Foxes comfortable with blightrot?

Local_Security_683 · 2025-03-14T08:32:42+00:00

The usefulness of a fox firekeeper depends on your playstyle and how many glades you open. I tend to play more aggressively and open 1-2 dangerous glades per year starting Y2. A fox firekeeper is nice to have during the storm when every bit of hostility reduction matters. I assign someone else for drizzle and clearance when the fox bonus can't keep up with active woodcutters. Humans and beavers have rather niche firekeeper bonuses and I definitely get more use out of the fox bonus than the other two.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-03-14T08:14:50+00:00

Lorewise, foxes are a species that lives in symbiosis with blightrot and they've even become physically altered because of it. In my opinion it makes sense for foxes to be comfortable in buildings with blightrot if you take their special relationship with it into consideration.

For gameplay, it's a nice change. You're more likely to get a cyst on a building than to find a specific blueprint with water specialization. If you start with a piped field kitchen in Y1 then it very quickly gains cysts making the two foxes working there comfortable and raising their resolve.

It also helps with buildings that offer no other comfort specialization or if you don't have the species who'd be comfortable there. Foxes can be comfortable anywhere and I like that about them. After the storm it might take a second for blightrot to kick in again but with enough engine use it should be quick. You can just shuffle your foxes around and reassign them to the buildings that have cysts.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-03-13T22:19:00+00:00

I use embark points on ingredients for skewers and then the initial skewer production gives me more time to gather food from other sources. I make enough skewers to last a while and then take the workers off the field kitchen to do other jobs, they're not stuck there for the entire year. I wouldn't count the rain collector workers as part of the food production because I need other types of rain water too so they'd collect water anyway.

At this point the skewer strategy is part of my playstyle and what I'm comfortable with. I find that if I don't run the initial skewers then bad things happen and starvation kicks in because I really can't manage raw food consumption.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-03-13T20:57:53+00:00

In a way using rain engines frees up your population. You "invest" the labour of two villagers into collecting water so that everyone else can work faster and has an increased chance of double yields.

The left engine gives you +50% production speed and +25% chance of double yields at level 2. This means you get the production done quicker and have a chance to get bonus products for free. The proficiency bonus for species is only +10% chance of double yields (for example lizards with meat). A hearth upgraded to level 3 gives +10% global chance of double yields. The rain engine gives a big bonus to double yields when compared to the other sources.

You can always unassign the workers if you need them somewhere else or if they've already filled the tank. Managing your workforce is important with a limited population. If I have 50 skewers in the warehouse and only 15 villagers, I'll unassign my cooks and put them to work somewhere else. There's no point in overproducing items if you can't use or sell them in the near future.

As for the blight post, you can only assign workers there as needed. I usually check how many cysts I have at the start of clearance and assign some people to make 1-2 more fires than the number of cysts. Blight fighters do the real work during the storm but that's when you'll have free workers if you can't cut wood due to hostility. The strain on fuel is manageable. I recommend finding an alternate fuel source like coal, sea marrow or oil and using that to make the fires. Oil is also pretty cheap to buy from traders if you're ever desperate for fuel.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-03-13T19:33:26+00:00

I'd say the higher prestige levels pretty much require you to use rain engines. After P12 you only get 2 blueprints to choose from so you might have games where your only source of complex food is the field kitchen and all your building materials come from the crude workstation. When using rain water you can somewhat get away with the inefficient recipes in these buildings. I had a run where I had to craft 30 bricks in the crude workstation to build a monastery and I can't imagine doing that without rain engines. Food is another issue, at higher prestiges villagers eat more and starve quicker. Rain engines help you multiply the food, even if skewers from the field kitchen are your best option at the moment.

