Sorry if everyone knows this already. I see so much misinformation about this topic on various forums that I feel the need to set the record straight here.
Screenshot 1: This is an Herb, or a Herb if you prefer ;)
Screenshot 2: This is an Herbalist stalking an herb in the wild.
Screenshot 3: The Herbalist strikes! The herb is basketized.
Screenshot 4: The plant yielded 3 Herbs, which are added to the Herbalist's personal inventory. I would assume every herb plant would yield three herbs when collected.
No one else can gather herbs. If you make a clearcut, your laborers will chop them (thus destroying them), and if they are in the footprint of a building under construction, they will count as an item to be removed. But only an Herbalist can gather herbs and store them.
This particular Herbalist is walking around with 72 trade value in her basket.
If one knows where to find herbs, one might well build an Herbalist to collect them just for trade value.
These things are everywhere in forests. They are easiest to see in a Forester circle where the Foresters have done some serious thinning. I always assumed they were just immature trees. The "old growth forest" story is bunk.
oh ya , they are good value :) specially if you can get thousands to sell but only the general goods merchants will take them.
no need to put 2 workers per buildings. herbs spawns are very very slow. i only assign only 1 worker but you can put tons of them everywhere. in a scenario like 500 farmers challenge they arent usefull cause all your map is painted with crops but like in my Lucky Seven City, where most buidings are gatherers and foresters.... i can get tons of herbs to sell
Quote from: irrelevant on July 03, 2014, 02:53:21 PM
Screenshot 1: This is an Herb, or a Herb if you prefer ;)
I grew up in So. Cal. hearing and saying "'erb." After moving to Southern Ontario I had to learn to say "herb." Of course I had to learn to say things like fil-em instead of film and proh-gress instead of prah-gress. But I will never, ever say taa-co for taco. That is a bridge too far. ::)
On a more serious note, the whole "old growth" forest thing is way over-blown. Herbs, onions, berries and roots all grow under "mature" trees, which seems to mean any full-grown trees. That is why plant-and-cut foresters, gatherers and herbalists can happily co-exist in the same circle.
@rkelly17 Al-you-min-ium yet? ;)
Quote from: rkelly17 on July 03, 2014, 04:40:24 PM
On a more serious note, the whole "old growth" forest thing is way over-blown. Herbs, onions, berries and roots all grow under "mature" trees, which seems to mean any full-grown trees. That is why plant-and-cut foresters, gatherers and herbalists can happily co-exist in the same circle.
I have been wondering about that lately, I couldn't remember anyone saying one way or the other, so thanks!
@irrelevant I'm sure this thread might help clear up some misconceptions about Herbalists.
Quote from: irrelevant on July 03, 2014, 05:00:21 PM
@rkelly17 Al-you-min-ium yet? ;)
That's one that I have never learned. People tell me that I don't have much of an American accent, but I think that's because, coming from So. Cal., I talk just like the people on TV.
with my tests tonight :
gatherer + forester = awesome combo
herbalist + forester = extremly bad, even 0 herbs for years
looks like herbs spawn at the foot of very very old trees but foresters always cut those trees before it gets to old (cutting at mature phase) so... no old trees ... no herbs
@RedKetchup -- That's odd. I don't think I've had an herbalist in a forest with forester's that did so poorly as yours are. How long have the foresters been managing your forest ... ie, has it reached a balance between the cutting and re-planting, yet? That can take a few years to happen.
Quote from: RedKetchup on July 04, 2014, 11:37:19 PM
with my tests tonight :
gatherer + forester = awesome combo
herbalist + forester = extremly bad, even 0 herbs for years
looks like herbs spawn at the foot of very very old trees but foresters always cut those trees before it gets to old (cutting at mature phase) so... no old trees ... no herbs
This is not the first time I have heard this, but it has never happened to me. I do always set the foresters to "plant only" until the growth is pretty thick. 3 -5 game years.
it is in my Lucky Seven blog. in district 1 i had trees which never been cut since i seeded them when i made the district. there were hundreds of it. and in my old town , where my forester were always cutting and seeding since year 1 .... i ve checked and deleted my 3-4 herbalist huts cause in 'this year' and 'previous year' stats were totally empty, not even a letter was written something.
