How to defend my kingdom?

[Exanthos]

I can't have my every one of my gnomes in squads training, patroling, and getting killed 24/7. I can't make armor because I don't have a bone needle yet, and on a previous attempt at a play through, a well trained squad with weapons a little armor couldn't even kill a somewhat large goblin raiding party, let alone a bear.

[bar.pys]

first off- you can build walls//remove ramps around your area of choosing. This will block both goblins, ants, animals and your own gnomes.
second- you can get a bone needle, you have 2 yak's from the very beginning (butcher one of them). Bone needle is not really a problem at the beginning. The problem is not enough hides for leather strips/leather armor to make full set for even 1 gnome.
third- first wave of goblins is fairly easy- my tactic for first wave is to temporarily assign all gnomes into military squads and order them to attack. It helps if you have some stone swords/wooden shields then too.

EDIT:
-check out the post on Gnomoria forums for more info:
http://forums.gnomoria.com/index.php?topic=7560.0

[Ishan451]

Originally posted by Xorobyte:

I can't have my every one of my gnomes in squads training, patroling, and getting killed 24/7. I can't make armor because I don't have a bone needle yet, and on a previous attempt at a play through, a well trained squad with weapons a little armor couldn't even kill a somewhat large goblin raiding party, let alone a bear. :missing:

Okay, let me tell you a real story.

In ancient times the humans living in the city of Uruk asked the same thing and in the end they decided that building a city wall would be the best idea to protect themselves from the harsh wilderness and bandits and raiders.

Interestingly enough, limiting the point of entrance to a limited area, which they could guard with their soldiers proved so successful, that many other cities adopted their little solution. Over the time it evolved from a simple city wall to full blown ramparts.

[Vermillion Cardinal]

What the others have said above is pretty much what you have to do. As for my two cents:

If you butcher your first male yak, prioritize getting a leather helm and cuirass; having a throat ripped out, a heart pierced or going blind is deadlier in the short term than a lost arm or leg, and in the case of the first two it costs you a gnome who could still be somewhat productive.

You can also get your WOTG gnomes to jump en masse on some monitor lizards and honey badgers to boost hide acquisition. Don't even bother tackling bears until you have 3-4 people fully covered, but once you have done so take them on as frequently as possible for better leather.

Early in the game I sometimes like to have my soldiers sleep at the entrance so that they get targeted by raids first; this means an extra soldier or two up for the battle who would've otherwise been dozing away underground.

When completely walled off with goblins beyond your walls, you have some time to pick the time of battle if most of your soldiers are asleep. Wait until they're available, then group all your gnomes into squads and have them wait at a part of your wall using guard points. Mine a hole in the wall (preferably with a stockpile of bandages nearby) and the goblins should rush towards it (or designate a target for all your squads if they don't do so); with your people all together you'll have concentrated firepower immediately than if you had to wait for them to rally to a few defenders.

It can be dangerous, but if you know the rhythm of the raids you can stockpile massive amounts of food, wall off, and try to get the mants and goblins to fight each other. Both parties usually hang around for 2 days or so, and mants don't have tunnelers to worry about. This works far better on smaller maps, and the biggest risk is having mants still around when gnomads arrive. This should help you until the goblins start wearing heavier armor, which may prevent mant scouts from leaving the map to summon their workers.

If all else fails, lower the difficulty; there's no achievements and this is a singleplayer game, so there's no shame in fighting with the deck stacked in your favor with a 0.25/0.25/0.25 game setting.

[Inzainia]

i wrote and video'd a full guide on this game a year or so ago, that still pretty much applies to the current version, it is found in the guides section. im not necessarily promoting it, but if i were you, i would watch the first couple episodes, and at a minimum, the one on population, and the one on military. this game has a semi steep learning curve, and once you understand those two windows you will find it a breeze to play.

secondly as to the above, it takes 12 days (one game month) to gain a new yak. this is if you do not kill one to get the bone needle(which is unnecessary for atleast 2 months)

you will start with a box of bandages, your gnomes can use to heal bleeding.
armor is useless in the leather phase, so is generally skipped by all but your gate guards, until you can get them in copper and even then they tend to wear nothing and use the way of the gnome perk.

day one grow a decent size farm of cotton so that by the second month you have a good sized stock of cotton ready to be turned into bandages. also feel free to make 3-4 stone hand axe and stone hammers, BUT do not equip them, just leave them in a stockpile.

build smart but slow. get everything going, like in the videos, It is of the highest priority to get your kingdom worth over 1900 prior to hitting the second month so that you get 2+ gnomads on the first migration wave (can check what net worth is needed on the gnomoria wiki under population).

once you hit month 2 (when goblins will start to invade) they will come at you in very small groups, 2-3 at most. and are really weak and easily defeated (if you have watched that military video and set them up properly)

on the first day of season 2, the game will save at approx 4am-6am. at this point watch the bottom left of screen you will see x gnomads have arrived sooner or later. when this happens, if it is not the maximum amount you could get,(based on population chart on wiki) hit alt+f4 re launch game and continue redoing it until it does. it is of vital imporataince for the following strat to work, to get at least 2 more gnomes in your first migration, or you will be short on people. using 2 of your originals, and the 2 gnomads, as soldiers.

