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Morita

Started by rkelly17, July 07, 2014, 03:05:18 PM

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rkelly17

Who can resist blogging a settlement. Allow me to introduce the settlement of Morita. Pictures are also in the village section of the galleries. Here is the seed:



I got the seed from the Banished Seeds place on reddit. I'm starting on hard because of the flexibility and because I plan on using the wagon as part of my beautification project.

Here is the map and the starting summary:



The map is an interesting one with lots of flat land plus a river with many sites for trading posts. The yellow quadrilateral marks the start point. There is plenty of forest and you are right next to the river. This is the first time I've had so many people to start with on a hard game. Nice for labor, not so nice to feed. Let's see what happens.

The next picture is year 3. Any of you who have watched pinstar's Crossroads Build YouTube series will recognize the layout. At this point the forest village is complete plus the blacksmith, school and tailor. Because of the 17 people I've also placed a 7th house early. The blacksmith and tailor are working part time. As I anticipated, food was tight for the first few years and I had to bring the gatherer and hunter up to full staffing earlier than I might otherwise. The good news is that there were enough workers to do this. What I did not anticipate--but should have--was how fast 17 people ran through the supply of tools, which is 20 on hard. By the time I got the blacksmith built and running there were 4 or 5 people with worn out tools. It wasn't long before all were supplied, but it was still an anxious time. As you can see I've started planning and have laid out the center of town.



By year 6 the plan is starting to be carried out:



The fishing dock, market and one trading post are complete and working with 1 staff person each. The location for the fishing dock is not ideal. There is going to be some serious fishing up at the sharp bend in the river, but that will come later. For now I'm ramping up production of firewood in anticipation of a seed or general merchant bringing corn or wheat so I can grow grain.

So the first merchant came and after more than a few reloads I got a seed merchant selling wheat seeds. You can see the result in Late Spring of year 8:



Soon my citizens should be fully fed and their health should begin rising. The next project will be a small cemetery for the pioneers and then we'll start thinking about sheep. Expansion planning is also happening, but I need to make a decision. North along the river? South along the river? Maybe across the river if I get a fruit crop and can start making ale to trade. There are always so many possibilities at this stage of a settlement.

tomplum68

I'd be interested in seeing how an ale commerce economy gets started

rkelly17

Quote from: tomplum68 on July 08, 2014, 06:42:13 AM
I'd be interested in seeing how an ale commerce economy gets started

I am no expert on trading. For that you want to look at towns built by @nmid and others.

Here is what I did on two towns: The 500 farmers challenge and the vegetarian challenge. Because the 500 farmers challenge was about, well, producing a town with over 500 farmers I decided to grow my own fruit to ferment. IN that case it was cherries since that was what I got first from a merchant. I started with 4 15 wide by 4 high orchards. When those started bearing  I built a tavern and when ale appeared I set the trading post to gather 1000 ale. When that trading post filled up I built a second and then added sets of 4-5 orchards plus a tavern as needed. I followed the same process in the vegetarian town, except that the fruit there was apples. Since that map had more trading post locations the ale production cycle got quite large. I think by the end I had 15 or so trading posts with 1000 ale each running flat out. There was room for more. What I bought was logs, stone and iron in both towns. In my 500 farmer town I also bought firewood and coal since I wasn't producing enough of either to keep everybody warm after I hit about 800 people. In my vegetarian town my woodcutters were able to keep ahead of demand--so no buying of firewood or coal--but I was also buying textiles (which seems to mean wool and leather) to make coats since there could be no livestock or hunting. In both cases I had to dig a quarry and iron mine to bridge the gap between running out of surface resources and getting enough from trading, but once I had 5 or 6 trading posts I was good for iron and stone. Logs were always harder to get, especially in the 500 farmers town with its larger population and more land given to farming. I think that the fact that construction, woodcutters and blacksmiths all use logs means that you just go through them faster. I am not clear about whether or not merchants supply as many logs as they do stone. In the vegetarian town I had so much stone I was paving everything in sight.

I'm going to try something similar in Morita. We'll see how it works. So far no merchant has brought fruit so I will have to do some save and re-roll the next time a merchant comes down the river.

I should note that I start by trading firewood since that is cheap and easy to produce in the beginning. Seed merchants will trade firewood but not ale, so until I get the seeds I want I keep a couple of trading posts with firewood (625 units per seed). After that it is all ale all the time. You can buy a lot of stuff with 1000 ale.

rkelly17

Year 10

To begin with here is the basic data:



As you can see Morita is short of labor at year 10. The first two of the original pioneers have died and all but two of the adults are working at specific jobs around town leaving only two laborers. Because there were so many citizens to start off I haven't been able to build houses for all potential families. The other factor that has affected population is that there were more girls than boys among the children at the start and the ratio has not gotten much better. Many of the women have been into their 30s--a couple even 38 or 39--before they could pair up and so the birth rate is lower than one would expect in Banished. The last two houses I built saw 28 year old women pairing up with 13-14 year old school boys, so even though it says 19 potential families the potential for growth is limited at this point. Plans for big expansions are definitely on hold. Maybe I'll get a group of all male nomads.

