Hello and welcome to my guide on how to be the King Of Winter! There are three parts to this Guide. The First Part will be Generic Key Points to Focus On. The second is how to get through Winter without a Mod and the last part will be With a Mod. This will also help prepare you for Future Seasons or Content in the Future. I am also sharing "With a Mod" because I know there are Unofficial Mods out there that tweak the gameplay and the actions of the Second part but is also Highly Optional and Frowned Upon by those who play Normally like myself. I just used the mod to see if the method still holds which it doesn't entirely need a few steps. Either way, Enjoy the post!

When starting and playing in winter there are Passive Skill Nodes that you want to activate when you get a chance. They are:

Supply Chain - For getting Deliveries to your Restaurant (But you need to Complete the Grand Opening to Use)

Friendly Neighbor - To gain Friendships Faster.

Bookworm - to get Passive Starter Recipes

Salesman - For Lowered Shop Prices

And Optionally

Oceaneer - for More Fish you Fish Up.


With these Skills, there is a path I take to try and utilize all 4 nodes when I get them but at the same time, My path is to focus on Passive Growth to get the Supply Chain and through the Grand Opening.

Now to go and explain my path so you can get to that point.

When I start the game and choose Winter as a starting Season, I get the Character Creation Screen (Of course you probably know that but that is how I am starting this).

When you make your character, I choose to start by putting all possible points into an Active Skill I would Struggle within Winter and the rest in an Active Skill I will need at the start. For some of you, the Idea is Cooking and Endurance and I would say that is fine, for a Human Play-through, but I would rather choose an Android character for a natural starting Endurance boost and then focus on Social as the second Key Point to put the remaining points to. You can also split the 3 other points between all the other Active skills other than cooking but I think with this play-through, you will get the gathering and Endurance up Faster than you may imagine if following my pattern.

Now when you start day 1 and can get controls after the train ride, Get the Friendly Neighbor and Salesman Skill Node in your Skill Menu (Press Esc to do so and go to the tab with the vertical 3 bars).

Then go into town like you would for the main story to get supplies from the town's Selected Townspeople. While doing that, Talk to these People Twice today before going back to Hazel and every day after that till you are close friends with all. Those people are:

• Uriel
  
• Mae-Lou
  
• Nabiha
  
• Bianca
  
• Aloys
  
• Bowie
  
• Thelio
  
• Valentina
  
• Bea

(The reason is those people are some of the key NPCs for shopping in my eyes. Oh and Pomarine but she is just for Epic Bow and Scythe)

After talking to the townsfolk and going back to Hazel, IGNORE OPENING THE RESTAURANT. The reason is that you won't have enough money to get what you need to sell food so you gotta gain money passively till Winter 14th-21st (a range that depends on if you gift people, do the Hunting Route or the fishing route)

If you are Hunting, Focus on the Elder Boar or the Elder Elk. To tell the Difference, The Elder Boars are Bigger and rougher on the hair on their back while the Elder Elk have Horns that are as long as their bodies. (Sadly I do not have images of the two compared at this time)

If you are Fishing, you would either want to start by fishing on the beach where your restaurant is or focus on the beach to the right of town just under the train station. both areas have a chance of Salmon and Caviar and the more Caviar you get, that is what you want to try and get every day when fishing. (later when having a better rod, go fishing on the North West beach past Pomarine's Archery Range)

Whichever way you choose to go, this is my routine:
Weekday:

• Wake up
  
• Talk to the townsfolk listed above and Pomarine twice a day
  
• Gift if I have Spare Cash to buy a gift.
  
• (if have Bookworm) go to the Library to look for recipes
  
• Go Gathering (I like Fishing but like I said you can hunt)
  
• Go to Bowie or Uriel and sell half your Stock from hunting or fishing before 4 PM every weekday
  
• Buy Coffee (+20 Stamina for humans and Androids) or Energy Drinks (-10 Health +40 Energy for Androids)
  
• Continue to fish or gather till midnight on the game and head straight to bed.

Try not to feint at all while gathering cause you will lose a day.
Check and See if I can get any of the key Skill Nodes Every Level up and save 3 for Supply Chain.
Try and get 10 shells stored in your apartment storage

Weekends:
Do all the same but talking to townsfolk will be harder so I would ignore talking to them these days.

