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Banished |OT| Its like SimTown, but by one guy instead of Maxis, oh and its great

ASTROID2

Member
A blazing fire destroyed my town. It stared as one house then spread to another house and them my school house then my storage barn. And my blacksmith, and wood cutter. In total is was like 6 houses 1 storage barn and 1 blacksmith, and 1 wood cutter. After this them all my people started starving. I lost so many adults and children. :(

I also noticed during the fire I got an abundance of adults, I think the disaster might make children become adults faster.
 

Raxum

Member
A blazing fire destroyed my town. It stared as one house then spread to another house and them my school house then my storage barn. And my blacksmith, and wood cutter. In total is was like 6 houses 1 storage barn and 1 blacksmith, and 1 wood cutter. After this them all my people started starving. I lost so many adults and children. :(

I also noticed during the fire I got an abundance of adults, I think the disaster might make children become adults faster.

Probably what happened was when your school burned down the students in the school no longer had a school to go to, so they became "Adults".
 

Niahak

Member
Any tips for using the brewmaster? It seems like mine is constantly out of resources.... I'll have like 500 apples and the brewmaster uses them all up in a flash and is idling without resources

I've been running into the same trouble, but my yield improved somewhat when I:
1) Put the brewmaster near the resource it uses if you can (e.g. by the storehouse your apples go into)
2) Produced considerably more of that food source than others (much easier with wheat than with orchard resources)

I wish you could designate a food type to be used only for brewing, so brewers could run all year instead of just until that food type runs out.

I'd be interested in other tips re: brewmaster. The problem with placing it by resources is that it makes it more difficult for citizens to visit. Wish brewmaster and tavern were two separate concepts, or that the booze went to the market.

I also found out while playing tonight that my citizens had probably grown unhappy due to their proximity to mines / quarries, and that wells (evidently) can produce a little happiness as a gathering spot. Didn't realize that either building type had that direct effect.
 

elfinke

Member
I would say, "YES!" I have found that playing Banished relaxes my emotional stress while stimulating my mind much like Caesar 3. The big difference for me is that Banished seems more limited since it does not have buildings advance - I always loved seeing insulae get bigger! If someone can create a mod that allows homes to advance and require additional goods and services, I will be playing Banished for years.

Definitely, though obviously the scale is much smaller (I wouldn't call anything in this game a proper city) and basic survival plays a big role. But if you're a fan of either game, I think you'd feel right at home in Banished.

Most excellent, thanks.
 
Any tips for using the brewmaster? It seems like mine is constantly out of resources.... I'll have like 500 apples and the brewmaster uses them all up in a flash and is idling without resources
Use wheat, plums as I think they grow faster and in more abundance. Also more than one farm as they out use a single one
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
Just noticed something...what the hell is the category of nuts? Cuz it ain't "fruits", "grains", or "vegetable", since it doesn't auto buy from those categories.
 

Retro

Member
There are a few orchards that grow nuts. I had pecans in one of my first towns, and I'm fairly certain there are more.
 

Orlandu84

Member
cool, I have an avatar-bro. I salute you sir.

As I you, sir. The Laughing Man is simply too cool not to use.

Speaking of Banished's popularity, it goes to show just how many people were waiting for a game like this to come out. Perhaps this surge of interest will lead to a stand-alone complex of great sim games ;)
 

Mengy

wishes it were bannable to say mean things about Marvel
There are a few orchards that grow nuts. I had pecans in one of my first towns, and I'm fairly certain there are more.

Yeah, pecans, walnuts, and chestnuts off of the top of my head.

On the topic of ale, I like using wheat for it. I always seem to have a ton of wheat, so it makes for plentiful booze.
 

subrock

Member
Just got hit with the population die-off. Seems like increasing the happiness and getting the market/trading post/townhall combo for nomads was the only way around it
 

Ultrabum

Member
Just got hit with the population die-off. Seems like increasing the happiness and getting the market/trading post/townhall combo for nomads was the only way around it

Also having more houses results in more children, even from the same number of adults.
 

Niahak

Member
Anyone had luck with a "controlled" die-off?

I took in a bunch of nomads for the achievement, but I had a glut of laborers (which I could support food-wise, after some wrangling and quick fishery-building). My pop grew to 350 or so. Rather than try and build facilities for them to be useful, since there's not really a need for any new labor, I built a very limited number of houses and now I have a lot of people in their 60s-80s and I'm waiting for them to die off to keep my population more manageable.

Will I see another pop boom when those houses become empty and they're filled with kids? I'm planning to grow my population over time, but I want it to be gradual and I don't want to suddenly have 300+ kids.

Right now my mix is something like 280/50/40 adults/students/kids, most of those adults are in their 50s or so. Very few people in their 20s/30s.
 
