How to Get Started in Settlement Survival

Hello all!

I recently discovered this cute looking indie game and quickly became immersed in the city building gameplay that this game has to offer. However, I found myself getting stuck frequently as there is very little documentation around this game.

I am in no means an expert when it comes to this game (feel free to suggest any changes or improvements), but I thought i'd share some tips and tricks that I've picked up from my 15 hours of playtime in order to help out some of the new players!

This is not meant to be a step-by-step guide, as I feel as though learning the game for yourself is what makes the game fun. Therefore, this is only meant to be a quick little reference guide to the concepts behind the game.

Controls Overview

For this guide, we will be referring to a game on easy mode, as it is more of a getting to know the game rather than challenging yourself. Also, we will be playing on the default standard mode.

Before we get started, a quick overview of the necessary controls:

- W A S D- for moving the camera around
- Q E OR Click the middle mouse button and drag- to rotate the camera
- Scroll wheel -zooming in/out
- F1 - slows down the game
- F2 - speeds up the game
- Spacebar - pauses the gamed

Hotkeys:
- All of the types of buildings on your hotbar at the bottom of the screen are automatically hotkeyed with '1' assigned to "Housing", '2' assigned to "Food", etc.

- The entire inventory for all gathered materials for your town can be found by pressing 'U', or by clicking the icon in the furthest top left. This is extremely useful for resource tracking and trading later on in the game.

Tip:
If you ever get tired of Settlement Survival's in-game music, as sadly it does get extremely repetitive, after a couple hours of overall playtime, just pull up some Skyrim ambiance music to play in the background! It wonderfully fits the tone of the game and makes much it more immersing than silence,

I also prefer to play the game at Speed x10, as i find the game is much to slow at any of the other speeds.

Icons

This is just a quick pointer to the various icons you see on the map.

By now, you've noticed that there are various spelling mistakes in the English version of the game. None too egregious, but just enough to have a little laugh about.

Keeping this in mind, i will be making very slight assumptions with what these areas supposedly do:




Fertile Soil Icon

• Looks like a little mound volcano and provides an additional 100% output for both fields and forest farms

Grassland Icon

• Looks like blades of grass and provides an additional 100% output for pastures

Hunting Point

• Looks like a cow and provides an additional 100% of cubs gathered whenever hunting. This one slightly confuses me as you don't get to tell your hunters where exactly to hunt, so i'm unsure how to efficiently take advantage of these, as they move around.

Collecting Point

• Looks like two plant leaves. This one is slightly more... open for interpretation as the game says "Collecting 100% get plant seeds". I'm assuming that it means that in this area the amount of seeds gathered is doubled.

Fishing Point

• Looks like a fish. This one provides double the fish for any fishing dock inside of its radius.

One last thing to keep in mind is: i'm not entirely sure how much of these "areas" have to be inside of the range of your respective buildings. I've always tried to have the range entirely inside of the icons as this consistently works for me with the 'Fishing Point' but you might not need to.

Where to Place your City

Fortunately, deciding where to place your city is rather intuitive. Typically look for an area that has water access with plenty of accessible resources around.



Ultimately, it is entirely up to you where to place your city, however It can prove to be difficult to grow in the late game if you are too spread out.

Keep your city somewhat close to the water for water access,
As you will need access to sand, clay, reeds, and the merchant ship (among other things) to develop.

Make sure all of the terrain around your starting city is accessible by workers ,
Even though the terrain might look traversable, make sure it is entirely flat or your citizens will be forced to walk entirely around the obstacle, which is not possible in some instances. In the cases of mountains, tunnels can be built to travel through them. Keep in mind the ability to terraform is only accessible to you after you invest 3 Development Points under 'Sand Mining', so you will be stuck with what landscape you have for a bit.

Try to settle around nearby resources,
This goes for deposits of iron (the little black rocks), stone, plants, timber, and even special resources indicated with a little green circle that hovers above the area.

Plan ahead your city's layout!,
Eventually you will need access to everything from mountains to big areas of open land in order to utilize all of the buildings that you eventually research. Plan ahead so that your workers don't have to travel so far without roads to access these buildings.

