Newcomer question

[XtReMz98]

Howdy!

Being new to Anno 1800, I'm doing my fair share of rookies mistakes in the campaign:

-Not setting up a soap trade with Eli.
-Getting steel production going pre-artisan.
-Getting hammered by royal tax.
-Getting sidetracked by the storyline to the detriment of my islands.

Not going to lie, the last point is probably the worst: the campaign is a poor tutorial to anyone fresh on any Anno game like myself. I fixed or at least alleviate most of the bullet point mentioned above, but since I got to the new world, I figured I'd asked intermediate tips here. Namely:

1) When should I migrate my farms in old world (schnapps, sausage and sheep) in favor of artisans city blocks? Fields chew up a decent size of my OG island and I still have some room, but it's slowly getting cramped. Also, peasants don't bring income as artisans do. Artisans was the turning point of my deficit running steelworks to a profit. Wood/coal is also notorious for using space.
2) When should I opt for single production islands? When I get the bonus for expansion that gives +200 free workforce? Assuming I do have some local population (I saw some 0 pop setup but they required trade unions + tractors) running said production, is there a rule of thumb on how many trade ships you need per basic/luxury goods in respect to the distance to cover?
3) I'm producing rum since it gives a lot of money for artisans (along with beer), but I'm unsure how many clippers are needed for a transoceanic route to be sustained (ideally in regards to artisan pop to be supplied on my main island)?
4) While the DLCs are nice, I kinda want to finish the campaign ASAP since I feel it's negatively impacting my gameplay at the moment. Is there anything I could do to help me expedite that process?

I'm fine to be directed towards a guide too if a lengthy block of text is necessary, but perhaps someone with lots of "anno hours" could help me with a few pointers!

Cheers!

[DazzaLCFC]

Good series of how to videos here: https://www.youtube.com/@Nivarias

Helped me hit that next stage.

Certainly specialist islands are a good way to go - i have an island that produces all my Farmer/worker needs, an industrial island and an island that fills in any specific needs like animal skins etc.

The free workforce thing is especially helpful - along with commuter piers with your industrial island - you wont need to put any houses there!

[XtReMz98]

DazzaLCFC a écrit :

Good series of how to videos here: https://www.youtube.com/@Nivarias

Helped me hit that next stage.

Certainly specialist islands are a good way to go - i have an island that produces all my Farmer/worker needs, an industrial island and an island that fills in any specific needs like animal skins etc.

The free workforce thing is especially helpful - along with commuter piers with your industrial island - you wont need to put any houses there!

I'll make sure to watch some of his content. I saw he has a serie on "ultra hard". I think seeing strategies/setup on this could be applied to easier gameplays.

If I may, do you expand like a madman (buying steel from Archi), therefore limiting the AI's expansion or does that come with a flat maintenance cost? I can't see any maintenance cost when I click on a trading post port, so unsure if there is a downside to this.

This question is chained to the previous one, but once nothing but super tiny island are left, is it best to buy your competitors or rush engineers/investors and then buy your competitors?

[way2co0l_2003]

XtReMz98 a écrit :

DazzaLCFC a écrit :

Good series of how to videos here: https://www.youtube.com/@Nivarias

Helped me hit that next stage.

Certainly specialist islands are a good way to go - i have an island that produces all my Farmer/worker needs, an industrial island and an island that fills in any specific needs like animal skins etc.

The free workforce thing is especially helpful - along with commuter piers with your industrial island - you wont need to put any houses there!

I'll make sure to watch some of his content. I saw he has a serie on "ultra hard". I think seeing strategies/setup on this could be applied to easier gameplays.

If I may, do you expand like a madman (buying steel from Archi), therefore limiting the AI's expansion or does that come with a flat maintenance cost? I can't see any maintenance cost when I click on a trading post port, so unsure if there is a downside to this.

This question is chained to the previous one, but once nothing but super tiny island are left, is it best to buy your competitors or rush engineers/investors and then buy your competitors?

I tend to try to expand quickly so I can claim the choice islands I want before the AI can get to them which means buying things like steel whenever I'm able. It's not always necessary to go for the biggest islands either. What matters most is that it has fertilities and resources you need, and that's it's positioned in a more optimal location on the map. You don't want all your trade routes to have to sail right by the enemies harbor guns if you get caught up in a war. I made that mistake in my first playthrough and spent the entire time dreading that mistake because I wasn't able to improve reputation to get peace and had to instead continue to destroy their emplacements every single time they tried to rebuild them. It was a nightmare. Don't make that mistake. lol. Look into which edges every region transition point is and have clear routes in and out of each region to spare yourself the headache.

