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The two crafting systems, recipes, and levelling your tools.
Refined goods (Planks, Bricks, Iron Ingots, Mortar, Steel, Rope, Charcoal) are never gathered raw — they're crafted. There are two player-driven crafting systems depending on your tier, plus your city's own automated NPC crafting once it's built the right building (see Masterwork below).
The /craft panel lets any player with a Workbench produce goods on demand, with a dedicated crafting queue that runs on its own timer (separate from the hourly tick). This is the main crafting path for Settlers and Citizens. Each craft makes 2 items and takes about 6–10 minutes — your output, XP, and materials per hour are the same as a fast one-at-a-time timer would give, but you re-queue half as often, so there's much less to mind. Your Prize Crate chance over time is unchanged.
Your recipe tool's level multiplies what you get. A fresh Level 1 tool crafts at the base rate, but every level beyond that multiplies your output — by Level 10 a tool makes roughly ten times what it made at Level 1, for the same craft. This applies to every crafting tool (Axe, Shovel, Scythe, Pickaxe, Crucible, Chisel, and Tanning Rack), so levelling up is now the single biggest thing you can do to boost your workbench output. This doesn't change how a craft counts toward City Score — the amount that scores is unaffected, so the realm's rankings stay exactly as they were; only what you actually walk away with grows.
⏳ Slots are runway, not speed. A queue slot only lets you queue another craft — it does not craft in parallel. Every craft still finishes one at a time, one craft-time apart, no matter how many slots you've filled. More slots mean you can walk away for longer before you need to requeue; they never make any single craft finish faster. Only a Rush Token (see Consumables) speeds up completions — Hired Help only adds slots.
/craft is the full amount you'll be charged, and you need all of it on hand to start./craft to open the crafting panel.Your first completed craft (by either system) unlocks the one-time 🏆 Artisan medal worth +5 ⭐ Reputation.
Once you reach Developer tier and max out your Workbench, you can also queue crafting actions in your hourly action queue alongside (or instead of) gathering. Each queued craft slot fires once per tick — one finished batch of goods per hour, no timer-watching required. See Your Action Queue for details.
The Workbench levels up from XP gained every time a craft completes (XP per craft = current level; threshold = 10 × level² for Levels 1–4, a steeper 15 × level² for Levels 5–9). Each level adds one queue slot and shaves 30 seconds off the craft time, down to a 3-minute floor at Lv5. Reaching Level 5 is free to everyone — going past it to Level 10 requires the Master's Charter and to Level 15 the second one, and those extra levels keep adding slots, never more speed.
| Level | Slots | Craft time | Total queue | XP to next |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | 5:00 | 5 min | 10 |
| 2 | 2 | 4:30 | 9 min | 40 |
| 3 | 3 | 4:00 | 12 min | 90 |
| 4 | 4 | 3:30 | 14 min | 160 |
| 5 | 5 | 3:00 | 15 min | 375 |
| 6 | 6 | 3:00 | 18 min | 540 |
| 7 | 7 | 3:00 | 21 min | 735 |
| 8 | 8 | 3:00 | 24 min | 960 |
| 9 | 9 | 3:00 | 27 min | 1,215 |
| 10 | 10 | 3:00 | 30 min | — (max) |
Levels 6–10 require the Master's Charter (50,000g, Trading Post Level 4) — see the Tools section below.
