Highlights

• Get lucky by hunting Prismatic Shards on a lucky day with high Luck. Increase Luck with meals like Lucky Lunch.
• Boost Luck stat with items like Special Charm & Lucky Ring. Break Mystic Nodes, hunt special monsters, and fish for treasure.
• Dive into Skull Cavern for the best chance of finding a Prismatic Shard. Be prepared with meals, tools, and luck-boosting items.

One of the most exciting moments in Stardew Valley is finding your first Prismatic Shard. This item is extremely important and used for a variety of purposes. The first and probably most important use is to retrieve the Galaxy Sword — a powerful weapon that's near-necessary to delve into Skull Cavern.

These rainbow-colored rocks can also be used to finish the Missing Bundle, make Wedding Rings in multiplayer, "dismiss" unwanted children, and much more. They are very rare, so many people spend a long time trying to find one. Here are some tips for finding one for yourself.

Updated March 19, 2024 by Gabrielle Castania: With the 1.6 update releasing today, we're going back through to update some of our older Stardew Valley guides to bring them to our current publishing standards.

13 Hunt On A Lucky Day

Each day in Stardew Valley, you'll have a different Luck stat rating. Your Luck stat can determine a wide variety of things about your adventures, including item drops from rocks and monsters. It will also determine how many treasure chests appear while fishing and how likely nodes are to appear in the various mines.

These are all methods for finding a Prismatic Shard, so you'll want to make sure your Luck is high when you search.

There are a few different ways to increase your Luck stat, but you also have a daily base Luck rating. It can be determined by watching the Fortune Teller channel on TV, and there's no way to change it. There are six different ratings that your Luck stat can have, outlined in the table below.

12 Make Lucky Recipes

If your Luck is rotten (and even if it isn't), it can be increased by cooking and eating meals that have a luck buff on them. Each luck point will make certain luck-based events about one percent more likely to occur.

The best Luck meal is the Lucky Lunch, which will add three points to Luck. However, there are also some other great choices, as outlined below.

However, if you're trying to get more Prismatic Shards, it could help. You do get one for donating 90 items to the Museum, and they can occasionally drop from slain Haunted Skulls, so you maybe you'll get lucky.

11 Other Luck Buffs

There are some other ways to boost your Luck stat, too. Two of the most notable are the Special Charm, which offers a permanent 0.025 boost, and the Lucky Ring, which adds a full point of luck when worn.

The Special Charm can be found by completing Secret Note #20. After finding the note, you'll need to solve the puzzle it offers. Once you do, you'll earn this charm, which permanently increases your Luck stat by 0.025.

Lucky Rings are one of the many Rings in Stardew Valley. Lucky Rings are dropped as special items from breakable crates and barrels (about 2.2 percent of crates and barrels are "special") in Skull Cavern, or by very rare "special" monsters, which are mostly indistinguishable from their normal counterparts.

Slimes are the one exception, offering a slightly higher chance of dropping a special item (about 1.2 percent compared to other monsters, at 0.2 percent), and denoted by a gold star.

You can also find a Lucky Ring when panning, but it's very rare.

10 Treasure Lures

One of the most common ways that you can find a Prismatic Shard is through a treasure chest while fishing. Randomly, when fishing, a small treasure chest will appear on the fishing bar. If you can manage to open it and still catch the fish, it will award you some random items. There is a 0.012 percent chance that the chest will have a Prismatic Shard.

This can only occur at Fishing Level Six or higher, but it's a great way to find that elusive gem.

Luckily, some lures can help. Willy sells a Treasure Hunter lure (it can also be crafted), which will increase the chance of finding treasure. You can get the recipe for the Treasure Hunter at Fishing Level Seven. It takes two Gold Bars to make one, and it will increase your chances of finding a treasure chest while fishing by 33 percent.

9 Choose The Pirate Profession

If you're hoping to really start pulling in those treasures from the sea, the Treasure Hunter lure is helpful, but it often isn't going to be enough. At Fishing Level Ten, you can choose between two Professions; the one that will help you find a Prismatic Shard is called Pirate. This doubles your chance to find treasure chests when fishing.

At Level Five, you'll have to choose the Fisher Profession to have the Pirate option at Level Ten. If you want the other Profession, never fear, you can always change Professions in the Sewers at the Statue of Uncertainty.

8 Crack Your Omni Geodes

Breaking stones, opening fishing treasure chests, tilling dirt on the farm, slaying monsters, and many other methods can provide you with geodes. These geodes come in four varieties: regular Geodes, Frozen Geodes, Magma Geodes, and Omni Geodes.

