Ciris: Have you played the tutorial? They take you through everything (minus best survival strategies, but those you have to work out alone).
Sachys: actually, the tutorial is damned terrible I found - had no option but to resort to the wiki as to "WHY WONT THEY DO THAT?" kind of situations.
also: OFGs post is from december... havent seen em since sadly.
I've found that the tutorial explains the general mechanics - but then you have to work the rest out yourself, like: "villagers need to stay warm in the winter" means not only that it's a factor of happiness, but also that they'll be less efficient if cold, can even die, and that building a woodcutter will supply them with firewood and a tailor can make warm jackets so they can work for longer outside.
For more tips and such, I went to YouTube videos with perfect towns or starting tactics and read through the
Banished subreddit. Now instead of having a mass starvation-related death wave in year 10, I have it in year 25 :D PROGRESS!
