How to Build Relationships in Stardew Valley: A Guide to Marriage and 100% Completion

Hello, friends! Have you ever wanted to get married in the game or achieve 100% completion? If so, building relationships with the villagers is essential.

Relationship Levels and Marriage

In the game, press the E key and switch to the Affection panel to view the villagers’ affection levels, represented by red hearts. Each villager has a different maximum number of hearts. Specifically:

• Non-marriageable villagers: 10 hearts
• Marriageable villagers: 8 hearts

Once you reach 8 hearts with a marriageable villager, you can buy a bouquet from Pierre’s shop and give it to them to become boyfriend and girlfriend. This increases the affection level cap to 10 hearts. After reaching 10 hearts, on a rainy day, you can buy a Mermaid Pendant at the beach and give it to them to become engaged. Three days later, you’ll get married and the affection level cap will increase to 14 hearts. In summary, there are three stages: 8, 10, and 14 hearts.

Increasing and Decreasing Affection

There are many ways to increase affection:

• Talk to villagers daily; the first conversation each day increases affection.
• Give gifts twice a week for a significant affection boost.
• Give gifts on villagers’ birthdays for an extra-large affection increase.
• Complete bulletin board tasks for a considerable affection boost.
• Trigger special events by reaching specific affection levels. Some events have choices that can increase or decrease affection.
• After the movie theater is built, invite villagers to watch a movie and buy snacks for them to increase affection.
• Kiss your spouse daily to boost affection.

Affection can be decreased by:

• Ignoring villagers for a day.
• However, if their affection is at the current maximum level (8 or 10 hearts), it will not decrease.
• Spouses’ affection decreases continuously and quickly, so be cautious.
• Giving disliked gifts, attacking villagers with a slingshot, or rummaging through trash in front of them will also decrease affection.

Benefits of High Affection

High affection levels provide several benefits:

• At full hearts, you can become boyfriend/girlfriend and get married.
• Villagers will give you recipes when you reach specific affection levels. Each villager has several recipes, which are primarily obtained through television and affection levels, with a few available for purchase in shops.
• Villagers will also give you crafting recipes, which are essential for recipe collection.
• At first, villagers may seem harsh, but they will become kinder as their affection for you increases.
• At certain affection levels, villagers will send you letters and gifts, such as batteries, fish, and fertilizers.
• Interesting storylines are triggered at specific affection levels.
• Most importantly, when your spouse reaches 13 hearts, they will give you a Stardrop.

In conclusion, the affection system is linked to four main aspects: overall affection, half of the recipes, crafting recipes, and Stardrop collection. So, get moving and start building those relationships!