Here are our New Cycle Tips and Tricks. Learn how to survive and thrive in Core Engage’s new post-apocalyptic city builder.
New Cycle has been in early access for a bit now and after getting the scope of the land that is the post-apocalyptic Wasteland, we have a good idea of how to handle ourselves and survive in its harsh environments.
And we’re gonna pass that knowledge down to you. Here is everything you need to know to get started in the New Cycle and some pointers in the right direction.
New Cycle Tips and Tricks
Wells and You
Wells are an essential part of survival in the New Cycle which is why you should invest in them very early. But there are some things you should know ahead of time. They don’t require any manpower to function which is why there’s no reason to build as many as possible to stockpile resources early on.
Just be careful and don’t connect one well to several water sources at once. The well will slowly draw from each node separately, slowing down production. Stocking up on water early on is important whenever droughts, frost, or disease come into town. Invest in them early and often to avoid trouble
Rusty Buildings
One very important mechanic early on is the Rust mechanic. If a building isn’t used for several days, it will garner rust which in turn will slow down the building production for 5 days by up to 20%. So if you’re planning to expand your base of operations plan carefully. You can’t afford, especially early on, for your facilities not to pull their weight.
Road and Layouts
If you’re experienced with citybuilders this might be a no-brainer but it’s still worth mentioning. There is now hauling in New Cycle which means all the resources gained and produced will automatically land in your stockpile as long as the building making and producing it is connected via the route.
But if you’re familiar with something like Factorio, it is worth noting that later buildings utilize conveyor belts to transport goods for further production. When laying out your shanty town, make sure to leave space for expansion and make sure that you always have space to remodel things.
A similar thing will also go to housing. Taverns, Watchtowers, and Infirmaries all have a reach for the houses around them. So make sure to clutter them up in residential centers and build housing around them. We also recommend leaving enough room for these city centers to grow.
Morale
One of the things that’ll top up many players of the New Cycle is the Population Management tab responsible for morale and population group settings. You have to adjust all of these manually and at the start, it’ll be set up in a way that your workers will get sick quickly.
This is why you want to tune up water rations and Workforce energy to increase their morale from the start and keep them healthy. You can start adjusting these once you get more productions going that’ll affect Morale directly such as taverns and soup kitchens.
It will seem counter-intuitive at first, starting slowly but a high morale will make up for by having easier-to-handle citizens and it also attracts additional settlers early on.
Techtree
Development is based on your Population and Knowledge and unlocked other titles in the city builder/4X genre these resources will not be used. Every worker will generate 1 knowledge per day, researching different types of tech will also require items that you need to procure before.
Early on Basic Technologies and Establishment are the ones you want to go for. In the second cycle Metal Working and Power Grid will be essential to your thriving community. At the moment these choices don’t carry too much weight but we expect that to change as the early access progresses.
Events
There are a few events that will occasionally pop up throughout your playthrough. These will affect some of the stats of your settlement, many permanently. Of course, these will always be very situational, and sometimes the right boost to morale or production will save your bacon.
But normally you always want to go for the choice that increases your production. Morale is relatively easy to manage in the long run and an increase in production will make that even easier. So do cease the means of production at any occasion.
Stockpile Management and Bottlenecks
Stockpiles are essential in any good building and management game and New Cycle is no exception. But there are some neat tricks you can do to make it work for you. Limiting the amount of resources you can store will make it very easy to identify bottlenecks. If you see wood or iron constantly capping, you plop down some more production facilities to keep things rolling.
This is not as bad early on but in the later goings of a save, you want your productions to be optimized so you don’t have to sit around for tens of minutes at a time until you research the next piece of tech on your Development Tree.
And that is all we have on New Cycle for more. We’ll keep a close eye on the title as it progresses through its early access period and we’ll have much more on it very soon here on ESTNN