I was playing on a map that had very distinct fertile areas that made spreading out my markets and farms desirable. What I found out was the farmer AI that makes them great when farms are next to each other, cause a death spiral once there is a farm separated from others. Basically my farmers spent all of their time trying to go back and forth from zone A to zone B and that led to crop rot and starvation.
I wonder if there is a way to have farmers somehow prefer their own assigned farm, and then only help others if in some predetermined range - otherwise you always have to clump all farms together regardless of fertility/land features.
This situation annoys me quite a bit. It prevents from actually using the landscape and fertility and to set up small satellite towns farther out. Especially if one aims for high pop in a city. Right now I have like all my farms on on side in the west and my barns in the north so they get the fodder for winter. My hunters and fishers are mainly in the south together with some industry. In the east I’ll set up my orchards so food comes at least from all sides. But in that scenario I have to place my Smokehouses somewhere in the middle, else the smokers run for ages from one side to the other. Right now I have a rootcellar close to them with minimum need at max so every meat and fish is brought in by labourers. But then again one needs them for other stuff too.
In short: it would be great if the workers had a radius in which they do stuff around their workplace so you can savely spread buildings farther away instead of cluster them all.