The colorful Omni Geodes are perhaps the best of the four types, providing a huge variety of rare minerals and artifacts when cracked open. One of these precious item drops is, of course, the Prismatic Shard. There's a very rare chance (about 0.4 percent) to find a Prismatic Shard this way.

You can only receive a Prismatic Shard from an Omni Geode after you've cracked 15 geodes. Before this, it is impossible to obtain one.

7 Make A Rainbow Trout Fish Pond

Fish Ponds are small farm buildings that can house up to ten fish of a certain species. Each type of fish will have different item drops once per day, and Rainbow Trout can drop Prismatic Shards if there are at least nine of them in a pond. The chances are quite low, at just 0.09 percent.

Rainbow Trout can be caught in the River or the Mountain Lake before 7 pm during the summer, and only if it's sunny.

After stocking a Fish Pond with a Rainbow Trout, you'll periodically need to complete quests for them, so they can expand their population. They won't produce a Prismatic Shard until the Pond has at least nine fish, so it'll be a little while, but it's one option!

6 Break Mystic Nodes

The large area in the northeast of town beyond the broken bridge is the Quarry. This bridge can be repaired either by finishing the Crafts Room bundles in the Community Center or by purchasing it from the Joja Community Development Form. Here, you can find tons of rock and gem nodes, as well as the Mystic Node, shown above.

Mystic Nodes have a 25 percent chance of dropping a Prismatic Shard, which is quite high compared to other methods. You can also find these nodes in the Mines (above level 100) and in Skull Cavern.

Clear the Quarry out regularly so that new Mystic Nodes appear, and you'll have a much better chance of finding a Prismatic Shard.

5 Slay Special Monsters

There are a ton of different monsters in both the regular Mines and the Skull Cavern. Some of them, if you're lucky, will drop a Prismatic Shard. Below, you can check out the monsters that have a chance to drop Prismatic Shards.

There's a chicken-and-egg dilemma where the Galaxy Sword is almost necessary to defeat the enemies in the Skull Cavern, but the Prismatic Shard is needed to get the Galaxy Sword. Still, it's not impossible to use this method to find one.

After completing the Prismatic Jelly Special Order for the Wizard, you'll receive the crafting recipe for Monster Musk. This will double the number of monsters on new floors that you enter for ten minutes.

If you're desperate for a Prismatic Shard, you can use this to increase the number of monsters you encounter, therefore increasing the chances of a Prismatic Shard drop. To make Monster Musk, you'll need 30 Slime and 30 Bat Wings.

4 Head To Ginger Island

After completing the Community Center, you can gain access to Ginger Island. Here, you'll find new tasks, a whole second farm to use, and a new mine called the Volcano Dungeon. With a new area filled with new content, there are more opportunities than ever to find a Prismatic Shard.

The Volcano Dungeon is definitely for more seasoned players, but heading in there can be a good way to find a Prismatic Shard. Once you reach the top of the Volcano, there will be a chest containing a Prismatic Shard. This can only be obtained once, but it is guaranteed.

3 Crack Iridium Nodes

While a Mystic Node will drop a Prismatic Shard about 25 percent of the time, they are very rare. A much more common stone that can be cracked is an Iridium Node. These mostly drop Iridium Ores, but they also have a four percent chance to drop a Prismatic Shard.

Iridium Nodes will appear in increasing quantity as you descend further through Skull Cavern. To make it through without a Galaxy Sword, a Lava Katana is a good option. It can be purchased at the Adventurer's Guild after reaching the bottom of the Mines.

2 Obtain The Statue Of True Perfection

The Statue of True Perfection is a late-game furniture item that will give you one Prismatic Shard a day. This comes with a catch though; you will need to achieve 100 percent completion, which means befriending every townsperson, growing and shipping every crop, and so much more.

Due to this, the Statue of True Perfection is incredibly hard to get your hands on, even once you're in the late game. If you still need Prismatic Shards after reaching 100 percent completion, though, this is the best method.

1 Dive Into Skull Cavern

It's hard to admit, but just going full-on prospector mode in the Skull Cavern might be the best bet for finding a Prismatic Shard. These desert mines contain all the best chances for finding a Prismatic Shard, from the enemies with the highest drop chance to frequent Iridium Nodes.

Prepare for the journey with some Defense- and Luck-increasing meals, bring some stone to make Staircases, and craft a bunch of bombs to speed things up. When trying to find a Prismatic Shard, it's sometimes best to just bite the bullet and dive deep into Skull Cavern. Good luck!