Are you the type of farmer who just loves taking care of animals in Stardew Valley? The Auto-Petter is just what you need to make your animals the happiest they can be! Read on to learn more about Stardew Valley’s Auto-Petter.
What Is the Auto-Petter?
Joja Co. patented technology for coops and barns. Keeps your animals content, but can’t replace the full benefit of human touch. Hand-petting can be provided to supplement.
The Auto-Petter
The Auto-Petter is a rare tool that will automatically pet your animals for you each day. This tool works in barns and coops alike. As long as you have the Auto-Petter, neither the animal’s mood nor its friendship rating will decrease.
While the animals’ moods will be positive every day, their friendship ratings will only go up a little bit. Luckily, these activities stack – the Auto-Petter can pet your Cow, and you can pet it as well, making your animal happier than it would be with the tool or just the farmer.
Why Does Animal Happiness Matter?
Animal happiness is very important in Stardew Valley. A happy animal will produce the highest quality animal products, whereas an unhappy animal may not produce any product at all. You need happy Chickens to get Large Eggs, and happy Rabbits to get the Rabbit’s Foot.
The two factors that contribute the most to an animal’s happiness are mood and friendship. As we’ve mentioned, petting an animal is the best way to gain friendship and a great way to keep the animal’s mood up. Sometimes, though, there are just too many animals to pet, and not enough time. In that case, this tool will be invaluable for you.
How To Get The Auto-Petter
There are three ways you can get the Auto-Petter; none of them are quick or easy:
- Purchasing it from JojaMart
- Finding it in the Skull Cavern
- By taking on Mr. Qi’s Special Order Danger In The Deep quest.
1. Joja-Mart Route
Become a Member
The first method by which you can obtain the Auto-Petter is by siding with JojaMart. Unsavory as this may be, this is actually the most straightforward and reliable way to get this tool!
In order to get the item, you must complete the Joja Community Development Form. This is the JojaMart equivalent to the Community Center Bundles. Choosing to pursue the Joja Warehouse route, you’ll be choosing NOT to complete the Community Center. Choose wisely, as this cannot be undone!
In order to start this process, you must go to JojaMart when it’s open (every day from 09:00 to 08:00) and talk to Morris. He’s the spectacled dark-haired man with a devilish smile. Unlike most other NPCs in Stardew Valley, Morris is always found in the same place; on the right side of the JojaMart store, standing behind a counter. Speaking to him allows you to purchase a JojaMart membership for 5,000g. After this, the Community Center north of town will be refurbished into a Joja Warehouse, and you can start filling in the Development Form.
Unlike the Community Center Bundles, the JojaMart form is very straightforward. You don’t need to spend ages toiling in the fields, mines, and rivers of Pelican Town, collecting various items. Instead, all you need is cold hard cash.
Complete The Form
You need to acquire the following five developments before the Auto-Petter becomes available:
- Bus (fixes the Bus that can take you to Calico Desert)
- Bridge (fixes the long bridge that leads to the Quarry in the Mountains)
- Panning (unlocks Panning)
- Minecarts (unlocks access to several minecarts around Pelican Town)
- Greenhouse (refurbishes the Greenhouse on your property)
In total, this comes up to 135,000 gold. A steep price! With that out of the way though, you can finally get your hands on the Auto-Petter! Very simply, once the Development Form has been completed in full, you can simply purchase this item from Jojamart. It costs 50,000g, and you can purchase as many Auto-Petters as you’d like.
2. Skull Cavern Route
Reaching the Skull Cavern
The second method to try to get your hands on the Auto-Petter is to travel to the Skull Cavern. In order to do this, you’ll need to get the Bus up and running first. As we’ve just mentioned, one way to do that is by fulfilling the “Bus” development at Jojamart. The other is by completing the Vault bundle in the Community Center.
The Vault becomes available once you’ve completed any four bundles. Unlike the other bundles, you can very easily complete the Vault bundles. All you need is some gold! 42,500g is enough to get the Bus fixed, which is just slightly more expensive than if you went with the JojaMart form instead.
However you do it, once the bus has been restored, Pam can get to work and drive you to the Calico Desert. But before that, you’ll want to make sure you’ve acquired the Skull Key. To acquire this wallet item, you must reach Floor 120 in the Pelican Town mines. This key will allow you to enter the Skull Cavern in the desert. Key in hand, head on over to the bus stop and interact with the ticket machine, paying 500g and head on over to the desert. Once there, head northwest to find the entrance to the Skull Cavern.
Finding the Auto-Petter
With all that out of the way, we can focus on getting the Auto-Petter. Unfortunately, unlike with Method #1, you’re not guaranteed to find this item in the Skull Cavern at all. You could make it all the way to the bottom without ever seeing an Auto-Petter. It can’t be found in barrels, or crates, nor does it drop as monster loot. It does, however, have a slim chance of appearing in treasure rooms.
Treasure rooms are special rooms found only in the Skull Cavern. They function identically to floors in the Pelican Town mines that appear every 10 levels. They’re small rooms that have no monsters and no, or few, rocks to mine. Instead, the room is fairly empty except for a chest in the middle of the room. Unlike in the regular mines, where the contents of the chests at each level are pre-determined, the treasure room chests are totally random.
In these chests you can find a wide variety of things:
- There’s a 1/702 chance that you’ll find 5-20 random seed packets.
