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11 Running a settlement in Stronghold 4 means balancing several interlocking systems. Food keeps the population fed, taxes raise income from the people, and honour returns as a resource earned through the life of the court. These inputs feed into one another through supply chains that the player must keep flowing.
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44 Core resources
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66 SystemRoleFoodKeeps the population fed; production can be slowed by snow and the seasonsHonourEarned through the life of the court; rising honour advances the castle through ranks that unlock new buildings, units, and optionsTaxesRaise income from the people, at the cost of their contentment if pushed too highSupply chainsConnect workshops, farms, and stores so resources keep flowing
77 Honour and rank
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99 Beyond paying for court life, honour drives a rank system. Raising honour, by building higher quality living quarters, hosting banquets, and similar means, lifts the castle through a series of ranks, and each rank unlocks access to new buildings, units, and options. Progression through these ranks gives a graded route to expanding a settlement across a mission.
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1111 The ladder is numbered and each step carries a title, shown at the top of the screen beside the player's portrait. Screenshots of the game in play confirm rank 3 as Man At Arms, rank 7 as Knight, rank 8 as Baron, and rank 10 as Duke. Firefly has not published the full list of titles or the honour thresholds between them. On screen the rank sits beside a crowned counter showing progress toward the next step and a button to take the promotion when it is earned, and the target climbs steeply as the ladder goes up: screenshots show 31 of 50 at rank 3 and 479 of 500 at rank 8.
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1313 RankTitle3Man At Arms7Knight8Baron10Duke
1414 Several buildings feed honour and court life. A wide choice of banquets lets a player decide how best to spend banqueting goods, upgradeable houses generate extra honour as they improve, and religious buildings use candles to provide spiritual cover for the population, adding another layer to the economy.
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1616 Production chains can run several steps deep. Cow farms, for instance, produce milk that has to be turned into cheese before it feeds the population, rather than yielding food directly as a simple dairy farm would. Keeping each step of a supply chain connected is part of running the economy.
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18-Keeping subjects content is part of the challenge. The game tracks it on a panel that adds up the pressures on the population: a ration slider for how generously the settlement is fed and a tax slider for how hard it is squeezed, both adjustable up and down, sit above rows for the comforts that offset them, among them religion, ale, and gardens and decorations. The panel resolves to a single running total that can sit either side of zero. Push taxes too high or let food run short and a settlement suffers, so players weigh the demands of war and construction against the wellbeing of the people who make the castle work.
18+Keeping subjects content is part of the challenge. The game tracks it on a panel that adds up the pressures on the population: a ration slider for how generously the settlement is fed and a tax slider for how hard it is squeezed, both adjustable up and down, sit above rows for the comforts that offset them, among them religion, ale, and gardens and decorations. The panel resolves to a single running total that can sit either side of zero. Push taxes too high or let food run short and a settlement suffers, so players weigh the demands of war and construction against the wellbeing of the people who make the castle work. Players can also click on individual subjects to hear what they make of the way the settlement is being run.
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2020 Hunting and Wildlife
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2222 The world is stocked with wildlife. A more advanced hunting system tracks three types of roaming animal herd, and the confirmed roster includes boars, deer, wolves, sheep, chickens, crows, rabbits, and cows. Some are farmed, some are hunted for food, and some, like wolves, have to be fended off, so managing animals is part of both the food supply and the defence of a settlement.
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2424 The economy is tied directly to castle design: workshops, farms, and stores have to be placed and connected sensibly, and the seasons can help or hinder production from one part of the year to the next.