Foundation Villager Needs & Happiness Explained

Your villagers Happiness is crucial to build a prosperous and successful Medieval city. In this Foundation guide, you will learn about each type of villager, their routines, and how to fulfill their needs and keep them happy.

Jump to: Newcomer – Serf – Commoner – Citizen – Novice – Soldier – Knight – Monk – Prior

Understanding Your Villagers = Success

Your villagers have a Happiness rating, you can see this whenever you click on a villager and open their info panel. Happiness is also displayed under the Villagers tab in your Book.

When looking at the villager panel in the top left corner is the type of villager they are and their name. You can rename them by clicking on the quill icon and type your preferred name.

You can see what they are currently doing, it’s usually “I am on free time” or “I am working” or “I am on a mission.”

Happiness is a rating based on the list of needs. You can hover over these bars to learn what is needed to fulfill their happiness. An overview of all villagers Happiness can also be seen at the top of the screen under Villagers > Happiness.

Each villager has what I call a “daily routine” that they go through, it’s a cycle of needs for survival and personal growth which leads to happiness and work assignments. The routines are different for each villager type. As a villagers status changes from Newcomer to Citizen they gain additional needs to be fulfilled.

Tips on Building for Villager Needs

1. Think of your villagers routine as a two-part process, they fulfill their Happiness needs when they are on free time usually near their residence, then separately their work assignments at the workplace.
2. When placing your residential zones, you want to have a Market or two nearby, a water Well, and a Church for Services. When I can afford it, I place at least one of each type of stall in a Market, food, goods, and luxury.
3. Place residential areas near worksites. For instance if you have an industrial mining area you want to place some houses, a well, market, and church close by.
4. If a villager needs 2 Food or 2 Luxury they will walk to multiple market stalls to fulfill them, keep a variety of food, goods, and luxury in your stalls, don’t stack all Berries into one area, etc.
5. Happiness is constantly degrading, the farther a villager has to walk the more they drain by the time they return to work.
6. Villagers will walk as far as needed to fulfill a need, keep an eye on Resources and Markets to make sure you have enough Food, Goods, Luxury. Right-click on an item in the Resource menu at the top of the screen to quickly track it around the map.
7. Check on Church capacity by clicking on the church and see the number of attendees, create more Churches if there is a Services shortage.
8. Build Granaries and Warehouses nearby production and gathering spots to make the Transporters job more efficient. Example: place a Granary near the Fishing Huts, a Warehouse near the Lumber Camp, etc.
9. You can follow a villager by clicking on the locate button in their panel, this can be helpful to troubleshoot why they are not happy.
10. I like to place a Tavern near the Keep to make it easier for the Knight to purchase their 2/2 Luxury goods.

Below you will find a break down of each type of villager and what they need for happiness.

Newcomer

When Immigration is enabled your new villagers are known as Newcomers. Upon arrival they will congregate near your Village Center and will need to be assigned jobs. Newcomers are hardworking and only need the bare necessities to survive.

A Newcomers routine will be something like go to work, walk back to Village Center, work, visit well for water, Village Center, work, food at Market, Village Center. This routine can change order depending on their current needs.

In my experience, it’s best to promote your Newcomers to Serf as soon as you can because they spend a LOT of time walking across the map to the Village Center and back and forth often. When they are promoted to Serf, they can reduce this walking time by finding a home near their work place.

Best jobs for Newcomers are Builders, Foresters. They can also be good Transporters and Market Tenders.

Serf

Serfs are your dedicated working class villagers. They work hard and need a house to live in and a church nearby for services. Serfs will live in a Tier 1 house and don’t require a desirable area.

A Serfs routine is quite efficient, they work, go home for Comfort, then to a church for Services, stop at a market for Food, and finally stop at the Well for water before heading back to work.

Best jobs for Serfs are gathering and production type jobs like Fisherman, Gatherer, Farmers, Weavers, Miners, Woodcutters, and Transporters. Any job that has to do with production and gathering resources will work well for a Serf.

Commoner

Commoners enjoy a double serving of food and require goods in addition to having access to water, a home to live in, and services. They prefer a high desire residential area and a Tier 2 house.

A Commoners routine is less efficient than a Serf and they like to take a longer rest when visiting their residence. Their daily routine is go to work, rest at home for Comfort, visit church for Services, get water from Well, buy Goods at a Market, visit home again for Comfort, work, visit two separate Markets for two types of food, visit home, then work and this pattern changes depending on their needs fulfillment.

Commoners make good Market Tenders, Bartenders, Cooks, Tailors, Hunters, Candle Makers, Jeweler (aka Builder), and other producers of goods. Because they have a longer needs fulfillment routine I prefer to assign Commoners to Market Tenders primarily because they don’t have to be at the market in order for goods to sell, so their time away from the market stall is not too detrimental to the economy.

Citizen

Citizens have a taste for luxury and distinction. In addition to the basics, they require two types of food and two types of goods plus luxury items. They travel around quite a lot in their routine to fulfill needs. Citizens prefer a highly desirable residential area and a Tier 2 house.

The Citizens routine is something like go to work, visit home for Comfort, visit Church for Service, buy Goods from nearest Market, move to next Market to buy more Goods, go home for Comfort, visit Market for Food, then another Market for Food, head to Well for water, stop at Tavern for Luxury (or visit a Luxury Market), go home for Comfort, time to go back to work. Whew, busy day!

Citizens make excellent Tax Collectors and Bailiff. You can also assign them as Bartenders, Foresters, and other jobs that don’t require a high production time.

Novice

A Novice is a newly assigned villager that needs training to become a Soldier. They have similar needs and routine as the Serf. When they are not at the Keep they will walk around the village to fulfill their needs.

When a Novice reaches level 6 they can be promoted to Soldiers during the monthly promotions. You want to equip them with a weapon so they can use the training dummy and go on Military Missions.

Soldier

A Soldier fulfills its needs when not on a Military Mission, they will live at the Keep in a Dorm or in a Tier 2 house near the Keep. When a Soldier reaches level 6 they can be promoted to a Knight, there must be 5 Soldiers to every 1 Knight.

Knight

Knights are the highest ranking soldiers of your Army. When not on a Military Mission, they will live at the Keep in a Dorm or in a Tier 2 house near the Keep.

A Knights routine when not on a Military Mission is train at the Keep, go to Church, go home, buy Goods, visit Well, buy Luxury two times, back home, and to Keep for work.

Monk

Monks live a peaceful life at the Monastery where they work and live in the dorms there. Monks need to visit the same places as other villagers to fulfill their needs.

If you build a Monastery far off away from your village center, remember to place a Church, Well, and Food Market nearby. A Monks routine is work, go to dorm for Comfort, walk to Church for Services, buy Food at the Market, get water at the Well, visit dorm again for Comfort.

Prior

A Monk can be promoted to Prior when they reach Level 6. The Prior is the highest ranking Monk of a Monastery. As of my current play-through v1.8.1 the Monk and Prior have the same needs, though this may change in a future update.

A Priors routine is work, go to dorm for Comfort, walk to Church for Services, buy Food at the Market, get water at the Well, visit dorm again for Comfort.