod below iridium grade and a fishing level in the middle of the scale will lose several before one lands. A pirate band drinks in the cove after eight in the evening on even days without rain, which makes an evening visit noisy but harmless.
Blue Discus want fresh water, and the island's streams and ponds in the north and the west are the only place they hold. They dart about the bar in short bursts, which is awkward at low fishing level but much easier than the stingray. Lionfish want salt water, and they turn up along the western shore, around the south beach and off the south-eastern rocks. They swim smoothly and are the kindest of the three to hook.
That split matters when planning the day. The west side of the island touches both fresh and salt water, so a single afternoon spent there can fill the lionfish and Blue Discus lines together, leaving only the cove to visit. Rain changes nothing for any of the three.
The order asks for every item in this table.
| Item | Image | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Stingray | 
|
5 |
| Blue Discus | 
|
5 |
| Lionfish | 
|
5 |
Rewards
The gold is small next to what a late-game farm earns in a morning, so the tank is the payment that counts. It is five tiles wide and belongs indoors, and it carries four swimming fish and four creatures along the bottom, along with one of each kind of ornament: coral, seaweed, a stone, a pearl, an anchor, a Treasure Chest and the rest. Willy puts it on his own shelves for five thousand afterwards, which makes a second and a third tank possible for anyone furnishing a room around them.
Stocking it is the fun part. Swimming stock is any ordinary fish plus shrimp, while the floor takes crabs, crayfish, flounder, sandfish, stonefish and snails that wander, or clams, cockles, mussels, oysters, periwinkles and sea urchins that sit still. The game chooses where each ornament lands, and lifting the furniture and putting it back deals the whole arrangement again while the stock stays inside. A Sea Urchin will wear a hat, which is the sort of detail that keeps a farmhouse aquarium interesting.
Mr. Qi sells a larger tank for gems in his walnut room, holding six of each, so the deluxe tank is the best aquarium a farm can own before the island's inner rooms open.
Finishing the order pays out all of this.
| Reward | Image |
|---|---|
| 2,500g | - |
| Deluxe Fish Tank | 
|
Strategy
Prepare the trip rather than the fish. A full day on the island, an Iridium Rod, bait in the reel and a cooked meal for the fishing bar is enough, and the boat should be caught early so the cove is reachable before the light goes. Walk the west shore first for lionfish, cross to the fresh water above it for Blue Discus, then finish in the cove, where the stingray will take the longest.
Bait aimed at one species shortens the dull stretches considerably, since it pulls that fish out of the pool far more often than a plain reel does. For a farm that has already stocked ponds, the island fish breed quickly in them, and roe sales pay for the boat.
The usual way this one fails is the week rather than the water. The deadline was set when the paper went up on Monday, not when it was signed for, so a board read on Thursday leaves a long weekend to find a hidden cove and land fifteen fish. The other trap is arriving on the island without having built the resort, since the rubble on the beach simply will not move and the cove stays shut.
Notes
All three fish have a second life as trade goods. The Island Trader takes a single stingray for a packet of mahogany seeds, three Blue Discus for an Oceanic Rug on Saturdays, and one lionfish for a Tropical Chair on the even days of a season. Anything caught over the fifteen is therefore worth keeping rather than shipping.
In a pond the three breed at a good pace, Blue Discus and lionfish every few days and stingray a little slower, and their roe runs in three different colours. A stingray pond asks for cinder shards and then a Dragon Tooth before it will grow, and at a full population it starts turning out battery packs and dragon teeth of its own.
Willy himself takes any of the three as a polite but unexcited gift, and most of the valley would rather not be handed a venomous fish at all.
All Special Orders
Every special order from both boards, with who posts it and how long it runs.