Beginner's Guide

In Norland you are in charge of helping a noble family of lords who own a province achieve prosperity, security, and personal ambitions. Your lords obey your commands, but they also have their own will.

Game settings

The first step when creating a new game is creating the player family. The family will start with 3-5 lords. At character creation the starting age of an adult lord depends on what skill levels they're given. The family will begin with a sum of skill levels considered optimal by the game but the skill levels can be redistributed. The maximum starting age is 40, at which point additional skill levels cannot be added. Children cannot be given skills. The following family relations are possible when starting a new game:

• Two brothers and a wife
• Husband, wife, child
• Two sisters and a son
• Two brothers
• Three sisters
• Father and three daughters

The second step when creating a new game is first choosing a starting location and then choosing which provinces and independent and which are vassals. Every province can be selected and expanded to include more vassals.

The final step is choosing the starting scenario, modifiers, difficulty, and whether the Unholy Horde will be present or not.

Start scenario

The start scenario determines the initial priorities you will have.

• Prisoner: There is a bandit camp with 6 bandits in the city's province that has kidnapped one of the lords.
• Nectar's Children: All starting characters have nectar addiction. Start with the Alchemy Lab and Nectar books.
• The Sword's Path: King and his brothers are bastards, start without Flour and only 50 Wood but also with additional weapons and protection equipment and 2 additional warriors.
• Deserters: There is a bandit camp with 20 bandits in the city's province.
• Juice of Life: All starting lords have Hemophilia.
• By Touch: All starting lords have Vision Loss.
• The Hammer's Way: Start with only 300 Gold and the Coal Furnace, Workshop, Weapon Forge, Axes and Swords books.
• Prison Owners: Start with prisoners instead of peasants.
• No scenario: No starting scenario.

Modifiers

Modifiers can give bonuses or penalties to everyone in the game.

• Fast Metabolism: Characters age and gain experience twice faster.
• Wave of Fanaticism: All migrating peasants are Fanatic.
• After War: Forest bandits have increased Combat skill and better equipment.
• Trade Decline: The Holy Caravan has only a 25% chance to arrive each day but will appear at least once every 5 days.
• Strength in Numbers: All peasants and prisoners have a Combat skill of 5-10.
• No Disasters: Disasters cannot happen.
• Longevity: People become Elderly after 60 years.
• Excess Iron: Each Mine has 500 Iron.
• Old Grudges: Xenophobia penalties are increased.

Difficulty

• Peaceful mode: Increased starting resources and neighbors won't bother you unless you initiate aggressive actions. Difficulty of the game will gradually increase during the first few days and new mechanics and challenges will be introduced gradually.
• Normal: Difficulty of the game will gradually increase during the first few days and new mechanics and challenges will be introduced gradually.
• Hardcore: Decreased starting resources and challenges can happen at any point.

Beginner tips

• The first buildings that should be constructed are Lumbermill (for construction materials), Rutabaga Field (for food), Tavern (for selling alcohol), Altar (for satisfying the Piety need) and Library (for gaining knowledge).
• By creating a strong army you can force neighbors into vassalage and use their tribute for further development.
• Always assign lords to tasks best matching their skills:
  • Lords with high Command skill can effectively destroy forest bandit camps, gaining rich loot.
  • Lords with high Management skill can produce a lot of extra goods - the more complex the goods and the higher the level of production building, the more profitable it is.
  • Lords with high Trade skill will help you make a profit when trading with neighbors or the Holy Caravan.
  • Lords with high Persuasion skill are useful for effective convert actions on the world map and later improving relations with neighbors.
  • Lords with high Manners skill can seduce foreign lords to your side.
  • Lords with high Teaching skill can quickly train peasants to use in place of expensive mercenaries.
  • Lords with high Intellect skill will gain knowledge quicker.

Defeating stronger enemies

If a neighbor becomes your enemy but their army is more powerful there are a couple of ways to weaken them:

• Reid their villages. This will slow down population growth and therefore Gold income, which will limit their ability to hire mercenaries.
• In the province menu use shadow operations - hire bandits to rob the hall, which will also reduce their hiring capabilities.
• Neutralize their lords with the highest Command skill using intrigues.
• Try to bribe the heir - he will start rebellion, which will greatly reduce the province's army and number of lords.
• Finally, you can sit out the dangerous time and gather strength by becoming someone's vassal, which will protect you from enemies.

Building management

The production menu

Some buildings require workers and instructions to function and will display an icon above if they do not currently have any. Instructions are given by assigning a lord as a manager. The same lord can be appointed as manager to multiple buildings and will try to visit each building every day, starting with the buildings that require instructions the most. Failing that, the instructions given by them are valid for three days. Each lord gives a production bonus that scales with its Management skill. On average one lord can manage between 7 and 10 buildings. Right-clicking on a building will quickly open a list of lords to assign as managers.

Once the workers receive instructions from managers they will begin working. At 6 PM workers will carry the produced resources to the warehouse. After work they receive their salaries.

Buildings that produce basic resources will produce them continuously without any input from the player. But buildings that produce resources that require other resources need direct orders from the player in the Production menu, where you can either place a one-time order to produce a certain amount or set a continuous production until a set amount is reached.

Hovering over the Economic Summary will list buildings that do not have instructions, that have insufficient workers, that are broken or non-functioning, as well as fields on the verge of depletion.

Finance

The finance menu

The Finance menu is is where wages and the sale of resources can be adjusted. On the left side you can adjust the maximum amount of a certain resource that can be sold every day, as well as its cost. On the right side you can adjust the wages for the population. Peasants, Warriors and Unemployed are paid with Gold while prisoners are paid with food and alcohol resources.

Every character consumes 1 food per day, so the amount of food produced should be at least equal to the population and the food price per unit should be lower than the workers' salary. Characters who work also need alcohol every few days and their mood can be regulated with the quantity and price of the sold alcohol. Prisoners receive food (and alcohol if allowed) for free but require a functioning Prisoner Barns building for that. Markets open after 6 PM.

Peasants will buy food from the Holy Caravan if prices are set too high.

Holy Caravan

The Holy Caravan arrives every 1-3 days and is the primary source of gold, holy rings, books and prisoners. Prisoners sold by the Holy Caravan do not have any Combat skill.

Prices at the Holy Caravan depend on the Trade skill of the lord trading with the Holy Caravan and can also be increased or decreased by buying or selling a large amount of a certain resource. Prices may also change randomly.