The more spread out your city and its workers are, the more susceptible they are to become cold, injured, and less efficient, not to mention slower building times!
Try to plan your city around roads, as roads help your workers move quicker, which ultimately helps tremendously with efficiency.

Getting Started

As soon as you settle your city, a bunch of problems rear its ugly head:

First issue: Housing
You start off the game with 30 citizens on this mode and all of them will be looking for a house to live in. Build two houses and a boarding house at the start to quickly fulfill everyone's housing needs and turn your attention elsewhere. Keep in mind however that boarding houses are not a viable long term solution, as it makes the citizens less likely to have children. Eventually you will work towards a network of singular houses to ensure that the desire to have children is high.

Second Issue: Water
Quickly tapping 'U' will show you your water supply and it's not much. Build a big well immediately and it should supply your entire city for a couple years in-game.

Third Issue: Food
Build two fields close by to your village in an area that is able to expand to meet your settlement's food needs. What seeds you can plant are ultimately down to luck with what you spawned with. Focus on vegetables at the start, it doesn't matter which ones.If you spawned with any seeds such as agave, then expand to have a field whenever you build a distillery. You can also build a pasture if you wish, as you will need some type of wool to make clothes.

Fourth Issue: Dwindling Resources
At the start of the game you are not able to replenish your resources until you have built the corresponding buildings. This issue will be broken up into multiple parts:

• Lumber - Build a "Logging Camp" (Hotkey 3) in an area removed from where your city will develop to, but not too far for your workers to carry back lumber. Find a happy medium that allows for your Logging Camp to have its plant and harvest radius be largely undisturbed by your settlement's development for maximum efficiency.
  
  
• Misc. Resources - Build a 'Gathering Station' (Hotkey 3) as well as a 'Hunting Cabin' to ensure that various plant needs are being worked on, as well as gathering meat for food and wool for clothing. Build a Gathering Station in an undeveloped patch of land near you settlement for max efficiency. I find that putting it next to the Logging Camp works well.
  
  
• Tools & Clothing - Build a 'Blacksmith' (Hotkey 4) as well as a 'Tailor's Workshop' to make sure that you do not fall behind on tools and clothing. A lack of clothing makes your citizens more susceptible to the environment, and be less happy and efficient. A lack of tools mainly damages your worker's efficiency. At the start of the game MAKE SURE TO SET PRODUCTION LIMITS on how much clothing and tools you wish to make, as if you leave the default value unchanged, it will deplete your resources for extra tools that you do not need. Set a production limit to around 40, plenty to supply your settlement for the time being (you can always come back later and change this). Also, you do not need permanent workers in these both these shops. Alternate workers until your limit has been reached and then assign them to whatever job needs more citizens the most.
  
  
• Fuel - Ensure that you have researched the 'Sawmill' as the Sawmill can convert timber from your Logging Camp into domestic fuel. 'Water Sawmills' are more efficient so if possible look to build one of those instead. Without this fuel, your citizens will grow to be cold and can even eventually die. Also remember to set production limits for this as well, as you do not want to use up all of your timber for fuel.
  
  
• Warehouse Space - You do not start off with a lot of room for inventory, and after harvesting resources for a little bit you will soon reach the maximum capacity for your default storage. Build more open warehouses or simply utilize a development point in Logistics to build an actual 'Warehouse' that is much more efficient in space taken up per storage.

By now you will run into a lack of resources that is keeping you from building. While you can simply search around for iron(little black rocks) or stone and harvest resources utilizing the pickaxe on the hotbar, this is not sustainable. As such you will need to invest development points into 'mining' and 'stonepit' to be able to build a 'Quarry" for stone, and a 'Mine Pit' for iron ore. Build both these away from your city as they takes up a lot of space.

Fifth Issue - Development
Development points are what allows you to progress in the game and there for are crucial in developing a functioning city. Build a 'School' (Hotkey 6) and invest a development point in a 'Research Institute' after you have a steady supply of stone and iron. Both building contribute massively to earning more points and are extremely worthwhile to build. Consider investing down its development path for research buffs, but keep in mind they will require resources and buildings that you do not have access too yet.

