Boarding House v. House

[Ludovin]

So, I noticed at the start of the game (Hard) that a lot of people love to take as much food as they can whenever the first house is built. This leaves whoever has the last house built almost always either freezing, starving or otherwise just not surviving past the second or third winter (they never seem to catch up). So, I was wondering: Would building a boarding house be ideal? What are the disadvantages? Especially during hard starts, you'd have all of your food, firewood and clothing in one place, which would allow you to not worry as much about food production. I know it costs more than 5 houses, but still. Trade offs.

[ChewMyFudge]

Actually I only do boarding house with hard start..

Doing it, I can then just build Stone Houses after first winter.. so no need to redo wooden to stone later on.. I really don't see any disadvantages building one

[なの〈Nano〉]

I always like to build boarding house first, just becareful about child lack, so your town don't die on old later :)

[Ludovin]

Originally posted by ChewMyFudge:

Actually I only do boarding house with hard start..

Doing it, I can then just build Stone Houses after first winter.. so no need to redo wooden to stone later on.. I really don't see any disadvantages building one

Yeah, I've managed to build a barn, woodcutter, fishing pier, hunting lodge and boarding house this first year, and collect more resources for future expansion, without having to worry about building each and every house before winter comes, and that there's enough food for everyone. This is working well, actually.

[ChewMyFudge]

Ah yeah, it can fit in ALOT of people, so incase of burning your town down, it can save alot of villagers through coming winter

[Lamoe]

I always start with one stone house for the winter.
And I never have starvation or freezing problems.

If you are unlucky with you map seed, it can take a while before you can build enough houses to start growing, so you might have to build a few wooden ones to ensure offspring later.
But I don't get the point of boarding houses, they seem to be burning a lot fuel too...

[[BLA]Unmortal]

i mostly go boarding house 1st then food then make some fast woodshacks then re work on the food then try get a balance and slowly expand.

also i like to make a forester / a gathere and hunting cabin near each ather en i just trow 1 guy on forester. the athers will work in the food chain for the most.

then a market is needed to share the goods ather wise youre builder will die

[Lamoe]

You don't need a market, as long as you take it easy.

Going for the mountain men atm, almost there without a market.
Just didn't have room / a good place for it.
(that's what happens if you take whatever map the game throws at you)

[Jester]

Boarding house is very useful, I use it because it doesn't eat up too much firewood, and keeps everyone warm(very important). so you don't have to build a woodcutter right away. and it doesn't cost in material wise that much more than 5 wooden houses you have to build in the begining. . It does slow down the childbirth, but doesn't stop it thou. Don't stay in it for too long, usually by 2nd winter, I would put down a woodcutter and start moving families into their own wooden houses.

[Elegant Caveman]

I've been wondering about this as well...

Some people prefer boarding houses (I'm one of them), but I've seen some insist that they're a waste.

Let's look at the differences.

Wooden houses cost 16 logs, 8 stone and 30 build points. They house 1 family, which can have up to 8 members. Each house can have up to 2 builders working on it.

Boarding houses cost 100 logs, 45 stone and 150 build points. They can house 5 families. A boarding house can have up to 4 builders working on it.

To build 5 wooden houses would cost you 80 logs, 40 stone and 150 build points. Which is just a tad cheaper than a boarding house.

I'm not exactly sure about the exact values of firewood usage, but this wiki page[banished-wiki.com] claims that it takes roughly 25 firewood/year for a wooden house. It's wrong about how many build points a wooden house requires, though (claiming 10 when it's actually 30), so I'm not sure how much I trust it.

I seem to recall reading that stone houses use up half the firewood of a wooden house, and I seem to recall reading that a stone house uses up 15 firewood. I forget where I read these things, so they're to be taken with a grain of salt. It's probably safe to assume that a wooden house will use up 30-50 firewood/year and a stone house will use up 15-25 firewood a year. I have no idea how much a boarding house uses, but I'd guess that it's equal to or a bit less than 5 wooden houses (maybe ~100 firewood/year?).

