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[!] You find a letter in your aviary mailbox! Farm Draft Notice You have been selected to partake in the honorable work of ploughing the public wheat field for this year’s planting. The winter has come and gone, and now we must prepare for next year if our granary is to remain full of grain! Report to the Town Hall nine days from now (and no sooner!) and we can begin work! -Mimosa Applefoot-Nimblefoot. ((7 PM EST, today on Wednesday the 5th of April, 2023. Located in Bywater, the home of the halflings on Almaris))

[!] A note is pinned to the Bywater Notice Tree Gardening Plots! ~The newly restored fields of Bywater, no longer a fair area~ The fair is over, and with its passing our daily lives return to us. There is still more land to clear and put to good use. To anyone willing to pitch in some labor, I'll offer them a garden plot to grow vegetables, spices, herbs, and whatever else comes to mind. Knox bless the shire! ~Mimosa Applefoot ((Event 8 PM EST, Tomorrow on Tuesday the 14th of February, 2023. Located within Bywater, the home of the halflings on Almaris. Directions to Bywater: ))

[!] A note is pinned to the Bywater notice tree Preparing The Year's Harvest! A new year has come, and with it, a new set of duties for us to carry out if we are to remain faithful to Knox, our patron, and keep our stock of food fresh and topped off! My hope for this year is to bring in a record harvest using all of our new equipment and more experienced workforce. May the grains never stop flowing! Next Pumpkin Day, we shall plough the fields. After that, we are to plant seeds upon them, harrow them with rakes, weed them, fertilize them, take care of them, and harvest them at year's end! There is much to be done! ~Mimosa Applefoot, Mayor of Bywater, home of the halflings ((Event tomorrow at 8 PM EST on Thursday the 26th of January, 2023, located within Bywater, the home of the halflings. Directions: ))

[i] A new pamphlet arrives at your door. THE WHEAT WHACKER CHRONICLES THE CHERUB OF THE WORKBENCH Any self respecting farmer knows that a workbench is essential to farming, to repair our tools, as well as to pack our crops into the appropriate bushels and bales. Dear shepherds and shepherdesses, imagine my distress when I was tilling the fields of Minitz - which have done extraordinarily well ever since I’ve taken them under my wing, proving all the farms in the Harvest Confederacy only need a bit of LOVE AND ATTENTION - ahem, excuse me. I became sidetracked. Imagine my distress when I couldn’t immediately find a workbench! How lucky was I when a flaxen haired youth approached me and showed me to a workbench I could use. Truly, when the youth understand the importance of farming, that is when we are truly blessed. To this child, whose name I do not know, I dub you the Cherub of the Workbench. You shall always have a friend in the Wheat Whacker. THE SECOND REVIEW This time I have traveled far and wide, to many a place within the Southernmost part of our world. I have been to farms near and far, and to places with no farms at all! I have traveled far and wide so you do not have to. To the farms outside the ruined city of San Luciano, the tiny patch in the Barony of Triglav, to the farms nearest Vistulia, I have traversed and farmed them all. I started my journey in the Viceroyalty of Hyspia, and whilst I am understanding of the fact that the desert dries out soil at an alarming rate, I am not sympathetic to the fact that a live chicken is living in between the stalks of wheat. The less said about the feral animal the better. Whilst San Luciano remains abandoned and in dire need of repair, the farm outside the ruined city is in good condition considering the city it used to feed. There are patches of crops that have been trampled and become unusable, but overall, it made for a good harvest due to the superb irrigation and size of the field. The Barony of Triglav came next, and while their farm was well irrigated there were a few bare patches that should concern whomever farms it. Overall, it was well-kept indeed. Vistulia was the next stop, and their farm was large indeed. Whilst the dry patches are forgivable due to the climate, the cross contamination of crops is not. Carrots, just two or three patches, in the top of the field, and dry spots galore! Surely whichever poor soul must farm that field regularly is not so careless? Erwinsburg, Erwinsburg. Their farms are superb! Well watered and expansive! Truly a great environment to grow crops. If only there were crops growing! Every field is empty and bare, even of seedlings. How sad, to see such potential go unused. The Duchy of Redclyf truly has a personal farm to be proud of. Dry patches, yes, but they only have one tilled spot that is bare of any crop whatsoever! Hurrah! As the foremost farming authority, I would recommend going no further than this duchy if you are indeed touring the farms of the world as I have. While the Grand Duchy of Balian may seem nice, there is truly no greater sin than not having a farm so that the people in your care may feed themselves. I was horrified to learn that most preferred to sit on their laurels rather than use their day to feed themselves and others. I recommend steering clear of Balian at all costs. A place without a farm is a place without kindness. SUBMITTED FARMS Whilst the village of Helious may seem… haphazard at best, their farms are an entirely different story, much to my joy. Most often farmed by my faithful companion, the Silent Sodbuster, these fields are the picture of health. With minimal dry patches and an… admittedly unorthodox irrigation system, there is no denying that it works. Perhaps the farms could look better, but there is no doubt that they produce fine crops. Do send in your farms for review. Even if they aren’t sent in, I’ll get to them eventually! All submissions should be forwarded to this address. [OOC: The Wheat Whacker#1688] The foremost farming authority,

