Please feel free to create a thread if you have a question not answered in this FAQ. I will continue to update this OP with frequently asked questions and answers.
INCOME AND PRODUCTION
What do the numbers under the coin icon (top left) mean?
The first number is net income or loss. The middle number is income (from homes). The bottom (red) number is your total operating costs for all your buildings.
Why don't my numbers add up?
There is a hidden +50 income, a gift from your buddy Northburgh.
How do I make more money?
Why are my residents moving out?
Why is my production lagging?
What are stone roads for?
Carts move faster on stone roads, optimizing your efficiency. Connecting production buildings to distribution house via stone roads is a good idea, assuming you don't think you'll want to move those buildings. Each road segment costs 5 stone to make, and you only get 2 stone back each from demolition.
INCOME AND PRODUCTION
What do the numbers under the coin icon (top left) mean?
The first number is net income or loss. The middle number is income (from homes). The bottom (red) number is your total operating costs for all your buildings.
Why don't my numbers add up?
There is a hidden +50 income, a gift from your buddy Northburgh.
How do I make more money?
- The short answer is build and ascend more houses. Your houses, until you can trade, are your sole source of income.
- The longer answer is to also optimize your production.
- Make enough of everything your people demand. When you tap a home, if the icon for that item is green, you are good to go. If it is yellow or red, you need to produce more of that item. If your home has a "!" over it, you are completely out of something they want and are not making you the money they could.
- Don't make TOO much of what they need. Every structure in this game other than a home costs you money to run. If you have too many of them, more than your people consume, you are losing money. You can pause a building and pay only half price upkeep, or demolish the building (pickaxe icon), but if you demolish it, you lose what you spend to build it.
- Optimally, you want to make a little bit more than the demand calls for. That way your inventory of the item grows slowly, and you can fulfill all your quests from inventory. And you have a bit of a cushion so that when you build more homes, and those more people want more of said item, if your net becomes negative, your people are still being fed/clothed by what you stored until you build more.
Why are my residents moving out?
- All residents must range of a market and have a road connecting it to the market.
- As your city grows, your people demand more of you. If you don't meet their new needs, they will leave you. Tap the residence. If the icons are green, those needs are being met. If yellow or red, they are not and you must supply them with what they now ask for to keep them in your burgeoning city.
- The top row of demands are goods. The bottom row are buildings. Each building has a different sized range, and your home must be in range and connected by a road to those buildings.
- Pioneers eventually require fish, goat milk, woolen garment and a market. When carpenters (the plank & hammer icon), chapels and fire stations become available, you must be in range of those for people to move in and to ascend to vassals, but if you fill the home then move it out of range, they do not leave.
- Vassals need fish, bread, goat milk, cider, woolen garments, a market, carpenter and chapel. When linen garments, fire stations and taverns become available, you must be in range of those for people to move in and to ascend to merchants, but if you fill the home then move it out of range, they do not leave.
Why is my production lagging?
- Do you have a distribution house in range of all production buildings/fields in that production chain? If not, you need one. If that distribution house is serving a ton of other buildings as well, build another.
- Do you have distribution houses but it's still slow? Try building stone roads. Carts move much faster on them than dirt roads and greatly improve your efficiency.
- Is your storage of that item full? If so, it shows a down arrow but you are already making more than you need.
- Do you have the optimal ratio of buildings in the supply chain? If you are not sure what the optimal ratio is, there are 2 ways to tell:
A) you can tap each building in the chain and see how often it produces. If your raw material takes 6 minutes to produce and your secondary produces every 3 minutes, then you need 2 raw material buildings for every one secondary.
B) Check in the build menu. If you tap a building in the chain, it pops up a diagram showing the supply chain and ratios. - Some basic ratios:
- 1 bakery : 1 mill : 2 wheat farms
- 1 cider brewery : 2 apple farms
- 3 monastery breweries : 6 monastery gardens : 4 wheat farms (or 1:2:1.3)
- 1 spinner's hut : 1 sheep farm
- 1 weaver's hut : 3 hemp plantations
- According to the graphic, 4 toolmaker's workshops : 3 iron ore smelters : 2 iron mines : 4 charcoal burner's huts. If you don't want / have that many, I do fine with 2:1:1:2 works well enough.
- When you unlock coal mines, 4 toolmaker's workshops : 3 iron ore smelters : 2 iron mines : 2 coal mines.
What are stone roads for?
Carts move faster on stone roads, optimizing your efficiency. Connecting production buildings to distribution house via stone roads is a good idea, assuming you don't think you'll want to move those buildings. Each road segment costs 5 stone to make, and you only get 2 stone back each from demolition.
Last edited by Zenobia on Fri Dec 12, 2014 2:05 pm; edited 11 times in total