For the longest time I've had people starving. I also noticed I never saw my hunters' meat anymore. Finally I check the inventory of houses and some of them are freaking stockpiling for the zombie apocalypse!

So I think I finally need to build a market and allocate my food a bit better. But it seems like some houses are still stuffed with food and robbing the market at the same time I'm losing a villager due to starvation. Is it just that I'm not hitting the individual household's "saturation" level for food, and so they still stockpile? Did I encounter a glitch or is this just how the game plays?

It's just frustrating to have my small village (~20 - 25) constantly starving off a member or three when some houses have 100 pieces of venison.

Could you zoom out and post a shot of your village from directly overhead? I might be able to offer some suggestions if I could see your layout.

Sorry it took so long! Thanks for the reply - I learned from another friendly Banished player that the problem was the market is really for larger villages, and I should rely more heavily on localized storehouses.

There are many more knowledgeable Banished players than myself, having said that I will share some of what I "think" I've learned. My first several game starts were disasters because I had not yet learned the game mechanics. Starting games on easy, valleys, mild climate, medium size map, weather effects off and no disasters seems to be the quickest way to learn IMHO.

One of the things I didn't realize early on was the importance of barns. It seems that all food resources must first go to a barn . . always . . where the citizens will collect required resources as needed. A single barn is sufficient to support a village of 10 to 50 citizens without a need for a market (usually . . every game differs). Market vendors pull their food resources from your barns so barns are required to support markets. I learned this the hard way foregoing barns and building markets expecting the markets to replace barns . . . not.

As I layout my crop fields and harvest them I keep a close eye on the barn capacity. If I see my barn capacity reaching 50% or more after a harvest I will build another barn near my crop fields. Since all food resources go to a barn . . . adding a gather, hunter, fisherman, crop field or pasture can affect the storage space available in your barn. Check it often and build another if it appears to be nearing full capacity.

I often have as many as three barns before I build my first market. The original barn and two or three scattered about the crop fields. Having barns near the crop fields means the farmers can harvest faster since they have to carry the food less distance to store it in a barn.

I lost an early game to extreme starvation even though I had lots of crop fields. My farmers were idling with food rotting in the fields. I realized that I only had one barn, 100% full, and with no where to store the food . . the farmers could not / would not harvest the crops. Managing your barn count and location is important for a successful game.

I don't build a market until around year 10 to 15 depending on how well I manage my crops, pastures, hunters, gathers and fishermen and the population count, sometimes sooner, sometimes later. I usually use one vendor and add more as my population grows with four vendors working well for me early on. Keeping your food resource production optimized seems more important than a market so another farmer is more important than another vendor. When I expand my existing village, I have one market but a new market is the last thing I build at the expansion site. Markets can destabilize your food resources quickly especially when you add lots of vendors. Your barns will be nearly full but vendors from expansion sites can quickly reduce your stored food.

A couple more things concerning food . . .

I try to get a pasture built quickly in a new game. I build it just large enough to handle my existing critters. The citizens won't slaughter animals until the pasture is at full capacity. Building a huge pasture early on means you won't have beef / mutton / chickens until the pasture is full which may take several years. After building my first small pasture I try to build future pastures that hold a minimum of 10 animals. It seems that a pasture that does not hold at least 10 animals cannot be "split". Splitting a pasture is very helpful as you expand so building pastures to hold at least 10 of a given animal is helpful later on as you can split the heard without having to buy more. I leave enough space around my original small pasture so that I can remove it and replace it with a larger pasture later in the game. Look here for some pasture tips.

Crop field layout is important for maximum output. This page is very helpful concerning crop / orchard field management. I try to make fields that use two farmers but that's just me. If your crops are not fully harvested by late autumn or early winter you may need to add another farmer to the field. Pay attention to your field layout concerning houses. As in the tips above putting houses for your farmers to live in near the fields is very helpful since they don't spend a lot of time traveling back and forth to their homes. If there are no homes near the fields . . your harvest will suffer.

This applies to every citizen . . build a fishing dock? build homes close by for the fishermen . . a forester . . build homes close by for the foresters etc. etc. It may take a little time for the right worker to move close to their work site but they usually do in time. Also if I build a new home and a miner moves in with the mine located on the other side of the map . . I take that as an indicator that I may need to build more homes near the mine.

Edit: I will also mention . . when I reach a population count of between 1,700 and 2,000 citizens I ALWAYS lose them to starvation. No matter how well I manage my food resources I hit this wall where I cannot build more fields, pastures etc. This has happened in my last two games . . still I had great fun getting there. It may be that I simply maxed out the map?? Hoping for another patch?

I like the game for the delicate balance you must maintain. =)

Quarry's, mines and herbalist are some of the last things I build. I go several years without a herbalist usually building one when their health drops to 4.5 stars. Later I try to have a herbalist in every expansion site as the citizens visit them for health reasons. Early on I only build wood houses and find enough stone and iron laying around for the most part. I start converting / building stone houses only after I have a fully functioning quarry and surplus stone.

Other observations that may be correct =)

The first decade or longer I stop work in the crop fields after the harvest and use the farmers as [ builders | foresters | gathers | fishermen | woodcutters ] not forgetting to turn the fields back on and reassign farmers in the spring. It's a big day when you have enough extra laborers to leave them in the field. I believe they automatically become laborers in the winter but I usually need to make their efforts directed to a specific task.

Forester is also my default expansion hut. When my initial village is stable I place a forester hut in an area with the influence ring just overlapping my first forester hut influence ring. I build a dirt road to the location . . or not as I can pause the building when necessary. When built I add a wood house next to it for the forester and an empty stock pile. Because my existing forester has been working for a few years my local forest is doing well. I stop work at my original hut and move the guy to the new forester hut to get a forest started at my new location. As soon as I have more people I put one back in the original hut or swap them back and forth as necessary. I will later add a hunter and gather huts with houses for them to live in and a barn. Market will be the last thing I add other than houses as I usually add crop and pastures to support the expansion area via the barn.

Found that rotating crops did NOT seem to matter and saved a lot of time by not doing so.

Early on I build minimal dirt roads as the builders seem to build roads before anything else which causes your new hut to sit un-built. When I do build roads it is in the winter after I have all my basic huts built.

My first few games I built the forester, gather and hunters huts out in the woods as it seemed logical that they should be there. Now I build these huts in the center of my town with any new expansion hut's influence rings just overlapping the original. Being located outside the village meant they spent huge amounts of time traveling from their home to their job and it took forever for them to return goods to town.

Usually build a school as my first non survival building as educated workers produce more.