Not enough food

[lauren.long2]

I can't seem to ever get enough food population of 100 (workers, students and children).
I have:
3 gatherers huts- 12workers
3 hunters huts - 9 workers
2 fishing docks- 8 workers
2 crop Fields- 6 workers
2 orchards - 3 workers
1 farm - 2 workers
My current food in reserve varies from 0 to 200. It was sitting at 4000 and then suddenly plummeted.
Any advice? What to build?

[TheDiaz]

Well, I haven't tested this, but in this game a building's production doesn't go up for a fixed amount for every worker it has. The third and fourth worker will produce less than the first two, so to increase efficiency is better to build more buildings with less workers each.

[lauren.long2]

Thank you I will give that a go!

[Poddu]

As your population increases, so should your food reserve. It's easy to underanticipate your food needs and then fall into an unexpected plunge. Typically, one can recover from this simply by building more food resources. Your food cycle will have a yearly maximum and minimum from your crops and orchards. You can watch this from year to year. It should be a little higher each year, because your population is growing. You can use the food graph to help monitor this.

[Gregorovitch]

I can't remember the numbers too acurately but I would say on a conservative estimate you should be gettiing about/at least:

Gatherers...............................5000
Hunters..................................2000
Fishihng.................................2000
Crops.....................................1500
Fruit........................................1000
Pasture....................................500

Total........................................12,000

You require 10,000 p.a. for 100 pop, so it's a fair bet that some or all of your pops staffing these facilities are not doing enough working and too much walking.

One thing for sure you are facing disaster with your food stocks running out becasue all your gatherer's farmers etc are going to running around deprately lookiing for food rather than tending their fields or collecting berries, and they start to do this long before you actually run out of food. They will not, as you might hope, stay in their fields to save the situation. This is the death spiral, very hard to break.

The main problem that led to it was probably your measly 4000 stock. This is less than six months supply. One bad harvest and /draws finger across throat.. Death spiral.

This why you should aim for two years supply of food in store at the end of every harvest - it means you can survive up two or even three bad harvests due to early frosts, tornadoes w/e. For 100 pop settlement you want your food stocks to vary in the range 10-20,000 over the year.

You should not be in this position, with what should be a 2000+ p.a. surplus you shouldhave been able to build a much bigger stick that 4000. That you didn't means there are other problems with the way you got everything set up. Such as how far away from work everyone lives.

Don't forget you can look up the last years yields in building/fiedl windows. But having run out of food all together now you may not be able to get out of this.

[lauren.long2]

Thank you. For all the information. I have started to recover I am up to 5000 reserve now and trying to grow it! I was definitely playing the game wrong not thinking of future growth and what could happen and just wanted to grow the population without thinking of the conseconsequences on food and other production reserves. The next town time I start I will definilty be working on having much larger reserves! Thanks again.

[Grace1957]

Build a town hall as soon as you can.It will tell you how many resources you produce/use,how many homes you have/need,and all kinds of other useful info.

[ebrumby]

Couple of things to remember. One 11 x 11 crop field only needs 1 Farmer and (if the Farmer is educated and the climate is mild) will produce 847 food. (see size calculator: https://banishedinfo.com/tools/size-calculator) Uneducated workers often produce 25% less than educated workers. Sometimes there's a bigger difference: an educated Tailor will produce one coat for one Leather, but an uneducated Tailor uses 2 Leathers to make 1 coat. The Hunting Lodge only needs 2 workers to produce the maximum amount (some of us find 1 worker is enough). Fishing Docks need lots of water in it's circle to produce a lot of fish - even a bridge going through the circle will reduce the fish caught; so don't put fishing docks too close to each other.

[Gregorovitch]

Originally posted by ebrumby:

Couple of things to remember. One 11 x 11 crop field only needs 1 Farmer and (if the Farmer is educated and the climate is mild) will produce 847 food.

