Stardew Valley Expanded is one of the largest fan-made mods and adds many hours of playtime and challenges for seasoned players. The Iridium Quarry is one of the unique additions to Stardew Valley that gives players an entirely new place to explore and conquer.

Iridium is not only an expensive item in the game, but it also adds a lot to your player experience. For instance, Iridium is one of the main items used to upgrade many weapons and mining equipment. This makes it a highly sought after item, made even more valuable by its rarity.

Location of the Iridium Quarry

Stardew Valley Expanded adds the continent of Galdoran that players can explore. The Crimson Badlands exist on this new continent and is host to a lot of new monsters that can provide an exciting, yet tough challenge. The Iridium Quarry is another unique feature of the Crimson Badlands and allows players to mine Iridium, a fairly rare ore found otherwise in Stardew Valley.

The Quarry is located on the West of the Crimson Badlands and is made noticeable by the multitude of Iridium nodes and meteorites. The quarry is rife with tough to beat monsters such as Corrupt Mummy’s, and Corrupt Spirits. The presence of these monsters makes the process of mining for Iridium ore more challenging.

The Iridium Quarry is unlocked once the player manages to unlock the Crimson Badlands. This desert wasteland opens for players after they have completed the Enchanted Grove questline and completed several other side quests.

Unlocking the Iridium Quarry

Players must follow and complete several quests to gain access to the Crimson Badlands, where the Iridium Quarry is situated. These are listed below:

1) The Enchanted Grove Questline requires you to have met Alesia, who is a member of the Adventurer’s Guild in Castle Village. You’ll be able to meet her in the building of the Adventurer’s Guild after you’ve experienced the initiation cutscene and spent 90 days in-game.

2) You’ll also need to have found the Galaxy Sword, a unique weapon that players can acquire by bringing a Prismatic Shard to the Three Pillars located in the Calico Desert.

3) Additionally, players will need to complete a quest set by the blacksmith Clint to remove a blockade near The Summit caused by a boulder. Once this boulder is removed, players will need to trek to the top of the caldera present on Ginger Island’s volcano.

Once players have finished all three of the above-mentioned quests, the Enchanted Grove will remain open year-round for players. After gaining access to the Enchanted Grove, players will be able to unlock the Crimson Badlands, from where they can access the Iridium Quarry.

Obtaining Iridium Ore from the Quarry

Mining iridium ore needs to be done alongside defeating high level enemies, which can make this a challenging endeavor. This includes two unique monsters. One of these is the Corrupt Mummy which is a stronger version of Mummies that are found in the non-modded Stardew Valley. The second is the Corrupt Spirit, a stronger version of the Carbon Ghost located in the Skull Cavern.

Some strategies for maximizing your ore yields include having the correct weapon, a good stock of food that replenishes your health, an upgraded pickaxe, and plenty of storage in your inventory. Some players have testified about the usefulness of bombs to both destroy ores while simultaneously defeating enemy swarms.

The Significance of Iridium Ore in Crafting

Iridium is a vital crafting item used for upgrading a variety of tools. Upgrading your tools usually follows this order: From Basic to Copper, then Steel, Gold, finally followed by Iridium level tools. You can have your tools upgraded with the help of Clint, the blacksmith in the southeast side of Pelican town. Some tools you can upgrade this way include the pickaxe, axe, hoe, trash can, as well as the watering can.

Iridium bands are also a highly valuable item, requiring 5 iridium bars as one of the ingredients. The iridium band increases your attack skill by 10% and can be stacked with another iridium band or other rings such as the Magnet Ring, the Ruby Ring, the Glowstone ring, or the Glow ring to improve your overall stats.

Iridium Sprinklers are another amazing item that help you in your farming endeavors by watering 24 adjacent tiles each morning. This particular item is unlocked at Level 9 of Farming and has a sell price of 1000g.

Tips and Strategies for Farming Iridium

Finding the Right Weapons

The Infinity Blade can defeat a lot of monsters with amazing ease. If you build up on this weapon by adding Crit. gems such as Ruby and supplementing it further with Enchantments such as the Crusader, it can drastically improve your Attack power.

Another useful weapon is the Infinity Gavel, which combined with a Combat Enchantment such as Artful, and 2 Emeralds can increase your hit radius, which is especially useful when you are being swarmed in the quarry.

In addition, if you are an Acrobat by profession, you’ll receive a permanent buff when fighting enemies.

You Are What You Eat

Foods that help you buff up your Attack, Defense or Luck can really improve your gameplay. Foods like Eggplant Parmesan, Pumpkin Soup, and the Roots Platter can help buff up these levels exponentially.

If you are looking for items that are even more potent, you can purchase elixirs such as the Aegis, and Lightning elixir from Camila.

The Iridium Quarry vs the Skull Cavern

While the Iridium Quarry is an area designed solely to help you increase your Iridium yield, you can also find Iridium in the Skull Cave in the non-extended Stardew Valley. In the Skull Cavern, Iridium nodes begin to spawn around the 140th floor, while the Iridium Quarry spawns 17 to 25 Iridium Nodes every day.

Conclusion

While Iridium is an item that is available in the vanilla version of Stardew Valley, it remains a fairly rare and highly sought after item. For this reason, the addition of the Iridium Quarry through Stardew Valley Expanded helps players get their hands on a rarely dropped item that can be used in a multitude of highly useful ways.