When it comes to the maintenance you mention, I'm not sure what you're referring to. There's no financial maintenance cost to claiming an island and just leaving it there. You never have to do anything to it at all until you want to. The only cost to it is that it ties up some of your influence which ultimately limits how many islands you can claim. The bigger the island you try to claim, the more of your influence is spent to do it. That's the real limiter right there. If you go and claim 6 big old world islands, you're probably going to be extremely limited in what you can grab in the cape or new worlds. That's why you don't always need to grab the biggest. Big enough, with the right resources and in the right positions so you leave yourself plenty of influence to spend elsewhere. In my current game, I've got 4 islands in the old world, 3 in the cape (will eventually be 4 when I get enough influence to claim crown falls), 5 in the new world (will be 6 when I claim Menola), and 8 in Enbessa but most of those are smaller.

In order to get as many as I have, I first had to grow quickly enough so I could get to each region before the AI so I could pick the islands I wanted, but I also had to build my population up quickly enough to earn enough bonus influence to do it. Hit 7200 pop and with all the islands I've claimed I'm only currently left with 6 influence so I need to build my population even further to build a fleet to defend it and to claim the last 2 islands I want.

Regarding your last question, if the small island is in a strategic position I might grab it to protect my trade routes. Otherwise I'd hopefully have grabbed every island I really wanted already by this point so no real desire to acquire any more of theirs, but if I did want to acquire them for whatever reason I'd suggest building up to investors for the extra money and influence. If you've spent all your influence like I have, then you can't acquire any of their islands anyway so you'll need the bonus influence both from population and investor buildings so you can eventually absorb them through either war or share buys.

[XtReMz98]

way2co0l_2003 a écrit :

The only cost to it is that it ties up some of your influence which ultimately limits how many islands you can claim. The bigger the island you try to claim, the more of your influence is spent to do it. That's the real limiter right there.

Ah, very good pointer. So that's where influence comes in. No influence, no expansion. That's why there is no upkeep to grab an island and leave it unbuilt for a while. I'm unaware of transition points so far, I need to look out where to find them; I saw no visible feature on the map to plan where my ships would sail to transit to another zone, but it must be there somewhere. It would help me avoid sending clippers right through the center of the map to get to another zone.

It will take me some time to master some features, but one thing you mentioned stood out: it's better to find a cluster of islands that cover my needs close to a transition point. It would keep my trade free of any potential conflicts.

I also did the mistake of getting in an alliance, my ally would declare war on pirates every ceasefire end, drag me into it and instantly sign a ceasefire. Pretty douchy ally, but also a dumb mechanic in a way.

[way2co0l_2003]

When it comes to region transition points, it's generally best to build in the south-east corner of the old world. The south western edge takes you to the new world and the south eastern edge to the cape and enbesa so that location gives you safe routes to the major regions. The arctic would be the outlier of course but it's also not usually a priority.

When it comes to trade ships and those regional transition points, when you go into the trade interface where you setup trade routes. If you select one of the routes and then look at the map on the right where the line is drawn to the edge of the map... If you select the arrows off the side of the map, you can drag those entrance and exit points along that side of the map. All routes leaving the old world to the new world still have to enter and exit from that south western edge, but can do so anywhere along that edge which makes it easier to fine tune to avoid threats.

[XtReMz98]

way2co0l_2003 a écrit :

When it comes to region transition points, it's generally best to build in the south-east corner of the old world. The south western edge takes you to the new world and the south eastern edge to the cape and enbesa so that location gives you safe routes to the major regions. The arctic would be the outlier of course but it's also not usually a priority.

When it comes to trade ships and those regional transition points, when you go into the trade interface where you setup trade routes. If you select one of the routes and then look at the map on the right where the line is drawn to the edge of the map... If you select the arrows off the side of the map, you can drag those entrance and exit points along that side of the map. All routes leaving the old world to the new world still have to enter and exit from that south western edge, but can do so anywhere along that edge which makes it easier to fine tune to avoid threats.

Amazing stuff! I saw where my transition poiut is in the campaign now. So spawning in the south corner in the Old World do seem like a minor advantage (except for the arctic transition). Inversely, I saw that the new world arrival point is from the N-E edge, so being north or east would be beneficial in regards to protecting your trade routes. I watched a couple episodes of Nivarias and so far his expansion pattern is pretty much as you suggested. Cluster of island protected from the AIs (he took 2 extra islands before the AI started expanding on their own). Then he proceeded to build up towards steel production.