I know a lot of min-maxy people use that system but there is a down side in that it's much less reliable and can be easily affected by late planting, early frosts, the one farmer going shopping during plant out and harvest, all sorts of things. Havijhg many farmers working bigger fields is a much safer and more reliable way to do things. Even if this system produces more food per farmer it doesn't produce more food per tile and that can be more important in the end.

[pdoan8]

It depends on the farm-storage-home set up and what you are planting. I always use farm size between 100 to 120 with one farmer in harsh weather. My usual crops are bean, cabbage, wheat and corn. Adding fruit when I really need to make ale.

3 gatherers huts- 12workers -> this should yield 6000 or more.7000+ if setting up well.

3 hunters huts - 9 workers -> might be too many hunter. 6 hunter would yield 1800 -2400.

2 fishing docks- 8 workers -> If these are good fishing spot, should produce 3600+.

2 crop Fields- 6 workers -> max 15x15 size would yield 3150 max. Split into 6 10x10 would yield 4200 max. 6 11x11 would yield more, especially in mild or fair weather.

2 orchards - 3 workers -> bad for early stage. Should only produce fruit when you have a stable food production. Orchard is unstable.

1 farm - 2 workers -> ?

You should make enough food for 100 people with some extra (about 50%).

[Modern & Classic Gaming!]

Don't forget about livestock I see no one even mentioning having them Chickens generate eggs and meat and will never run out the same as sheep generate wool and meet when too many. These still continue to provide during the winter too! I started on Hard difficulty and now I have a population of around 110-120. I only started playing this game yesterday and seem to have picked it up fast :P Also, Livestock can be split to make even more totally free if you add more pens later.

I want more variety on pastures too, but I need merchants to sell them to me. 4000 food is something you should have at the start of the game in a few years :O

2 pastures of Sheep - 20
2 Pastures of hen total of - 52 hens (Both can be bought from Traders)
2 fisheries on the lake, with 8 fishers.
3 hunters
2 orchards - chestnut and other is apple
3 Crop fields - 2 Squash and 1 Beans ( i want more variety but I need the merchant to sell diff seeds :P
My total food reserves are 28000 atm.

[Sgt. Max Cockburn]

At some point I seem to get into a circle of starvation, even at small populations. Seems to be nothing I can do to stop it.

[ebrumby]

Starvation spirals are caused by not having enough food. You need to produce at least 100 food per person and extra for new houses and kids. If you have crop fields, they are only harvested once a year which causes food to drop too low just before harvest. Therefore you need a surplus that will carry you through the year. A one year surplus is best, but 2 years' surplus is even better.

[maiden4meldin]

Everyone has given you excellent advice so far. So here is my two cents.

First to save yourself. Check you path functions. it is in the settings area, has an arrow pointing up with a line across the top. This will tell you how far the houses for each food producer is. If your food producers are walking a long way to get food/warm. They are not working. The will be less productive.
Second, Assuming the path function isn't the problem. Build Barns close to the Food producers.


Getting Started New Game, No Food Problems Ever:

I build a Gathering/Forestry/Hunting Hub like this. From the first barn, or wagon of supplies. I choose the best area to place the Hub. Then I draw a straight road from the Hub to the barn. I place the houses skimming the Radius circle and pause those. The first building I build is always a School. I need to be educated, works without education too, just produces less. Next I build the gatherer, the forester and the hunter. Staffing each with one or two, (This is the beginning) Once I have the town more built up, I add to those numbers until they are at max, with two hunters. For me this is a completed forestry hub. One stockpile 2x10 running along the road towards the barn. The barn is also outside the radius, but skimming the radius. Once those industries are built, I build ONE HOUSE for winter. The Bannies will survive just fine using one house to warm up, and eating from the Sing Barn.

By the time the forest hub is completed, I should have built, six houses, each house comes active after a producer like woodcutter and blacksmith, as soon as I have two producers needing housing, I build one house .

I also place and PAUSE a MarketPlace, Pin it so the radius is always showing. Do not build houses outside the radius of a marketplace. That single house will not get proper distributions of food and waste a ton of time hunting herbalists, to help with their health issues. For the Woodcutter, Blacksmith, and Tailor, I build these next to the paused marketplace. I see the need for two houses, so place and pause those.

