If you’ve ever wanted to live out your lifelong fantasy of being a lord who gets to order their peasants around as they build up a whole city for you, then Manor Lords was probably made just for you. There are a few things that can feel obtuse, though, so here are some beginner tips for getting started in Manor Lords.
Get the Basics Covered First
When you first start a game of Manor Lords, your immediate goals are simple: build your Burgage Plots, Granary, Stockhouse, and Logging Camp. The reason for this is simple. You need Burgage Plots to help shelter the homeless people, and you need the Granary and Stockhouse to properly store all of the supplies left out near the homeless tents. After that, build a Logging Camp and assign someone to it to start generating Timber, as that’s one of the main resources you’ll need to construct everything else.
These are the basics. Once you’ve got those covered, then you can look into building a Forager Camp to start gathering Berries, followed by a Woodcutter’s House to generate Firewood. You’ll need to make sure you’ve got enough housing for everyone, along with food and fuel to sustain your families, or you won’t be able to grow and expand in Manor Lords.
Cover all these things, and then you can start looking into getting a little fancier with your resources.
Watch Out for Seasonal Resources
Speaking of resources, there are some items and resources that will just disappear during the winter, such as Berries. This means that as soon as the game starts, you’ll only have a few months to gather all the Berries you can get before they disappear for the winter season, and this is why you should prioritize building a Forager Camp first once you’ve got your basics covered.
The Hunting Camp is great for hunting wild animals, which are another source of food and hides, but hunting is available all year round, and it’s possible to deplete the animal population if you’re not careful. So build your Hunting Camp, but always keep an eye on it and don’t cull the animals. Once the animal count gets lot, take your workers off the Hunting Camp and put them somewhere else while the animals replenish.
Stock Up for Winter
Like in most city-building games with seasons and weather effects, winter is the most devastating period of time in Manor Lords. This is when the game is at its toughest, as your source of Berries will be gone, and your families will consume twice as much fuel as they do in the other three seasons. This is why it’s imperative that you collect all the Berries you can when you start the game, and store them in your Granary so you’ve got a good stockpile of food going into winter.
While it may be tempting to ignore Firewood, I’d also highly recommend setting up a Woodcutter’s House early to build up your stock of fuel as well. You’ll probably have a surplus of these going into winter, but you can build a Marketplace near your Burgage Plots to let your families have easier access to the resources they need to survive the cold.
Don’t Expand Too Quickly
In that vein, make sure you’re not being too gung-ho with building your Burgage Plots and expanding your population size too quickly. Each family requires food and fuel, and that requirement jumps up exponentially each time you add a new family to your settlement. Sure, more families means more workers, but you’ve only got a finite amount of resources and jobs to go around at the start of the game.
I’d recommend halting expansion about one or two months before winter hits, and just focus on stockpiling your resources in that period of time. After winter has passed, then you can look into expanding again and building out.
Make Sure Everyone’s Always Working
Finally, make sure that everyone living in your settlement has something to do. Whether it’s transporting goods to and from the Storehouses, or hunting for food, or cutting wood, make sure everyone’s doing something. That being said, you’ll also want to make sure you always have one unassigned worker. This person will be in charge of managing the ox, helping to construct buildings, and moving logistics around.
In addition to that, don’t be afraid to shuffle people around. You don’t always need to have one person chopping wood if you already have a crap ton of Timber just lying around. Move that worker to something else that’s more immediately beneficial to your settlement.
