u/Kashmir_Slippers

I just "finished" my first play through where I was doing seemingly well before I rapidly expanded too quickly and made a food shortage cycle, so I am game to try again.

Rather than just trial and error a lot of little things, I was looking for a guide/video series that is at the "intermediate" level of play, that teaches how to deal with the game systems. I searched for recommended Let's Plays here, and have watched a bit of Keralis and Cappy Bara playing on their youtube pages, but their series were long and felt like I was watching someone vibe playing rather than teaching.

A lot of the Steam guides are good but feel either outdated or fairly barebones and simple. For example, through various guides and reddit threads, I have seen tips like "don't promote pops too early," but I have not seen people list out when it is time to promote or really even talk about promotion much at all, or I have seen things like ~3 wheat farms per 1 mill per 1-2 bakeries is the appropriate balance for food production per building, but that has also been across many different pages and threads and not somewhere concise.

I was wondering if there was something more centralized and dense with this sort of information. I get the basic gameplay loop but am looking to get a little more nuanced before I start trying to make a castle/big city. I really enjoy let's plays, but I would also just rather play the game rather than watch a 10+ hour series.

Thanks!

I am in act 5 and I am currently romancing the twins (I guess). Back in act 2 when I got them and did their recruitment quest, I slept with Kanerah, but did not pick the "You almost fell on me? Hmm, now that's something..." dialogue with Kalikke when they switched because I thought it sounded a bit creepy.

Has not picking that dialogue choice locked me out from romancing Kalikke? I just finished the soul eater quest, took the neutral option, and saved all the Sweet Teeth, but I do not see some of the dialogue options with Kalikke that the guides say should be there when talking at her house in the capital. Is there any way to check other than just playing the game more? Have I already locked myself out?

Long rant incoming:

If what I think is true, is true, I find it really frustrating because this will have been the second time not picking one dialogue choice did this to me. I am playing a lawful stupid male protag and wanted to romance Valerie when I heard she was an option (but also was not following a step by step guide). I used her in my party all the time, agreed with choices she suggested, and just generally was nice and supportive to her in her quests and scenes. I thought the romance was going to be a very low burn thing, but when I looked it up after being in mid Act 3, I learned that the ONE in town dialogue choice I did not take with her was the one and only trigger for the romance.

When talking to her that first time in town, she had just told me that she did not like how people made a big deal out of her beauty, so immediately turning around and hitting on her and calling her beautiful seemed like it would actually turn her off, rather than maker her interested, so I just kept playing the game waiting for something to happen (like the scene I got with Octavia when I brought them back to Oleg's the first time in act 1).

I understand completely that these sorts of romances are the epitome of insignificant fluff that do not matter, but it just really annoys me that I spent so much time with the character, playing an MC who would naturally jive, and I missed out on all the scenes and character development because I did not take one, kind of creepy, dialogue choice. There is a small part of me that wants to restart so that I can do the romance, but I am almost 100 hours and feel like that would be silly. I turned to the the twin romance instead, but now I'm wondering if I should just restart and follow a guide step by step for everything in it feels so convoluted and easy to miss.

Anyway, thanks for listening.