Sixth Issue - Happiness and Health
As your citizens are currently savages with nothing to do besides work, they will become unhappy and unhealthy quickly. To combat this, build a 'Church' and a 'Clinic' to ensure that your citizens are as happy and healthy as they can be in the early game. The more happy and healthy they are, the lower the stress they will have, increasing the fertility rate. Eventually you will run out of herbs for the Clinic however. Work on investing four points down the 'apiary' column of the Agriculture development section to obtain the 'Nursery' and 'Herb Knowledge'. These two things work hand in hand, as now whenever herbs are collected, you have the chance to gather seeds which you can then plant in a nursery and create a steady herb supply. In the 'Quality of Life' development section, work towards spending three development points down towards getting a 'Theater'. Keep in mind however that building a theater requires Bricks, Laid Stone, and Glass. Glass and Bricks are smelted by unlocking the 'Calcinating Kiln' in the mining development tree, and Laid Stone is unlockable in the construction tree. Happiness can also be improved in the way of spirits (name for plain alcohol in the game) if you have the spirits. A distillery can change your agave plants into spirits which then increases happiness, so if you have the room for an extra field, throw in a field of agave!

Seventh Issue - Population Control
While starting off the game with 30 settlers is great and all, it could be a lot better. After a couple years your initial generation of settlers will begin to die off and your city will be in dire need of citizens in order to continue working and expanding. After building a 'Town Hall', you will be able to accept immigrants to live in your settlement, usually 10-11 at a time. This yearly influx of immigrants helps to combat your dying original population and are crucial for growth. To increase fertility rates to make sure that as many children are being born as possible, ensure that citizens have a dedicated house, are happy, and healthy. Working towards buildings in the 'Quality of Life' development tree is crucial in the long term.

By now your settlement should be looking somewhat like this:

Growing Your City

Now that you have the basics already set up, let's talk about how to maintain a steady growth in your city.

The most valuable commodity that you have are your citizens, so it's extremely important to have a steady, growing number of citizens. A big mistake that I made in my earlier playthrough's was that I waited too long to provide singular housing for my citizens. By the time I had caught up to demands, half of my original population was old and my fertility rates were tanked. Standard houses can supply this demand just fine so don't worry about sinking development points into housing just yet. This way you can maintain a healthy birth rate and not have to rely so much on immigrants.

Immigrants are crucial in the early game to help counteract your initial aging population and providing more workers for expansion. An initial boarding house is suitable temporary accommodations for immigrants. Be warned however to not accept more immigrants than your settlement can sustain.
Accepting too many immigrants can leave your city looking like this:



More citizens means that you require more:

• Tools
  
• Clothes
  
• Domestic Fuel
  
• Herbs
  
• Food
  
• Water

You initially do not start with herb seeds, a necessity for a clinic to provide health, and are relying on the stockpile you started with. I recommend rushing 'Herb Knowledge' so that way you can work on constructing nursery's with herbs planted. This will help you fight a shortage in the near future as your town grows and consumes more herbs.

Another seed to be on the lookout for are 'Flax Seeds', as these are eventually used for creating linen and eventually clothing. It is essential that you try to obtain these quickly if you do not have access to wool. Lack of clothing means your citizens are more likely to die and lose progress in growing the settlement.

Make sure to monitor your tool and clothing consumption and even make additional shops to keep up with demands if need be. Clothing can be made from wool, linen, or leather, so if you have a reliable source of any one of these you are fine.

Domestic fuel can be created from either animal dung or timber. Keep in mind that everything you build will require lumber, while dung is needed for fertilizer to increase crop yield. An alternative source for fuel is coal which can be mined at a 'Mine Pit' (unlocked under mining) by switching gathering from iron to coal. Be aware that these early game mines/quarry's have a limited amount or resources and cannot be demolished.

Invest in big graveyards early on so you don't have to worry about it making sure that all of your dead can be properly buried (preventing a happiness debuff), as the amount can get up there quickly.

At this point, you should also be working up to stone roads around your city to ensure that the citizens are more efficient and can attend to their needs quicker.

Prepare yourself for an incoming hot-take

I do not find that investing in trade to be worthwhile for the most part.

