fist steps

[calabacina]

good morning feudal lords

How do you manage the workforce the first year? we start with 5 families, if I understand correctly AT LEAST one must be free from work to be able to dedicate themselves to transport and construction so you start with 4 possible jobs, I would say that the priority is to make wood, secure food and materials and then start producing food ... but by doing this I remain without workers... how do you do it? do you rotate them?

[TimeTraveller]

Definitely a case of micromanaging them, for instance. build a foragers hut for berries in the summer, and build a hunters camp for meat in the winter, switch one worker between them seasonably in the beginning (berries are never available in the winter as they're seasonal).

[Agony_Aunt]

Your priorities are logs, food, and fuel.

First things you need to build a are a woodcutter's camp, a logging camp, and either a forager's hut or a hunting camp.

That gets you started and you have 3 families assigned leaving 2 for construction and moving stuff.

Where you go next depends on your chosen strategy and preferred build order, but you want to get a grannary and warehouse built fairly early on, a well is never a bad idea, just in case lightning sets something on fire, and a sawmill.

You may also want to get a second hitching post or upgrade to a small stable as you'll soon find log delivery being a bottleneck with only 1 Ox.

After that housing. Once you have housing for your 5 people and food coming in (probably by this point you've built the other food gathering building) and probably going over 50% approval, which will bring in more families.

Wealth is going to be an issue here as you want to get some backyard plots going for more stable food supply, so one option is an early trade house to sell off some excess goods.

A church is also highly desirable as soon as you've got housing done to improve happiness.

[cornus]

never, ever fist them :))

[redtails_nf]

For me, what important is try to find a starting location with good fertility for wheat (and restart game until I get a better fertility area)

after that just like others, pause the game, plan the road access, place logging camp, woodcutter (as far as I know woodcutter and logging use tree from nearby area so don't place them near each other), forager hut or hunting camp (or both, and save hunting camp for winter by switching people from foraging to hunting camp). (3 People 1 for each)

after all basic job created, usually I create well and some house, with quite large backyard area for vegetable, and some smaller one with chicken. (5 house at least) after build some house town will upgraded and I choose heavy plow upgrade and start to create farms, mill, communal oven.

and start adding supporting job like forestry so you doesn't run out of trees, market, to have some income, then add more house with vegetable garden, build church, etc.

[calabacina]

thanks all

[rosablanka]

Yes, I pause the game, look at the map, look at the SOIL fertility and all surrounding resources and plan where should put what - wood cutters right next to a forest, well over water, etc.
First, I build a granary and put it on highest setting, to be built first (leaving supplies for too long will damage them).
The second is storehouse - setting very high, then I build a second stable and purchase a second ox, then plan the houses ( 1 house veggies, 1 house chicken at least in the beginning - money is limited until I build the tradepost). Then firewood cutters, sawpit, well and marketplace spot.
Assign 1 family for chopping trees for timber, 1 in the granary to start collecting exposed goods and 1 fam to the store house to collect the other supplies. Then concentrate on the houses, to make 5 asap. Then forager or hunter. And depending what I need fast I reassign the families, once they are done with collecting the supplies i can reassign to a sawpit - to build the stable asap so the animals don't run away.
First developing point I use for trading, second, trading again. And voila, can start making money and buy whatever is needed in emergency.

[Agony_Aunt]

Originally posted by rosablanka:

Yes, I pause the game, look at the map, look at the SOIL fertility and all surrounding resources and plan where should put what - wood cutters right next to a forest, well over water, etc.
First, I build a granary and put it on highest setting, to be built first (leaving supplies for too long will damage them).
The second is storehouse - setting very high, then I build a second stable and purchase a second ox, then plan the houses ( 1 house veggies, 1 house chicken at least in the beginning - money is limited until I build the tradepost). Then firewood cutters, sawpit, well and marketplace spot.
Assign 1 family for chopping trees for timber, 1 in the granary to start collecting exposed goods and 1 fam to the store house to collect the other supplies. Then concentrate on the houses, to make 5 asap. Then forager or hunter. And depending what I need fast I reassign the families, once they are done with collecting the supplies i can reassign to a sawpit - to build the stable asap so the animals don't run away.
First developing point I use for trading, second, trading again. And voila, can start making money and buy whatever is needed in emergency.