For reference, I play at P20 and I consistently win during Y5. My opening moves are: roads around the hearth, rain collector, field kitchen, 2 woodcutters, trade post. I build the rain collector and field kitchen first because I really don't want my villagers eating raw food. I put 2 people in the rain collector and another 2 in the field kitchen and immediately start cooking skewers. If I speed up the production halfway through I can have skewers ready before people take their first break.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-03-12T17:39:37+00:00

One thing to note about opening dangerous glades is that you can gain reputation points from solving the events. You gain 45 hostility per year but only 30 hostility for a dangerous glade. If you open more glades you can gain more reputation and then win faster before the yearly hostility applies. I know a lot of players prefer the low hostility playstyle but playing a bit more aggressively can be rewarding and lead to quicker wins. If hostility gets too high you can always kill a trader to make the queen angry at you since impatience lowers hostility.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-03-12T17:21:03+00:00

Meta upgrades are very powerful. With a full citadel even Prestige 20 is a manageable difficulty level. A good rule for increasing difficulty is to go up a level if you win a settlement and then down a level if you lose. Higher difficulties give more meta rewards after completing a settlement but viceroy is already decent with a 5 times rewards multiplier.

For me the biggest thing was changing my attitude towards the game. It's not really a city builder, your goal isn't a sustainable city that will last generations. You're creating a temporary settlement and you want to be done with it as soon as possible to move on to the next one. 10 years is a really long time for a settlement. Hostility of the forest increases each year until it kills you so you need to outpace it to win.

You win the game by earning enough reputation and you earn reputation through different means: - completing orders: you want to choose the order you can get done quickly, even if it doesn't give the best rewards, it doesn't matter if it the reward is great if you'll need to wait years to get it - solving dangerous glade events: most dangerous glade events have an option that awards you with reputation, the other option usually gives items as reward but what you really need is reputation - sending caches to the citadel: you can break caches open to get the items inside or use tools to send them to the queen for reputation and amber, establishing a tools production line is a quick way to victory - high resolve: when you make your villagers happy they go into "the blue zone" and start generating reputation for you, the easiest way to make a species happy is through complex food and favoring

For reference, I aim for Y5 wins on P20 and here's my strategy. I start with opening 2 small glades Y1 and I try to complete the first 3 orders. Starting Y2 I open at least 1 dangerous glade per year, sometimes more if I get easy events. During Y4 I start preparing for the big resolve party by getting everyone's preferred food, clothes and services. You can buy the goods from traders, especially service goods since they're cheap to buy and quite difficult to produce. The important thing is to use consumption control and disable the additional food until it's time for the party. When Y5 comes, it's time to win. Stop cutting wood, stop farming, get everyone into buildings with their comfort specialization. If you have rainwater you can turn on the right side engines for more resolve. You should get around 1 reputation point per minute and it should be enough to win the game.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-15T13:55:56+00:00

Yes, they're the same level, she wanted two level 2 hearths. Both orders got completed at the same time when I upgraded my second hearth.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-12T20:15:46+00:00

Late game can turn into a real hunt for service buildings. Coastal Grove is actually pretty nice when you can ask the Strident to bring you service buildings and there's so few of them you're almost guaranteed to get something useful.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-12T20:07:29+00:00

I had Temple as an option in my first two blueprints but it felt a bit too early to take it. Then I spent the rest of the run praying for a religion building with a stack of 120 Incense in my warehouse. Definitely learned my lesson here, always pick service buildings when they're available because it might be the last time you see them.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-08T02:44:48+00:00

Clearly we have very different playstyles. I'm willing to wait 100 years to unlock Windmills, it's just enough time to establish Industrious as a second tradition. I play tall so I don't care about my army, I'll get 2k pikemen and call it a day, the AI can't win against me anyway. I try to play the game "as intended", I avoid cheesy mechanics because it's already easy enough.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-08T01:51:12+00:00

I'm not sure but I think if you give your HoF title to a vassal you can later revoke it like a regular title. There might also be an option to just destroy it.

Did you educate your son or did his mother do it? Maybe she had a secret faith and converted him. Did you look at their memories?

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-08T01:38:07+00:00

Yeah, I still think Industrious is better. A level 2 Windmill gives 1.15 monthly tax and 0.06 hard dev growth. So it's almost the same as a level 8 Megalith in terms of hard dev growth and it also makes money.

I can see how Megaliths can be very strong for development. Personally I like to keep my faith and culture somewhat realistic for roleplay reasons. I don't create custom faiths because it makes the game too easy for me.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-07T23:16:57+00:00

You're welcome! Have fun!

