Beginners Guide for Manor Lords: Tips and Tricks

Released in April 2024 in early access Manor Lords is an economic city-building strategy wargame set in the early Middle Ages. Players receive a plot of land which they must turn into the center of their own empire, starting with almost nothing. This guide explains how to do it.

If you're a fan of strategy games, then getting into Manor Lords — at least in its early access version — should be straightforward. It most resembles a mix of ANNO, Frostpunk, and SimCity with elements of the Total War combat system. It's worth noting that Manor Lords doesn't directly copy ideas but forges its own path. Many aspects of the game work differently, and we've highlighted these differences in the guide.

The gameplay is based on building a large city full of residents (families). The larger it is, the more taxes can be collected and the more soldiers can be recruited. The city cannot do without housing for the population, social interaction centers such as markets and churches, as well as infrastructure buildings, like wells for water, fields, farms, and buildings of a unique industry. All of this needs to be built.

Players directly manage the citizens — assigning them to buildings or removing them for important tasks, such as harvesting or constructing new buildings. Idle citizens should not be left without tasks; all must be accommodated. The influx of new families is influenced by the satisfaction of existing ones and overall security: the higher these indicators, the more willingly residents will move to the player's city. Unfortunately, Manor Lords does not have serfdom rights. If people are not provided with housing, food, or firewood for the winter — they become dissatisfied, grumble, and move to more prosperous cities. The same effect occurs if bandits raid and burn half of the city.

City residents are divided into development classes: peasant laborers, numerous craftsmen, merchants and the wealthy. Each class provides bonuses to city development and fills (or not) the balance of labor supply and demand. The higher the population level, the more needs must be met. Movement between classes is impossible without meeting the needs of each individual home.

The city is situated on land with a certain set and volume of resources, all of which need to be extracted and processed to the final stage, as the end product is significantly more expensive than the raw materials from which it is made. The money obtained from trade also goes towards the development of the city and strengthening the player's power through the creation of a feudal lord's castle, summoning his retinue, etc.

Continuous development is the main goal of Manor Lords, at least while it was in early access. Not to miss a second, not to skip the opportunity to build something with free resources. The faster the construction, the more residents arrive and resources are processed, the higher the people's provision, the wider the trade routes and the volume of trade, the faster new territories can be claimed. It remains to capture them from another feudal lord and repeat the development cycle.

As per genre conventions, everything starts by creating a new game from a separate menu. However, when Manor Lords first launched in early access, the only significant aspect of this menu was the selection and customization of the difficulty level. We recommend initially going through the scenarios («Path to Prosperity», «Let There Be Peace», «On the Brink»), and then playing in sandbox mode («Unencumbered») or launching the game with AI opponents («Standard»).

In early access, there was one, albeit very extensive, world map available, consisting of 9 regions. Most likely, this choice will remain with the release of the full version. The region for the start was determined randomly, as was the location of resources, making the start in some cases more difficult, in others easier. Building is only possible in the starting region; the other 8 will have to be unlocked.

The player does not appear on the map empty-handed. There is a tent camp for 5 families, 1 ox for transporting goods, a set of food, and resources for initial construction. But first, it's necessary to understand where the riches of this land are located. Primarily, identify the places where cereals and water grow. To do this:

For initial marking, use roads — lay them out where the wheat and barley fields will be, and where there are groundwater sources. You can run roads throughout the region, the presence of forest will not be an obstacle. Additionally, roads speed up movement and are built instantly, costing nothing, so use this to your advantage.

After determining all locations and the distance from the tent camp to the future city, assess whether it's worth starting in this region or better to restart the game. Due to randomness, the starting position and city position can be significantly far apart, and a full move will take time, which is critical at the start. For example, in one session, we immediately found a favorable spot. In another session, we had to move closer to resources.

