Constant food shortage

[Cyne Vulpine]

I have two fisher huts, with three people between them, two hunters huts with three people between then and a gathers post with two people, but for some reason I cant feed 25 people and they keep dying, do I need free workers to cook food or something? or assign carriers to ensure they bring it to warehouses? Its really confusing me.

[Builder_of_Worlds]

Hello!

I do not know all the details of your food production chain infrastructure, but I'll try to point out a few possible struggles that might be happening based on your description:

1. Free workers/carriers - your suspicion might be on to something. Number of free workers should be about 20% of your total available workforce. They will carry resources around, supply houses etc... For example, if you produce enough fish, but there isn't anyone to carry it to depots/warehouses and further to houses, the production chain can be disrupted.

2. You have much more hunters then gatherers. It doesn't have to be an issue, but note that hunters also use metal as upkeep resource. If you're low on that, their production might be disrupted. Gatherers on the other side, have lower upkeep and don't need metal at all so in early game it makes it easier to cope with upkeep demands and keep production flow. Also, free workers also impact if eventually produced food will be brought to needed place

3. I don't know if you've used upgrades to production buildings or not. In Patron, building upgrades are very very important, even more then stacking more people to production. Well aimed buildings upgrades can increase production even by 75% (with same number of workers inside), and also significantly decrease resources spent for that production.

4. It is a very good idea to build depots/warehouses near production buildings and housing units. This greatly decreases amount workers spend carrying resources around, and in effect less workers will do more job. In addition, placing roads everywhere will help even further (basic road is free so why not? ).

This is all that comes to mind in regards to your description. Hope it will help!

[WilliW]

Originally posted by Builder_of_Worlds:

Hunters on the other side, have lower upkeep and don't need metal at all

What you mean is gatherers do not need metal at all ;)

[Builder_of_Worlds]

Originally posted by WilliW:

Originally posted by Builder_of_Worlds:

Hunters on the other side, have lower upkeep and don't need metal at all

What you mean is gatherers do not need metal at all ;)

Yes, you're right. My mistake :) . Now corrected!

[Cyne Vulpine]

Yes I started noticing that once I uilt more depots near the resource gatherers my supply chain suddenly skyrocketed! Now I'm actually selling food over supply where I have extra (not starving) workers!

[EMAPhil]

Learnt early on to cluster things like mines, quarries etc and put depots beside them. same for Gatherers, hunters, herbalists. The teleportation of goods between depots is unrealistic but that's the game.
One thing I've not tested out is whether its good to have depots near houses or unnecessary. Another is if the number of carriers, as well as being a percentage of the population, is linked to the number of Depots.

[WilliW]

Depots are so important, you cannot have too many!

Teleportation between depots is an old scheme that already existed in the very early Anno/A.D. games (1602, 1503) some 20 years ago, and it has always been hard for new players to understand it. Perhaps the manual can be improved in this respect.

Also (unlike in Anno/A.D.) goods are carried by workers from depots to houses, so yes, you also need depots close to houses. As said, you can never have too many.

[EMAPhil]

Originally posted by WilliW:

Depots are so important, you cannot have too many!

Teleportation between depots is an old scheme that already existed in the very early Anno/A.D. games (1602, 1503) some 20 years ago, and it has always been hard for new players to understand it. Perhaps the manual can be improved in this respect.

Also (unlike in Anno/A.D.) goods are carried by workers from depots to houses, so yes, you also need depots close to houses. As said, you can never have too many.

I wasn't complaining, I've played most of these games so kind of used to the concept. I tend not to delve too deeply into the manual as part of the fun is figuring out the game mechanics. I think Nebuchadnezzar actually needs carriers between stores, and Sumarians has hard range for a store.

[Ready2produce]

I discovered 'Patron' from a recent 'Banished' discussions thread post.

'Patron' is more a city game while 'Banished' is more a village game.

(Village games useful in learning the game type quirks.)

Just starting 'Banished' so intend to switch to 'Patron' later ... 'Patron' more challenging.

I've bought many 'build' games ... most are not a good fit to my game play preferences.