He's also moving industries away as time progress and also leaves space for later amenities and power plants, which I never used the latter, but I'll try to leave gaps in my layouts for these.

[Tankfriend]

You will have to use power plants, eventually, since they're needed to progress from engineers to investors. If you have access to the Arctic, you can also consider using gas power plants instead of oil powerplants so you don't have to run trains through your city.

The map transition points can be changed, by the way. You can't change them from one map edge to another, but you can move them along the edge they're sitting on to slightly change the path your ships will take.

[XtReMz98]

Tankfriend a écrit :

You will have to use power plants, eventually, since they're needed to progress from engineers to investors. If you have access to the Arctic, you can also consider using gas power plants instead of oil powerplants so you don't have to run trains through your city.

The map transition points can be changed, by the way. You can't change them from one map edge to another, but you can move them along the edge they're sitting on to slightly change the path your ships will take.

Howdy. I'm finally messing with engineers production chain. Sadly, starting chapter 4, the quest chain broke (you are supposed to get an item to get it going, but I didn't get it nor did I get any questline at all). Basically, I started a sandbox, no AIs except pirates/neutrals, so I could try stuff without distractions/competitions.

First, the dockland's potential seems pretty strong. My main island is out of building space right now, so I'm considering either using the docklands or build my schnapp/work clothes elsewhere. Which is better? I would need around 145 soap to get the 480 schnapps I consume and 100 for my 440 work clothes. I only have 200 soap, so I would need to transfer some of the deleted industry for pig/soap chain, but perhaps the land imprint is still lower (fields take so much space).

I built 3 hotels, all pretty much paid for themselves, but not good enough imo. I think what might help them would be to get rid of my steel (aka dirty) industry. Is it best to produce steel ingots/beams elsewhere? Except for cement/glass, the rest of furnace/steel/brass are all worker based, so I could really reduce my peasants/workers pop on my main island with 1-2 punch from docklands and moving the steel elsewhere. It would be quite a task to send all my minerals elsewhere though, so perhaps I could wait a bit before doing it?

I could also run propaganda non-stop like Niverias do (+15% income and -30% consumption are insanely good imo). They snowball well with the dockland numbers above (aka less soap required).

I'm also going to do Africa, Sunken Treasures and Arctic to maybe find which one is best for my next playthrough. Any thoughts on these?

[Gunny]

XtReMz98 a écrit :

Tankfriend a écrit :

You will have to use power plants, eventually, since they're needed to progress from engineers to investors. If you have access to the Arctic, you can also consider using gas power plants instead of oil powerplants so you don't have to run trains through your city.

The map transition points can be changed, by the way. You can't change them from one map edge to another, but you can move them along the edge they're sitting on to slightly change the path your ships will take.

Howdy. I'm finally messing with engineers production chain. Sadly, starting chapter 4, the quest chain broke (you are supposed to get an item to get it going, but I didn't get it nor did I get any questline at all). Basically, I started a sandbox, no AIs except pirates/neutrals, so I could try stuff without distractions/competitions.

First, the dockland's potential seems pretty strong. My main island is out of building space right now, so I'm considering either using the docklands or build my schnapp/work clothes elsewhere. Which is better? I would need around 145 soap to get the 480 schnapps I consume and 100 for my 440 work clothes. I only have 200 soap, so I would need to transfer some of the deleted industry for pig/soap chain, but perhaps the land imprint is still lower (fields take so much space).

I built 3 hotels, all pretty much paid for themselves, but not good enough imo. I think what might help them would be to get rid of my steel (aka dirty) industry. Is it best to produce steel ingots/beams elsewhere? Except for cement/glass, the rest of furnace/steel/brass are all worker based, so I could really reduce my peasants/workers pop on my main island with 1-2 punch from docklands and moving the steel elsewhere. It would be quite a task to send all my minerals elsewhere though, so perhaps I could wait a bit before doing it?

I could also run propaganda non-stop like Niverias do (+15% income and -30% consumption are insanely good imo). They snowball well with the dockland numbers above (aka less soap required).

I'm also going to do Africa, Sunken Treasures and Arctic to maybe find which one is best for my next playthrough. Any thoughts on these?

If you want it easy you can start with the 1 star AI. They will ask you permission before taking an Island and will obey you like a puppy. HINT: Town halls and union halls are HUGE. You can not only increase production and population but you can get new world goods like rum from a person in your town hall. You can also change production needs like switching new world cloth for old world wool to make fur coats. Remember they use influence though and you can run out fast.