Most likely, from the start, it won't be possible to immediately lay down the city in an ideal place. For example, part of the map will be occupied by forest, which still needs to be cleared. It's also worth avoiding too long communication paths between houses, raw materials, and productions — at the beginning of the game, this will only slow down development, as NPCs need to physically move from one point to another to deliver goods.

Choose such a place that there is enough space for the city in the future, and it does not bump into fields or another natural limitation, such as wildlife or berries inside the forest. And start building your first base-city there, minimizing all distances.

It's simpler and wiser to place everything on one street, with residential houses on one side, and on the other side — the church, market, buildings for trading resources and animals, and other productions.

At the normal difficulty level of the game, right from the start, there will be enough resources to build all the necessary minimum. The sequence of actions is as follows:

The buildings above constitute the minimum needed at the start of the game. Now the population is almost ready to move to the second level. Just a couple of nuances left.

Clicking on a household, you can see its requests at this level. The requirements are divided into two parts — amenities (access to water, drinks, spirituality, and others) and market offerings (fuel, food, clothing, and others). Amenities are provided through building construction (well, church) and supply to the warehouse (tavern).

Market offerings are found by the residents themselves, but the goods must be brought to the market by someone directly from the production. Once you meet all the requirements, you can upgrade the household to the next level.

What happens at the second level of development? The household now starts to pay taxes, but most importantly, it opens the possibility to turn some peasants into craftsmen, and their household into a manufacture. Craftsmen produce a wide range of consumer goods: clothes, cloaks, quilts, shields, weapons, and much more, consuming a few resources from the warehouse. Also, craftsmen leave the labor market and you can no longer distribute them among buildings.

The placement of markets and managing their operation will affect the efficiency of resource and goods distribution in the city. Keep an eye on the stocks and place markets so that they fully meet the population's needs.

Ultimately, it's not advisable to turn all residents into craftsmen, just 30% of the total number of households is enough. Note that you can add an extension to a first-level household, but it's not advisable to do this at the beginning of the game — better to spend resources on trade.

Attentive fans have already noticed that until now, there hasn't been much talk about money — a key resource in economic and city-building strategies. This is no coincidence, as at the time of early access, money didn't play such a big role in Manor Lords, especially at the beginning. Nonetheless, there are two money systems in Manor Lords:

Regional Wealth (on the left) — the key money system, determines the overall budget. You receive wealth from taxes on second-level residents, when you sell goods in the merchant's shop or on the international market. And you spend it when buying sheep, horses, and mules, as well as opening trade routes for major deals.

Treasury (in the corner on the right) — a derivative of wealth, as it is replenished only from taxes on the taxable population. You can use money to hire a militia from the city's peasants or mercenaries from outside, conduct diplomacy, and settle new regions. Also, to replenish the treasury, you need to build a lord's manor and a tax post to it.

At the start of the game, the regional wealth in Manor Lords is 50 units, and in the lord's treasury — 0. You can increase the wealth before you have second-level citizens. There's one way — sell resources on external markets through the trading house.

When you unlock the next level of the city, you will be rewarded with a choice of perk. We recommend the one related to trade, so each new trade route costs 25 wealth.

The trading process with external regions is organized through the trading house, known in the Russian localization as «Factoria». After completing the basic development and gathering 7-8 city residents, you can build it. The trading process itself deserves a separate explanation due to the menu's multitude of small icons and inscriptions.

So, we select the Factoria, open the «Trade» tab, choose one of the 6 (in early access) categories of goods. Next, we study the table. The far left column determines the flag of the goods — import, export, no trade. Next comes the type of goods and the volume in stock. If you set a value in the input field between «-» and «+», it will determine the limit of selling or buying goods. For example: if there are 37 units in stock, the «export» flag, and a limit of 10, then 27 units of goods will be sold. If there are 0 in stock, and the «import» flag, a limit of 9, then 9 units of goods will be purchased.