[i] A new pamphlet arrives at your door. THE WHEAT WHACKER CHRONICLES INTRODUCTION What, ladies and gentlemen, are the tenets for every farmer? Of course, proper irrigation, seeding, and harvesting is key to any farmer’s livelihood. Alas, it seems more and more of us are forgetting these tenets! Across Almaris, much of which I have farmed in, there are unseeded patches and dry spots in every field. Much to my horror, I can assure you. The purpose, dear shepherds and shepherdesses, of this pamphlet is to bring attention to the sorry state of our fields. But what authority have I to comment on your farming procedures? The six thousand potatoes and carrots, and the eight thousand bales of hay, all perfectly stored in my storeroom, are my qualifications, dearest farmer. And, of course, if you’ve a field nearby, I’ve farmed it. From the tiniest farm just outside Corwinsburg to the farm just outside Amathea, I have farmed far and wide. If I haven’t farmed your fields, it’s only a matter of time. I, the Wheat Whacker, will aid you in your endeavors to better your farms. THE FIRST REVIEW We shall begin, my farmers, in the Harvest Confederacy. Surely a nation named after harvesting will have immaculate fields, will they not? I’m afraid that the Confederacy will disappoint us, for while their fields certainly look impressive, they seem to value quantity over quality. At first glance, the golden fields of wheat and rich-looking vegetable patches fool most as they pass by. Poor irrigation and dry patches are apparent even in the very first fields I came across, just outside of Vienne, or whatever it’s name is now. A fluke, I said to myself, and shared a glance with my trusty companion, the Silent Sodbuster, saw us quickly harvesting all we could carry and wandering off to the next stop. The further inward we went, the more problems arose. We had run all the way to Arichsdorf, our bundles of wheat steadily growing, before we were too disheartened to continue. Bare patches riddled fields and poor lighting saw some of the seedlings not taking to even irrigated soil. Truly, a horrific sight. Dry soil was plentiful, and truly, my hopes cannot have been more crushed. While there may be hundreds upon hundreds of wheat fields, and the crop yield is impressive, it is not enough to excuse such heinous oversights. I truly hope this pamphlet, drawing attention to their problems, will prompt the farmers to correct their mistakes. Do send in your farms for review. Even if they aren’t sent in, I’ll get to them eventually! All submissions should be forwarded to this address. [OOC: The Wheat Whacker#1688] The foremost farming authority,

