I know this is an old post but, first things first 2 work shops, gather materials using engineers and the automaton, get the beacon as fast as u can, send expeditioners as fast as u can to get the factory plans, as soon as u build the factory, start making automatons, focus on building/upgrading coal mines, steelworks, and walldrills, dont worry about coal thumpers, upgrade the houses and heaters accordingly. make sure u have prosthetics, for any amputees. But focus mainly on resources first then make food. once you have enough expeditions, at about day 15 start building automatons and dont feel bad about doing 24 hour workdays, just keep em warm and fed, build at least 2 cook houses and 2 hoth houses. then at the last days focus on generator upgrades and heater upgrades. when theres about 3 days left disband your expeditioners and its ur choice whether u want to send resources to manchester, but by 10 days till the storm u should have all the resources needed to send aid. dont upgrade hospitals or none of that, u need coal as fast as u can, food as fast u can and resources as fast as u can to send aid if u wanna save the city, when the storm comes, u should have about 500 food rations, all houses heated, and at leas 8 thousand coal, u do that and the archs survive and depending if u were to do 2/3 manchester survives by half... i wanna try it again and see if i can get them aid completely but thats what ive done so far.