D

Deleted member 47027

Unconfirmed Member
As I you, sir. The Laughing Man is simply too cool not to use.

Speaking of Banished's popularity, it goes to show just how many people were waiting for a game like this to come out. Perhaps this surge of interest will lead to a stand-alone complex of great sim games ;)

I agree. It filled a big void in my life that other competitors didn't get right. Banished is dope as fuck.
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
Would anyone be interested in a GAF Banished challenge contest for fun and prizes? I'm thinking of something like....we choose a suitable seed for a map that is small/mountains/harsh and then see who can get the highest population over the weekend. I can provide some Steam games as prizes.
 

bjaelke

Member
Starting on the same seed could be fun. If not for the competitive aspect, then just to see how everyone approached the scenario.
 

Mengy

wishes it were bannable to say mean things about Marvel
Would anyone be interested in a GAF Banished challenge contest for fun and prizes? I'm thinking of something like....we choose a suitable seed for a map that is small/mountains/harsh and then see who can get the highest population over the weekend. I can provide some Steam games as prizes.

Starting on the same seed could be fun. If not for the competitive aspect, then just to see how everyone approached the scenario.

I like this idea, kind of like a NeoGAF Banished Challenge. I wouldn't be able to do a timed event like over the weekend deal though, my schedule is too random to promise something like that. But a nice casual challenge where we all pick one seed and map settings and then see who can make the most interesting / highest pop town, yeah I'd be all into that. It would be fun to compare everyone's towns to each other.
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
I like this idea, kind of like a NeoGAF Banished Challenge. I wouldn't be able to do a timed event like over the weekend deal though, my schedule is too random to promise something like that. But a nice casual challenge where we all pick one seed and map settings and then see who can make the most interesting / highest pop town, yeah I'd be all into that. It would be fun to compare everyone's towns to each other.

Well, it could be a weeklong thing, or even span a couple weeks.
 

Cerity

Member
I'm really liking some of the mod ideas that are coming out. Bee hives so you can obtain Honey and Wax, you then can use the wax to make candles. Windmills so you that you can produce flour and ultimately bread. I'll probably dive into the modding scene depending on how the mod tools are
 

Orlandu84

Member
I'm really liking some of the mod ideas that are coming out. Bee hives so you can obtain Honey and Wax, you then can use the wax to make candles. Windmills so you that you can produce flour and ultimately bread. I'll probably dive into the modding scene depending on how the mod tools are

One feature that I would love to see implemented is a day/night cycle. That cycle would impact how productive citizens are based on how much light they have. In particular, summers would see more activity since there would be more light and heat with winters have less activity, especially outside. A proper candle mod would then enable your town to have more light at night allowing increased productivity!
 

kidko

Member
I've been running into the same trouble, but my yield improved somewhat when I:
1) Put the brewmaster near the resource it uses if you can (e.g. by the storehouse your apples go into)
2) Produced considerably more of that food source than others (much easier with wheat than with orchard resources)

I wish you could designate a food type to be used only for brewing, so brewers could run all year instead of just until that food type runs out.

I'd be interested in other tips re: brewmaster. The problem with placing it by resources is that it makes it more difficult for citizens to visit. Wish brewmaster and tavern were two separate concepts, or that the booze went to the market.

I also found out while playing tonight that my citizens had probably grown unhappy due to their proximity to mines / quarries, and that wells (evidently) can produce a little happiness as a gathering spot. Didn't realize that either building type had that direct effect.

Sounds like I'm probably building it too early. I figured one orchard would be able to supply a brewmaster but I probably need to get 3 of them going first... or try a crop like wheat instead.
 

Niahak

Member
Sounds like I'm probably building it too early. I figured one orchard would be able to supply a brewmaster but I probably need to get 3 of them going first... or try a crop like wheat instead.
That seems pretty likely.

I think I had 7-8 wheat fields (10x10 or so) each producing around 600 wheat annually before my breweries started routinely producing 100 ale a season.

Having a huge surplus of other food would help too, so your citizens aren't eating all the apples.
 
Kinda hard to unlock Uneducated, Isolationist and One with Nature using the same town. :(

Lack of stone and food plus dumb population = ...
 
That seems pretty likely.

I think I had 7-8 wheat fields (10x10 or so) each producing around 600 wheat annually before my breweries started routinely producing 100 ale a season.

Having a huge surplus of other food would help too, so your citizens aren't eating all the apples.

how are you having so many fields producing so little wheat? should produce 1k+ per field unless you rushed them really early and before education
 

Orbis

Member
This is one of those few city-builder style games that feels truly alive. The fact that things can very rapidly descend into disaster due to your own mismanagement and lack of attention to particular areas is probably a major factor in that. Relative to other games, it's quite a challenge to build something that's stable and sustainable.
 

