Salem

Ive been playing Salem for a while now and consider myself early/mid level in my development. Ive put down my first Claim, a small place down by the river, with a forest and grasslands around me. Skills are getting increasingly difficult to acquire, so im starting to plan my long term game.

1. Are seeds available from the environment or solely from the Market? Is there a way of obtaining seeds besides the high cost at market?

2. Ive gotten to the point where i have recipes for a lot of cool stuff, but the majority of it requires Iron Bars. Do i need to just spend the time develoiping metalurgy skill set, and make bars, or is it feasible to buy them?
Ive only had maybe $400 silver total since playing. To buy the occasional Nail and a Claim cert. Do i need to focus on generating Silver, or just spend the time to train up and make Iron Bars?

3. How much stuff fits on the Sled? Is it feasible to pack up on a sled and move? Lots of people have been moving in around me lately, not sure if i should pack up and go, or just deal with it. I never see anyone, but lots of camps popping up.

1. The only field-crop seeds available in the environment are Pumpkin Seeds which are acquired from New World Gourds planted in pots which turn into Baby Bears. These Baby Bear pumpkins can then be grown as potted plants until you have enough to yield the necessary amount of seeds to plant a field (50 for fresh field, 25 for one that has its upkeep already reduced).

2. Iron bars are quite expensive. I was lucky to build my smelter at a time when there was a price-war among the Iron-selling players and so it was (relatively) cheap. 200 Silver per bar of Iron from the NPC stalls is prohibitively expensive. You need Iron to get Iron: smelters require 3 iron and 2 nails. After that it's 5 iron bars to make an anvil before you can make your own nails. Is it worth it? YES! Unless you have a lot of silver on hand, it is easier to make your own iron than attempting to buy all of it. You'll need to buy some, but after that you can save your silver for claim expansion, or purchase of other goods you can't easily get yourself.

3. A sled holds 4 liftable objects (such as boulders or containers filled with goods) and when pulling it you walk at a reduced rate. I personally would not recommend it for long-distance migration because of its slowness. It's better to use up all of your consumables and walk (or wander) at a faster speed to get to a better place to settle. Sleds are quite expensive though (4 bars of iron, 4 nails), and if you haven't even settled yet, it is unlikely anything you could carry in the sled would be worth more than the sled itself.

Great, exactly the info i was looking for.

So far, all my Silver has come from Indian Feathers. Im right about the point where i can start hunting bigger things to eventually start finding brains. But i need get my Humours up first. Still in the 9/10 range.
I have tons of hides ready to tan.
Is there a better way of generating Silver besides the Feathers, and eventually these hides? All of which are the lesser hides, not Bear hides or Beaver hides yet.

waico wrote:Is there a better way of generating Silver besides the Feathers, and eventually these hides? All of which are the lesser hides, not Bear hides or Beaver hides yet.

Put up some drying frames and dry those hides, then sell then to npc at 4s each. This applies to the dried snake hides you find in stumps too. They add up.

Also, make cricket teams and sell those to npc.

You need to be careful to keep an eye on drying frames not on a claim, but they are cheap and easy to repair. You might lose a few hides, but silver is important and trying to save them all is silly. Rabbits get to be really easy to kill so getting more will be easy later.

If you find a place with lots of grass, you might put up a leanto, make a couple containers, and make a bunch of hay... look for a buyer on the trade forum here. Again, not big silver on a per item basis (maybe 3-4s per hay) but it adds up. It's nice to have 2-3k in hand when you find a spot to settle. You can claim more and afford the iron and nails you need to get some things up quickly. And afford some good seeds from players who have spent time developing their crops.

Check the trade forum, you would be surprised the 'easy' things to collect even as a 5 bile new character are valued.

If you are on Roanoke for example I am buying Hay @7 silver each Flint @4 silver each.

2 things you can start accumulating 1 hour into the game.

If only there was an in-game way to easily sell things to other players...

Hans_Lemurson wrote:If only there was an in-game way to easily sell things to other players...

I'm assuming there's a bit of sarcasm to that, but in case there isn't... Make a contact via the forums and set up a time to meet in game to make a trade. Sounds pretty easy to me.

MagicManICT wrote:

Hans_Lemurson wrote:If only there was an in-game way to easily sell things to other players...

I'm assuming there's a bit of sarcasm to that, but in case there isn't... Make a contact via the forums and set up a time to meet in game to make a trade. Sounds pretty easy to me.

It's genius game-design! Make something doable in-game by having people do it outside the game!

...Aanyways, that's enough derailing on that topic.

One more thing I wanted to add, Waico: You are not "mid-game". You are early-game. In my limited experience, the beginning of mid-game is when you start to erect buildings and smelt your own iron. (Others might disagree and call me a noob and say it only begins with your first murder, but whatever)

I am on ROanoke actualy, and have TONS of Grass/hay near my home. I can churn out Hay like no ones business...
Im currently on an exploring expedition. Once i get back home, get situated and churn out a few boxes ill repost on here to set up a meet?

Also, i notice there is an unofficial mapping website. But, no matter how far I explore, i cant quite situate myself to the map. I know there are a lot of missing areas to the map, but still, nothing seems to match up. Is there a coordinates system or some way to find yourself on the map?

waico wrote:1. Are seeds available from the environment or solely from the Market? Is there a way of obtaining seeds besides the high cost at market?

It's really best not to get your seeds from new world gourd or the white stalls. Players sells seeds that at least have some purity to them for reasonable prices and you get to skip a lot of work grinding purity.