| Output | Inputs | Required tool |
|---|---|---|
| 📋 Planks | 2× 🪵 Timber | 🪓 Axe |
| 🧱 Bricks | 2× 🏺 Clay | 🪣 Shovel |
| ⚙️ Iron Ingots | 1× 🔩 Iron Ore + 1× ⛏ Coal | 🔥 Crucible |
| 🗿 Mortar | 2× 🪨 Stone | ⚒️ Pickaxe |
| 🔧 Steel | 1× ⚙️ Iron Ingots + 1× ⛏ Coal | 🔥 Crucible |
| 🪢 Rope | 2× 🧵 Fiber | 🌾 Scythe |
| ⚫ Charcoal | 1× 🪵 Timber + 1× ⛏ Coal | 🔥 Crucible |
| 🛋️ Furnishings | 1× 🧥 Leather + 1× 📋 Planks | ✂️ Chisel |
| 🧶 Cloth | 1× 🧵 Fiber + 1× 🪢 Rope | 🌾 Scythe |
| 🥫 Provisions | 2× 🌾 Grain | 🌾 Scythe |
| 🍽️ Crockery | 2× 🏺 Clay | 🪣 Shovel |
| 🪛 Fittings | 1× ⚙️ Iron Ingots + 1× 🔧 Steel | 🔥 Crucible |
The last five — Furnishings, Cloth, Provisions, Crockery and Fittings — are the Merchant Quarter district goods; they're crafted just like the rest but feed a district rather than a building upgrade.
✂️ Furnishings needs a Chisel. Every recipe's tool matches the materials it works with — Cloth is fiber-and-rope work, so it crafts with your Scythe; Furnishings blends leather and planks, work no existing tool really fit, so it has its own dedicated tool: the Chisel (2,500g at /vendor, only for sale once your city has built a Craftworks). The Crucible sticks to genuine furnace work — Charcoal, Iron Ingots, Steel, and Fittings.
Once a city upgrades its Craftworks building to Level 2 — only possible after Town Hall reaches Level 4 — it's renamed Masterwork. Its NPC workforce switches to a flat, very high output rate that no longer scales with your city's population, unlike every earlier level. It's what makes the expensive Level 4 building upgrades affordable. Masterwork output is never counted toward City Score — it's automated industrial throughput, not personal craftsmanship. Recipe assignment works the same as before. A Labor Contract still adds +50% workers — but at Masterwork scale that's a real +1,400 workers (and +2,200 once your city reaches Town Hall 5, where the Masterwork's workforce is larger), not the token amount it added at your city's first Craftworks level; see Cities & Building for the full building mechanics and current pricing.
💰 Level 4 costs are flat. Every Level 4 building upgrade, and the Masterwork upgrade itself, has a fixed material and Treasury cost — unlike Levels 1–3, which scale up with your city's population.
Once your city's Library reaches Level 4, a one-tap 🔦 Library Insight button appears right on the main /queue panel (and in its gather and craft sub-menus). Tap it and it instantly fills every one of your open queue slots for you — no picking resources by hand. The main-panel button is needs-aware: it looks at what your city's active project is actually short on and mixes gathering and crafting to suit — crafting the finished goods it needs (when you own the tool and the raw materials are in stock) and gathering the raw materials it needs otherwise. The gather and craft sub-menu buttons stay single-purpose if you'd rather fill with just one.
It fills your queue exactly as things stand the moment you tap it — it won't re-plan later if your city's needs change, so use it right before you're about to be away for a while.
Tools are personal equipment that make you more productive. They improve how much you gather each hour and unlock crafting recipes for Tier 2 materials. Your city needs a Trading Post before the vendor will set up shop.
Every tool starts at Level 1 and caps at Level 5 — or Level 10 with the Master's Charter, and Level 15 with the second one (both below). Each time it fires (on a gather or a workbench craft), it earns XP equal to its current level. The XP needed for each level climbs fast, and climbs even faster from Level 5 onward — but so does what the tool gives back.