When you got about 20k-30k credits (or you'll hear me slip and say 20k-30k G) you would be free to start buying ingredients or Furniture or Staff for your restaurant to get past the Act 1 Requirements and do the Grand Opening. Decor, Reputation, and looking Nice is not needed for Act 1.

When you get past the Grand Opening. Get the Supply Chain Node and you are good to start buying ingredients and selling food. Continue to make sure you gain the Social Active Skill levels for Shop Price Reductions and Endurance and Gathering for Spring but now you can cook going forward.

That is my little starter guide for No Mod Gameplay, However, the Modded Gameplay is different.

The Modded Play-through (though not appreciated by all) is, in my opinion, A LOT easier and has fewer steps to get active in the gathering process.

The Mod I used for the Start of Winter play-through with mods is "Simple Fishing"[www.nexusmods.com] by MorthyJD on Nexus Mods.

There are other Mods like a Mining Mod for better ore drops and a Snapshot Mod for taking pictures of your entire Restaurant but I will only focus on the Simple Fishing Mod cause I feel by the time you get going with this mod, you notice you don't need a high-quality rod (Edit: I realized the Highest Quality Fishing Rod for Caviar which is the money maker), don't need high-quality bow and you would just be fishing for income all Winter. Oceaneer helps with the amount of fish in return for this play-through for sure but it is a struggle cause you gotta hit the sweet spot in the fishing spots for constant giant fish/

When you get to making a character, My thoughts are still the same: If you're Human, Get the Cooking then Endurance maxed out if you want but Preferably go Android and get Cooking first and Social maxed out as much as you can.

• After getting all the tools from the townsfolk, Choose Energy from the last section (Black Coffee for Humans or Energy Drinks for Androids) finish Talking to Hazel, and get access to the Restaurant Fridge. Store all the food in the fridge and BEELINE IT to the North West Beach in the game. Start fishing, use Every bit of energy without feinting, and get as much Squid and Caviar as possible.
  
  
• When it is getting close to 2:30 pm. STOP FISHING. Go sell half your stock at Bowie's Shop and talk to every shopkeeper EXCEPT Pomarine and Valentina (for now). When you finish selling and talking to shopkeepers twice, Go back to fishing on that beach if you have energy then head home to store your stockpile and sleep when you are almost completely out of energy or it is midnight.

Repeat the Steps in list format every day till you have 50k-100k Credits (or G), which should be fast if you're selling half your stock of Caviar every day, and rush to the Grand Opening finish as soon as possible.

This gameplay loop is kinda faster cause I think you gain more money in this loop and can get everyone loved gifts every day (except Nabiha who loves flowers) and would have enough money by the 17th for sure or sooner if lucky on the energy items and selling more than half your supply every day.

While you're still in winter, focus on cooking more at this point, gather the Caviar in mass quantity to enhance your dishes in the Research Facilities for massive money gains but massive Caviar losses when cooking all those dishes with Caviar.

if you want to use the Mods from Nexus Mods for starting the gameplay, that is fine in my eyes, but duly note that right now, Mods aren't fully supported due to being early access. The fact that Devs can change one line of code and your mod will stop working down the line if the Author doesn't keep up with the mod and game patches, your game save may corrupt and would have to start over if it is. That is why I said Use With Caution in the title.

Understanding my process to best play through winter these two ways has been a challenge cause some factors affect the game every time you play this game: Is there an Elder Animal in the Swamps or Cliffs? Did I get enough fish today? Did I Talk to Everyone on the List Today? Is this lasting Longer than expected? Did I faint and cut my time by a day? and for sure Am I Consistent with My Pattern?

The Game earns the Title RPG (Role Playing Game) as you are immersing yourself in Playing the way you want and for me, that is optimizing the hardest part of the game (which in this case is winter as a starting character). Winter is a handful of RNG (RPG's Son-in-Code meaning Random Number Generator) and with every aspect, you want as many high numbers as possible cause that is what you sell to get income starting. if not high numbers, you chance at just grinding meats and fish all winter and finally working on your restaurant in Spring, which is still a viable choice for players who just want to be passive.

I hope this guide helps you guys out and keep in mind that this was based on testing in 4 different saves. Once on a modded save play through after testing the mod to see how it works.

Please Leave a comment if this helped you get through winter at least or gave you a start down that path.