- Anvil Empires getting started begins with faction choice, which locks you in for an entire age
- Bounty board is your first and most reliable source of silver in the town keep
- Craft a flint knife from 2 branches + 1 flint to hunt boars and earn your first 8+ silver
- Rent private storage (5 silver, 31 slots) to protect items from death drops
- Recruit named avatars at the keep for higher skills than your starter auxiliary
Anvil Empires Getting Started: First Choices
When you press Play in the Anvil Empires menu, you face your first decision: faction selection. Three factions are available, and apart from aesthetics and starting territory, there is no functional difference between them. The critical catch is that you are locked into your faction for the duration of an entire age (test period), so coordinate with friends before committing.
After choosing a faction, you pick a spawn town. Hovering over town icons shows how many avatars are available at each location. Left-clicking a town opens the avatar selection screen, where you can claim a level-1 auxiliary avatar. This only sets your starting point — you are never bound to that town.
Video Highlights:
- Faction choice is permanent for a full age, so pick the same side as friends
- Hover town icons to check available avatar counts before spawning
- Tutorial panel appears on the right side after loading into the world of Caligo
- First tutorial mission covers the bounty board and earning silver
Once loaded in, you spawn inside the town keep with a tutorial panel on the right side of the screen guiding your first steps.
Your faction choice is permanent for the entire age. If you play with friends, agree on a faction before either of you commits — you cannot switch later without waiting for the next age.
Controls You Need Immediately
Mastering a handful of key bindings makes everything in your first hour smoother:
| Action | Key | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Open inventory / crafting | Tab | Crafting menu appears on the right |
| Interact (boards, keeps, benches) | E | Prompt shows in bottom left |
| Open doors and gates | V | Get close first |
| Sprint | Left Shift | Drains stamina |
| Aim / look ahead | Right Mouse | Useful for spotting branches |
| Open map | M | Town icons show two crossed swords |
| Equip / stow item | R | Uses main hand slot |
| Attack / gather / harvest | Left Mouse | Works on resources and animals |
| Build menu | B | Fire pit lives under Food category |
Scroll up to zoom the camera in, and hold the scroll wheel to rotate it. This is essential for navigating keeps that have extra structures attached.
Earning Your First Silver: Bounty Board
The bounty board inside the town keep is the primary early-game economy. Press E near it to open the list. Each bounty shows a description, difficulty estimate, required items, and reward. You do not need to accept a bounty — simply show up with the items.
| Bounty Item | Reward (Single) | Reward (x3) | How to Get |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wolf tooth | 12 silver | 36 silver | Hunt wolves (later) |
| Boar tusk | 8 silver | 24 silver | Kill and harvest a boar |
Craft a flint knife
Open inventory with Tab, hover the flint knife in the crafting menu: it costs 2 branches and 1 flint. Gather flint from small stone piles and branches from tall branch bushes outside the keep.
Hunt a boar
Equip the knife with R. Approach the boar from the side or back at walking speed — never sprint — so you engage with full stamina. Left-click repeatedly until it dies.
Harvest the carcass
Stand over the boar and left-click to cut it up. Tap rather than hold; low stamina makes harvesting less effective. Right-click the boar meat and boar tusk icons to transfer loot.
Turn in the bounty
Return to the keep (follow the crossed-swords icon on the map or compass). Open the bounty board with E and click the coin stack behind the boar tusk bounty to collect your silver.
Delivering one boar tusk pays 8 silver — enough to immediately rent private storage and start building your economic foundation.
