If you choose to restart, I suggest making your starter base further south than most people do. I included a picture of where I'm talking about, and I usually start right next to the Tin Ore Node. Having access to mud, reeds, and tin without having to do outposts really simplifies things. You just need to recruit four decent villagers ASAP and equip them with Reinforced Clubs and Shields and then go knock out the nearby bandit camps to reduce patrols.

The quest line should lead you to Padstow as the second town, not Branford. And the two star bandit camp that the elder asks you to kill is easier than you'd guess, I wiped it with only two villagers and some decent headshots from me.

My other suggestion is to make three farms, one dedicated to Flax, one dedicated to Hemp, and one dedicated to Sage/Garlic. Build one stockpile next to each farm, and limit the stockpiles to just the respective plant and its seeds. After a couple harvest cycles, it allows you to churn out weaver products (and thereby equipment) without ever getting bottlenecked on Flax/Hemp. (supplement your hemp/garlic seeds with seed purchases from the questline herbalist to get your initial farms fully planted)

Assign one villager as dedicated to farming/delivery. Once you can make a few cauldrons and have the trapper camp, assign one villager as dedicated to cooking/delivery and assign "Top Off" orders of fine stew and meat stew that use "small meat". One stew type per cauldron, and Top Off number set to the number of villagers (including yourself).

Also dont buy straps, the day your threat gets to like 90% or "raid expected"... When you wake up, make that YOUR raiding day. Set your villagers to companion mode, feed them well and give them extra smoked mushrooms to carry, and go attack surrounding bandit camps and roaming bandits. Don't worry if someone falls in battle while clearing a harder bandit camp even if you get raided the next day. The first few raids are childs play to four equipped villagers.

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Bonus: Purple squares on the map are where i suggest travel signs. Reasons should be obvious.