The far right column — the most interesting for us. Here contains two buttons and a value between them, for example, 25. As seen in the screenshot, we have opened a trade route for leather. And here, pay attention:

Is it possible to trade without opening a trade route? You can and even should, but it's better to dispose of excess if they accumulate, than to sell on a permanent basis, as the price will be low, and families will spend time on their production. For example, for 1 unit of boards, you will receive 2 units of prosperity, whereas for 1 unit of leather 6 units of prosperity, and for 1 unit of tiles 8 units of prosperity. Obviously, it's more profitable to spend boards on your own development, establish the production of the same tiles, and recoup the expenses with it.

In early access, Manor Lords offered a classic scheme that is repeated in dozens of strategies: mine ore/clay at a quarry; wood/leather in a camp; wool/grain at a farm — deliver to a warehouse or a processing enterprise. After a while, the resulting product (metal, tiles, clothing, food) returns to the warehouse or is distributed to other enterprises.

Usually, an enterprise employs from 2 to 8 workers, and one or two can sell the product to other families at the local market, but someone else will have to work. Therefore, to properly establish production, you need at least 16-18 families, otherwise, a dropout from either the trading network or the production part is inevitable.

Regarding logistics, it's simple. Light goods — firewood, wool, grain, meat, berries, and so on — people carry themselves. Heavy ones — trees, planks, clay — using an ox. To ensure logistics work without delays, you'll need to purchase an additional 3-4 oxen and add a few «tie posts», providing them with ox drivers. Don't forget to connect all buildings with a network of roads.

Bandits in Manor Lords will cause you a lot of trouble: from simple resource theft at the very beginning to brutal raids that burn half the town closer to the middle. It won't be possible to gather several squads of soldiers to protect against bandits at the very start — simply because the necessary weapons won't be available. But there are still two options, both related to the construction of the feudal lord's manor.

After its construction, you can call a group of the feudal lord's allies — at least 5 people. This will be enough to destroy the basic bandit camp, but it's best to avoid direct confrontation with them. Come to the camp when no one is there, and take the gold for the Treasury, which will be useful for expanding the arsenal and developing territories. An alternative to calling for service is to build a watchtower. It will immediately provide protection from attacks.

You will have to engage in battles against various opponents — bandits, feudal lords, and other threats to your city — throughout the game. This means you need to recruit warriors and command various units.

Equip your army. A good army should have three types of units, but in the first few years, the city will likely only afford militia infantrymen. Later, expand them with militia archers and then recruit another infantry unit. Continue to expand the army with spearmen as soon as you can afford it. Do not skimp on equipping your warriors; a fighter in a helmet, plate armor, and chainmail is much more durable than a peasant in a robe.

Use stances to control your troops. By selecting any combat unit in Manor Lords, you will see a row of icons at the bottom. These are stances that determine the unit's behavior during combat. By default, the unit is in a balanced stance, capable of attacking and defending. There are stances for attack only or defense only, useful for ambushes or under fire. For example, archers can be set to ready-fire mode, allowing them to attack enemies as soon as they come within range for an open volley and are not shielded.

Act tactically smart. Combine the stances from the above point with well-known tactical maneuvers: pinning the enemy in an ambush or on spearmen; attacking with cavalry from the rear or at least the flank; taking high ground and attacking downhill; and avoiding encirclement while encircling the enemy yourself. All of this is implemented and works in Manor Lords.

But there are a couple of important indicators to watch. These are morale and fatigue. Morale is an indicator of how willing your troops are to fight for the city. To keep it high, the overall approval rating of the residents should also be high. If no one is willing to fight for you, the units will simply run away instead of standing their ground, and at best, will not allow the use of certain stances.

Fatigue inevitably occurs during battle, but it can be significantly reduced by using stances, relying on a smart selection of troops, and pulling tired units out of the fight. The weather during battle can also affect fatigue — warriors do not like fighting in the rain and expend more effort doing so.

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These were the main aspects that beginners need to know in Minor Lords. Have you played this game? What can you advise? Write in the comments!