Next I look for a Mining source, if there isn't a mining area that can support at minimum two mines, four is better, Then I keep looking, and once I find an area, I have a direction to go for the expansion area. If no mining sources available. Place a second forestry Hub. Again, place a barn at the edge of the Hub Radius, and four houses, Build the hub, with two houses all at one time. Still using the same paused Markeplace area. ***You do not need to build the Market until you have more than one Barn*** This is because Bannies will only go to one barn for food if they find no food in the first barn, this starts them panicking, and they will continually seek out food for a good while, until they have found enough inventory for their houses. If first barn is empty, and second barn is full, the bannie will go to the second barn. But, if first barn has small supply of food, with no variety, then the health of the citizen will become poor, and they will hunt the Herbalist often, and reduce their productivity.

As soon as I have second barn, I build the Market. Staff with one worker. Should not need to build a house as the two houses for the woodcutter, blacksmith and tailor should have a slot for a vendor.

Once I have two high producing fully staffed forest hubs, I then look to add in farms. I build my farms, 5 x 15 with one worker. Make sure the skinny side is the way the farmer is walking. You don't want them planting along the 15 length side. Side to side is Ideal. I place dirt roads all around the farms. Each and every one of them. I build two to four farms. and plant ONE veg, and ONE Grain only. These are all I will ever plant. I don't bother planting more, as I can trade surplus of veg and grain for the variety available at trading post. I also place One barn for every two farm spots, and One house for every two farms. Those houses must stay inside the market radius, the farms themselves don't need to be inside, but they usually are. I also look for a fishing spot.

A fishing spot needs a minimum of 50% water. You look for a spot that has lake connecting to river, Two dips along the river or lake. If there isn't a suitable fishing location, I don't put down a dock. If I find a good location, But it is'not inside or near to the market Radius, I do not build a Dock. A high production Fishing Dock, and I have had some docks produce 2800 fish in Vanilla, Can be a game changer for food. But to get a high production requires several things.
- Houses must be right beside or as close as possible to the dock.
-You will need a dedicated Barn for the dock. One is fine, Two is okay, but Three or more is best.

Once I am all finished and ready to move on to the next expansion area, I have already around 20,000 food stored in various barns. And rising.

To save yourself in a food shortage, it is hard, but can be done. Build plenty of New Barns near the food producers. Each food producer needs its own dedicated barns. Exceptions are Hunters, can share Gathering Barn, Farms, farms can share One barn in a pinch, so long as that barn is central located. The Vendor will go to each Barn and stock the Markeplace.


Put in plenty of Vendors in a food shortage situation. Your citizens won't go looking in barns for food, they will keep checking the Market though. So adding more vendors will help. If you don't have the extra people then Take them From Blacksmith/Tailor/Woodcutter/Forester, mining or quarry. Leave only the teacher and food producers working if needs be to up the Markets Staff.

Trading Post. In a food shortage, can be a blessing or a disaster waiting to happen. If you have Coats, Sell them all to buy food. If you have a surplus of firewood, sell that. Do not sell tools unless you have a surplus. you don't want to add a tool shortage and or a firewood shortage to a food shortage as well. You only need one type of protein or meat , So if you are farming any meat producers, then you can sell all the meat from it short term loss to the food now, is worth three food later. Just leave one meat source alone. by that I mean, if you have fish, venison, and beef. I would sell the Beef and Venison, they are worth three each, come in slower, and the Fish actually come in faster.

I wish you lots of luck saving yourself, if you have more questions about the relationships of the Vendor Marketplace and HOuses, check out my guide, The Achievement Path, Hints and Tips for the Beginner and Intermediate Player. There are some screenshots of fishing locations.

[Justin Sellers]

a 4x30 crop plot takes one farmer and produces 840 food. If you arrange it so the 30 is north south, the farmer can simply move down the plot, with no side to side motion. This allows you to fully harvest the crop before winter with no waste.