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FAQ/Walkthrough

Version 0.1
Last update 4/2/2008
By ReyJavikVI: [email protected]

Copyright 2008 Javier Badia

If you have any suggestion, correction, or the like, send it to the e-mail
above.

NOTE: Since I'm not a native English speaker, my grammar may not be perfect.
Any correction is encouraged. Thank you for your time.

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Contents
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1.0 Introduction

2.0 Basics

3.0 Version history

4.0 Legal & such


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|1.0                     ---| I N T R O D U C T I O N |--                    <
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Knights & Merchants is a game that is not well known, but I still think it's
very good. Additionally, I saw it as a chance to make a FAQ that will very
probably get accepted (since there aren't any FAQs for this game as of April
2008).

Oh, and the game uses the "thou" verbal forms to talk to you. Get used to it.

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|2.0                           ---| B A S I C S |--                          <
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2.1 Units
2.2 Buildings
2.3 Game basics

Unlike other Real-Time Strategy games like Age of Empires, you don't control
people individually here. Most things are done automatically.

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2.1 Units |-------------------------------------------------------------------+
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You have four main types of jobs: laborers, serfs, employees, and soldiers (I'm
making this names up).

Serfs: These men carry things. Be it building material, food for the Inns, raw
elements to a workshop, or food to the soldiers, you need lots of these to make
sure your city doesn't get stuck.

Laborers: When you select where to place a building, these guys come and build
it. It's as simple as that. They also build roads, vinegards, and farms.

Employees: These are either resting at their workshop, working or eating. There
are many types of employees, like bakers, farmers, carpenters, and many more.
If you made a workshop but there is no corresponding employee available, then
the building is useless.

Soldiers: These are (obviously) what you use to fight. There are many types,
such as militia, archers, scouts, knights, pikemen, and all those traditional
middle-age warriors. They are grouped in companies, which move as one soldier
(i.e. all the soldiers together).


Employees
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|WARNING: Boring and repetitive list ahead.|
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Stonemason: Mines stone. Works in the Quarry.

Woodcutter: Cuts wood (duh). Works in the Woodcutter's (duh again).

Carpenter: Works the tree trunks into wood tables, suited for building. Works
in the Sawmill.

Farmer: Works with the corn and the wine. Works in the Farm and the Vineyard
(you will need one for each).

Baker: Works in the Mill, transforming corn into flour, and in the Bakery
making bread.

Animal Breeder: Breeds pigs and horses. Works in the Swine Farm and the
Stables.

Butcher: Makes the pig meat into sausages and the animal skin into leather.
Works in the Butcher and the Tannery.

Metallurgist: He uses coal to refine the gold. Works in the Metallurgy Shop.

Blacksmith: Works the iron. He works in the Iron Smithy, the Weapons Smithy,
and the Armour Smithy.

Miner: Mines coal, iron and gold. Works in the mines.

Recruit: They are trained into soldiers, or they go to the Watchtowers to throw
rocks at the enemy.


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2.2 Buildings |---------------------------------------------------------------+
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Buildings must have a road communicating their door to the rest of the city, or
they will be of no use.

Storehouse: Here is where all your materials are stored. Your serfs will come
here to pick up and deposit things. It's vital to have one.

Schoolhouse: Units (except soldiers) are trained here. You need gold to create
them. They take a little time to appear.

Inn: Here's where people (except soldiers) eat when they're hungry. Be sure to
have some food, or else they will starve to death, and dying is not good.
Believe me, it happened to me once.

Quarry: Here the mined stone is deposited and cut into blocks by the
stonemason.

Woodcutter: Here the Woodcutter leaves his trunks.

Sawmill: Here the raw trunks from the Woodcutter are made into wood tablets.

Vineyard: Here the wine is made.

Farm: Here the corn is collected.

Mill: Here the corn is worked into flour.

Bakery: Here the bread is baked.

Swine Farm: Here the pigs are bred. You need lots of corn for it. Each pig
provides one "unit" of meat and one "unit" of skin.

Butcher: Here the sausages are made. One "unit"of pig meat produces three
sausages.