| Level | XP to next level | XP per use | Gather bonus | Craft bonus-yield chance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 10 | 1 | +0 (baseline) | — |
| 2 | 40 | 2 | +5 per gather | 10% |
| 3 | 90 | 3 | +12 per gather | 20% |
| 4 | 160 | 4 | +22 per gather | 33% |
| 5 | 375 | 5 | +35 per gather | 50% |
| 6 | 540 | 6 | +50 per gather | 67% |
| 7 | 735 | 7 | +70 per gather | 83% |
| 8 | 960 | 8 | +92 per gather | 100% |
| 9 | 1,215 | 9 | +117 per gather | 100% + 15% chance of a 2nd bonus unit |
| 10 | 1,500 | 10 | +145 per gather | 100% + 33% chance of a 2nd bonus unit |
| 11 | 1,815 | 11 | +174 per gather | 100% + 46% chance of a 2nd |
| 12 | 2,160 | 12 | +203 per gather | 100% + 60% chance of a 2nd |
| 13 | 2,535 | 13 | +232 per gather | 100% + 73% chance of a 2nd |
| 14 | 2,940 | 14 | +261 per gather | 100% + 87% of a 2nd + 15% of a 3rd |
| 15 | — (max) | — | +290 per gather (max) | 100% + 100% of a 2nd + 33% of a 3rd |
Levels 11–15 need the second Master's Charter. The gather bonus keeps climbing the whole way, ending at +290 — exactly double what Level 10 gives. And it's only half the reward: your share of a Level 4+ producer's output doubles across those same five levels too (see the callout below), so both of the things a gatherer levels up for grow by the same amount.
Gather bonus applies only to the four gathering tools (Axe, Pickaxe, Scythe, Shovel). Craft bonus-yield chance applies to Axe, Shovel, Scythe, Pickaxe, Crucible, and Chisel when used in a workbench craft — a successful roll adds a bonus unit before your tool's level multiplies the whole thing (see above), so a higher tool level makes that roll worth more too. The Workbench levels up the same way but improves crafting slots and speed instead — see Workbench levels above. Levels 6–10 on any tool require the Master’s Charter, and Levels 11–15 the second one.
🏭 Gathering at a Level 4 producer. Once your city upgrades a resource's producer building (Sawmill, Quarry, Mine, Farm, Coal Shaft, Textile Mill, Clay Pit) to Level 4 — part of the Industrial Era — gathering that resource there is amplified enormously: your tool level determines how large a share of the building's massive output you personally command. City Score always counts the un-amplified base amount, so the flood boosts your stockpile without ever inflating the leaderboard.
| Tool | Cost | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| 🪣 Shovel | 450g | Improves Clay gather amount. Unlocks the Bricks crafting recipe. |
| 🪓 Axe | 600g | Improves Timber gather amount. Required to craft Planks. |
| 🌾 Scythe | 600g | Improves Grain and Fiber gather amounts. Required to craft Rope and Cloth. |
| ⚒️ Pickaxe | 900g | Improves Stone, Iron Ore, and Coal gather amounts. Also required to craft Mortar. |
| 🔥 Crucible | 2,000g | Required to smelt Iron Ingots, Steel, Charcoal, and Fittings. Craft-only — no gather bonus. |
| ✂️ Chisel | 2,500g — appears once your city has built a Craftworks | Required to craft Furnishings. Craft-only — no gather bonus. |
| 🪚 Workbench | 1,500g | Personal crafting station. Not needed until your city is ready for Level 2 building upgrades — by then you'll have the gold. Every craft produces 2 units, and the wait shortens as the bench improves: 10 min at Lv1 down to a floor of 6 min from Lv5. Past Lv5 (Master's Charter) each level adds a queue slot, never speed — Lv10 holds 10 waiting crafts, Lv15 holds 15 with the second Charter. Slots are runway, not extra hands: the queue works through them one at a time, so more slots mean more hours you can be away, not more crafts per hour. |
Once your city's Trading Post reaches Level 4, any citizen can buy the Master's Charter from /vendor for a one-time 50,000g. It's a permanent personal license — buy it once and it's yours for life, in any city.
Buying the Charter earns the one-time 🏆 Licensed Master medal (+10 ⭐ Reputation); your first leased craft earns 🏆 Leased Genius (+5 ⭐ Reputation); reaching Level 10 on any tool earns 🏆 Grandmaster.
Once your city's Trading Post reaches Level 5 — an Age of Commerce building level — a Charter holder can buy a second Charter for another one-time 50,000g. It raises every tool's ceiling from 10 to 15, and like the first it is permanent and personal.