Niahak

Member
how are you having so many fields producing so little wheat? should produce 1k+ per field unless you rushed them really early and before education

It's probably because I only assign one worker per field. They vary between ~600-1000 per season. I figure another worker isn't worth the ~250 or so improvement in harvest. I haven't run tests to see the difference though.
 

espher

Member
Did I screw myself by expanding and building a second market? When my population hit 70 adults (currently 70/15/15, was higher) I decided to build almost like a second hub on the other side of the river.

I emulated the setup I used initially, to some extent -- market surrounded by houses and crafters, a couple of satellite product facilities (built the same way my main town was built), but since then I've had starvation problems and had problems maintaining a food reserve (though things are starting to improve a bit now that I got through a season of farming) and I've had about 12 people die of starvation this year (and in an odd twist of fate they were almost all gatherers/farmers).

Food consumption looks to be up a bit (despite no pop change), but production should be too since I added more sources (it is not and my reserves are trending downwards). I can't account for the increased consumption, or where resources went, but almost every barn is empty, the vendors never have food on them when I check, and both marketplaces are often empty. My ale/alcohol production is at the same level it was previously, so it's not like I've suddenly fed MOAR BERRIES into it. Sometimes I'll inspect people and they'll be nowhere near their home or workplace, and the pathing for NPCs and homes seems to have suddenly gone tits-up (and I'm not sure if there's a good way to reset that aside from perhaps unassigning everyone and re-assigning them and hoping they get a job near their home -- is there a good way to do this?).

I'm just trying to figure out what caused it to all go belly up when a season prior I was sitting on a surplus of every non-building resource and it's got me perplexed.

Edit: Or it might have just been the AI being silly. A year later I've got a stockpile of 800 food, but I watched a starving NPC walk all the way from one side of the map (the one with his home, work, market, and nearest storage barn) to the other to get something to eat, only to have someone empty that barn before he got there, then watched him walk almost all of the way back -- walking past a stocked barn and both marketplaces -- trying to get... who knows where... before dying of starvation.
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
Quick question about the game, can you place 2 hunting cabins side by side or is that useless due to the fact they will be hunting the same land?
You shouldnt overlap hunting/gathering/fishing.

you should have a hunter hut as free of other buildings as possible. Just like the fishing dock yields more fish the more water is in the circle, the hunters cabin yields more meat/leather the more empty land is in the circle. You can put the number or workers up to 4 and get max yield. it's ok to have the storage bin and housing outside the circle. it doesnt matter that much for hunters.
 
You shouldnt overlap hunting/gathering/fishing.

you should have a hunter hut as free of other buildings as possible. Just like the fishing dock yields more fish the more water is in the circle, the hunters cabin yields more meat/leather the more empty land is in the circle. You can put the number or workers up to 4 and get max yield. it's ok to have the storage bin and housing outside the circle. it doesnt matter that much for hunters.

Much appreciated.
 

Mengy

wishes it were bannable to say mean things about Marvel
So I've been trying to get three achievements at once for the past few days:

  • Uneducated: Reach a population of 300 citizens without building schools.
  • Isolationist: Reach 300 citizens without building a trading post.
  • One with Nature: Reach 400 citizens without building crops fields, orchards, or pastures.

I'm on my third town now, two attempts imploded horribly, and this third town is holding steady but rough going. I am constantly juggling tool shortages with food shortages, every time I try to expand. Trying to feed an ignorant, uneducated civilization with only gatherers, fishermen, and hunters is like walking a tightrope wearing high heels. And I need a ton of blacksmiths and miners just to keep the tools in supply, I guess stupid miners and blacksmiths simply have a horrible output.

I may need to break these three achievements up and start trading for iron, food and tools, because one thing I am in great supply of is logs and firewood. Maybe I'll get the no trading achieve in a town where I can grow crops and animals.
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
So I've been trying to get three achievements at once for the past few days:

  • Uneducated: Reach a population of 300 citizens without building schools.
  • Isolationist: Reach 300 citizens without building a trading post.
  • One with Nature: Reach 400 citizens without building crops fields, orchards, or pastures.

I'm on my third town now, two attempts imploded horribly, and this third town is holding steady but rough going. I am constantly juggling tool shortages with food shortages, every time I try to expand. Trying to feed an ignorant, uneducated civilization with only gatherers, fishermen, and hunters is like walking a tightrope wearing high heels. And I need a ton of blacksmiths and miners just to keep the tools in supply, I guess stupid miners and blacksmiths simply have a horrible output.

I may need to break these three achievements up and start trading for iron, food and tools, because one thing I am in great supply of is logs and firewood. Maybe I'll get the no trading achieve in a town where I can grow crops and animals.