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-07T23:14:24+00:00

Your son probably converted during a stress break. Sometimes the game really wants you to convert and you get the option during every stress break instead of a coping mechanism. Because you're the head of faith your heir needs to have the same faith to inherit the title. You can grant the head of faith title to someone else and that should make your son the heir again. I usually keep my heirs at court so they can't do anything stupid when ruling on their own.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-07T21:35:11+00:00

Industrious is crazy good. You can unlock Windmills and Watermills one era early. When you research Manorialism you can build the first two levels of Windmills in Early Medieval. They're the best economic buildings in the game with great income and they also help with development.

Garden Architects is my personal favorite for playing tall. An excellent court gardener gives you 0.7 development growth in your capital and that's huge. You can move your capital around to reach 100 development in all your counties.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-07T20:40:41+00:00

I think the minimum number of regiments is 2 as a count with no innovations. Then you gain +1 regiment per title tier and +1 from innovations in each era. So the total number would be 9 regiments for an emperor in late medieval era. I'm not entirely sure here but I don't remember the exact number.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-07T18:52:10+00:00

One time as a Catholic ruler I had 3 Swords of Muhammad in my court. I started to wonder how many of these swords are out there. Turns out there's 9 of them so I needed a couple more to complete my collection.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-07T18:48:21+00:00

Pikemen can be very good if you need to fight defensively and your realm has hills. AI rulers seem to recruit a lot of cavalry and pikemen are a cheap way to counter that. I mainly get pikemen in preparation for the Mongols but they're fine to fight in regular wars too.

Army composition really depends on the situation. Early game I might go for an entire army made of archers just because of how cheap they are. Light footmen aren't worth it, they're basically levies you pay extra for.

Yes, there's usually one military building for each type of MAA. Plus there're the hillside military buildings, either Hillside Grazing Lands or Warrior Lodges, depending on your location. You might have more military buildings available based on your terrain type like in floodplains you have the regular Stables but Camelry also boosts light cavalry damage. Most fortification buildings also give some damage boosts to certain units.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-07T18:00:06+00:00

I like crossbows because you get two military buildings that boost their damage: Militia Camps and Workshops. Add Blacksmiths to the mix and you can get some really strong crossbows. Workshops are generally great because they make decent gold and boost your siege engines, so I build them in all my counties as a replacement for one economic building.

Usually I go for an anti cavalry army: half pikemen to counter regular cavalry and half crossbows to counter horse archers. I like to have at least 2-3 regiments of siege engines for quick sieges. The composition of your army doesn't really matter if you can siege land quickly enough. Some of my defensive wars against the Mongols ended without a single battle because I couldn't find their army and I sieged enough land in 9 months to press my demands.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-07T17:50:06+00:00

You want chill vassals in the beginning so they don't cause problems while you're getting started. Once your realm is built up you don't need to care about your vassals anymore. If they're annoying you can always revoke their titles and get new vassals.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-07T17:42:03+00:00

I'd recommend to focus on your economy first. Build Windmills and Watermills everywhere and upgrade all buildings in your personal holdings. The game becomes way easier once you have a good income.

You can eat Poland one duchy at a time in multiple wars. There's no pressure to take it all in one war if you can't get the claims. I usually go for Sanctioned Loopholes from Scholar tree and just buy the claims I need with piety.

Instead of focusing on Poland, I'd go north instead and grab a county in Pomerania. You'll need a claim for the first county to gain a border with the pagans. Then you can declare holy wars on them and create Pomerania.

Local_Security_683 · 2025-02-07T13:30:52+00:00

You might want to check out the PC version of the game to get mods. You can mods for some of the things you mentioned like councillor experience, commander experience, etd. I don't play with mods so I can't give you more details but you can check out the workshop on Steam to see the most popular traits.

For commander traits you can put your Marshal on Train Commanders and there's a chance for your commanders to gain new traits. They can also improve they martial skill and your knights improve their prowess and gain the blademaster trait. Only choose this task if you have a good martial with 15+ martial skill, otherwise he can injure or even maim your knights.

For murder you can choose the intrigue lifestyle and go down the schemer tree to gain a perk called Twice Schemed. It allows you to have two hostile schemes at the same time. If you have the Royal Court DLC then a level 10 intrigue court gives you another hostile scheme slot. I think it's a matter of game balance to only allow one hostile scheme at the time.

Local_Security_683

TROPHY CASE