Post 15 Mar 2007, 03:38 by LadyAurora
I have beaten TSK twice now (I'm obsessed, I know), and have just discovered TPS, so now I have a new thng to kill hours of valuable time on..
Anyway, I like this game because I love building really efficient towns- I thought I'd share some of my strategies. Some of them are different than those already on the site.
*Build your farms close together.
Build one farm with your standard 12-15 squares of ploughed fields next to it. After your famer has seeded those squares, add another 8-10 squares to your field. Then build another farm nearby. While you are building your second farm, your farmer will seed the new squares while he is waiting for his fields to grow. By the time your second farmer is ready to work, most of the field will be planted and some of it will be ready to harvest!
This is handy for getting your wheat stockpile up early in the game. It is also more efficient, as your famers are always planting right behind the other farmer's harvest. And it saves precious land in the levels where space is a priority.
Do not build vineyards together in this way, however. There is no advantage, in fact your two farmers will try to inevitably try to harvest the same vines and one of them will waste a trip out, making your wineharvest take longer.
*Build grapefields before you build your vineyard.
Vines take a long time to ripen. If you build your vineyard as you are building your field, your farmer will reach his house and spend a lot of time waiting around with nothing to do. If you wait a little while (about the time it takes to go build something else), that way your farmer will arrive with some vines already ripened, and he'll be able to start his harvest right away.
*Woodcutter to Carpenter Ratio 3/2.
I've found that the best way to ensure a steady supply of timber is to build two woodcutters to one carpenter's shop. This way there are always enough tree trunks, but never so many that they start piling up at the storehouse. Also I alway build my first carpenter's shop near the forest. It is often faster if tree trunks go straight from the woodcutter to the shop, as woodcutter's huts often need to be far from the storehouse, and it can take a long time for your serfs to go back and forth.
For levels where you are building bigger towns, I build a new storehouse near my forest to hold tree trunks, and build my second carpenter next to my weapons workshop.
*Get rid of unwanted trees
That spot in the middle is the perfect place to put my mill/butcher's shop/bakery, but there's a tree in my way and I don't want to put a woodcutter there! What to do?
Well, there are a couple of ways to get rid of that pesky greenery. One of them will cost you a wood and a stone. Build a vineyard square next to your tree. Then immediately build a road on top of the vineyard. The vineyard walls will get rid of the tree, and you can build on top of the road square. If you have the resources this way can be a little easier.
The other way is to lay out a smaller building next to the tree, and the laborer will dispose of the tree as he is flattening out the ground. Then demolish the building before the serfs get assigned to bring the resources to build it. This only works if you can build a building with the tree on the side, as the laboror usually leaves the tree intact if it is on the corner.
*Leave lots of space in front of your barracks.
Whenever your build multiple soldiers at once, they will immediately come out in a long line, and you will have to wait for all of them to exit the barracks before you can consolidate them into formations. So make sure your barracks door is not blocked in front by buildings. Otherwise your soldiers will wander all around your town and get in the way of your serfs trying to use the roads. I find its good to put my barracks above my forest or my farmland, where there are few serfs about to interfere with. Or build it so that the entrance sticks outside the town entirely. It is also good if the road entering the barracks approaches from the side rather than from the front. That way serfs carrying armour and weapons inside are less likely to be roadblocked by exiting soldiers.
Hope someone finds these helpful! I'll write more if I think of them.
-Aurora
. To speed things up - place dozen of towers at once. Note: roads built by this method are not visible on mini-map.
