How to increase Approval in Manor Lords

Increasing Approval in Manor Lords is vital to keeping your citizens happy during your playthrough, as well as increasing the population of your town. As a result, if you wish to stay in power, you’ll need to maintain a healthy Approval rating to grow your settlement and avoid any nasty surprises such as civil unrest.

At the start of a game of Manor Lords, your Approval rating will be quite low, but don’t panic, as there are a number of ways to improve this. Read on for our walkthrough on how to how to increase Approval to get more families, and how avoid things that will make your Approval rating go down.

On this page:

• Approval in Manor Lords explained
• How to increase Approval in Manor Lords
• What to avoid to make sure Approval doesn't go down

Approval in Manor Lords explained

In simple terms, your Approval measures how happy your citizens are in your settlement. Fulfilling their basic needs - such as providing access to food, housing and clothing - will typically lead to a good Approval rating.

You can check Approval by hovering over the ‘thumb’ icon on the bar at the top of your screen. This will display your Approval rating over the last 30 days, in addition to your ‘previous’ Approval rating from the period before this.

Your Approval has a significant impact on the success of your settlement, as it determines population growth. This is the rate at which new families move into your settlement, and you’ll need to keep recruiting villagers to take on jobs. An Approval rating of 50 per cent is required to increase population, and keep families moving into your village.

Approval also impacts the morale of your militia units, with a high Approval rating allowing your soldiers to fight more efficiently. Low Approval will lead to low morale, and your militia units won’t perform well on the battlefield if they feel unhappy.

There are also some dire consequences if you fail to maintain a healthy Approval rating, with citizens turning to crime or abandoning your settlement if they feel dissatisfied with your leadership.

It’s worth noting that as you level up your Burgage Plots to Level 2 and Level 3, some of your living requirements will also increase, meaning citizens will require a greater supply of food and clothes in order to remain happy. Therefore, proceed with caution when upgrading your Burgage Plots, as you may need to adjust your supply of goods to accommodate this.

How to increase Approval in Manor Lords

When looking to increase your Approval, these are the key areas you should try to address:

• Food variety
• Clothing variety
• Church level
• Ale supply

Ensuring your settlement has access to a diverse range of food will give a boost to your Approval, in addition to satisfying Burgage Plot residential requirements (which in turn will help you increase your settlement level).

This means you'll need to have multiple food sources available, such as Berries, Meat, Bread, Eggs, Vegetables, Apples or Honey. Remember to build plenty of Burgage Plot extensions to produce Eggs and Vegetables. Taking the Beekeeping upgrade in the development point tree will also give you access to Apiaries where you can collect Honey.

Similarly, residents will want a variety of clothing items to keep them happy. The easiest way to achieve this is by converting Hides into Leather at the Tannery building. If you add Goat Shed extensions to your Burgage Plots, you should be able to produce plenty of Hides to support this.

Once you have upgraded a Burgage Plot to Level 2, you can also build a Cobbler’s Workshop extension to start producing Shoes from Leather.

If you find yourself short on types of food or clothing, you can always import supplies through trade.

Build multiple Marketplaces to ensure even distribution of goods

To make sure all your citizens have easy access to food and clothing stalls, we recommend building lots of small Marketplaces throughout your town rather than one big one. This will ensure that your goods are evenly distributed, as the Burgage Plots closest to a market place will get first pick of the items there, leaving distant houses unstocked. Assigning plenty of Granary and Storehouse workers will also allow your goods to be taken to market quickly.

Build Churches near your Burgage Plots

Another easy way to boost your Approval rating is by placing a Church, as your villagers will want somewhere to pray.

The Wooden Church costs x5 Timber, x20 Planks and x10 Stone to build. This can later be upgraded to the Small Stone Church for x5 Timber, x20 Stone, x10 Planks and x10 Roof Tiles.

Keep the Ale flowing to your Tavern

Once you have an established town and are looking to upgrade your Burgage Plots to Level 3, you will also need to provide entertainment. For this, you will need to place a Tavern and keep it stocked with Ale.

Making Ale is quite an involved process, as you'll need to grow Barley fields, build a Malthouse to turn your Barley harvest into Malt, and then a Brewery to turn that Malt into Ale.

To make sure your Burgage Plots have ready access to Ale, we recommend building your Tavern in a fairly central location in the middle of your town.

What to avoid to make sure Approval doesn't go down

While there are several ways to boost your Approval rating, you should also be mindful of potential penalties that can damage your rating:

• Homelessness
• Bodies needing burial
• Taxation
• Failing to meet Residential Requirements (lack of water, food, clothing etc.)

The first of these you’ll need to address is Homelessness, as when you begin a playthrough, your citizens will be living in a homeless camp rather than established homes. If left unresolved, this will result in a loss in Approval which will slow the growth of your village.

A quick-fix for this is to upgrade the homeless camp with x1 Timber, which will turn it into a Worker Camp. This provides temporary accommodation and will prevent your Approval rating dipping below 50 per cent (the amount required for immigration). Citizens living in the camp will not be truly happy until they are living in Burgage Plots, however, so you’ll need to move them into proper houses as soon as possible.

At some point, you are likely to have a battle near your town, particularly if you are raided by bandits. Having dead bodies lying around in the streets is, understandably, quite upsetting for your population - and will cause a loss in Approval if left unresolved. You will need to build a Corpse Pit in which to bury raiders, and a Wooden Church where villagers can be buried on hallowed ground. Make sure you have workers assigned to the Corpse Pit and the Church, as gravediggers are required to bury the bodies.

Taxation is an option that becomes available once you have reached the ‘Small Village’ settlement level (Level 2) and placed the Manor building. Implementing a land tax will convert some of your Regional Wealth to the Treasury, but be warned: any level of taxation will result in a loss in Approval. High levels of tax will significantly agitate your population, so we've found it's best to keep your taxes at around 10-20 per cent.

Finally, to keep your citizens satisfied, you will need to continuously supply them with a diverse range of food and clothing - particularly if you’ve upgraded their Burgage Plots. Level 3 Plots, for instance, will need uninterrupted access to Ale at the Tavern. Failing to supply homes with Fuel in the form of Firewood or Charcoal can cause unhappiness, and you should also check your citizens all have access to a Well. Should resource shortages cause you to not meet these Residential Requirements, Burgage Plots will become dissatisfied, and you could face penalties to your Approval rating.

Part of the fun in Manor Lords is improving your settlement’s efficiency and solving logistical challenges, so be sure to tinker with your town layout and Marketplaces to maximise your citizens’ access to food and clothes. If you’re struggling to access a certain resource, remember that importing items through the Trading Post is a great way to solve goods shortages.

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That's everything you need to know about Approval and getting more families in Manor Lords. For more help getting started in Manor Lords, find out what to do first in our beginner's tips and tricks guide, as well as the best development points to unlock early, and our best advice on how to get food and farm, as well as how to trade goods and animals to bolster your town further.