at this point you will want to slaughter your first newborn yak and get your needle(this is if you have not killed a monitor lizard who got too close to your camp which i generally end up doing)

build the loom and tailor (now you can make bandages....VERY IMPORTAINT TO GET ASAP! will be the difference between life and death for your gnomes!!!! i cant overstate this....

by this time, you should have already been mining down but do not go below -6 (it shows in the corner what z level your on) so as not to stir up skeletons etc.. and you should have some copper ores by now... watch my mining video if you need help with mining it explains it all in pretty good detail.

use said copper smelt it into bars, with a smelter, then forge it into armor!!! not weapons armor!!

if there is not enough copper to make 1 full set of copper armor, make a shield, a chestplate, and all but a helm, that you can. make a bone helm from the skull from the yak, lizard etc..

at this point and only this point, you want to make stone weapons for your squad,(because they wil be equipping armor and this nullifies the way of the gnome perk)

(currently in uniform in the first tab you must set it to bone handaxe, bone hammer etc.. in order for them to dualwield, if you dont and leave it on- any, handaxe or hammer, they will only grab one, if any of the bone weapons)
once you are up to copper weapons this menu works properly and they will start grabbing the best they can get)

i go with 3 dualwielding a handaxe, and hammer (handaxe does good damage to flesh, hammer breaks armor faster) this way each has the chance to do both to both types.
the last guy, you want a hammer and a shield on. in military set him up as taunt, and block. (i believe , might be guard) its the one that increases his defense

note, the guy with the shield gets ALL armor first!!! he will be the one taking the damage. because he will be tauning the goblins onto him.

once you have 1 full sets of copper armor equipped on your tank, then make a few weapons... i cannot overstate this enough also.. your guys get hurt, they run grab a bandage, and fix the bleeding and go back, yes you go through a lot , but its fine, because they survive,.. yes weaker weapons mean longer fights, but the reason you want armor first is that they must BREAK it in order to one shot your guys.. and rarely at this point can a group of gobbies break armor.

priority of pieces for first guy are: shield > chest > head > legs > arms > hands the rest +weapons
remember that the helm and chest are one per unit, the rest are 2 per unit, so for example, each soldier will wear one helm, one chestpiece, 2 gloves 2 greaves 2 boots 2 pauldrons.

the reasons behind this priority, is bone armor and below mean your guys can recieve the epic, one shot to the lung collapsiong it, or to the heart, killing them instantly, with copper or better this no longer happens. the helm removes the blinding issue you will see in weaker versions if unlucky etc..

once you have this group setup, build 2 trsaining dummies close to your entry. setup the groups in 2 2 man squads. training full time (all 3 time slots each) at them, and just leave them there forever.

continue playing, expanding building etc.. every year or so i add 2 or so more soldiers to my military, mixing them in with a vet so they learn faster. until i end up with 2 tanks, 4 dualwielders, 1-2 2handers, and 1-2 missile guys.

this will prevent you from dieing so early hopefully, just remember to set the retreat if bleeding option under military for your troopers, and to set up a couple bandaid stocklpiles with a crate filled with bandages by your front door, close so they can easily and quickly get to them, and you should be fine.

hope this wall of text helps :)

general rules i go by :

monitor lizards can be killed if close to gate by unarmored gnomes if careful and have banadages. (just save game prior to combat and alt+f4 if a gnome dies, and retry) yeah its a cheat, but i only use it here and there in the first month of the game ever because losing even a single gnome in that first month is detrimental to the game.

ignore bears. your guy will run, the bear will run the opposite way, its aggrivating, but only an issue if your guy is specifically going to gather something and the bear is currently fighting when they do.

DO NOT BUILD AND LEAVE a stockpile for body parts. there will be times when a bear or others will kill goblins, and your guys will run to collect the bodies midfight.. this is bad.. set one up, set it to inactive, and only activate it during cleanup after kills. then deactivate it again.

once a 4 man squad is in full copper armor and weapons, you can start to kill any wildlife on your map, but i suggest leaving them there, because they will engage incoming goblins and mants weakeneing them (if not killing them) prioor to them getting to your base.

make 2 stockpiles 1x1 with a crate on it for bandages, set it by your front gate where you gnomes will be defending, and set your tailor to keep a stock of 64 bandaids. also disable bandaids in all other stockpiles so they ONLY go here.

do not build beds the first month.. save that straw for your yaks. make sure you have approx 15 straw per month per yak growing so that when winter hits they wont starve and leave.
its better to have to much than to little.

remember in the current version you have to build a room for a visiting emmisary in order to begin trading( along with the trade stand thing elsewhere), this is importaint early on, so build a stonecarver, and start building statuettes as soon as you can, so that when you get one, you have the trade value, to get what you need. (more yaks is good, maybe emu for eggs, more ore etc.. and grape seeds and mushroom seeds which are valuable to have late game)
the values on them are animals=500 seeds are like 10 and ores are 20 or so each

hope this all helps.

[Exanthos]

Okay, thanks for your help everyone! I'll definatly build a wall and get some squads training.