Town Facilities and Crafting
Use V to open gates and doors, zoom with the scroll wheel, and rotate the camera by holding the scroll wheel to navigate complex keeps.
| Facility | Location | Function |
|---|---|---|
| Bounty board | Inside keep | Turn in items for silver |
| Private storage | Keep center (E) | 31 slots, 5 silver/day rental |
| Workbench | Town, up the stairs | Craft armor and tools |
| Workshop | Town | Intermediate resources (planks, nails) |
| Repair bench | Next to workbench | Full repair for 1 copper nail |
| Recruitment table | Keep, across from bounty board | Recruit named avatars |
Key crafting chains to know:
Crude Leg Armor
- Cost: 1 flint + 2 fiber
- Crafted at workbench
- Fiber from berry bushes
Pickaxe
- Cost: 3 branches + 2 flint
- Crafted in inventory
- Required for malachite mining
Copper Nails
- Input: 1 malachite fragment
- Output: 6 nails at workshop
- Used to repair tools
Tools have durability shown as a white bar next to the item. When the white is gone, the tool breaks and is destroyed. Repair at the repair bench: transfer the tool and one copper nail, then click repair for a full fix.
When private storage rental time hits zero, everything inside moves to public storage. Extend early — each extension costs 5 silver and adds one day.
Avatar Recruitment and Deployment
Auxiliary avatars start with all skills at level 1. Named avatars recruited at the keep's recruitment table have higher skills and randomized skill ceilings, shown only after you pay.
| Avatar Specialty | Benefit |
|---|---|
| Fitness | Longer sprints, better odds of surviving fatal blows |
| Melee | Better armor and weapons, higher melee damage |
| Ranged | Better ranged weapons, higher ranged damage |
| Blacksmith | Less work needed at anvils |
| Logging/Mining | Less stamina consumed gathering |
| Hunter | Easier movement near wildlife without aggro |
Ranks determine starting skills: Apprentice (all level 1), Journeyman (some higher), Master (all high). To deploy into a recruited avatar, open the town keep menu, click the stationed avatar, and confirm.
Deploying into a named avatar disbands your auxiliary and drops everything in its inventory on the ground. Store your items in private storage first.
Stationed avatars recover health and stamina over time but will starve without food — deploy occasionally, load food into their inventory, and station them again.
Food, Cooking, and Survival
Your top-left HUD shows hunger, stamina, and health. Empty hunger means starvation; depleted health means death. Eating replenishes hunger and regenerates health over time, but food diversity matters.
After eating one food type (shown as an icon under the stamina bar), you cannot eat that same type again for a while. Rotate between berry foods and meat foods to stay fed.
To cook, press B to open the build menu, select the fire pit under Food, and place it outside town borders (3 branches to build). Add fiber as fuel — one fiber burns for about a minute, just long enough to cook a hog's leg. Retrieve food promptly: leaving it in a burning fire pit lowers quality from three-plus down over time.
| Food | Source | Quality |
|---|---|---|
| Raw berries | Berry bushes (also yield fiber) | Lowest satiation |
| Blood berry field bar | Cooked berries at fire pit | Higher quality (3+) |
| Hog's leg | Cooked boar meat at fire pit | High satiation |
First Hour Checklist:
- Choose faction and spawn town
- Complete bounty board tutorial
- Craft flint knife and turn in boar tusk bounty
- Rent private storage at the keep
- Craft crude armor at the workbench
- Recruit a named avatar
Anvil Empires is still in pre-alpha and development moves fast. Specific recipes, prices, and mechanics described here may change between updates.
FAQ
Q: Does my faction choice matter in Anvil Empires getting started?
Functionally, no — the three factions differ only in aesthetics and starting territory. However, you are locked into your faction for an entire age, so coordinate with friends before choosing.
Q: How do I earn silver early in Anvil Empires?
The bounty board inside the town keep is your main early income. You do not accept bounties; simply deliver the requested items, such as a boar tusk worth 8 silver. Multi-item bounties pay a multiple of the single reward.
Q: What happens if my private storage runs out?
When rental time reaches zero, all contents are moved to public storage. Extend the rental for 5 silver per day at the town keep before it expires.
Q: Why can't I eat another meal?
Food diversity is enforced. After eating one food type, you cannot eat that type again for a period — the active type shows as an icon under your stamina bar. Switch to a different food type, such as meat after berries.