Getting started

What you need

• Timberborn 1.1 or newer.
• BeaverBuddies Co-Op/PvP Edition. Not the original BeaverBuddies: they share a mod ID, but only this edition has what Timber Empires hooks into, and with the original a multiplayer game goes out of sync. Timber Empires tells you on the main menu when it finds the original.
• Harmony and Mod Settings (1.1 or newer).

Subscribing on the Steam Workshop pulls in the mods it needs. Every player needs the same mods, in the same versions.

Playing with others

Each multiplayer game has a game mode, Co-op, PvE or PvP, picked on the New Game screens’ last page (Multiplayer mode): see Game modes.

Timber Empires runs on top of BeaverBuddies, so hosting and joining work the way BeaverBuddies does: Multiplayer on the main menu, then host a new game, host a saved one, join a friend, or find a match.

Matchmaking. Find a match pairs you with another player over Steam. Each of you picks a faction, the host’s map is used, and every player places their own first District Center wherever they want on it. That first one is free: it’s built at once, with 7 adults, 3 children, 100 berries and 100 water.

Hosting a game. In a game you host yourself, the map’s starting District Center belongs to nobody until someone takes it in its panel (“Owned by”). Once a district has an owner, it stays theirs. With Mixed factions on, each player plays their own faction (set “My faction” before joining) and a player whose faction isn’t on the map yet gets the same free first District Center.

Factions. Folktails and Iron Teeth each have their own troops and a few buildings of their own. Factions from other mods work too: they’re built on one of the two and get its buildings and troops (see Modding).

Playing alone

Without other players, keep Play as an empire on (it’s on by default, in the Customize list of the New Game screens’ last page). Your districts are yours, land claims and fog of war work as they do against other players, and the bandits are your opponents. It needs the Co-Op/PvP Edition installed even for single player.

With it off, Timber Empires’ buildings and troops are still there, but there’s no fog, no land claims and no ownership.

First steps

1. Put up a Watchtower or two at the edge of what you want: claimed land is land nobody else can build on.
2. Build a Forge and a Barracks. Spearmen and archers need no science.
3. Scout the bandit camps near you. From the third cycle they start raiding.
4. Pick a district specialization once you know what each district is for.