There are two ways to Upgrade a process or building in FF. Provide an entire new building with different capabilities, or add more workers to an existing structure. But the maximum number of workers a structure will hold is set by the game.
Let’s take a look at the ‘bottlenecks’ created by this dual system.
While there are structures in both Amenities and Storage categories that have no upgrades and few workers’ spaces, I haven’t seen many complaints about them. The single Teacher in a School can turn out 10 - 30 graduated townsfolk at once, so seems to have no problem keeping up with the population. The only complaint I’ve seen about the Rat Catcher is the maintenance cost in Gold at a time when all costs are critical, not that the single Rat Catcher cannot keep up with all the rats in his work area. The single Publican in a Pub can already sell enough booze to start riots by drunken homicidal soldiers, so another booze-slinger in the pub might not be an Upgrade but simply a source of extra problems.
It is in Food and Resource production and use that the system becomes erratic.
Food Production:
While the Hunter Shack has an Upgrade, neither Forager nor Fisher do, and they are, like the Hunter, limited to a single worker each. I suggest that both need an Upgrade version:
Forager could Upgrade to Herb Gardener, still with 1 worker, the Herbalist, who can now move Herbs and Medicinal Plants and Willow the way Blueberries can be moved now. That would allow you better access to critical resources for your numerous Upper Tier inhabitants.
Fisher’s Hut could upgrade to Fishing Shed, also still with 1 worker, but he can use Flax to make Fishing Nets and Traps and greatly increase production of fish from the same area.
Other buildings in Food Production, like Snokehouse (1 worker), Windmill, Bakery, Arborist (2 workers each), and Cheesemaker and Preservist (6 workers each) also have no Upgrade versions, but are less critical. You want to spread out your Bakeries, because they give a slight Desirability bonus, while at the moment one Mill seems to be able to make Flour faster than 1 Bakery can turn it into Bread: at a 1:1 ratio of Mills/Bakeries, I find that I wind up with almost 4:1 flour to bread.
Resources
This is where the game gets weird. Out of 25 manned structures available, 19 have no Upgrade version. And 4 of those have a maximum of 2 or fewer workers:
Compost Yard (1 worker)
Cobbler Shop (2 workers)
Basket Shop (2 workers)
Brickyard (2 workers)
- every other production building has 4 or more worker slots potentially available
- and by no coincidence, it seems hardest to keep up with the population needs for Shoes (cobblers) and Bricks (Brickyard). No one that I’ve seen has posted about a shortage of Baskets, but they are a lucrative early Trade item so if I have access to Willow on the map, I find a second Basket Shop almost a requirement.
Suggestions:
Cobbler Shop could upgrade to a Cordwainer, with up to 4 workers who could make not only ordinary Shoes but also luxury Boots for upper Tier housing.
Brickyard could upgrade to a Brick Kiln with up to 4 workers which, depending on how they plan to extend the game beyond Tier 4, could provide not only regular bricks but also clay roofing tiles (Because one of the first rules in any walled town was that you had to have fire-proof roofing of tile or slate to avoid spreading devastating fires - a thatched roof would never be allowed because of the fire danger)
Basket Shop could upgrade to a Wicker Works, 4 workers maximum, which provides not only more Baskets but also woven springs and bases for more comfortable beds - also a luxury or even a required item for upper Tier housing.
They’ve already hinted at Deep Mines and Quarries to ‘upgrade’ all the mineral resource structures: mines, stone, clay and sand pits. This fits neatly with the current upgrades available for some of their end-products, like the Foundry, Blacksmith and Armory. To keep in line with all those that have up to 6 workers in their Upgrade versions, the Brickyard might upgrade to 6 workers as well.
Defense
Right now, both walls and towers have one Upgrade: from wood to stone. But the towers are still small, with only 2 Guards, and the stone walls are about 8 - 10 foot tall curtain walls that more closely resemble the Toll or Tax Walls than real defenses. That is, they are sufficient to keep the farmers from sneaking a cart load or pack animal’s worth of produce into town and selling it at the Market without paying any taxes on it, but in the game they cannot even keep individuals with clubs from beating their way through the wall.
I suggest, therefore, that we need one more set of Defense Upgrades:
Watch Tower should upgrade to a Bastion, with a 2 x 2 footprint instead of 1 x 1, but holding up to 4 Guards and embedded in the wall (that is, stone wall sections can connect to it on all four sides). A nice touch would be to make these round so that they protrude out from the wall.
Fortified Gate could become a Gatehouse - now a 2 x 3 structure instead of 1 x 1, a heavy gate opening vertically into an upper structure with a round tower on each side and a portcullis gate behind. Could also hold 4 Guards and ‘shoot’ down into the space between the gates (‘murder holes’)
Fortified Wall could become a Hoarded Wall, a 2 tile deep stone wall with Hoardings - wooden upper works, a roofed, protected walkway for defenders to fire from and cover the wall.
These ‘Upper Tier’ defenses should be expensive, requiring Gold as well as Planks (for the Hoarding) and Iron (for the Portcullis and reinforced Gate) as well as piles of Stone.
The Hoarded Wall would require the most change, since so far in-game walls are just barriers, with no defensive effect except to slow down the enemy and keep him vulnerable to fire from the towers for a bit longer.
For balance, of course, the 2nd Upgrade defenses might be matched by Upper Tier Raiders as well, but I hope they don’t go too far in that direction: as I’ve posted elsewhere, there are plenty of battle-oriented games for those that want to play digital soldier, so I don’t think it would be smart to turn FF into yet another game of Knights an Archers.
