1. I think oxen for farming are a percentage of your cattle. how does this mechanic work? When I go to the farming screen I can click on someone and it tells me how many oxen I need and what I have for farming.

2. how do i tell how many temples i can support? it says i can't support them when i get too many, but i can't figure out the mechanic.

3. how do i tell how many trade routes i can support? it just says i lose them.

4. im lost on heroquests. ok i sacrifice. ok i use magic to increase my chances. ok i need a trickster on my circle. how do the choices work? Ive basically been guessing. someone said in myths. where do i read this stuff? do my choices matter to my success in the quest? Im lost.

Most of these questions don’t have a totally simple answer — they all depend on a variety of factors. And each screen’s advice will likely have at least part of the answer. The manual may have more detail as well.

Barntar’s magic can affect how many oxen you need.

As well as costs to perform the required rituals, temples also require worshippers. More are available once you form a tribe.

Trade magic increases the number of routes you can support.

Heroquests reenact myths. Myths are in the Lore screen. Your choices are critical, but as at any time, just knowing the best action does not guarantee that the quester is able to succeed at it.

To get more info about the myth, you have to sacrifice (or trade) for them, and you'll have access to them in the lore screen (in fact, you probably already did sacrifice for it since you can't try a quest without knowing the basics of the tale). But the info you get is often incomplete. You can often sacrifice again to get a more accurate version of the tale (for example the "basic" tale may tell the god fought an enemy, but the "complete" tale will give you the tactics he used).

And, as David said, you can fail even if you make the right choice. Or succeed if you made the "wrong" one. Or even fail and get sidetracked in a cool sidequest. It depends on your magic, your hero...

Since this got bumped:

1. Oxen for farming are a third of your cattle. It's 2 oxen per hide, of 1.6 with Barntar's Plowsong blessing, and 2.5 farmers per hide, and the number doesn't change with Vigor - perhaps they don't complain as much?

2. I don't think there's a straightforward way to tell. I go with this: you need goods to maintain temples, and if all the necessary goods for sacrificing can be locally (naturally) produced by your crafters without ruining your economy / fouling tribal mood, you're fine.

3. Dunno, I just play it by ear and send out a trader to establish a route whenever something that might benefit trade happens. Build up your Issaries temple (I have every blessing but Trading on), trade with neighbors for the Silver Tongue artifact, keep a worshiper of Issaries on the ring and keep investing in Trading during Sacred Time - that also raises your # of routes for the following year. Remember to always have your trader be physically present during Sacred Time, or else you'll be unable to invest a decent amount in trading and one of the routes will be lost during the year.

3.5 Also, search your tula for resources. When you find some (such as green clay, stones for amulets, iron and the like), don't sell it to another clan, instead, go to the clan screen and press the "Crafters" button. Reassign some crafters from generic goods to your newfound special goods.

4. If you're completely lost, there are articles on the wiki, but keep in mind that correct options have a chance to fail, and some "wrong" options work as well as the "correct" ones.

Moar unasked-for vaguely relevant advice:

- Greet the ducks as friends. This is non-negotiable. Don't mess with other beastfolk, dorfs, dragons, or trolls, either. Don't choose them (or Faralinthor for that matter - unlike elves, Praxians, and ice demons, the flood is a flat percentage fuck-you) as enemies during clan creation.

- Successful heroquests give extra magic. Try to give magic to cults, and perform heroquests so that it stays high, and you can keep your goods and cattle.

- Learn which sacrifices/donations of magic give you a slider (four points is advisable) and which eat up a flat percentage. If your pool is large, avoid the latter.

- Trade for treasures with the neighbor clan which likes you the most. Treasures that exist in the game are not assigned to specific clans unless you sell one, so you can keep going to the same clan asking to buy a treasure and eventually end up with everything that can be traded for. When they start offering spirit fetches, you're done.

- Once you've cleared the game's supply of tradeable unique artifacts, when an artifact is necessary, buy a spirit fetch (they disintegrate when you expend magic, so stocking up is kinda pointless).

- Generally, try to not rack up hidden grudges with other clans. If it sounds like you might have grievously offended a clan, make note of it. Perform the Divination - Attitude blessing when you have free time. If it says they remember several slights, it might be the time to do the Issaries heroquest for reconciliation.

- Make your clanmate the first tribal king, but don't hold on to the throne if he or she kicks the bucket. Your successor from another tribe is going to die or resign in ~5 years. Landing two kingships in a row is really damn difficult. If you absolutely need the next guy or gal to also be one of yours, your best chance is to have someone else elected first and sabotage their rites.

- When you have too much food, send emissaries to give some to other clans (70+ per emissary), prioritizing those whom you owe a favor, your neighbors, and those who don't yet owe you a favor. The more clans owe you, the better. Don't collect them unless absolutely necessary (such as you're raiding across another clan's tula and they decline your bribes).

- Switching permanent blessings doesn't cost a turn, so do it when necessary. Get Truesword and Fyrdwomen. These are probably the most useful war blessings.

Dunno, I find the trolls one of the easiest, most straightforward enemies of the game. Sure, you should avoid the darklands like the plague if you're feuding with them, but their raids can be dealt with, and can rack you up some easy magic and goods.
Of course, you don't want to anger them too much, but that's true to many enemies (including the ducks)

Depends on what you mean by “as well as.” You can definitely get past a station of a heroquest by choosing the “wrong” answer (if there is one!). But, recreating the myth as precisely as you can is always easier — i.e. more likely to succeed.

Doesn't it also depend of the quester's skills? (i.e. a violent "wrong" answer could be easier because your quester is a combat beast)

I agree. I've never had much of a problem fighting with trolls. Since you've got to have some enemies, you might as well pick them.

Conceivably so.

