Technical questions

[Paeng]

I can't say what's the best thing to do generally. It depends on many things.

Precisely... that's one of the best points about Banished (or any good game actually) - there is not just one "right" way to do things...

[rkelly17]

Not sure why so many build a forester and then let him only plant trees. I always short on manpower (and girlpower) in the beginning, so will only have a few available people as labourers/builders. Maybe just one person for forester, and I want him to chop trees for sure.

I always start a hard game by clearing 250 logs from outside the future foresters' circle and a medium game by clearing 300. Then I start building and the initial supply lasts for the first year. The main reason I do "plant only" in the beginning is that I need to clear trees from various future building and farming sites anyway, so there are enough logs added to the stock. Usually for the first couple of years I can only afford one forester and whatever s/he does goes too slowly for building and firewood, so every so often the laborers (usually 1 or 2 in the beginning) are called on for a few more logs. The clearing of the circle keeps the stone and iron stocks up. BY the time I have enough people to fill the foresters' lodge the circle is thick with mature trees and they harvest more efficiently on "cut and plant." Since I usually put my gatherer across the road from the forester, this also creates plenty of forest food. By year 5 or so when students start graduating both foresters and gatherers are off and running.

I'm sure it would all work with "cut and plant" from the beginning, but I worry about cutting into the gatherers production at a point when food is so important. It is interesting to me how such a rich variety of playing styles can yield differing ways to accomplish the goals equally well.

[Pangaea]

I'm sorry for you @Pangaea. I can't help a bit! I have no Linux experience.

Thanks. I've no idea what is wrong either, and I've tried quite a few things by now. Am fed up of wasting so many hours on this game only to see it crash, so it's best to simply stop playing it I think - even if I really want to play it. Was nice to come back and see some threads, and some old faces, and I have had fun with the game. But ultimately it's pretty pointless when I can't play past 10-20 years, or x hours, or whatever the hell is causing the crashes.

[assobanana76]

reading your answers I am increasingly aware of how much I play superficially (giving much more attention to the fact that the city is more beautiful than functional)
why I position it on the fly forester / gatherer / herbalist and I do not deal more until they begin to get the alerts!
then I start running after emergency breaking down whole forests, building bridges to gather stones / iron olter rivers and raising crops / orchards ..
not the best way to play .. 

take for example my next future city ..
I already know how beautiful plots of various crops of random size, positioned along all the main river ..
I already know what it will be nice hypermarket .. 
I know that part of the river is wild with native camps while the other half will be urbanized "medieval" and "colonial" ..
I already know what will be the beautiful quarry that "digs" the mountain ..
but it is sure that after 50 years the population will be about 100 people and that the run-up to the alarms will be constant! 

[Nilla]

Don´t be sorry @assobanana76. You have your own way of playing Banished. That´s OK, too.

That´s also one of the great things with this game. You don´t have to build those huge dense giant settlements with X-1000 inhabitants. You can also play it your way ; focus on beauty. I can´t do that. I don´t have that kind of eyes, that kind of creativity and patience that´s needed for something like that. So I enjoy looking at yours and some of the others (@Paeng as example) settlement very much.

[assobanana76]

So I enjoy looking at yours and some of the others (@Paeng as example) settlement very much.

OMG! 
you make me blush.. 
really you put my name along with that of @Paeng in the same sentence???
although his is in brackets then I'm the best player! 
No, Seriously ..
I'm flattered but I think you've seen that behind the "beauty" there are many hours of testing and failed attempts ..
I think instead Paeng, after so many years of cities built, create landscapes so beautiful and breathtaking is completely natural and in a few minutes!
I still have some way to go! 

[Paeng]

I think instead Paeng, after so many years of cities built, create landscapes so beautiful and breathtaking is completely natural and in a few minutes!

Well, actually I'm a real slow poke... like up to now, I still play Banished at +2, often at +1... partly also because I like to see my towns grow, with constantly refining small and smaller and even the smallest details. You are right that many things feel completely natural to me, like I have a good sense of proportion and just kinda "know" what will go well together - I guess after working as a designer for more than 40 years some things do become second nature 

But all this would mean nothing or at least feel rather lonely without any interaction... that's why I love city-building games and their communities - there are always so many people with so many different talents, sharing their work, their creations, their ideas and --last but not least-- their knowledge, mostly without that urgent sense of competition so prevalent in most areas of our lives.

[irrelevant]

I'm sure it would all work with "cut and plant" from the beginning, but I worry about cutting into the gatherers production at a point when food is so important. It is interesting to me how such a rich variety of playing styles can yield differing ways to accomplish the goals equally well.

After the experiment I ran with my 1000-year town last weekend, I no longer believe that normal logging interferes meaningfully with gatherers' output. It certainly does kill herb production by about 80%, but what seems to hurt gatherers far more than logging, is a lack of laborers.

[assobanana76]

I think instead Paeng, after so many years of cities built, create landscapes so beautiful and breathtaking is completely natural and in a few minutes!