Farming Guide Hey there! Do you have a plot of land somewhere on the server? No clue what to do with it? This guide will teach you how to be a farmer and obtain both passive & active income from your farming! PRO TIP: Right click mature crops with a hoe to harvest and auto-replant them! This doubles wheat yields! Contents: ~Field setup~ ~Does lighting matter?~ ~Crops to consider~ ~Selling your crops~ ~Animals are important~ ~Controlling your cattle~ ~Field Setup~ ~Each block of water hydrates a 9x9 square (4 blocks in every direction) around it~ Fields, how do you set them up? By far the most important thing to consider is hydration. Without hydrating your farmland, your crops will grow very slowly! However, if you spam water everywhere, you might miss out on space that could otherwise be planted on with a more efficient water setup! ~Cheeky water-block hiding under the farmland, hydrating the farm without wasting any space to do so!~ On a flat surface, the most efficient water layout is to put 1 block of water in the center of each 9x9 square on the field, leaving 8 blocks of farmland between each water block (not counting the water blocks themselves). However, if you are farming on a slope, you can hide water blocks underneath existing farmland to hydrate everything without any exposed dirt left un-planted! ~Does lighting matter?~ No! Unless you are farming underground (which isn't allowed on LOTC), block lighting has no impact on crop growth. Crops grow based on the SKY light level, not the block light level. The block light level only matters if the sky light level (which remains at 15 even at night if the block is exposed to open sky) is too low for crop growth. As long as the crop can be planted, it will be able to grow there during daytime AND nighttime. Don't believe me? Look below: ~Crops to consider~ Wheat: Wheat is used to craft bread, cake, cookies, and hay bales. Hay bales are useful for healing horses and as a decoration block, and bread is a common travel food. On LOTC, each harvested wheat crop yields 2 wheat, 2/3rds of a loaf of bread. Wheat is easy to process into a sellable form, easy to store by crafting it into hay bales, is vital for horse breeding and horse combat (in hay-bale form), and is needed to breed cows and sheep (high-value animals). This is why wheat is the most common LOTC crop, and thus it's highly worth planting on your LOTC farm. Potatoes: Potatoes can be smelted in a furnace to make baked potatoes, providing 6 saturation and 5 food points just like bread, or fed to pigs to breed more of them. On LOTC, each harvested potato crop yields 2 potatoes, each potato capable of being smelted into a baked potato. Thus, potatoes are 3 times as efficient at producing food as wheat, assuming you have enough fuel to smelt them. If you plan to sell food in bulk, don't have tons of space to farm, and have access to cheap or free fuel, potatoes are worth farming, perhaps even better than farming wheat if you're only producing foodstuffs. If fuel is expensive or otherwise unobtainable, don't bother. Carrots: Used to make golden carrots and breed rabbits and pigs. Carrots themselves are a horrible food item, but golden carrots are the best food item in the game, hands down. Golden carrots provide 6 hunger points and 14.4 saturation, the most saturation out of any item in LOTC (steak only provides 12.8 saturation). Golden carrots heal you faster than any other food item in LOTC as a result, on top of being necessary for horse breeding. Carrots are worth farming if you have access to lots of gold or plan to breed horses. Otherwise, don't bother, you'll just fill up your storage with useless carrots you'll never be able to sell. Only a small carrot farm is necessary to produce golden carrots, as you'll likely be limited by gold instead of carrots, so don't go overboard with carrot farming. Beetroot: Used to craft beetroot soup and red dye or to breed pigs. Unless you need a lot of red dye, there is no reason to farm beetroot. Beetroot soup is nice for feasts at least, but for that purpose even a tiny farm will provide plenty of beetroot. Probably the worst crop in LOTC. Pumpkins: Used to craft jack o' lanterns and pumpkin pie. If you have a lot of eggs and sugar, growing pumpkins is worth it for the pie, which makes for an excellent base food item to make RP-item food with. Useful in October for seasonal decoration. It might be worth stocking up on some for when Halloween season comes around. Melon: Eating this restores 2 hunger and 1.2 saturation. The main use for melon is as glistering melon for potion-making, which isn't a thing on LOTC. Decent decoration block for jungle settings. As a whole, melon is down there with beetroot as a terrible LOTC crop. Only worth farming for variety in feasts, honestly. Sugarcane: S tier crop. Sugar can be used for cakes and pies, but the main reason you want to grow sugarcane is for the paper. 