Some thoughts after more time in the North

I’ve finally played with enough content that I have a few thoughts about what I really like with comments for the next version. First of all, great mod, so much to love!

I love the izba houses, and the log cabins, more than I like the upgraded red cottages, I’d like to see them provide enough well being to the residents that I can keep them around for the long term rather than feel like my villages will suffer for them, or an upgrade option that keeps their look mostly intact.

On that note, I really like the goahti as well, but I’ve ended up using DS tents because I notice less detraction from using them. I actually really enjoy the way the small tent clusters look, with the campfires, and they are so great to build near more remote work sites. I’d like to see the goahti lose the detraction factor, why not make it fully possible for communities to live in these homes long term over generations, out with their herds hunting and gathering, that is a very longstanding northern tradition in the real northern parts of the world.

I’ve noticed that no matter how well fed my bannies are, their hearts will drop to near zero fairly soon without a full time herbalist, despite being able to gather tons of herbs like other wild foods. Part time does not do the job, and this is incredibly hard to do with the norsemen aging enabled and no additional adults for many years of game time. I end up using the tiny workplaces from kid’s mods, or some of EB’s small village work buildings, for many many years just because they are so much more geared towards tiny early communities than the big vanilla buildings or even the North buildings. I really would not like to see the herbalist workplace require glass lol, that seems very counter intuitive anyway for what the herbalist does.

I build the beautiful North work sites as I can, but they often don’t make sense until twenty years or more down the line. To make them count, in terms of coverage, I need to build them far from my early homes and pastures, and since the low hearts and happiness mean work time is already very low, by the time the bannies get out to these great buildings, they accomplish very little lol. It makes more sense for me to build kid’s tiny workplaces right there in the tent camp, so they can walk there quickly even with all the extensive idling time. Perhaps some very simple and inexpensive workplace versions for those harder starts, especially if using norseman aging?

I don’t like the lack of bees until trading, especially as the vikings used honey and mead and only in Iceland is beekeeping still a fairly new and experimental thing. Maybe for an Iceland start it makes sense to have no bees, but otherwise why not have the other starts have bees and a way to gather wild honey? This again relates to how quickly and how low hearts get. Without honey as a ‘grain’, and without a fulltime herbalist, the bannies are basically going to be very miserable and extremely unproductive for years and years and years until there are enough adults to build a trading dock and get lucky with a trader, especially with the norsemen aging.

In my easiest start, with builders and a good climate, I still only got bee traders twice in 50 years, that seems pretty extreme lol. I eventually built kid’s tiny wild beekeeper in my Lake start with sheep herders, and the improvement in hearts and work productivity was very significant, even without the fulltime herbalist. Some players might really enjoy these difficulties, but maybe just for those really demanding start conditions? Just an idea.

I really count on being able to make stone tools and parkas in the early game, I would hate to see those go in the next version. I also wish there was an early way to use wool, weaving or nålebinding by the fire or in a small hut for those early herding starts with sheep.

Thanks for all the great work, I can’t wait to try the next version as well.