After 180hours of “Against the Storm” i wanted to share a few tips and tricks i’ve gathered. It’s not an exhaustive list, and only my opinion. I’ve never consulted any guide, this is what i gathered from playthroughs. It may contain minor spoilers but nothing about the story of the campaign.
I’m currently level 16, onwards to that gold seal unlock, and i have unlocked prestige 3.
Here we go:
Choose wisely your next tile before starting a town: the available ressources, the inhabitants you start with as well as the caravan points you spend: no need to invest in farms in marshlands, or spend points on the hut lvl 2 if there is only one kind of available resources you will use it for.
Most (all?) maps start the same. You are always able to draw a straight road from one end of the glade to the other, passing by the heart and the main storage.
I start all my games the same:
3.1 build the woodcutters next to the closest glade i’m interested in, one of the small ones and start chopping. When it’s opened, i will move the woodcutting to the side of the hearth, see 3.3
3.2 build whatever hut i need to collect ressources
3.3 elect the side of the hearth i will build the houses in. There’s enough room on the sides to align two rows of 2 large house + one special house. Ultimately, that will be 4 large houses 2 special houses on this side. Repeat if need more housing.
3.4 depending on the difficulty, build the comfort park to gain that +1 resolve (hearth lvl 1) and weather the storms better
3.5 one of your first three building MUST be able to make planks with at least 2 stars.
3.6 build roads all around hearth and storage
Some of my favourites cornerstones:
x ressources/min: having a steady income of one of the ressources you’re missing for clothes or food is tip top
2 provisions for each new villager: ultimate if you plan on leveraging on trade routes, you wont have to craft them provisions no more !
increase production of wood: then you can move on with either planks or coal and dont worry about wood shortage
Before the storm starts, take a close look at the coming negative events, and check if you can decrease hostility or improve resolve:
shutting down wood cutting, if you can afford it, can reduce hostility (some modifiers cancel this)
affecting workers to jobs that they like (blue highlight) will improve the morale for this population, potentially preventing resolve to drop below one and causing people to leave
can always speed up time while your colony is waiting out the storm and reaffect everybody in their right place back after the storm. However, for the coming year, you need build/choose perks and buildings that will improve the situation for next storm as possible.
sacrificing wood or coal in the hearth decrease hostility
build that first comfort park to reach hearth lvl 1
Trading
considering one pack of provision is worth one gold (money), do the maths for the trade routes to decide if it’s worth it: might reconsider giving those 16 planks for 5 gold if you need them.
buying luxury/manufactured items (beer, clothes, wine…) is cheaper than raw materials.
It may be worth to invest in those 40 biscuits 1 minute before the storm, to boost up resolve before the storm hits