3 paper can be crafted into a book on LOTC. Books are very easy to trade or sell to librarians who always need more bookshelves to expand their libraries. If you plan to do writing on the side for extra minas, sugarcane is a must-have crop, but even if you never write any books or journals, sugarcane is worth growing along any bodies of water near your farm for easy paper. ~Selling your crops~ ~Bread selling on the auction house~ Bread, baked potatoes, and other such travel foods are easy to sell on the auction house. It's common for players to run out of food when traveling and by more from said auction house. If you're producing a lot of wheat and potatoes, auctioning them off is a good way to make some minas. Keep in mind that auction house prices for food are often cheaper than shop prices. Thus, you'll make more minas selling your farm goods in a shop than you will selling them on the auction house. ~A typical bread shop~ Shops that sell bread or potatoes for 0.1 minas each are also a common way farmers unload their goods. Some nation capitals don't have auction houses anymore, and thus players are forced to buy food from these shops, giving the farmers who stock them a good amount of minas in return. If shops are cheap to buy in your nation's capital, it's absolutely worth getting one. PRO TIP: You can sell wheat both as hay bales or as bread. Take a look at the typical prices for each and see what will make you more money. Each hay bale takes 9 wheat and each bread takes 3 wheat, but sometimes hay bales sell for more than 3x as much as bread does. You can also barter your goods directly for things you need. This is especially the case with leather, hay bales, or wool. The next time a traveling merchant enters your city, consider offering them some of your farmed resources in exchange for the weird trinkets they carry. ~Animals are important~ ~Sheep, cows, and a chicken coop~ While crops are cool and all, most of a farmer's money comes from animals instead! You can breed up to 4 animals every restart, so make sure to get the best value out of this limited ability as you can! Some animals provide passive income whereas others only produce valuable goods once killed. PRO TIP: You can breed animals during high serverload by feeding them first and then putting the animals you've fed on leads. The leads re-activates their mob ai and lets them breed! Produces value when killed: Cows: THE MOST VALUABLE ANIMAL! Cows can be killed for leather and raw beef that can be processed into surge PvP gear and steak, a common PvP food, respectively. If you don't know what to do with your 4 animal breeds, just breed cows! You can never go wrong with cows! Since cows don't produce any value until they die, there's no reason to stockpile too many cows at once. A good rule of thumb is to breed up to 8 cows and then kill any adults off past 8. This way you can always breed 4 more cows and receive a steady stream of valuable steak and leather. Pigs: Meh. They provide more food when killed then cows, but since cows drop leather and pigs don't, they are easily outclassed by cows. Rabbits: Rabbits can be bred during high serverload when other animals have their mob ai turned off, so if you only ever log online during peak, weekend hours, it might be worth it to have some rabbits (the pro tip above nullifies this advantage, sadly). You can make rabbit stew from their meat, a pretty decent stew item which sadly does not stack. Otherwise, they're just cows but significantly worse. Produces value when alive: Sheep: Sheep are great for making minas. Wool sells pretty well, since builders need lots of it for decoration and often don't have sheep of their own. Sheep need the following to produce wool: -Serverload isn't on high (mob ai is on) -Grass block for them to eat Sheep's minas-producing capabilities are destroyed by high serverload more than any other animal. Furthermore, grass blocks won't grow during high AND medium serverload, making sheep more of an off-peak sort of animal. To maximize the value of your sheep, give them lots of grass in a big pen so that they don't run out when random tick speed is turned off in medium-high serverload. Chickens: Chickens are the best animal for passive value. Chickens will lay eggs forever even if you completely ignore them, unlike sheep which requires you to shear them on occasion. If you put your chickens on top of a hopper, they will slowly fill the hopper up with eggs. It is worth having chickens in a chicken coop in order to produce eggs without you having to do anything at all. ~Controlling your cattle~ ~Cows well secured behind iron doors and a piston wall~ Breeding animals has its risks and isn't just free, easy minas. There are people who kill other people's animals to fence their stolen innards on the auction house. These people are difficult to stop as they typically strike when you aren't online. KNOW YOUR RIGHTS! Server rules dictate that thieves MUST leave an RP sign behind when killing your animals so that you know the criminal act was committed. Furthermore, they cannot, under any circumstances, kill or let-out animals such that fewer than 2 animals remain in a pen. If you notice a bunch of your animals disappearing without an RP sign left behind OR if all the animals in a pen suddenly vanish, MODREQ IMMEDIATELY! Cows are the most common target of these cattle rustlers, as they drop high value leather when killed. Your cows should be the most secure of all of your animals. Sheep, on the other hand, need lots of grass to produce wool, and don't drop anything too valuable when killed, so it's probably fine to have sheep out in an open pasture (unless the castle rustlers are feeling cruel and kill your sheep just for the heck of it). Your farmer character might want to cooperate with the local guard force to keep your animals safe from thieves. You could even hire mercenaries just to protect your animals, if you have the coin for it. Keep your most valuable animals in a barn if you can, protected by locks, walls, or even traps if you want to try out some redstone. A safe cow is a happy cow (until you kill it yourself, that is)! -jumperhand3, longtime LOTC farmer