Tannery: The Tannery makes three pieces of leather from a pig skin.

Stables: Here the horses are bread, which also requires corn. Once the horses
are big enough, they are taken to the Barracks.

Weapons Workshop: This place produces one axe, one bow, or one spear from two
pieces of wood.

Armory Workshop: This place produces one wooden shield with one wood piece, and
one leather armor from one piece of leather.

Coal mine: You build these over the coal. Guess what they do?

Iron mine: See Coal mine.

Gold mine: See above.

Metallurgy Shop: Here the "raw" gold from the mines is refined into material
ready to be taken to schoolhouses. This needs coal.

Iron Smithy: Here the "raw" iron is refined. This also needs lots of coal.

Weapons Smithy: Here swords, pikes and crossbows are made. You need iron and
coal.

Armour Smithy: Iron armors and shields are made here.

Barracks: Looks like a castle to me, but whatever. Here is where all the
military units are made. This buildings stores things like weapons, horses, and
armour, and recruits go there. To train a soldier, you need a specific amount
of weapons and armour.

Watchtower: Recruits throw stone (the same that you get from the Quarry) at the
enemies.


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2.3 Game Basics |-------------------------------------------------------------+
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Here I'll explain how the basic things work.

First, building. Building is easy--you have to place the building's foundation 
and some road so the serfs can get there, and you're set. Every building 
requires a specific amount of wood and stone, which is provided progressively 
(i.e. not all at once) by the serfs. Also, the building won't begin until you 
have at least one piece of wood in there. More laborers will build faster, 
obviously.

While we're on the topic of buildings, there's one thing that is simply 
awesome. While in some games the building appears out of thin air, or starts 
shrunk and gets progressively bigger, the buildings here have specific buildign 
animations--you get to see the laborers placing the wooden structure (which is 
unique for each building), and then cover it with stone.

Now, I'll explain how a purely civilian city (i.e. no soldiers, no fighting) 
works. It's basically like this: everyone works for everyone. You've got chains 
of people working to get food and make more buildings (which will help get more 
food) so you can feed everyone. There is no specific goal, and if a part of the 
circuit is broken, everything breaks with it. That's why it is specially 
important to have lots of food. Suppose you have little food and a farmer dies 
of starvation. Now, you will have even less food, because with one less farmer 
you will produce less corn. If you have less corn, more people will die, and it 
goes on like that.

Next, fighting. The soldiers trained in the Barracks are grouped into 
companies. There are many types of soldiers:

Note: all the soldiers also require a recruit.

Militia: requires a hand axe.

Axe Fighter: requires an hand axe, a leather armor, and a wooden shield.

Sword Fighter: requires a sword, an iron armament, and a long shield.

Bowman: requires a longbow and a leather armor.

Crossbowman: requires a crossbow and an iron armament.

Lance carrier: requires a lance and a leather armor.

Pikemen: requires a pike and an iron armament.

Scout: requires a hand axe, a leather armor, a wooden shield, and a horse.

Knight: requires a sword, an iron armament, a long shield, and a horse.


Back to companies. What do I mean with "companies"? Basically, you split them 
into groups of (I think) unlimited numbers. You don't control each soldier--you 
control a company. You can tell them to change the number of rows of columns of 
soldiers, to move, to rotate, to split, to feed, to attack, and some others. 
Note that when a company is attacking, you can't command them to anything else 
until the battle is over.

And that's it for the basics. More to come in the next update.


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|3.0                  ---| V E R S I O N  H I S T O R Y |--                  <
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0.1 - 4/2/2008
-First release. Made the Basics section.


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|4.0                     ---| L E G A L  &  S U C H |--                      <
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This may be not be reproduced under any circumstances except for personal,
private use. It may not be placed on any web site or otherwise distributed
publicly without advance written permission. Use of this guide on any other web
site or as a part of any public display is strictly prohibited, and a violation
of copyright.

This guide is Copyright 2008 Javier Badia

This guide may only be seen on the following websites:
www.gamefaqs.com
www.geocities.com/ancolinod

If you see it in any other website, please contact me.