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Farm Manager 2018: Campaign Guide

Hi everyone. If like me, you were pulling your hair out wondering how many chapters were left in the campaign. Or every time you seemed to have it all going well, the new mission was to harvest something and it’s just become winter, or you spent all your money on one thing and the next mission wants thousands for the next and you didn’t see it coming!
Well this is the guide for you!

Chapter 1 – Difficult Beginnings

Step 1 –
• 1x Small warehouse
• 1x Manure storage
• Fix farm owners house
Step 2 –
• Create 1x field 0.01ha
• Plow field
• Cultivate field
• Fertilize field
• Buy 79Ux strawberry seedling
• Plant strawberry seedling on the field
• Fix house for permanent employees
Step 3 –
• 1x Well
• Watering field
Step 4 –
• 1x Store for silage
• Fix small cowshed
Step 5 –
• Produce 2Ux silage
• Fix barn

Chapter 1 isn’t too hard, it’s a really good lead in to how everything works while not being too overwhelming.

If you follow the helpful tips from the game, you should easily be able to find everything for building.

A 0.01ha field is 10×10 squares, and the grid will turn a bright green/snap to that position. At this stage of the game I wouldn’t try making huge fields, as everything has to be done by hand and can take a long time.

When buying seeds or seedlings, you can either buy a fixed amount from the market, or you can buy the exact amount you need. This is done by clicking into plant in the task grid then choosing the seed/seedling you want and clicking yes when it informs you you will need extra and offers to buy it. This will only be possible between tasks on the field, as when ploughing etc the task grid is not interactive.

Silage is your first encounter with production in the game and can be a little tricky to understand at first. Initially you will only have grass to be turned into silage. Don’t forget to add a worker to your silage storage! Then, click on the silage storage and go to the production tab, select grass and the slider should be at 100%.

If you want to keep any grass then change the 0 in the bar to however much you want to keep or click the infinity symbol for the worker to take it all forever. Later in the game you will have the option of producing silage from straw and crops. You have two options here, build one or two more silage storages (expensive, and uses up to two extra workers, but faster production) or selecting all three in the production tab, which will mean they all run at 33% (slower production of each, cheaper, no extra workers).

Whichever you choose will depend on your playstyle, but this system will be the same for every production building in the game. As a side note, you can click items on and off as often as you like, for example, you have a load of straw you want to convert, but no crops at the moment, instead of leaving all three active, unselect ALL THREE then select grass and straw again. The reason you need to unselect them all is because the bars will remain at 33% even when one has been removed. (You could just change the slider manually, but in further production buildings with many more options this way is quicker).

Chapter 2 – Household Farming

Step 1 –
• 1x small chicken coop
• 1x small silo
Step 2 –
• Assign 1 employee to small chicken coop
• Fix farm owners house
Step 3 –
• 4x chickens
Step 4 –
• Buy 100.00 kg x Lupine
• Buy 100.00 kg x Sunflower
Step 5 –
• Plant lupine seed on the field
• Plant corn seed on the field
• Plant sunflower seed on the field
Step 6 –
• 1x medium silo
• Fix farm owners house
Step 7 –
• Use spraying anti-weed to spray on the field
Step 8 –
• Collect strawberry from the field

Chapter 2 brings animals into things, showing you how to care for them and the foresight needed for them.

For the fields needed for the lupine, corn and sunflower, I would stick to 0.01ha or 0.02 if you’re feeling brave and are making good time before winter sets in.

By step 4 you have assigned three workers to animals and one to silage, this is leaving you with only four to do everything else in the farm. You can’t hire seasonal workers yet, so another permanent house is probably a good idea. If you do decide to hire more permanent workers then I would advise training in lowering their wages as soon as possible, as removing permanent workers costs you their wages too!

When choosing workers, you notice the little symbols and numbers. These refer to their skill levels. The different skills are animals, beekeeping, plants, orchards, driving, strength and production. Most of these are self-explanatory, you want high animal skilled workers to care for animals and high production skill in producing buildings etc. The strength skill (as far as I can tell) relates to how much produce the worker can carry/ ploughing/ cultivating, for how long. If you auto select workers the game will usually put the most accurate worker with the task you want.

You can upgrade the workers skills, but this is expensive! However, if you have a cheap worker who will work for you for the foreseeable, then it might be worth it for you, depends on your play style. Sometimes a mini-task comes up where you can upgrade a skill for free.