[XtReMz98]

Gunny a écrit :

If you want it easy you can start with the 1 star AI. They will ask you permission before taking an Island and will obey you like a puppy. HINT: Town halls and union halls are HUGE. You can not only increase production and population but you can get new world goods like rum from a person in your town hall. You can also change production needs like switching new world cloth for old world wool to make fur coats. Remember they use influence though and you can run out fast.

Not going to lie, I'm NOT using trade unions and town halls so far and I feel like I'm missing out on some broken synergies. My trip to africa (royal institute) could help me play and then plan with unions for my next playthrough.

[way2co0l_2003]

Docklands are definitely strong as are town and union buildings filled with quality items. Don't be afraid to use other islands to handle some chains though. There's absolutely no need to go building everything on one island, especially if you're using it as a tourist island. Build a few trade ships and setup some routes for them to move goods around. It adds a little complexity, sure... exposes you to pirate activities too and costs money and influence to maintain but it's what will allow you to get maximum value from certain islands being setup for exactly what you want them to be for.

Tourists are generally a later game thing anyway. You can make them work earlier but the high startup costs combined with the assortment of high end chains you need to get real value from them means it's usually better to wait until you're ready for them. Public moorings on all your islands is much simpler, cheaper option to setup and will provide all you need for awhile.

[Tankfriend]

XtReMz98 a écrit :

First, the dockland's potential seems pretty strong. My main island is out of building space right now, so I'm considering either using the docklands or build my schnapp/work clothes elsewhere. Which is better?

Build it elsewhere, on a different island in the same region.
If you want to use the docklands to supply your city, you need a regular excess production of whatever it is you're trading away, so you need more production space, anyway.
Also consider that soap production is a polluter that people don't want to have on your island. The more you build of it, the uglier your island gets, which also makes your tourists unhappy. So you'd also want to put your soap production elsewhere, same as the heavy industry you already mentioned.

Consider pushing the island you're moving your production to to a population of just under 1000 peasants and workers each. Most islands can be more or less self-sufficient up to this point, and 1000 population per population level per island is free of the royal tax, so the point where you make the most money out of the population.
Alternatively, push your engineers far enough that you can build the commuter piers and build one on your home island and one on your production island so both islands share the workforce.

I'm also going to do Africa, Sunken Treasures and Arctic to maybe find which one is best for my next playthrough. Any thoughts on these?

Sunken Treasures is an alternative option since the Cape Trelawney map you get is also set in the Old World biome. However, it has the single largest island of the entire series which is basically predestined to become your capital island, since it has so much space to go with that it's going to take a long while before you run out.

Africa and the Arctic, however, are not alternative when you enable them. While they have their own goods and production lines (Africa even has its own building materials), they are still connected to the other regions, since everyone will start asking stuff from everyone else in the latter stages of the game.

[XtReMz98]

Tankfriend a écrit :

Build it elsewhere, on a different island in the same region.

Sunken Treasures is an alternative option since the Cape Trelawney map you get is also set in the Old World biome. However, it has the single largest island of the entire series which is basically predestined to become your capital island, since it has so much space to go with that it's going to take a long while before you run out.

I wasn't aware that soap was dirty (probably not the soap itself, but the pig production?). At any rate, I think moving the schnapps elsewhere, since I do have lots of space on other islands would be easy. Only farmers too, which is an easy chain to reclaim a big chunk of my island. I would probably move the work clothes for a 1-2 punches while I'm at it.

I'm quite tempted to see sunken treasures for myself now. I could then keep my OG island the way it is (aka somewhat dirty) and ship all the goods to that massive island you mentioned and make that my tourist capital. Next time I'll play, I'll try to notice which industries have a negative attractiveness value attached to them.

For the docklands, I've been selling soap, lvl 1 weapons (since there is no hostiles, I have no use for them), cement/limestone and if I'm floating them sewing machines/canned food. I think later on carriages and advanced weapons do trade well, so does champagne. Is there a good that is a "go-to" item to trade outside my list?

[way2co0l_2003]

XtReMz98 a écrit :

I'm quite tempted to see sunken treasures for myself now. I could then keep my OG island the way it is (aka somewhat dirty) and ship all the goods to that massive island you mentioned and make that my tourist capital. Next time I'll play, I'll try to notice which industries have a negative attractiveness value attached to them.

You can tell easily by looking at the toolbar at the top center and looking just to the right at the small circle which tells you your island attractiveness. If you click on that it brings up a breakdown on where your attractiveness is coming from and what's taking it away. If you click on any of those categories it actually itemizes them so you can see exactly what factory types are the issue under either pollution or vulgarity.