Okay, I finally figured out a way to effectively automate farming. The RWYS update frustrated me a lot because it made farming an incredibly frustrating task that required a lot of time and attention to get decent rewards from. So, finally, I have created a method for farming massive amounts of food while only having to interact with your crops when you plant them, and then you can just walk away until its time to harvest.
Benefits of this method:
+ One-time interaction with crops until harvest
+ No unwanted spawns of Lord of the Fruitflies
+ All crops grown are giant
+ Very simple, and can be done in the caves
Negatives:
- Does not grow large numbers of crops, so yield is smaller than mega farms
- Requires a little pre-planning (fertilizing the ground 1 time, killing 1 Lord of the Fruitflies)
- Can only grow a limited set of crops, not all crops
- Requires rotating crops
- Cannot be scaled up, already at maximum efficiency
Ok, now, to the method:
Make sure to spawn a Lord of the Fruitflies, kill it, and get the Friendly Fruit Fly Fruit.
The Friendly Fruit Fly Fruit needs to be placed on the ground for this to be passive, but he has a limited range and moves slowly.
He can reach 2 tiles North, South, East and West of him and 1 tile diagonally. Because of this, we are only going to use 4 tiles total for farming.
Imagine a 3x3 tic-tac-toe board. Place the Friendly Fruit Fly Fruit in the center of the board, and then dig up the 4 corners of the board with Rigamajigs.
Then you will need to fertilize each tile to 100 on all three fertilizers one time. Do this however you want.
Now, we will start with how to do this in Autumn and go season by season.
Autumn:
Dig up 6 seed holes in each garden plot.
Plant 6 Corn Seeds on each garden plot and water 4 times.
You can now walk away because the plot has all the nutrients it needs, will be tended by the fruit fly, and will only drop to 22 Wetness at the most when the Giant Crops finish growing.
Now, when you go collect your Giant Crops 3, the compost level is down to 4. We need to get that back up, and we will do it with rotating crops.
So now, you will dig 6 seed holes in each garden plot again.
Then plant 6 Potato Seeds on each garden plot and water 4 times again.
Once again, walk away for 3 days and return to collect you 24 Giant Potatoes.
The Manure level is down to 4 on each plot now, but the Compost is back up to 52.
So, once more, dig 6 seed holes in each garden.
But this time you will plant 6 Carrots in each (and water each garden 4 times).
Walk away for 3 days, return, collect your 24 Giant Carrots.
Now the plots are each at 4 Growth Formula, 52 Manure, and 100 Compost.
So, start over with a new set of Corn Seeds and keep repeating this process until Autumn is over.
Winter:
In Winter we will be using Asparagus instead of Corn, as we are after Giant Crops and you can't grow Giant Crops out of season.
So, lets assume our last crop of Autumn was Carrots, and continue the process.
The first crop of winter will be 6 Asparagus Seeds in each garden plot with each plot watered 4 times.
Leave for 3 days, return and collect your 24 Giant Aspargus.
Then plant Potatoes, and after Potatoes you will plant Carrots, after Carrots you plant Asparagus again, and...well you get the idea.
Spring:
In Spring, we are back to Corn, Potatoes, and Carrots.
Keep repeating the rotation until Summer
Summer:
Ok, Summer is the curveball. Here we have to change the gameplan as the previous rotations don't work and most Summer crops consume huge amounts of water, and we want to avoid those crops.
In Summer we will be growing Corn, Dragonfruit, and Pomegranates.
So, let assume your last crop of Spring was Potatoes. Your Manure in each garden is only at 4, Compost is 52, and Growth Formula is 100.
We need to now dig up 8 seed holes in each garden plot and plant 4 Corn seeds and 4 Pomegranate Seeds in each.
Water each plot 4 times and walk away for 3 days. When you return and collect your 32 Giant Crops, the gardens wil be at 0 Wetness. Thats okay because only a few of the plants will have gotten 1 stress point, which means you still get Giant Crops.
The Growth Formula in each is now at 4, Compost is 52 still, and Manure is at 100.
So now you will again dig 8 seed holes, but this time you will plant 4 Corn Seeds and 4 Dragonfruit Seeds. Water each garden 4 times, and walk away.
When you return for the harvest, the numbers will have flipped. Manure is back at 4, Compost at 52, and Growth Formula is at 100.
So now you plant 4 Corn and 4 Pomegranates again, then 4 Corn and 4 Dragonfruit, etc. until the end of Summer.
When the next Autumn begins, start by planting Carrots if the last crop of Summer was Dragonfruit, or plant Potatoes if the last crop was Pomegranates.
Ta Dah! A 100% passive Giant Crop farming setup that never requires additional fertilizers, extra watering, or fighting the Lord of the Fruit Flies.
Extra Tidbits:
Potatoes can be swapped out for Eggplants in Spring and Autumn
Carrots can be swapped out for Pumpkins in Autumn and Winter
Dragonfruit can be swapped out for Peppers in Summer
Pomegranates can be swapped out for Onions in Summer
Garlic and Durians suck, but if you want to grow them you can in Spring with a 4 Carrots / 4 Durian(or Garlic), then 4 Carrots / 4 Dragonfruit
Watermelon and Tomatoes suck because they drink water like crazy, when you're already losing 24 wetness a day in Summer from evaporation. Grow 8 of them on their own plots and use stacks of 5 Ice to water them passively if you really want them.
If you don't want to fertilize everything to max the first time, just fertilize each garden with 13 Rot, 7 Manure, and preferably 1 Growth Formula Starter. Then plant Corn as your first crop. This is the poor man's method of getting this farming method started.
EDIT: Thanks to @QuartzBeam for explaining this method of exiling the Lord of the Fruitflies. "You can exile the Lord of the Fruit Flies indefinitely, simply by spawning him at some remote spot and leaving him there. His Lordship will categorically refuse to go further than 8 or so tiles from his spawn point and will instantly drop aggro and return "home" if he goes that far. And since there can only be one Lord of the Fruit Flies at any time, that "protects" every other farm plot you make from uninvited nobility."
This allows my method to be used on all 8 tiles around the fruit fly fruit, thus doubling the yield. I found that if you try to expand to all 12 tiles the friendly fruit fly can reach, he does not get around fast enough to tend all the plants, so I would suggest sticking to a maximum of 8 plots if you have exiled the Lord of the Fruit Flies elsewhere.
TLDR:
Put fruit fly fruit in middle of tile and dig 4 farm plots in the four diagonal tiles
Fertilize each plot to max
Water each garden to max when planting
In Autumn plant 6 carrots, then 6 potatoes, then 6 corn, then repeat
In Winter swap out Corn for Asparagus
In Spring, back to Corn
In Summer, Plant 4 Corn and 4 Dragonfruit together, then 4 Corn and 4 Pomegranates together, then back to Corn/Dragonfruit, etc.