The health level has risen from 4 hearts to 4.5 with the introduction of grain into the diet. I am anticipating that within a year or two that will be up to five.

Morita is coming up against the third problem of starting with so many citizens: the percentage of educated is low because the generation that missed going to school is so large. That means that production is not as efficient as it might be. It will be a few years before that begins to correct itself when the original children reach old age.

Here is the current state of the town:



The town hall is finished as is the pioneer cemetery. We managed to get that built just before the first death from old age in year 9. A second farm has just been built and since a merchant brought pear seeds to trade we are now growing pears along with the wheat. I've got big plans for trade, but with no people at the moment those have to remain plans. I'm thinking that it is past time for a herbalist, so I'll build one soon. A hospital would be good in case nomads bring disease, but I'm still thinking about the best spot to discourage excessive idling. Maybe backed up against the river at a spot where I can't build a trading post. I'm thinking that the next expansion should be across the river which will create a center with the river on two sides. That could easily become the trading center for the whole settlement.

I am hoping for the livestock merchant to bring sheep so that the tailor can start making warm coats.



rkelly17

#4
The first nomads and first epidemics

Taking up from the last post, I decided that, since I had only 2 labourers available, I would prebuild a few necessary items, specifically a hospital and a pasture. I finally found what I thought would be a good location for the hospital with the river right behind it and a hill to the South of it, but that site pushed expansion to the North rather than across the river. That also meant thinking about the market square for the section, so I sited that as well and in the process ended up with a good location for a pasture. My plan was to leave the hospital unstaffed until someone actually got sick.

The hospital finished in year 11. By that time several citizens had graduated from school, so I started in on one house and the market. Right then 5 nomads (1 family of 4 and 1 single male) arrived at the town hall and I accepted them. Since a local couple took the house by the North market I built one more there and one by the main plaza. Then someone (not a nomad) got sick with dysentery, so I staffed the hospital.



I was feeling pretty good until I caught someone idling at the hospital.  >:(



Fortunately the dear little thing wandered off and the patient got well before anyone else could get sick. The houses and market finished and I built the pasture. Then, bang someone came down with mumps. Again Morita dodged the bullet and only the one person got sick. With the pasture finished I started a barn. Here is the Northern extension:



One of the challenges is to site a fishing dock to take maximum advantage of that nice swath of water at the sharp bend in the river. You can also see the double road which extends South past the Pioneer Cemetery to the main plaza.

And we'll close with the vital statistics for year 13:



As you can see, with a full pallet of foods the people are healthy and happy. The labour shortage is not nearly so bad. I'm trying to get by without a quarry or mine, but we'll see what happens. The educated percentage is still lower than I'd like, but even with the three adult nomads it's not worse than it was. Hopefully that trader you see coming down the river has some sheep for our new pasture and the tailor can make warm coats.



irrelevant

Morita's shaping up nicely. Love the four ports. And three more on the other side? That'll be a monster.

rkelly17

#6
Year 23

So, what has happened in Morita in the past 10 years? At one level, as always, life goes on. People get married and have children. The children go to school and graduate. People die and others take up the work. While all this "normalcy," as Warren G. Harding would say, goes on the town is growing. City fathers and mothers decided that it was time to start producing ale to sell for the goods which merchants bring. Five orchards were planted at the current North end of the settlement and houses were built to house the orchardists. Since a merchant showed up right at that time willing to trade peach seeds, the citizens decided that peach schnapps would be a nice drink to sell. When the trees matured a tavern was built and the trading post began collecting ale for trade.



The trading post was soon full of peach ale so the citizens decided to build a second trading post:



With a second trading post the amount of available firewood declined so the citizens decided to build a second forest village due West of the northern market square:



The location of this forest village was Northwest of the original forest village with a bit of a gap in between. The citizens thought this might be the ideal place for a herbalist to work, but they haven't yet gotten around to building one. That should happen soon because they do need a bit of a health boost at the moment.

Here are the stats:



As you can see the health is down a bit to 4.5 hearts in spite of a rounded diet. Education is coming up nicely and the tailor is now producing warm coats. The hunters' leather production has been supplemented by some purchases, so it would be nice to trade for cattle. A pasture is already complete and waiting, so we just need the cooperation of merchants.

People are starting to think expansion again and the land just across the river from the middle of town looks inviting.