Hi all, a few days ago I discovered this very nice game. Very refreshing to play a well-designed challenging strategy RPG that doesn't end in everlasting micromanagement and still provides a feeling of achievement (although having allowed for slightly bigger clans might have improved this feeling even more).

I had many questions about underlying mechanics and stumbled upon this post... Great! I came to this forum with exactly the OP's questions and here are the answers, but have a few more:

How exactly is the mood of farmers determined by the farmers/land ratio? What is worse: a slightly too big land or too small (overwork/much unused terrain/vigor etc). Or is exact 2.5 farmers by far the best and essentially the only choice? How is the optimal pasture size calculated? Does a bigger pasture size than needed leads to bigger cattle growth? How does pasture size influence the morale of farmers?

I recall reading somewhere that a peaceful tribe functions best (morale) with an Ernalda founder choice opposed to an Orlanth. This is different than in the beginners guide (although this guide was more biased towards a balanced clan, and I see how Orlanth is the best choice for obtaining skilled leaders). Is this true?! It would make the starting choice between peaceful and balanced more important.

Assume you are starting with an Arnalda clan with eg Uralda as first awakened. Am I correct that having an Orlanth worshipper in the Ring is then inferior compared to a Vingan because Orlanth doesn't provide a war sacrifice point?! Or are there less obvious advantages of Orlanth like in events, magic, treasures, crop yield etc?

Are there hidden disadvantages (morale) of switching from eg. a peaceful clan to a balanced clan?
Btw: what are all of the advantages of both? My current impression of "peaceful":
Peaceful: +1 crop (seems very good), +1 herd (seems great), +1 children (useless), +1 mysticism (not very useful), -1 war (very bad), less flexibilty in your actions than balanced (morale), slightly harder to recruit thanes (how exactly?).

I started with one game with an Uralda/Ernalda worshipper. Is she fully supporting both (does she count as a full leader of an Ernalda clan despite the Uralda symbol?!). My clan leaders seemed satisfied with her (she was terrible btw because of her poor leadership)? I read somewhere an Orlanth/Elmal worshipper is also possible. Out of curiosity: are there other possible pairs?

I have the impression that natural growth allows for a bigger stable clan than immigration. Is this true?!

What do you think what are the best rewards for the Heroquests early on (better rewards than stat raises/ assume a balanced/peaceful tribe if it matters)? Eg. Ernalda's crops yield seems pretty good, but which abilities/treasures do you think are vital?

I read a big warning against early questing: But assume you succeed (big assume): are there any long term disadvantages to doing a heroquest early?
Are there any disadvantages to doing the same Heroquest again (after succeeding) instead of a new one apart from opportunity cost?

Lots of questions, more than I can answer this morning… I assume you have read the manual and http://a-sharp.com/kodp/tips.html

Pretty sure mood only depends on having sufficient land, and the annual impact is not huge.

If 10 cows need 1 hide of land, and you have 100 cows, then you need 10 hides of land. A cow can't eat more grass than a cow can eat. If you have 9 hides, then cows go hungry. Everyone is unhappy. If you have 11 hides, then you still only have 100 cows, though you have room to expand. But that's only theoretical.

It really depends. 2.5 is best for morale, but the number isn't going to stay fixed as people die, grow up, and arrive. If you have enough cattle, more land means extra food that can be given (to increase relations) or sold to neighbors, and the continuing success of the clan will make the farmers take the extra work in stride. Also, reassigning land costs an action, so you might not want to do it every Sea season.

The founder choice gives you a shrine of the corresponding god and gives you an extra point of magic at Sacred Time if your clan chief worships said god. Since you're going to want that bonus magic, most if not all of your leaders will follow that god.

Don't know of any advantages, which is why I put a follower of legitimate war god on the ring instead (but not often a Vingan because I tend to have one and she's usually busy travelling early on; however, an old Vingan who's been places and managed to not die makes an excellent diplomat on the ring).

Presuably, there are fewer potential thanes available when you recruit by slider or event. Never had any problems with recruiting. Send a lot of your existing thanes exploring (but not too far), then recruit.

No idea, but clan size doesn't really matter a lot at the bounds I tend to hit with a lot of land. From my experience, if you're in a tribe and the carls initiate the split, the splitting clan is also in the tribe; if the weaponthanes, it isn't. So consider setting up Fyrdwomen, don't bless children, and by the time the split comes it will be beneficial.

Ernalda's earth should probably be your first heroquest pick. Splendorbread (Orlanth and Aroka) and Uralda's cow are also good, but I think these two are the most difficult quests. Later in the game, Issaries the Conciliator's "improve your relationship with another clan" option erases any slights they may remember (which aren't shown except by Divination-Attitude; since it costs an action, make a list of clans that you seem to have made particularly angry and check them first).

Doesn't seem like it. The real reason why you shouldn't do it is because you don't have a decent stash of magic in case you fail (and negative magic is very, very bad) and because you probably don't know the myth well enough.

Probably not. Toward the end of one game, I had a very talky Issaries worshipper who was questing almost every year to mend relationships and to gain clan magic.

Yes.

As for the ancestors, the big issues are really whether you live your ordinary life the way they did: keeping thralls and reveling in draconic lore (or not). Although you have a main deity, you worship the entire pantheon.

So in game terms, the deeds of your ancestors are mostly to establish starting conditions.

BTW, we used the old Anglo-Saxon term “hide” precisely because it was an inexact measure.

Thank you! Very clear! :)

"BTW, we used the old Anglo-Saxon term “hide” precisely because it was an inexact measure."

As a non-native speaker I wasn't aware hide was a genuine term. I have just checked its Wikipedia site. Very interesting! I couldn't find any Dutch site about this. So, apparently we have a collective gap in our history knowledge,,,, Thanks!