10 HRS in-game so far, just as a bit of side note I’m on my second playthrough, still exploring the mechanics of the game since I’m not the kind to go googling around or watch videos to learn, as I said, more of a trial and tested type of player with this kind of games
I have an issue understanding the desirability mechanic.
Right now, I’m a little bit stuck since I cannot upgrade my Shelters to Homestead given that homes do not have enough desirability.
How do you build it efficiently, since I haven’t found a detailed explanation in-game about it? It is something you can find from the start given how you position your buildings or what’s the deal exactly?
What I did so far to cover my potential mistakes is to fill the areas with Decorations, however, it’s really resource consuming, and I think there should also be another way than spending money for it.
Be mindful of building placement. You may or may not have noticed but some building lower desirability while others improve it. You’ll see in these screenshots that the barn greatly lowers desirability (indicated by the two red arrows down) and the bakery improves it (indicated by the green arrow up). I try to build my shelters in a way that the desirable buildings (market, bakery, etc.) will be in the center, and I completely segregate my “industrial” part of the town (foundry, wood chopping, other things that lower).
However, can you “stack” this low desirability in the “industrial area”? Does it influence worker behaviour or production in any way?
Because if I have a firewood chopping station and I build a barn, does it influence it in any way if it already has like -25?
I have not noticed any impact on those building as a result of desirability. If you press the “G” button on your keyboard it gives you an overlay showing all buildings desirability, this only shows up on shelters (and their upgraded versions) so I assume any of the other buildings have no impact on it.
You can get Homestaeds basicly zero decor buildings.
Don’t build anything near your houeses that has negativ effects. If you place a building, always press G and look out if you get lower desire. The red cicle around it, doesnt acuratly represent the real impact raduis.
Mines for example have a red “shadow” below them, but their negativity exceed this.
If your houeses are seperate from any industry, it’s normaly enough to place a market, healer and bakery so they benefit from it. You can see which buildings are effected by either using G again, or wihtout and look for the buildings with green outkines, which tells you, that they are included.
Fun fact: The bakery doesn’t need to be working. Build it, remove all workers from it, but don’t disable it. The healers house can be enabled/disabled as you need it.
When you got some gold, build a shrine. Then you can disable the healer forever.
I build myself blocks of houeses with 2-3 3x3 spaces in the center for shrine, medium garden, bees and small gardens.
Desirability only affects your hose structures where your villagers live such as shelters and temporary shelters (and all of the upgrades, of course). I’m on my eighth or ninth replay of trying to get the right combination of roads, shelters and desirable buildings and decorations right. Sometimes it works better and sometimes it doesn’t.
I tend to spam markets a lot both because they are tax revenue generating and because they boost desirability. I also put in wells every so often but not enough to overlap or to make it unsafe when fires occur. And when you have them, intersperse bakeries, schools, healers, etc. so they fit your path layout and if you fine you have smaller patches of empty space then put in decorations like parks or gardens or plazas. I dedicate some larger places for the larger of the decorations as well for a nice cosmetic look.
Finally, the theater has a huge sphere of influence on desirability so plan on putting that toward the center of your residential district.
This is all subjective to defenses, etc., but I play only in pacifist mode so I don’t worry about raids and the like. Your mileage may vary.
One thing is for certain - do NOT put anything that has a double red down arrow anywhere near residential buildings or you’ll never get them to upgrade no matter what you try.
Once i found that markets, bakeries, schools and healer houses boost desirability then it got a lot easier. I am still working on the best layouts but if i just throw those buidings in my neighborhood and then add some shrines and all the other little stuff then its not as bad anymore.