As you can see a market circle here would serve the planned trading posts on the East side of the river. There will be one additional spot for a TP when the storage yard just above the lower bridge is removed. It was placed to help resource collection East of the river but has now served its purpose. This are also provides 2-3 more sites for TPs since the river makes a sharp turn to the East and flows across the North side of this area. There is also room here to increase ale production, so this would become the trading hub of the whole settlement. We'll see how well the citizens can exploit the possibility here.

tomplum68

It looked like you put in a market in your orchard area to accommodate the orchard workers, how do your forest node workers fare without market support.  Are they sufficiently supported by gathering/hunting in the barn?

I tend to butt my marketplace circle with the forest circle so the houses are as close to work with market support without taking up forest space.  they don't take up much forest space so if they get enough supplies without a market then right in the forest would be the best place for them i suppose.

where are you putting your woodcutters?  i've experimented with them by the forester, by the market, and by the trading posts.

rkelly17

That northern market went in first because I sited the hospital where I did and needed a place for the physician to live. I noticed that gave me good sites for a pasture and orchards+tavern so I developed it that way. It was more serendipity than planning.

One reason I put a gatherer and a hunter in a forest village is so that there is almost always food in the local barn. The people living in the forest village mostly get it there. The woodcutter, who is placed here to be close to the source of logs, puts firewood in the local storage yard so there is usually some for local use. Otherwise the citizens walk to the nearest market. I place the first market so that it covers a piece of the river for fishing and trading, but it is often close to the edge of the forest circles (the hunter is the biggest) where it will cover some of the houses. The down side is you have to leave the forest intact and lose half the market circle for development. In this case the distance between the original forest village and the river was such that the market didn't overlap much at all.

I put my first two woodcutters in the forest villages. Two forester cabins seem to produce enough logs to support three woodcutters plus construction, so the third woodcutter goes near a market. In Morita I do not yet need the third woodcutter, but that will probably get built in the new area across the river along with a second tailor and blacksmith. Once I start trading for logs then more woodcutters will go near trading posts and near markets further from the river. I build schools fairly frequently to cut down commuting distances for students and get them through school faster.

No doubt someone can set this up more efficiently than I do. It works, so I keep doing it.

rkelly17

Morita Year 33

The past 10 years have seen some major development in Morita. First in year 25 or 26 a merchant showed up with cattle and the cow pasture South of the town center was occupied. At the same time the citizens built Riverside Cemetery which can hold 144 graves for the dear departed.



Shortly after that development East of the river began with houses and a market. As the population built up in Eastriver peach orchards and housing were added and a tavern when the peaches matured. While the peaches matured two farms were built in the southern half of the market circle. As more ale became available a new trading post was added. The population in the area was high enough that a school was built. Then more peach orchards and housing and another tavern. That enabled a fourth trading post. Finally a woodcutter, blacksmith and tailor were added along with housing for the workers. Now the Eastriver school has half of the total school population for all of Morita. As you can see from the picture, there is still room for four more markets in the center of town and four more along the North side of Eastriver, so trade will be brisk here.



While all this building was going on the citizens did not neglect beautification. A town forester was built and Town Hall Square is now full of trees.



Here are the stats:



The next expansion will need to focus on farming to feed the growing population. Right now I'm thinking that the area to the West  of the cattle and cemetery looks like a good spot.

So far Morita is able to build and produce tools without quarries or mines. Hopefully trade volume of stone and iron will pick up before surface stone and iron runs out.



rkelly17

Morita in Year 40

Morita has been growing both in population (now 319) and in area (new farming area opened). During the last 7 years about 50 nomads have been accepted and added to the population. That has kept the educated percentage down to 86%, but there are now plenty of workers for whatever projects are needed. The full complement of crops and livestock have been traded for and so health is 5 hearts. The factors that lead to happiness are present (except that the citizens get to make ale, but it all gets exported), so five stars all around. Here is the data:



Trade is picking up and there is enough ale in the trading posts to trade for whatever we need, so the citizens were able to complete paving Town Hall Square.



There are several wells around and the Pioneer Memorial, so this plaza is a magnet for idlers.

Eastriver hasn't changed much. The chapel is finished and a new tavern has gone into production, but that is about the only new construction. No new trading posts have opened because the citizens have been busy building a new part of the settlement.



The new area is called Farmington. The core is made up of two markets linked by a boulevard called Pecan Avenue after the trees planted down the middle. Farms are being built as fast as possible because food production has fallen a bit behind consumption. The citizens have traded for enough food to make up the difference, but they don't want to be dependent on the food merchants.



The farms North of Pecan Avenue come up just to the boundary of forest circles, so that is where development will stop, but there is plenty of space for more farming to the South and a bit of room to the West. As soon as food production is ahead of consumption, development of the trading industry will get back on track.

Here is a shot looking West along Pecan Avenue:



The area behind the school and planned chapel is a bit of a hill, so that will remain bare. A field can be planted South of the chapel and more houses added for the farmers. Eventually the boulevard will be paved as will the plaza.

Trade is bringing enough stone that most of the newer houses are stone. Hopefully the earlier log cabins can be replaced as well and everyone can be warm in the Winter.