Villages in harsh biomes — desert, tundra, high mountains — were collapsing on startup before they had a chance to get on their feet. That’s fixed. Economy initialization now accounts for biome difficulty, giving harsh-environment villages a proper starting baseline rather than spawning them already in crisis.
Caravans survive longer and trade more aggressively. They now linger at favorable trading partners rather than cutting visits short, carry more diverse loads per trip, and are less likely to abort a run when they hit rough terrain. A healthy caravan economy means the inter-village trade flows you depend on stay active throughout the season.
Trade activity notices appear when caravans and traders complete significant exchanges near you. You’ll see when a caravan drops a large food shipment at a struggling village, or when a merchant closes a high-value luxury deal. These notices keep you informed about the economic state of your region without requiring you to visit every village manually.
Gossip has been refined. Positive deeds — defending a village, completing bounties, donating supplies — now actively counter negative gossip circulating about you. Previously, bad reputation could persist even after a run of genuinely helpful actions because gossip was weighted asymmetrically. Your good deeds will be talked about and will dilute the bad.
Loom recipes for cloth substitutions have been fixed. Several recipes that should have accepted alternative cloth inputs (undyed cloth in place of standard cloth, rough linen in place of fine linen) were incorrectly rejecting valid materials. Those substitutions now work as intended across all weaver loom patterns.
See village economy for production rates and how trade stabilizes prosperity.