How to Get More Families and Increase Approval Level in Manor Lords

Manor Lords is a city-building simulator that has appeared on Steam in early access and has already won the hearts of tens of thousands of gamers around the world. In the game, you will encounter the gathering of standard resources, but the most valuable asset is the families populating your town. People form the foundation of the settlement, working in warehouses, building useful buildings and churches, and also defending against raiders. If you want to get more families and increase approval, this guide is especially for you.

To attract a large number of families who will settle in your village and then in your city, you need to meet several important conditions:

The game provides a convenient way to solve issues related to housing. You can independently set the size of your plot using four points, which allows you to organize economic buildings around existing buildings. After that, you are free to do the following:

Note: It's important to remember that building and expanding each plot will require 2 units of wood.

At the beginning of each new Manor Lords campaign, the approval level will be low — this is normal. Your task is to improve this indicator as soon as possible. Next, we will suggest several effective methods that will help you increase the approval rating and attract more families to your settlement.

Let's start with the basics. The approval level reflects the level of satisfaction of the residents of your settlement. The higher this indicator, the more your city attracts new families. Increasing the approval level is achieved by satisfying the basic needs of the population, including access to housing, food, clothing, and other necessary resources.

You can check the status of the indicator by hovering over the thumbs-up icon on the panel at the top of the screen. Here you will also see the approval level for the last calendar month and its comparison with the previous similar period.

Approval also directly affects the morale of militia units. With a higher approval rating, fighters defend and attack more effectively. Essentially, the approval rating is an indicator of combat spirit for soldiers.

If players fail to increase approval and maintain it at a high level, it can lead to unpleasant consequences: crime will flourish in the city, and citizens will quickly leave the town.

Another nuance: As the city expands and existing plots are upgraded to levels 2 and 3, respectively, many of the residents' needs will also increase. This will lead to the need for more food, clothing, and other goods to keep approval at a high level.

Approval can be increased in several ways. Here are the main ones to pay attention to:

As you can see, if you provide the citizens with a variety of food and clothing, as well as access to constant drinking, the citizens will remain satisfied. All this provided that you have enough free plots and have provided all families with a roof over their heads.

For this, you will need to find and develop new food sources. Focus on the following food items:

For the production of eggs and vegetables, you will need to use available expansions, and for honey collection — build apiaries using the Beekeeping upgrade. As for clothing, it is enough to harvest skins and process them into leather using a factory building.

As soon as you start upgrading economic plots to the second level, you can build a Cobbler's Workshop, which will allow you to start creating shoes from the harvested leather. In any case, if you face a shortage of food or clothing, you can always buy the missing resources in other regions using the trade menu.

To ensure convenient access to food and clothing for all residents, it is preferable to place several small markets in the city rather than limiting yourself to one large one. This approach allows for a more efficient distribution of resources among families, especially for those living in remote plots. To ensure timely delivery of goods to the markets, it is important to assign workers to serve granaries and warehouses.

An effective way to increase approval is to place a church close to the plots. To build a simple wooden church, you will need wood (5), planks (20), and stone (10). As the settlement develops, you can upgrade the building with the following resources: wood (5), stone (20), planks (10), tiles (10).

Despite the fact that taverns can be built at the very beginning of the game, there is no sense in doing so if your storages lack ale. Brewing this drink is a very long and complicated process. First, you need to sow barley fields, set up a malt house to turn the barley harvest into malt, and only then install a brewery, where the drink will be prepared.

However, if you have invested skill points in trade, you will be able to purchase ale from neighboring regions at the beginning. In any case, we recommend setting up the production of this drink as soon as possible.

Above, we listed the main ways to increase the approval level in Malon Lords, but it is also important for players to know which actions can severely harm this growth:

A quick solution to the homelessness problem is to upgrade the homeless camp with one unit of wood to establish a work camp. While this is not a full-fledged estate, temporary housing will prevent a decrease in trust. However, it is recommended to build estates for families as soon as possible to increase the approval rating.

It is likely that a battle will occur near your city at some point, especially if bandits attack you. Naturally, the sight of bodies on the streets greatly depresses the residents and can lead to a decrease in their loyalty if no action is taken. You will need to dig a grave for burial and build a wooden church for the villagers' burial on consecrated ground. Make sure you have workers responsible for the mass grave and church, as gravediggers are necessary for burial.

The introduction of taxes becomes possible after your settlement reaches the status of Small Village (level 2) and you have built a manor. Setting a land tax will allow you to transfer part of the region's income to your treasury. However, it is important to remember that any tax rate negatively affects the population's support level. High taxes can cause significant dissatisfaction, so we recommend setting the tax rate within 10-20% to minimize discontent and maintain a favorable atmosphere in the settlement.

To ensure the satisfaction of your citizens, it's important to regularly provide them with a variety of food and clothing, especially after you have upgraded their living conditions. For instance, residents of level 3 estates require constant access to ale in a tavern. A lack of fuel, whether it be firewood or charcoal, can lead to dissatisfaction, so it's also crucial to ensure access to water from a well for all your citizens. Failing to meet these requirements for supplying homes with necessary resources can lead to dissatisfaction among estate owners and, consequently, penalties that reduce your approval level.

And a bonus. Another way to increase the approval level is by improving the efficiency of your settlement and solving logistical issues. It's important to carefully plan the layout of your town and the placement of trading spots to ensure citizens have easy access to food and clothing. If you are facing difficulties in providing access to any resource, remember that importing through the Trading Post can be an effective solution to the problem of goods shortages.