Town charters

Once a village has grown into a Large village, its lord can grant it a town charter: Market Town, Mining Town, Garrison Town and so on. A charter gives that one village a lasting bonus and lets it raise two or three buildings that no village without the charter can build. A village takes a second, different charter when it becomes a Walled town. Charters belong to the village, not the lord, so each of your villages can be a different kind of town.

The basics

• The first charter can be taken when the village reaches Large village (15 finished buildings, see The hall grows with the village). It costs 500 gold.
• A second charter, different from the first, can be taken at Walled town (50 finished buildings). It costs 2,000 gold.
• Your inbox tells you once when each village opens a charter slot ("Tullford may now take a charter"). The village panel shows the village's charters under its Standing, with a "Take a charter" button while a slot is open.
• The picker lists every charter with its effects and its buildings. It works the same on a phone.
• A held charter can be exchanged for another for 3,000 gold. After any grant or exchange the village waits 72 real hours before it can exchange again.
• Charter buildings are on the Charter tab of the build menu. They are built like any other building, but only where the charter is held.
• If you give a charter up, its buildings stay standing but go idle ("Needs the Garrison Town charter.") and do nothing until the village holds that charter again.
• A village's charters show on its world map card with their pennants, in the realm overview, on your own lord profile, and as small pennons under your banners on the village hall.

The charters

Charter	What the village gets	Its buildings
Market Town	2 more market carts, and pays half the market tax on its trades	Guild Hall, Mint
Mining Town	+20% iron and stone	Smelter, Masons' Lodge
Timber Town	+25% wood, building 10% faster	Sawmill, Carpenters' Yard
Granary Town	+15% of every food, wheat and flour, +1 popularity	Tithe Barn, Threshing Floor
Brewers' Town	+25% ale and wine, +15% hops, +1 popularity	Malt House, Winepress House
Cathedral Town	+6 Standing, +2 popularity	Bishop's Palace, Almshouse
Garrison Town	50 more soldiers, +10% wall strength when defending	Muster Yard, Watchtower, Armoury Hall
Port Town	+30% fish, +25% salt, 1 more market cart. Needs at least 20 water tiles in the village	Fish Market, Smokehouse

The charters reference has every building's cost, size, build time and exact effect.

How the bonuses apply

Production bonuses multiply each workplace's output, like research and biome productivity. The charter's own bonus and its buildings' bonuses multiply together:

output = base x biome x research x charter x (1 + building bonuses) x fear x staffing

Building bonuses (a sawmill's +30% wood) count only while the building is finished, staffed and not paused. Production and tax bonuses scale with staffing, so a half-staffed sawmill gives +15%. Two sawmills add: +60%.

Worked example: say a woodcutter makes 9 wood an hour before charters. Its village takes the Timber Town charter (x1.25) and builds one staffed sawmill (+30%). It now makes 9 x 1.25 x 1.3, about 14.6 wood an hour.

Popularity and Standing from a charter show as their own lines in the village panel ("Cathedral Town charter +6"). Standing multiplies into Renown like any other Standing (see Ranks and Renown).

Building speed bonuses multiply: a Timber Town with a carpenters' yard builds 1.1 x 1.15, about 1.27 times as fast. A building already under way keeps the finish time it had when it started; the bonus applies to buildings that start after it.

Trade

Market carts from the charter add to those from rank, research and trade posts. The tax cut lowers the market tax this village pays at any capital; the territory's holder receives correspondingly less.

Worked example: Tullford, a Market Town, sells goods worth 400 gold at a capital with a 10% market tax. Without the charter it would receive 360 gold. With it, the tax is 5%, so it receives 380 gold and the holder 20.

Defence

The Garrison Town's troop cap and the Muster Yard's are added to the village's cap from rank, research and cards. Its wall strength and the buildings' battle bonuses (Muster Yard +5% attack for every defender, Watchtower +15% for archers on walls and towers, Armoury Hall +5% armour) apply whenever the village defends itself, on top of research and cards. They do not help armies the village sends out.

Taking and exchanging

Action	When	Price
First charter	Large village or bigger	500 gold
Second charter	Walled town	2,000 gold, must differ from the first
Exchange one charter for another	72 real hours after the last grant or exchange	3,000 gold

The 72 hours run from the last grant as well as the last exchange, so a village that has just taken its first charter cannot change it for three days. An exchange keeps the slot: a Walled town with Market Town and Mining Town that exchanges Mining for Garrison holds Market Town and Garrison Town.

A village that shrinks below Large village keeps its charters. It cannot take a new one until it grows back.

Interactions

• The village: charter buildings follow the usual placement, staffing and growth-cost rules, and count towards the village's size tier.
• Markets: extra carts and the tax cut.
• Military and Battles: troop caps and defender bonuses.
• Popularity and Ranks and Renown: the Cathedral, Granary and Brewers' charters add popularity or Standing.
• Inbox: the "may now take a charter" letter, and a record of each grant or exchange, under Events.

For maintainers

• server/src/features/charters/content.ts: every number (charterContent: slots, exchange price and cooldown, the eight charters) and the charter buildings (charterBuildings), which server/src/content/index.ts appends to the building list.
• server/src/features/charters/logic.ts: takeCharter (tier, price, water and cooldown checks) and charterModifiers. index.ts: the takeCharter message, the inbox letters, and WorldSite.charters for map cards.
• packages/protocol/src/features/charters.ts: the types, villageCharterBonus (carts, market tax, troop cap and defence from charters and their buildings, read by the market and military features and the client) and describeCharterEffects.
• server/src/village/sim.ts: missingCharter gates placement and idles buildings of a charter not held; the productionBonus, taxBonus and buildSpeedBonus building fields; charter Standing comes in through Modifiers.standing.
• Client: clients/web/src/features/charters/ (the picker, map card, profile list and pennant.ts, which paints each charter's pennant), the Charter tab and village panel line in hud.ts, and the pennons in villageLife.ts. /village-preview.html?charters=market,garrison shows them on the hall.
• Art: tools/art/raw_v2/<id>.png, prediction ids in tools/art/jobs_charters.txt, processed with tools/art/process.py.
• Tests: server/src/features/charters/charters.test.ts.