Now that Wheat is extremely slow to grow, I agree that it should become more balanced by increasing wheat price +1
Everything grows slower now, server is just running slowly. (unless 1.3 changed something with wheat growth)
No. And let me tell you why. There are four main crops as it stands now. The big players are pumpkin and wheat. Many people also farm melons. It was my farm that got sugarcane nerfed, and I am fairly sure I'm the only player to really commit to cane farming on a serious scale. Let's look at what each crop is capable of given the most ideal possible setup: First off, we'll look at the two crops to have recently been nerfed - pumpkins and sugarcane. Pumpkins at $1.00 made anywhere from $20-24k an hour. They have been cut by 25%, and so should now achieve $15-18k/hr. Sugarcane at $0.40 per cane also made $20-24k an hour. They have also been cut by 25%, and I can confirm that they now achieve roughly $16-17k/hr. Now for wheat and melons, two crops I have a touch less data to work with. Melons at Eff 5 / Silk can be farmed at non-stop walking speed. Pumpkins made $20-24k at $1.00 pricing at 2x fly, and so melons at $2.00 pricing and 1x speed ought to achieve the same result. That said, Eff 5 / Silk 1 is not exactly common, and will become more and more rare as axes are broken or misplaced. Therefore it is not a viable long-term indicator of profitability. Melons at Eff 4 cannot be non-stop farmed at walk speed. I don't have solid numbers here, but we can safely assume that melons make at least what pumpkins do. So we'll use $15-18k an hour (it's likely on the lower end of this scale). Now comes wheat. Again, better numbers are welcome here. But from speaking to a couple people, a reasonable assumption (including actual timed runs) is that one chunk can be cleared (via light harvesting) and replanted in around 1 minute 15 seconds. Lets call it 1 minute 20 seconds to include transitioning between floors. One chunk of wheat is $441 with four water placements. At 1 min 20 secs a player ought to clear 45 chunks in an hour, yielding $19.8k. However, this does not include seeds. Every wheat drops between 0 and 3 seeds. Let's assume 1.5 seeds per wheat (one extra seed per two wheat harvested). This gives us an additional $2800 in income from seeds over the course of an hour (252 wheat per chunk * 45 clears * .5 drop rate * $0.50). Thus even using conservative numbers, wheat should accomplish $22.6k/hr on a stacked single-chunk farm. Increasing the lateral space will only raise that figure, as replanting becomes more efficient over a larger area (less turning). Accounting for errors in timing/mistakes, we can assume $20-22k/hr. This gives us the following figures: Pumpkins: $15-18k/hr Melons: $15-18k/hr** Sugarcane: $15-18k/hr Wheat : $20-22k+/hr **Players lucky enough to own Eff V Silk axes can still achieve pre-nerf pumpkin prices, roughly 20-24k/hr. After the last round of price reductions (25% each on pumpkins and sugarcane), wheat is now the number one performer. While it has disadvantages (it is definitely a pain in the ass to replant), it's got significant advantages over other crops: 1) No donation features required (a massive investment) 2) No tool use required (a massive investment since 1.3, as pumpkins *require* Eff V) 3) Space efficient farming 4) Cheapest/fastest farm to build by far (a proper setup for pumpkins/melons/canes costs 100-200k+ and takes weeks to build). And you think wheat should give you more money? I just don't see it.
I'm still with melons. I have eff V silk, and I think I can make more then 15k per hour. I think (we can time me once) I can make about 20k per hour if I really tried. Also, some people need e-repairs for melons/pumpkins so that really can bring down profit margin AND time. You can sit around and wait for the person to tp to you or have to go to spawn and go all the way back. Wheat does not need an increase seeing the number above, but I also believe with the right donation features/tools melon farming can be the second most profitable crop.
Reread - I said at Silk V Melons are capable of 20-24k/hr. It's just that most aren't going to be able to get access to Eff V Silk 1, and they'll eventually disappear entirely. The melon figure reflects Eff IV.
As you can see, wheat is the best farming method, if anything, I think the price should go down to $1.50.