I already gave up on doing those three all at once. It's freakin' hard. I just did the One with Nature achievement by itself. I will attempt the no school/no traders at the same time, though.

When trying to do all three at once, the sheer logistics of food via gathering/hunting/fishing means that you're eventually going to run out of space. To do it, I think one would need a LOT of really good fishing spots, since the food/tile ratio is really good.
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
Would anyone be interested in a GAF Banished challenge contest for fun and prizes? I'm thinking of something like....we choose a suitable seed for a map that is small/mountains/harsh and then see who can get the highest population over the weekend. I can provide some Steam games as prizes.

Anyone one else? It seems like everyone (on gaf) has mostly moved on from this game. I don't really want to do it unless we get at least more than a few participants. Perhaps it would get more attention once (if) I establish it and put it out on the front.
 

Rubixcuba

Banned
Anyone one else? It seems like everyone (on gaf) has mostly moved on from this game. I don't really want to do it unless we get at least more than a few participants. Perhaps it would get more attention once (if) I establish it and put it out on the front.

I would be in, but as you note I've kinda moved on from Banished. Hit 75% of achievements with my one mega town, got over 1,000 population. Definitely feel like I squeezed everything out of it. Although, a challenge contest does sound fun !
 

Mengy

wishes it were bannable to say mean things about Marvel
Anyone one else? It seems like everyone (on gaf) has mostly moved on from this game. I don't really want to do it unless we get at least more than a few participants. Perhaps it would get more attention once (if) I establish it and put it out on the front.

I'd be up for it, I'm still playing every couple of days. I'm going to get all 100% of the achievements, and a few of them are proving rather hard to get. Dark Souls and Diablo III have been stealing my time lately.
 

SJRB

Gold Member
Is it possible to just keep a small community? Everytime I run into the issue that I'm forced to drastically expand, usually because I run out of natural resources [stone] and I need a quarry. Which in turn required an absurd amount of 20+ workers. Which require a lot of new houses. Which requires a ton of additional food resources. Which requires ??? workers. Which requires more houses. etc. etc.

The whole thing just kind of spirals out of control every time.
 

Rentahamster

Rodent Whores
Is it possible to just keep a small community? Everytime I run into the issue that I'm forced to drastically expand, usually because I run out of natural resources [stone] and I need a quarry. Which in turn required an absurd amount of 20+ workers. Which require a lot of new houses. Which requires a ton of additional food resources. Which requires ??? workers. Which requires more houses. etc. etc.

The whole thing just kind of spirals out of control every time.

Not really, unless you do some tedious micromanagement. If you don't build new houses, your young folk can't move out, because they can't fuck in the presence of their parents or something.
 
Is it possible to just keep a small community? Everytime I run into the issue that I'm forced to drastically expand, usually because I run out of natural resources [stone] and I need a quarry. Which in turn required an absurd amount of 20+ workers. Which require a lot of new houses. Which requires a ton of additional food resources. Which requires ??? workers. Which requires more houses. etc. etc.

The whole thing just kind of spirals out of control every time.

Dont ever trade away any stone, iron or tools, I did that on my newest save and I had tons of them left over and had no issues. They're finite resources, build 2 or 3 overlapping foresters and gather a ton of wood which convert to firewood (at woodcutters near to the forests so they dont have to travel far) and use that to trade with merchants until you can get cattle and sheep which you turn into wool and leather and can sell coats.
 

subrock

Member
Also having more houses results in more children, even from the same number of adults.

I had a glut of houses in the town, so I think there was something fishy going on with travel routes or supply proximity or something. It was like there was a hard edge at 60 people that is just didn't want to go past. I've since, with better layout, gotten up to ~120 people and no nomads, so it must've been a nuance that I didn't miss. I do agree with the spiralling out of control criticism. Something always seems to go wrong gradually and the die off starts.
 
I had a glut of houses in the town, so I think there was something fishy going on with travel routes or supply proximity or something. It was like there was a hard edge at 60 people that is just didn't want to go past. I've since, with better layout, gotten up to ~120 people and no nomads, so it must've been a nuance that I didn't miss. I do agree with the spiralling out of control criticism. Something always seems to go wrong gradually and the die off starts.

You shouldn't do any form of housing expansion without adding another farm/woodcutter etc, that will probably where you go wrong. More houses, you need more of everything because they will have babies within a year or so (unless very old people move into them but I've noticed they don't seem to move)

I let herbs and food build up, I don't want my farmers or herdsman etc getting me wood/stone, so even if I have like 20k food, I build a couple of markets and a couple of trading posts and I usually send my excess fish or mutton to the trading posts. Food doesn't go off so hoarding isn't a problem and it means I can easily put a ton of food back if I'm having issue with expansion.
 
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