In Manor Lords, the basic building block of any settlement is the Burgage Plot: a home for villagers that can also ively produce various resources. Burgage Plots are the core of every settlement; you’ll need to build and upgrade them to make space for new villager families. This allows sleepy hamlets to grow and expand into massive feudal-era cities.

Upgrading Burgage Plots allows you to house additional families and construct different backyard extensions, which can produce various useful resources ively. This provides much of the rich detail in Manor Lords’ city building. However, upgrading is rather difficult as certain infrastructure must be built beforehand.

How To Upgrade Burgage Plots To Level 2 In Manor Lords

Unlocking The First Burgage Plot Upgrade

To upgrade Burgage Plots to Level 2, your villagers must have access to the following:

• Water
• A basic wooden Church
• A Fuel and Clothing Stall at a Marketplace
• A Food Stall at a Marketplace supplying at least two different types of food.

Getting all of these set up requires several different buildings to be built and staffed by families. Access to water is the easiest to set up, as all you need to do is build a Well over underground water using Timber. However, the Marketplace stalls and the Church have additional requirements.

Constructing most buildings in Manor Lords requires Timber. To get this, set up a Logging Camp as one of your first buildings. Buildings also only produce resources when at least one family is staffing them.

Although building a Marketplace is easy, Villagers won’t set up any stalls there unless they have resources to distribute. As such, you need to secure Fuel, Food, and Clothing sources to get them up and running.

To acquire Fuel, set up a Woodcutter’s Lodge near a forested area. If staffed with at least one family, a Woodcutter’s Lodge will produce Firewood, a resource used as Fuel. Another alternative is to build a Charcoal Kiln, which converts a single Firewood into two Charcoal. However, although this is more efficient, unlocking the Charcoal Burning Development Upgrade is also required.

You also have a few options for food sources. The easiest approach involves setting up a vegetable garden backyard extension on any Burgage Plot to produce vegetables. You can then set up a Hunting Camp for meat and hides or a Forager Hut for Berries as a second food source. Your best option really depends on your starting point, and it’s worth scoping out your local area to see what resource deposits are most easily accessible.

You don’t need Clothing to supply a clothing stall. Instead, a supply of raw materials such as Leather, Linen, or Yarn will work. Of the three, Leather is the easiest to obtain. With a hunting camp, your villagers will produce hides, which can be turned into leather at a tanning building. As such, all you need to do is build a Tannery and keep it supplied with hides.

Linen requires processing Wool from Sheep, so you’ll need to import livestock, while Yarn requires Flax from a Farm. As such, it’s a relatively time-consuming and expensive process to obtain either, clear evidence of Manor Lords’ medieval realism at work.

Once your villagers are harvesting these resources, they should automatically build the necessary stalls at the Marketplace. To build a Church, you’ll need:

• 5 Timber
• 20 Planks
• 10 Stone

You will likely have Timber from your Logging Camp and can process it into Planks in a Sawpit building. Stone is easily obtained from a Stonecutter Camp placed near any Stone deposits, but you may already have some as part of your starting resources.

This whole process requires multiple families staffing different buildings. Although you start with a few families, you may need to attract more to your settlement to keep up with all the work. As such, make sure you’re constructing Burgage Plots and keeping your Approval rating above 50%. Approval ratings below 50% mean no new families will your settlement.

If your Sawpit suddenly stops producing, you may need extra livestock to transport Timber. You can always build or upgrade a Hitching Post and buy another Oxen for 20 Regional Wealth.

Once all the requirements are met, you can upgrade any of your Level 1 Burgage Plots to Level 2 for 4 Timber. If you want, you can even check out your new building in third-person POV using Visit Mode, a cool feature unique to Manor Lords. However, you can also go one step further and upgrade Level 2 Burgage Plots to Level 3.

How To Upgrade Burgage Plots To Level 3 In Manor Lords

Unlocking The Second (And Final) Burgage Plot Upgrade

Upgrading Burgage Plots to Level 3 requires more complex infrastructure. To begin with, your settlement will need to be at least a Medium Village. This means having at least 5 Level 1 Burgage Plots and at least 2 Level 2 Burgage Plots. On top of that, you also need the following:

• Water.
• A working Tavern, which requires a supply of Ale.
• A stone Church.
• A Fuel Stall at a Marketplace.
• A Food Stall at a Marketplace selling at least three different types of food.
• A Clothing Stall at a Marketplace selling Leather, Linen, or Yarn, and Shoes, Clothes, or Cloaks.

You should already have water and Fuel to sell and access to at least two types of food. As such, it shouldn’t be too difficult to secure an extra source of food. To get a Tavern running, you need a supply of Ale. This involves building a Brewery Extension on one of your Burgage Plots and making sure it’s supplied with Malt. Malt is obtained by processing Barley from a Field and Farmhouse in a Malthouse.

The easiest clothing to make is Shoes, as you likely already have a Tannery producing Leather. As such, you can build a Cobbler’s Workshop Extension on a Burgage Plot to make shoes.

To upgrade your Church, you need the following:

• 5 Timber
• 20 Stone
• 10 Planks,
• 10 Rooftiles

The only new resource you need is Rooftiles. To obtain them, set up a Mining Pit over a clay deposit and then set up a Clay Furnace.

In theory, you can trade for all of these resources using a Trading Post and spending Regional Wealth. However, this is extremely costly unless you have a thriving export economy and lots of Regional Wealth to spend. Unfortunately, Manor Lords doesn’t have multiplayer or co-op, so you’ll need to gather everything yourself.

Once that’s complete, you can upgrade your Burgage Plots to Level 3 for 4 Timber, 8 Planks, 4 Rooftiles and 25 Regional Wealth.

Overall, upgrading can be rather expensive, but it’s important to note that upgrading your Burgage Plots serves as a kind of hidden tutorial. By constructing all of these buildings, you’re actually setting up essential infrastructure and obtaining vital resources, quietly setting up your settlement for success. However, Manor Lords isn’t just a city builder, and you’ll also need to prepare to defend your Burgage Plots in battle.