A single hand made paper sign hangs on the wall of most cities and towns. It Reads Now Open in Sutica, Squishy's General Farming Goods, located at district house 5. For all your Farming Goods come on down to Squishy's General Farming Goods and find Jace Kellian. We sell Crops, plants, Farming tools and even pot(s), Everything you need in your farm Hire Jace to Farm your land Contact us to be your supplier for crops

Urguani Farming and Forestry Guild A place for dwarven lumberjacks and farmers. Overview of the Guild The Urguani Farming & Forestry Guild was created by Orrireat Goldhand for several reasons. 1. To profit from the trades of farming and treecutting. 2. To supply the Grand Kingdom of Urguan with food and lumber. 3. To teach interested dwarves and the like in the fields of lumber-making and farming. For little tithe or tax, the guild strives to keep the halls of Urguan stacked with hay and logs and make a mina or two doing it. In order to keep the supply of lumber and hay flowing, the guild will offer apprenticeship to any beardlings who wish to learn a trade. How to Join the Guild To those interested in the guild, there is a certain criteria they must fill to enter. 1. Be active in the pursuits of their trades, whether it be cutting trees or plowing fields. 2. Be a dwarf or honorary dwarf. 3. Give a small quota (3-5 stacks depending on skill) of their respective materials each stone week. Contact Orrireat Goldhand (DadElonglegs11) if interested in joining, or leave a note. Wages of Guild Members & Perks After a dwarf joins the guild, and their weekly quota is filled, they will be paid for each extra bundle of material that they give to the guild. The price paid for each bundle will be around six point six minae. For example, if a worker collects six bundles of hay, and he has already given his quota to the guild, he will receive thirty nine point six minae. In addition to being payed for their additional resources, guild members are entitled to free housing and food if they do so require. If interested in joining the guild, Attach a notice to this poster, Or contact Orrireat Goldhand. (DadElonglegs11)

Posters would be put up around the caliphate and human lands: Selling seeds, lots of them. 1000 500 minas for 3456 seeds. Come to Ariamis to buy them. I only have 3456 to sell, no more, so if you want them, you should come as soon as you can. ((54 stacks (large chest) of 64 seeds is 3456 seeds. Find me in-game, username is Pixel_Wings))

A flier is pinned up on a post by the main road, around midway to the Scarlet Lotus. Scrawled on it is an sketch of a cow! "Selling Cattle! I have gained the possession of around twenty cows and some dozen sheep, for which I have no home nor desire to keep. I am selling these sheep for fifty minas a head and the cows for a meagre one hundred each. Should you have any interest in purchasing these animals, contact Marvin d'Vallens by means of a letter and we will meet in Siegrad."

*A flier is posted in several areas where Farmland stretches* I'm just a small farmer that wishes to buy some cocoa beans able to pay with both Minas and Trade Items Please contact soon on the flier or send a bird to Damien (( Kitsunenokage66 ))