- There’s a 1/260 chance that you’ll find a five-stack of a random cooked dish.
- There’s a 1/156 chance you’ll find a random Fruit Tree Sapling.
However, you’re most likely to find something far more valuable. There’s a 1/26 chance you’ll find a special item. You can find unique hats, Slime Eggs of rare colors that spawn special slimes, Prismatic Shards, or the coveted Auto-Petter!
Reaching A Treasure Room
Now all that’s left is to find a treasure room. In order to find one, you must first go deep within the Skull Cavern. This is a lot harder to get deeper within the normal Mines, so you need to be prepared. You can prepare by gathering up the following items:
- A good pickaxe – A Gold Pickaxe will do the job, but try to have an Iridium Pickaxe with you when you delve into the Skull Cavern. The monsters there are very dangerous, and you don’t want to stay on the floors longer than you need to. A strong pickaxe ensures you’re constantly on the way down.
- A good weapon – The monsters in the Skull Cavern deal more damage and take more damage too. This means you’ll need a good weapon if you want to survive. Try to acquire the Galaxy Sword, Galaxy Dagger, or Galaxy Hammer by your side.
- Staircases – These are incredibly valuable in the Skull Cavern. Stumbled upon an infested floor, or are just taking too long to find a shaft or ladder, pop one of these down and waste no more time looking.
- Bombs – Useful for killing Mummies – highly common SKull Cavern enemies – which respawn if you don’t explode their bodies. Useful, also, for the same reason as Staircases. If you’re taking too long ti find a ladder, use a bomb to clear several pieces of stone at once.
- Highly nutritious food – You’ll need a food item that provides you with a huge boost in Energy and Health. Energy Tonics – sold at Harvey’s Clinic – are great for this. You can also bring your own Cooked Dishes or even raw goods like Cheese.
- Food that provides luck buffs – Lucky Lunch, Fried Eel, Magic Rock Candy. Whatever dish you can find, bring it with you to the Skull Cavern and highly increase the odds of finding a Treasure Room!
- A high Luck stats – Luck impacts both your chance to find a ladder and your chance to find a treasure room. High luck is necessary to find an Auto-Petter in the Skull Cavern. Increase your Luck by obtaining a Special Charm, and watch the “Fortune Teller” on TV to know if you’ve got a high daily luck stat before heading over to the desert.
3. Mr. Qi Route
Getting to Mr. Qi
Last but not least, you can get an Auto-Petter by fulfilling one of Mr. Qi’s Special Orders on Ginger Island. To accomplish this, you must first have access to Mr. Qi’s room on Ginger Island. Mr. Qi’s room is on the West side of Ginger Island, near the Ginger Island Farm. In order to enter the room, you must first obtain 100 golden walnuts.
There are many interesting things inside, such as the Perfection Tracker, the Qi Gem Vending Machine, and, finally, the Special Order Board. On this board, you’ll find quests from Mr. Qi himself, upon the completion of which you’ll earn a set number of Qi Gems, to be spent at the Qi Gem Vending Machine. The board refreshes with two new quests to choose from every Monday. What we’re looking for is the “Danger in the Deep” quest.
Completing Danger in the Deep
Upon accepting the quest, the mines in Pelican Town will reset back to floor zero. The quest requires you to reach the bottom, floor 120, one more time. To make matters more difficult, the monsters in the mines become stronger, more dangerous versions of themselves. The monsters have a higher attack, health, and defense and they take on a slightly altered appearance.
In order to reach the bottom in the timeframe – just seven days – you must go to the mines every, and go in prepared. Bring highly nutritious food (such as Iridium Quality Cheese, Energy Tonics, or Cooked Dishes), have a good weapon and Pickaxe, and bring Staircases and Bombs. You can cheese this quest by bringing 120 Staircases, however, this will require 12000 pieces of Stone to craft. Even if you don’t want to cheese, bring at least a small stack to help you out when you uncover a dangerous invasion floor or are just having bad luck.
Finding the Auto-Petter
So where does the Auto-Petter come in? Is it the reward for completing this daunting task? Sadly, no. You may complete this entire quest and not get an Auto-Feeder. This item does, however, have a chance to be dropped by the dangerous versions of monsters that appear during this quest. Furthermore, they can be dropped as Special Items from barrels and crates you destroy in the mines while this quest is active. There is a 2% chance the Auto-Petter will appear in this way.
Once you’ve completed this quest, you’ll gain access to the Shrine of Challenge – which will be located on Floor 120 of the mines. Activating it will cause all monsters in the mines to remain in their dangerous form, giving you the chance to find the Auto-Feeder anytime.
What’s the Best Way To Get The Auto-Feeder?
So, what’s the best way to get the Auto-Petter? If you’re trying to do it quickly and reliably, you should probably go with with the Joja route, as unpleasant as that may be. In both of the other methods, you’re not guaranteed to get the item at all.
If you’re willing to wait and risk getting lucky, the Skull Cavern is a solid choice. If you’re willing to be patient and wait until you gain access to Mr. Qi, then this is a slightly more reliable way to attain the item than spelunking the Cavern.
But what’s our verdict on whether or not the tool is needed? This is an absolutely fantastic tool that will make raising and caring for animals much quicker and more efficient. If you want to spend less time in your Barn and Coop, but still want happy animals, you should do your best to acquire this item as soon as possible!