@RedKetchup I have had this issue before too, though not zero herbs, but pretty low. I tend to have two woodcutters at every forestry hub (eventually). What helps me is to limit my herbalists to only one per hut. After that, I have a few things i do, depending upon the town.
One is to only have half of my herbalist cabins active at any given time and when their yields go down to turn those ones off and turn on the ones that were off before. This allows the forests time to recover.
Another is to simply give the forests time to recoup by turning them to plant only for a few years. This works best on forestry hubs near trade ports as the trade ports can supply them logs while the forests are recovering.
Finally, I sometimes build a second forester's cabin in forestry hub, man it with two people and have them set only to plant. This seems to keep the forest thick and provides more trees for herbs to spawn under.
i made a screenshot of my District 1. i gave recently the permission to my foresters to 'cut' the trees were there for a good dozen of year and you can see tons of herbs.
Yes, this is what I see everywhere. They don't really come back though unless they have good forest cover around.
Quote from: RedKetchup on July 05, 2014, 11:18:27 AM
it is in my Lucky Seven blog. in district 1 i had trees which never been cut since i seeded them when i made the district. there were hundreds of it. and in my old town , where my forester were always cutting and seeding since year 1 .... i ve checked and deleted my 3-4 herbalist huts cause in 'this year' and 'previous year' stats were totally empty, not even a letter was written something.
@RedKetchup, to help me understand better could you provide a bit more information? Did the circles of these herbalists overlap each other? Was there visible mature tree cover? At any point during the years were your herbs at maximum? I ask because I usually set my herb maximum at 100 per cabin with 1 herbalist per cabin and I never have any problems. I usually build 1 or 2 herbalists per map and they all share space with cut-and-plant foresters. I don't trade herbs so I'm usually at maximum and herbalists don't work much.
yes the herbalist circles could overlap a bit, never at any point i did get my max : 500,000 herbs. no there were no trees mature cause the foresters were cutting them asap they get mature.
do a test for me. put a herbalist side of a forester(4 workers) allow cut and plant (put a stockpile not far). put another herbalist further with forester(2-3 plant only) and go back 5-6 years later and check the stats. you ll see
Quote from: RedKetchup on July 06, 2014, 11:49:18 AM
... never at any point i did get my max : 500,000 herbs.
Sorry ... gotta ask ... do you really mean 500,000 herbs? Although I suspect the answer is 'no' and that was a typo, if it is 'yes', you'd be hard pressed to reach that. I only bring it up because it calls into question how you are evaluating herbalist yield. ;)
lol no no it s cause or i put 999,999 in all slot (but have to delete all numbers that arent a '9' like 200 ==> 999,999)
or i just add tons of zero at the end of the number in there ex. 200 => 200,000 , 500 => 500,000 , 2000 => 200,000 it is faster to just put zéros at the end instead of backspace and put just nines
and no , i never got that limit and never got anywhere near that ;lol. max i ve got in the game so far was around 1048 herbs
Quote from: RedKetchup on July 06, 2014, 12:03:06 PM
lol no no it s cause or i put 999,999 in all slot (but have to delete all numbers that arent a '9' like 200 ==> 999,999)
or i just add tons of zero at the end of the number in there ex. 200 => 200,000 , 500 => 500,000 , 2000 => 200,000 it is faster to just put zéros at the end instead of backspace and put just nines
and no , i never got that limit and never got anywhere near that ;lol. max i ve got in the game so far was around 1048 herbs
I get 999,999 food, but why 999,999 herbs? The citizens would never use that many. Even before you get a grain crop and they use herbs as a dietary supplement I've never seen them need over 100 in storage. Maybe if you have many, many thousands of citizens they might need 500-1000 in storage, but I get by fine with 100-200 as high as 1500 citizens. The main issue then becomes making herbalists convenient for all citizens as the settlement spread out.
cause to never being bothered? with all limits i put all 9999999 everywhere.... or i had 0000000 at the end of each limit :)
OK, I get never being bothered. ;)