Gold buys the ceiling; work buys the climb. Neither Charter grants a single level — it only opens room for levels you then have to earn, and the XP each one costs keeps climbing (Level 14 → 15 alone is 2,940 XP).
Everything doubles across those five levels. The flat gather bonus runs +174 / +203 / +232 / +261 / +290 — twice Level 10's +145 at the top — and your share of a Level 4+ producer's output doubles alongside it, from 2× at Level 10 to 4× at Level 15. The two were sized to match on purpose, so neither is the one that matters. On the crafting side the bonus-yield roll walks up to a guaranteed second bonus unit at Level 15, plus a 33% shot at a third — exactly the shape Level 10 had one tier below.
Working any tool all the way to Level 15 earns 🏆 Legend.
These tools only appear at /vendor once your city has a Hunter's Lodge. They level up through use the same way as regular tools, up to the same Level 5 / 10 / 15 caps.
| Tool | Cost | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| 🏹 Bow | 800g | Required to go hunting. Sends you on a quick trip at any unlocked hunting ground — short, light-to-medium game. Earns XP and levels up with each hunt. A higher Bow level biases your catches toward the heavy end of a species' range, exactly as the Crossbow does for its heavier prey — heavier animals give more Pelts. (Which species you can meet is still set by the ground you pick, not your Bow level.) |
| 🎯 Crossbow | 3,500g — appears once your city's Trading Post reaches Level 4 | Unlocks Big Game hunts — a much longer trip at every hunting ground that always bags one heavy trophy animal, plus the rarest catches in the game. A higher Crossbow level biases your catches toward the heavy end of a species' range — since heavier animals give more Pelts, leveling up your Crossbow means more Pelts per Big Game hunt (your Bow levels the same way for its own lighter game). Big Game hunts share the same hunt queue as your Bow, so loading up on trophies means fewer quick hunts. A Crossbow also unlocks a heavier Big Game expedition in /queue — double the supplies for a bigger pelt haul, when your city has raw materials to spare. |
| 🧤 Tanning Rack | 600g | Unlocks the Leather crafting recipe (2× Pelts → 1 Leather). Each level adds a 15% chance of double output — capped at 100% by Level 7 (reachable with the Master's Charter). |
🎯 What a weapon's level is actually worth, in a number. Your Bow or Crossbow level decides where inside a species' own weight range your average catch lands — and since heavier animals give more Pelts, that is straight income. At Level 1 the roll is flat: your average catch sits halfway up the range. By Level 15 it sits 85% of the way up, which works out to roughly a quarter more weight per catch than a Level 1 hunter takes. Every level in between gains, and /tools prints your current figure next to each weapon so you never have to guess whether the XP is doing anything. It applies to both weapons — the ground still decides which species you meet, your level decides how heavy a one you bring back.
⚠️ Tools are personal — they belong to you, not your city. If you move cities, your tools move with you.
🦌 Wildlife Passport. Every animal you personally bag — by Bow, Crossbow, or a hunting expedition — is logged to your own collection: how many species you've caught, how many times, and your heaviest of each. Send /wildlife to see it, or check the trophy case on your player profile on the website. The panel opens on an Overview tab (your overall progress and a quick per-ground summary), with a tab for each hunting ground — tap one to see that ground's species laid out in a simple table showing whether you've caught it, how many times, and your best weight, split into Quick Hunt (Bow) and Big Game (Crossbow) prey. Filling it out earns the Naturalist medal. Every hunt — a quick Bow or Crossbow trip, or a provisioned expedition — gives each animal at that ground an equal chance, so chasing a specific species for your Passport is fair game — pick the right ground and weapon (some animals only appear at one ground, and the heavier prey needs a Crossbow) and keep hunting. A higher-level Bow or Crossbow tends to bag a heavier catch of whatever you land. And keep your eyes open — there are rumors of a few extraordinary creatures out there that no one's ever properly documented; stumble onto one on a hunt and it's revealed on your own profile, plus a shot at the Cryptid Hunter medal. (The city's Lodge hunting parties don't count toward your Passport — only your own hunts and expeditions do.)