You buy a second ox before building a second hitching post or upgrading to a stable? That's a risky move. I see you understand the risk of them running away, but for a couple of wood, i wouldn't risk it.

[ChrizzyP]

one thing i would recommend.

is at the start during spring put as many families into gathering berries as you can -> two or even three.

because during spring the berries regrow, meaning that the faster you can deplete them the moar space there is during spring for them to regrow.

with 3 families on berries in the first year I've got 180 berries out of a 64 deposit.

as soon as it hits summer i just leave one family "gently" picking the remains.

there is no rush in "building the village"

my go to strat is

1. forager hut ( 2 fam)
2. log camp ( 2 fam)
3. granary
4. storehouse

once they've been built i have around 20 logs extra, i then switch the two from the log camp an put each into gran + store house to move the basic supplies.
(those two don't get taken out of the granary or the storehouse as they are your market vendors)

whilst thats being done the extra family goes into the forager.

so i'm at 0 unassigned. (which is fine because no construction!)

the firewood only gets used if there's houses. so you can avoid building houses until say july.
giving you 4 months to get the basics up.

once you hit summer you move the two from the forgers hut into "unassigned" and THEN build the houses.

1 family will use the Ox, the other will build the buildings.

1 house with a MASSIVE back garden for a veg plot that can support two families.
(it's massive so that when the house get's upgrade to T3 late game you can have 4 families working the plot if need be)
2 small plots that will eventually have chickens that can also support two families each.

whilst the houses are being built, map out your market area.

once the 3 houses are up, build a well followed by your woodcutter's lodge an put the 2nd "unassigned" family to work it.

it this point (autumn) you should have
1 family in forger's (once this has been depleted you move them to a hunting camp for winter)
1 -> granary
1 -> storehosue
1 -> log camp
1 -> woodcutter lodge.

as soon as winter hits (dec) take a family off of the wood cutter & log camp so you have 2 families spare again and build the church.

the market & church are vital for keeping your approval rating high and inviting new families.

as soon as you get your 6th family leave them in the church for the approval bonus.

during winter you want to also build around 4-8 houses, with all the wood you harvested in the summer.

two big houses for an extra veg plot or apples depending on how you want to grow & a few smaller houses that just have an extension that can't support moar than 1 family as you only want 1 family being an artisan (late game)

(reason for building so many houses is that you want to effectively insure that you have space to "welcome" the families in over the year until the following winter & each month you get 1 family if your approval rating is between 51%->74%. or two families if it's above 75%)

WINTER is when you really want to focus on your "building" & expanding or making materials. UNLESS you have 2-3 spare families and no jobs lined up.

after this build a trading post.

& then build/expand how you like depending on fertility or available resource deposits.


other notes:
personally i wouldn't go farming until the 3rd year when you can spare the "Family power" to fully max out the 8 slots in the farmhouse.

an as for the the veg plot ->It most likely won't get utilised in your first year, but it'll be ready for spring in the 2nd year,

for the best results, if you have spare timber build a clay furnace. and just build it "as close" to your veg plot house and assign the two families to work in it ONCE your town starts to get to around "10 pop"

reason for this is because the two families will always focus on the growing/harvesting of veg THEN when winter hits they will make clay tiles.
(provided you have spare clay, or they will just idle an help build things)

This way you DON'T have to micromanage them further and with a huge back-garden all they will do is just grow/plant the veggies, (with no travel time unless it's to the market or to the well) that way you will always have a constant supply of a T1 food resource.


But the best thing.... is that you can play the game however you want!

[rosablanka]

Originally posted by Agony_Aunt:

You buy a second ox before building a second hitching post or upgrading to a stable? That's a risky move. I see you understand the risk of them running away, but for a couple of wood, i wouldn't risk it.

Yes. It says there - it can take MONTHS for the new ox to arrive :) so I buy it first. Risky - true, but so far, so good.
Meanwhile the second post is created, and when the planks are ready (need 2 to upgrade to a stable), then buy a third and forth (IF have the money).
(and yes, a couple of times animals run away, but they returned after that, at least some, and also while I had a stable... go figure).