With all of this in mind, you have two routes you can go down, you can fill your houses up with workers straight away and hope that their skills will be useful for future tasks, or you can employ a few workers with relevant skills now and hire more when you need them. Again, play styles.

Chapter 3 – A Breath of Modernity

Step 1 –
• 1x parking
Step 2 –
• Buy rega tractor
• Buy box trailer
• Buy orchard planter
Step 3 –
• Plant apple tree on the field
Step 4 –
• 1x greenhouse
• Plant tomato seedling in 1 glasshouse
Step 5 –
• Finish training: Use of renewable energy sources
• 1x wind turbine station
Step 6 –
• Breed 20x chickens
• Produce 50U x chicken egg
Step 7 –
• Breed 3x cows
• Produce 500.00l x cow’s milk

Chapter 3 is all about the machines and increasing animal products.

Ok, finally machines! Bigger fields here we come! The machines aren’t too expensive yet, though you may need to save up for a bit.

Make sure at this point you are always training in something which cuts costs for you, either wages, buildings, getting a loan. Don’t worry about stamina or production speeds etc yet. We need to hold on to as much of the money we make a month as possible.

Don’t plant the apples by hand, you must use the orchard planter, this field can be whatever size you want, but you still don’t have a plow or cultivator. It won’t need to be done again though, so if you think you can fit in the time to do a large field manually at this stage then I say go for it.

If I was you I would also build more greenhouses than it asks for. They are harvested throughout the winter and really give you a money boost in those quiet months. They don’t all have to be tomatoes either. Personally, I like to plant strawberry’s because they only need to be planted once and are harvested often.

When you get to the wind turbine, you either have to save up or go for your first loan. Either is fine but be aware that a loan must be paid back! And if the loan means you are in minus money most of the time, you won’t be able to inseminate your animals so will be stuck on step 6 or 7 for a long time. It’s a judgement call, and wherever you are in your game will decide it for you.

Chapter 4 – White Business

Step 1 –
• Create 5x field 0.03ha
• Buy ester cultivator
• Buy rodon plow
Step 2 –
• Buy seed drill
• Plant colza seed on the filed
• Plant wheat seed on the field
• Plant buckwheat seeds on the field
• Plant rye seed on the field
Step 3 –
• 1x beekeeper building
• 3x hive
• Assign 1 employee to beekeeper building
Step 4 –
• Plant cherry sapling on the field
• Plant pear sapling on the field
• Finish training: workshop for fruit growers
• Finish training: annual agricultural school
Step 5 –
• Buy self-propelled forage harvester
• Buy 5m chopper attachment
Step 6 –
• Buy xena combine
• Buy reaper for cereals 5m
• Buy round press
• Buy trailer for straw bales
Step 7 –
• 1x arbor
• 1x flower pot 5
• 1x hedge
• 1x fence 1
• 1x scarecrow
Step 8 –
• 1x large silo
• Harvest field
Step 9 –
• Collect the bales from the field
Step 10 –
• 1x house for seasonal employees
Step 11 –
• 1x mill
• Produce 50.00kg x wheat flour
• Produce 50.00kg rye flour
Step 12 –
• 3x medium cowshed
• Breed 30x cows
• Finish training: breeding farmers training

Chapter 4, personally I found this to be the hardest chapter, but this chapter really helps you get to grips with doing a lot of things on the farm at the same time to make some good money.

First, as soon as you can, train in annual agricultural school, this takes a year to complete and is f100,000. It’s the longest training by far and hopefully by this point you have trained in enough cost cutting things to keep afloat from month to month. After this is completed make sure you are always training in something. A lot of later steps involve training in a certain thing and this way will mean you may have already done it.

For steps which require planting, always use the machines, otherwise it won’t be registered as complete. Same for step 8 and 9, use the round press and trailer for straw bales. A machine can only be used on a field which is over 10 squares in one direction or another, so bare that in mind.

For the 0.003ha fields, I would suggest 10×30 fields as the machines work fine on those and are still a manageable size, should you desperately need to do it manually. Now that you can buy seasonal employees, your greenhouses etc should be easy to manage.

When buying machines, don’t feel that you must buy new every time, sometimes even if the machine is in bad condition it is cheaper to buy it and repair/renovate it than buying a new one.

Step 12 is a pain, but once you get all the cowsheds (I like to keep them at 7/14 full for now) you can move cows around, so you don’t have to buy so many to start them off. I find that having the sheds half full means they are ready for breeding semi-regularly.

Finally, the mill works similarly to the silage storage, but with more workers. Depending on your market and field choices, this can become a very profitable building.