Your citizens can still have children if they live in a boarding house, but they will reproduce slower than if they live in individual houses, and there's a limit.

I've read[www.banishedforum.com] that a boarding house will fit 40 people, which fits with 5 families x 8 family members.

You start with 5 families on Medium and 4 on Hard. 6 on Easy, but you start with 6 wooden houses on Easy, so we'll ignore that.

Here are the number of citizens and amount of food you start with on each difficulty:

Easy:
• Citizens: 12/0/8
  
• Food: 2400

Medium:
• Citizens: 10/0/7
  
• Food: 1800

Hard:
• Citizens: 8/0/6
  
• Food: 1200

It's generally accepted that a citizen will eat ~100 units of food per year (same amount for adults and children). This means that though you start with quite a surplus on Easy, you're barely breaking even on Medium (a child will be born quite quickly) and you actually don't have enough food for everyone on Hard.

This means that hoarding is especially an issue when you're starting out, and doubly so on Hard. Boarding houses are a great way to get around this issue.

Personally, I like to start with a boarding house and I build a market before I start building wooden houses. I'd love to only build stone houses, but I find them too expensive, especially on Hard (since you don't start with any logs, stone or iron on Hard).

Boarding houses let you consolidate your food & firewood early on while making sure your population doesn't grow too fast while you're building your town's basic infrastructure.

In the end, it seems to me that the importance of the boarding house at the start depends on your difficulty:

Easy? Don't bother. Medium? Eh, not necessary. Hard? Optimal choice.

Thoughts on this? Anybody think that you should build wooden houses instead of a boarding house even on Hard?

[Lamoe]

I've only played on hard so far...
Never ran into trouble with hoarding. first thing I build is a gatherers hut and 1 stone house.
I usually build a dock before I even think of building a market.

[Norwegianjesus]

I think as a coping mechanism for the initial start it's not a bad idea but later on it's only good for when you need to upgrade wooden houses or in the event of a disaster (what it's designed for) though I think it'd solve a few of those issues of people starving on the way home from a job far away if they could stop over at a boarding house while working in that area. Obviously they'd be less happy but it would seem a compromise if they're crossing a large town to stop at a boarding house for a bit.

[Elegant Caveman]

Oh, definitely just for the beginning, yes. Long-term, boarding houses are inferior.

They're good to have around, though. And starting with one means you have it as a backup so you don't need to rush and build one if you're hit with a disaster or you accept some nomads into your town.

[[BLA]Unmortal]

Originally posted by Elegant Caveman:

Oh, definitely just for the beginning, yes. Long-term, boarding houses are inferior.

They're good to have around, though. And starting with one means you have it as a backup so you don't need to rush and build one if you're hit with a disaster or you accept some nomads into your town.

only good for nomads and upgrading houses to stone. i ive always 1 rdy for anything that happens like dissasters fire or even a tornado.

so its smart to have some around the place. this is a hard lesson i had.

My town caught on fire i already broke the boardinghouse down also my pop was 83 and it dropped till 20 then because nobody could eat well people starting to die also clothing run out and firewood eventully i only had 2 people left a mother and a baby boy but they stil coulndt get enough food meaning my hole city just got destroyed by 1 fire and a big mistake of keeping people outside with no possible shelter if dissasters would happen.

[fredreed2000]

You should be able to adjust these numbers yourself like on easy I would like to make the food 5000 to start with not 2400 which is actually around 1300. I have never seen food numbers on easy at 2400. As far as citizens goes It usually is 13/0/12 until you build a school house then that number goes up for children. But only on easy.
Easy:
Citizens: 12/0/8
Food: 2400

Medium:
Citizens: 10/0/7
Food: 1800

Hard:
Citizens: 8/0/6
Food: 1200

[ÐC]

like i wrote in my guide, just build one house and the other after food production already is working for the 1st winter and yes i dont loose anyone.