The scoring of the grange display contest is perhaps one of the governor likes most in his luau soup, the right assortment of items for a winning grange display remains obtuse and obscure, year after year.

In case it's a player's first crack at the Stardew Valley fair, here's what's going to happen: on Tuesday, the 16th of Fall, the entire town will gather in the main square between 9 AM and 3 PM. There'll be tourists to chat with, carnival games to play, and most importantly, a series of grange displays containing all manner of salable goods. Fruits, vegetables, fish, cheese, eggs, textiles, and sundry. There's also an empty display. The farmer's job is to fill it with the cream of their crop, but what that looks like may be different for each individual.

How To Build The Perfect Grange Display

Take Home The Prize At The Stardew Valley Fair

Grange displays are judged across three different categories: quantity, quality, and variety, with different numbers of points being awarded for different degrees of success in each category. However, the player can't actually see how many points their grange display will receive until after judging. There's probably a Stardew Valley mod for that, but that would be cheating.

Let's start with quantity, since it's the easiest to explain: the more items in a grange display, the higher it scores. Ideally, players always want to fill out all nine available slots, even if they have to sacrifice on quality or variety to do so. If need be, players can even fill them with nonscoring items, like trash, but in general, it's a better idea to add something usable, even if it's low-quality forage that only scores a few points.

Next, there's quality: the sell price and star quality of an item directly impact how many points it adds to a grange display, with a maximum of eight points per item. As a result, it's best to add the most valuable, highest-quality items possible. Some easy recommendations for high point counts include Milk, Crystal Fruit, Amaranth, Cauliflower, and Pumpkin, as well as any kind of wine, tree fruit, deep sea fish, or cave mushroom. , higher quality is always better here - Iridium is ideal, but Gold and Silver will do if need be. The table below describes the intersection between quality and points.

Keep in mind that any perks that change the sale price of certain items will also impact how they score in a grange display. For example, if the player has the Tiller skill in Stardew Valley, most vegetables they put in the grange display will score higher; the same goes for the Fisher skill and fish, or the Artisan skill and any Artisan Goods.

Finally, there's variety: a grange display is also judged based on the diversity of items included within it. There are eight categories to choose from, and each category represented gains the player five points:

• Animal Products
• Artisan Goods
• Cooking
• Fish
• Flowers & Forage
• Fruit
• Minerals
• Vegetables

Players can only earn up to 30 points for the variety of their displays, so don't worry about including every single category; six is enough.

Now, with nine slots, a nine-point bonus for filling them, an eight-point maximum per item, and a thirty-point bonus for having six or more categories represented, the maximum possible score for a grange display is 125. However, players will only need to score 90 points in order to win the grange competition at the Stardew Valley fair, and this is easily doable with only a handful of high-quality items. If the player fills all nine slots and covers at least six categories, they'll only need eight items worth four points each, and one item worth five points, to take home the prize.

An easy, winning display that almost any player should be able to craft, even in the first year, can include the following:

• Any Cheese
• Silver-quality Amaranth
• Silver-quality Sunflower
• Chanterelle
• Melon
• Emerald, Ruby, Fairy Stone, Opal, Fluorapatite, or Jade
• Silver-quality Salmon or Largemouth Bass
• Mead or Pale Ale
• Jelly (Wild Plum, Strawberry, Peach, Orange, Melon, or Grape) or Wine (Apple, Blackberry, Cherry, Crystal Fruit, or Cranberry)

But , there's a great deal of flexibility here. If the player doesn't have access to one of the items listed above, but does have an extra for another one, they can almost certainly swap it in, especially if it's higher-quality.

Stardew Valley Fair Rewards

Star Tokens & How To Spend Them

For winning the grange display competition, players receive 1,000 Star Tokens, a unique currency that can only be spent during the Stardew Valley fair. Pierre's stand always stocks five particular items, but will also have a handful of random sundries drawn from a small pool.

For an easy (sort of) win, players can also place Mayor Lewis' shorts in the grange display. He'll bribe them with 750 Star Tokens to keep his secret, and the shorts can then be taken home and reused in next year's display.

Either way, the single most important item available for purchase is the Stardrop. Once the player purchases it, they'll immediately eat it, giving them a permanent their maximum energy. It does, however, cost 2,000 Star Tokens, so players will need to participate in some additional mini-games in order to afford it. The best way to do so is to bet a little less than half of the player's total Star Tokens on green at the spinning wheel. Green comes up far more often, so doing this repeatedly can earn players more than enough Tokens in a short period of time.

Besides that, for the collectors, Rarecrow #1 is also sold at the fair for 800 Star Tokens. The other permanent items - potted Dried Sunflowers, a Fedora, and a Light Green Rug - are unique to the fair, but can be saved for later years unless the player really wants them. The random items, which may include Triple Shot Espresso, Pepper Poppers, a Glowstone Ring, 100 Hay, and 24 Mixed Seeds, are by no means necessary. But if the player has any leftover Star Tokens, it's best to spend them on absolutely anything, as Star Tokens cannot be kept or spent after the fair.

Getting the grange display right can be intimidating, but with a little preparation, it's not too difficult. With a Stardrop on the line, the Fall fair is one of the more rewarding seasonal events in Stardew Valley, and is well worth the effort - at least until the player can afford to buy the one-of-a-kind items in its shop.