Chapter 5 – Developing Knowledge and Broadening Horizons

Step 1 –
• Plant red pepper plant on the field
• Buy planter
Step 2 –
• Buy potatoes planter
• Plant budding potato on the field
• Finish training: industrial poultry management training
• Finish training: labour law training
• Finish training: training in banking 1
Step 3 –
• 1x farm owner’s medium house
• Buy new land
Step 4 –
• 2x small shed
• 5x goats
• 5x sheep
Step 5 –
• Breed 15x ducks
• Finish training: workshop for breeders of cows, sheep and goats
• Breed 10x geese
• Breed 5x turkeys
Step 6 –
• Produce 1500.00kg x Apple
• Produce 500.00kg x cherry
• Produce 1000.00kg x pear
• Breed 30x chickens
• Breed 10x goats
• Breed 5x sheep

Chapter 5 moves more into animals in the second half, and finally we buy some more land! By this stage your farm may be getting a bit cramped, so its really helpful to buy some as soon as you can.

As in chapter 4, planting the potatoes must be done with the potato planter or it won’t be registered. The same for the red peppers with the planter.

This can be a pretty long chapter even though it has fewer steps than others, because of all the training. Hopefully you have always been training in something, so you might have done the majority of these before you are asked to.

For the final two steps, if you are lucky you’ll be able to time it so that the trees can be left in need of harvesting for a time while you breed your last few turkeys, ducks and geese. This means you won’t have to wait another year to harvest them and be stuck on step 6 for a long time.

Don’t leave your trees if they need watering or spraying though, as the crop quality will decrease, and you can’t do anything but harvest them. In fact this applies to every crop!

Chapter 6 – Agricultural Business

Step 1 –
• 1x warehouse with cooling
• 1x small juice factory
• Produce 250Ux apple juice
• Produce 300Ux cherry juice
• Produce 400Ux tomato juice
Step 2 –
• Finish training: workshop on production management 1
• 1x seeds and seedlings production
Step 3 –
• Produce 200U x buckwheat honey
Step 4 –
• Finish training: industrial management for cow farming
• Finish training: industrial management training for sheep and goat farming
• 1x large cowshed
Step 5 –
• 1x milk processing plant (large)
• Produce 1 Ux cow cheese
Step 6 –
• Produce 6000.00kg x cherry
• Produce 1000.00x raspberry
• Produce 3000.00 x strawberry
Step 7 –
• 1x frozen food factory
Step 8 –
• 1x small pigsty
• 6x pigs
Step 9 –
• 1x slaughterhouse
• Assign 2 employee to slaughterhouse

Chapter 6 really starts getting into production. You should have a pretty good amount of stuff going on in your farm by now, harvests, animals and some production.

All the factories, plants and slaughterhouses work the same way as the silage storage from chapter 1, so you will have a good understanding of them by now.

Step 3 requires 200U of buckwheat honey, I found that two buildings with ten hives easily did this in a month or so with level 5 beekeepers. I’m not sure how close they need to be to the buckwheat, so I had it right next to it, but only a 10×10 field.

Again, for the training you should have done most of them or be working towards them, so that can save you some time. The worst thing is having to wait a year to harvest something next time round when all you were waiting for was training to complete.

Producing 6000.00kg of cherries sounds daunting, but I had two 10×30 fields and a couple of level 5 orchard workers and it wasn’t a problem in one year.

Chapter 7 – Stabilization

Step 1 –
• 5x wind turbine station
• Finish training: Farm financial management training
• Finish training: Financial training- cost optimisation 1
• Finish training: Financial training- cost optimisation 2
• Finish training: Financial training- cost optimisation 3
Step 2 –
• 1x farm owner’s large house
Step 3 –
• 1x small rabbit warren
Step 4 –
• Create 10x field 0.032ha
Step 5 –
• Finish training: industrial management training for pig farming
• 1x large pigsty
Step 6 –
• Produce 1000U silage
Step 7 –
• Produce 10000.00kg potato
Step 8 –
• f5000000

Chapter 7 rounds out the whole campaign and makes sure you can make a steady profit.

The only real issue I had in this chapter was trying to decide what to put on 10 fields! If you want to get ahead then I suggest a few of those be potatoes for step 7 and the rest be whatever you think will get you a good profit. Bearing in mind all the production facilities you have now.

Step 8 seems straightforward but can take some time, you could always get a loan for that final push (if you have any available to you at this stage), but that would be kind of like cheating, right?

Written by Amaria45

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