Don't get me wrong, the trading system does have its benefits, just not so much in the early game. It is useful to be able to place orders for seeds/herbs if they are difficult to obtain. However, I find the merchant ship to be largely unhelpful except for a occasional restock in domestic fuel. Most of the items presented are not currently useful or are things you already have. While the order system is more expensive, you can reliably solve almost any problem you have.

I reliably make it to year 20 without any need for much trade investment:



Saying this, investing in a grocery store to sell off any excess goods is a good way to slowly build your treasury size in case you need to make any emergency purchases.Remember that we aren't trying to make a mega city here! I found that investing in 'Salt Making' to be worthwhile for monetary gain. Salt is useful when making the transition towards higher food standards and sells at 2 silver a pop, making it an unnecessary resource that you can reliably obtain and sell for an ok amount. Later on you can worry about selling off excess processed materials such as glass for a higher amount.

By now you should have a Church, Clinic, School, and be on your way towards unlocking a bathhouse (requires soap, laid stone and linen) or a theater (requires a calcinaing kiln and laid stone). As your city spreads out, make sure that your citizens are still within the range of the buildings to so that all of your citizens can get maximum health and happiness. Also, work on creating more Research Institutes and upgrading your education tree. This way your settlement can unlock more materials and buildings to work with to meet your needs easier.

Summary

By now your settlement should be on its way towards self sustainability and looking like a real settlement! Don't forget to have fun and experiment with how you want your city to function and expand, as there are a ton of creative ways to do so!

In the future, if desired enough I might add a guide for money as well every material in the game, as the crisscross between gathering the resource, sometimes developing the resource, and then constructing the building can be quite difficult to track and optimize.

Anyway, I hope that this little guide helped, as it can be a little difficult to track and understand what is happening for new players! Feel free to comment with any questions or suggestions!

[darkmajesty]

I have a question. I cannot balance the number of people working in the plantation. Mostly, when October comes, the crop is not harvested in the field. How can I solve this?

[fireknight726]

@n4bzor yeah so i'm not exactly sure what language the developers work in because I also find some random words being changed to Chinese. That and along with some other language errors, that problem I assume is either a fake feature for the meantime or it's a bug

[n4bzor]

Ultimate resourses: At the main menu set language to Russian, than start sandbox mode (all easy) and in game again change language to English - all buildings builds without any resourses. Bug or ???

[alexis_taylor92]

@Feebs to rotate buildings press the 'R' key on your keyboard.

[kmbullet67]

The Hunting Point gives you a domesticated animal that you can place in a pasture, note that if the animal wanders off the map you lose that cub. The Collecting Point guarantees you a seed that you can grow in a field. You always have a "chance" to find a seed when foraging but the Collecting Point is a 100% certainty. Also note that if you don't send someone to forage that area before the plant in question dies you lose that guarantee. The fishing bonus can also be lost during a drought. The only bonuses that are permanent for the duration of the game are the pasture and field bonuses.

[fireknight726]

@[Recon]The Famous Zombie Hunter So the real question is was he hard at work or hardly working. i noticed that sometimes my workers would randomly be stuck "messing around" and not doing their job. I highly doubt that it is intentional as I came across the exact same problem as you. Honestly there are probably a couple reasons as to why this is happening, and since everything isn't well explained, I couldn't tell you which one. Fortunately for me, simply re-assigning or changing workers fixed the issue for me. Also with herbs, i believe that treatment is slower at the clinic. To be fair, i'm not exactly sure how herbs are supposed to fix a fractured ankle that all citizens inevitable get, but I know exactly what you're talking about. I'd imagine that once you start getting towards bandages, ointment, medicinal oil, etc. that healing times would improve

[fireknight726]

@trent just posted a section with explaining the icons!

[GamingToFailure]

pleasant read! Nice <3

[Tenoshii]

@Trent - There is a section on that within the Help menu in the game. I recently had the same question and decided to just check just to see what was in the menu and it had it :)

[Tenoshii]

@brubaby22 - Yesterday I divided from a pasture that was on the other side of the map and it worked out just fine. I suspect there is no maximum range on it.