Best layout for settlement development in Manor Lords

Building the best settlement in Manor Lords can prove tricky if you don’t know the ideal layout to use for your village as it develops into a thriving town, so here’s everything you need to know.

Having the best layout in Manor Lords for your settlement is all about optimizing the efficiency of your production lines. However, if you start off on the wrong foot, you can easily find yourself scratching your head at why you are running out of food or everything seems to be taking forever.

By following these key principles as you level up and expand into further settlement levels, you can ensure that you have the best layout possible to maximize your yield and become a well-loved lord.

Best settlement layout in Manor Lords

Starting Region

With your randomized starting Region depending on how you will design your settlement’s layout, then if you’re not happy with it, simply back out and start a new game.

In particular, you will want to make sure your Region has the best rich deposits available for your resources. These are indicated with a crown above them on the map, and allow you to harvest much more than a standard deposit. You will want a rich deposit for your Berry Deposit or Wild Hunting in your Region to ensure a constant food supply from the start.

Build Burgage Plots near workplaces

Reduce travel times of your workers by building Burgage Plots near workplaces, so that your villagers can get to work straight away. This will prevent you from slowing down your production lines, especially at the start when you will have a limited workforce.

Reassign workers to their closest workplace

Reassign your families to their closest workplaces by clicking on a Burgage Plot, place of residence, or workplace and hit the re-assign button in the people section for different families. Your settlement will continue to develop and change, so making sure your workers always have the most efficient travel routes is key.

Keep buildings that share resources close

Buildings that are used to collect and store certain resources will need to be transported to other buildings to convert them into another item. Make sure you therefore place these buildings next to or near each other to speed up production times.

For example, at the start of the game, you will want to prioritize making Timber and Planks for construction. So, placing your Logging Camp next to the Sawpit is optimal for making Planks.

Build road and Oxen network

You will quickly realize that roads and using Oxen are essential to keep a constant flow of resources being transported to different locations. Roads cost nothing and speed up travel time for workers and livestock, so make sure you connect these to all your buildings and that the routes are as short as possible.

Investing in Oxens as soon as possible is vital, as they can take a while to transport heavy materials around via your road network, such as logging around Timber for construction or between buildings.

Build small Marketplaces next to Burgage Plots

Even though a large central Marketplace is an obvious choice, building several smaller collections of Marketplace plots near Burgage Plots will avoid goods getting bottlenecked while in transport. This will also lead to a decrease in the Approval rating for various villagers as less will be available.

Make sure to then focus on upgrading all the Burgage Plots that are closest to the markets. This will give you various benefits, such as reducing the travel time of goods for market stalls, allowing better food and clothing to be sold on the markets, and ultimately ensuring their demands are satisfied.

Build amenities away from Burgage Plots

Don’t worry about constructing the buildings associated with amenities, such as the Well, Tavern, or Church far away from Burgage Plots and your main area. Unlike workplaces and Marketplaces, these aren’t as dependent on their location, just build these within your Region to meet villager requirements.

Manor Lords is still in Early Access, therefore when further updates are released, the best layout for your settlement development will be subject to change. The developers have announced that certain features, such as Fire Hazards and Smell have not yet been implemented.

Check out more Manor Lords guides:

How to build and use the Sawpit | Manor Lords system requirements | Is Manor Lords on Game Pass? | Does Manor Lords run on Steam Deck? | Best Development Points to unlock in Manor Lords