Well, actually I'm a real slow poke... like up to now, I still play Banished at +2, often at +1... partly also because I like to see my towns grow, with constantly refining small and smaller and even the smallest details. You are right that many things feel completely natural to me, like I have a good sense of proportion and just kinda "know" what will go well together - I guess after working as a designer for more than 40 years some things do become second nature 

But all this would mean nothing or at least feel rather lonely without any interaction... that's why I love city-building games and their communities - there are always so many people with so many different talents, sharing their work, their creations, their ideas and --last but not least-- their knowledge, mostly without that urgent sense of competition so prevalent in most areas of our lives.

this news surprises me greatly !!
I thought I was the only slow to play ..
I imagined you travel fast 10x to churn a city after another .. and one more beautiful than the other!

instead I, e.g. to create the hypermarket, there I will have put at least 20 hours of work!
and I have not even finished because I did all die of old age!
that rookie that I am !!

however, as I always say .. you are an inspiration to us!

and I add that it is indeed a pleasure to be here ..
is my first community video game .. and in general my first online community ..
and I feel at home from the first post .. and never stop to admit that thanks to you I learned a lot of things!

[assobanana76]

I'm sure it would all work with "cut and plant" from the beginning, but I worry about cutting into the gatherers production at a point when food is so important. It is interesting to me how such a rich variety of playing styles can yield differing ways to accomplish the goals equally well.

After the experiment I ran with my 1000-year town last weekend, I no longer believe that normal logging interferes meaningfully with gatherers' output. It certainly does kill herb production by about 80%, but what seems to hurt gatherers far more than logging, is a lack of laborers.

wow! 80%?
It is so much !! not?
It would seem an absolute rule as to its own, to divide forester from gatherer / herbalist!

[Paeng]

I imagined you travel fast 10x

No way... I can't enjoy at that speed, it feels like watching a movie at fast forward. And after a few years of fast forward I don't know of my peeps anymore, they're all strangers... 

[A Nonny Moose]

Banished barely crawls on my machine, but still I enjoy it.  If I get a successful village started I like to branch out with multiple communities separated by some green space and usually based on a market.  As far as most players are concerned, I am only an egg.  The largest village I've ever achieved is something on the order of 500 villagers.

I get to a point where I just don't want to cope with yet another crisis, and close the village out.  Of late, I am having trouble keeping the wood demand in balance.  Something I am going to concentrate on in my next effort.

[irrelevant]

I'm sure it would all work with "cut and plant" from the beginning, but I worry about cutting into the gatherers production at a point when food is so important. It is interesting to me how such a rich variety of playing styles can yield differing ways to accomplish the goals equally well.

After the experiment I ran with my 1000-year town last weekend, I no longer believe that normal logging interferes meaningfully with gatherers' output. It certainly does kill herb production by about 80%, but what seems to hurt gatherers far more than logging, is a lack of laborers.

wow! 80%?
It is so much !! not?
It would seem an absolute rule as to its own, to divide forester from gatherer / herbalist!

Forester and herbalist are okay together if you have the forester set to "plant" only. In fact, that seems to increase herb production from what you would have in an unmanaged forest.

I think there is very little interference between forester and gatherer, I eventually put a gatherer with every forester.

[Pangaea]

I'm a very slow player too. 5x feels way too fast, at least most of the time. I play at 2x almost all the time, and often pause when making design decisions, which is one of the most fun parts about the game. It's the same with Settlers. I just love following people around, watching what they do, checking production buildings frequently, to see their output, how it compared to last year, and so on. Oh look, a divorce! Wonder why the kid lives with the father instead of the mother... Oh noes, that poor guy died. Wonder how old he was... (one of my pet peeves)

This is also why it hurts a lot when I suddenly lose a town in year 10 or 20. That isn't half an hour of investment or however fast you guys play at 10x, but at least one day of full playing. Managed to play for many hours yesterday and got to year 6 or something.

I've always been of the opinion, based on observation, that gatherers and foresters don't seem to hurt each other, at least not much, so I couple them routinely too. Herbalists is a different story. These guys need older and more untouched forests. Naturally a thick forest is better, so I like to put them in a well-forested area, more or less on their own, maybe with a hunter or gatherer.

[Pangaea]

Forgot one thing. I'm also a slow grower (grower not a shower haha). Prefer to start villages with maybe some roleplaying, imagining these guys stuck out in a rot, and needing to fend off nature with what they can find. Instantly building a heap of farms and orchards and a pack of trade ports just doesn't feel 'right' to me. Not a million houses to begin with either. As a result I don't get rapidly increasing food and population curves, but a nice steady incline. I saw a challenge thread yesterday with people getting to pop 100 in year 7 or something crazy like that. In the save I lost in year 20, I had pop 70 or thereabouts, which probably isn't very rapid.

It's one of the things so great about this game: you can play it in many different ways, and it's still fun. Too often I feel people get hung up on "meta-gaming" and most "efficient" play, min maxing and all that stuff. This game is different, or at least it's different for me. I would never build a village with 100 trade ports or something, producing next to no food or other products myself, only ale and firewood. I want the villages I build to be somewhat realistic for the environment the game is set in. The village I built a year back, when I last played the game, had over 3000 pop with only four trade ports, so it can be done that way too. Probably much slower, but I like it that way