Understanding the Dawn of Man

Hi, I made this guide just to make it clear for new players to understand the balancing trick between production and food in this game. In other words, how to survive.

Important Tips

Before you rush to the game running on x8 speed building and enjoying the game and after several years oooops , famine, no straws, raiders are raiding your settlement as if it was a free real estate. in order to avoid such mistakes follow the coming rules:

1- Do not expand fast: this is a very important rule for you to maintain. you need to resist the urge to expand your techs into new eras without being ready. Expanding into new eras will increase the amount of raiders and if you are not able to maintain your village from raiders then they will keep consume your population until you are done

2- Workload is more dangerous than it seems to be: I noticed something about the AI that each person do single task individually, they do not do several tasks at the same time even if it looks like a possible thing to you, this is a simulation not real life adam smith management principles. so do not expect the AI to pick up tools in its way while doing other tasks even if it has free carrying slots and time to do so. Also, if the workload is high, you could miss harvesting season which means your animals will starve and you will not be able to renew your forts after the coming raid. therefore, you will lose years of progress for a fool mistake

3- Avoid hunting during planting/harvesting season: remember, you can hunt whenever you want but planting/harvesting has a very limited time. also, don't forget to provide a sickle for every able hand

4- manage your production limits based on your needs so you can avoid having inefficient workload

5- concentrate your towers so they can fight the most possible raiders at once, this to avoid getting your towers destroyed one by one

6- do not start massive projects when you lack the manpower, better do these projects step by step. e.g. Building the ultimate megalith/ massive walls or towers projects

7- build as much as possible of totems and they better be located close to the residence/work locations. totems are cheap and easy way to increase your prestige which also increases the possibility of new people to join your village

8- locate Haystack so they can be close to the fields, same for granaries. this is logical and more efficient for kids of your village so they can store straws faster and then transport the valuable wheat to your granaries.

9- invest in sheep: sheep provide you a variety of expensive materials such as : wool, meat, skins. of course it does not provide skin and meat as other animals such cattle but it does provide wool and it is important to make heavy clothes that would replace skin clothes. Wool is also very expensive and you could trade it for a lot of other important tools and goods

10- do not invest too much in sheep: sheep are cool, and easy way to provide your villagers with a good life. however, raising too much sheep can be your demise if you do not have enough manpower to serve/maintain them, the last thing you need is extra workload when you do not have enough manpower in harvesting seasons

11- the AI: lets talk about the AI, the AI basically do things in parallel, if you have a ton of wheat but only 1 oven ! then do not expect your villagers to stand in line on that single oven. If the villagers found a workplace occupied they will just find another task to do which means that the production on that workplace will be treated in parallel like any other task. How to solve this? simple answer: build many ovens/ mortars/ etc. , put them on high priority, remove limits on bread/wheat production. that is the easiest way to avoid famine and starvation on the long run.


thats it for now, I'll add more of what i get in mind

[MrsPuddleduck]

why arent my people eating the animals they have killed?

[MrsPuddleduck]

Where is the Potter?

[pimpingbunny]

not real life adam smith management principles hahahhaha

[akana379]

果物、パンは腐ってしまうので、生産しすぎも死を早めます。人数分の生産がいいかもしれない。収穫時期も生産上限抑える必要があります

[Hwyranger]

Very good write up and additional tips.

[Bigbres]

thanks for the guide, im installing the game right now

[spanish3djf]

Thanks for the input

[d102_KoT]

^ Skins>leather problems = limit your dried skins. 10 is plenty, 5 if not making skin clothing & tents. 2 skin dyers + 2 tanners should be adequate for 150+ with enough tannin (I set mine to 25/30)

[d102_KoT]

Excellent advice! Following these tips will get you far.
#3 I would add never to auto-hunt. Either select an animal and select to hunt if you can afford the excess workload. If not, like early on, select a bunch of hunters (h + left mouse drag) and send to hunt. Using the animal hunt option makes it more likely that your hunters will be healthier for longer distance hunts but not always, I send back hungry/tired/miserable hunters and hope AI will replenish them with healthy guys. It's also good to get your hunters grouped, micro-managing their movements, sadly this means they lose their target so it's best to do this when attacking an aggressive group as all will respond or micro-managing the entire hunt, especially if faster prey like horses, donkeys etc). Micro-managing can also allow you to conduct pincer movements or force your quarry into rivers which is hugely helpful.

[Ancient Aliens Guy]

Another tip: if you find yourself not making enough leather out of your surplus raw skins, build equal amounts of skin driers and tanners; that way, the AI prioritizes them the same. Way easier than having to fiddle with limits!