Automating Your Business Empire in Europa 1410

Dear Business Owners,

As you try to make a profit in the busy world of The Guild, building new workshops and hiring more workers, you will find that managing production and maximizing profits can become stressful, and you might ask yourself: can someone else handle some of these tasks for me? Thankfully, you will have trustworthy employees managing certain areas of your business so that you can continue scheming against political rivals while your business is managed by good hands.

In this dev diary, we’ll talk about our vision for production automation and the different types of business managers you can hire. Tied to that, we’ll also share our plans for how your workshops can cooperate so you can create complex production chains without the hassle of setting up complex trade routes. We’ll be sharing some sneak peeks, with some tidbits that will be available with our October 2026 update!

Our Vision for Automation

Automation in The Guild 1 Remake: Europa 1410 is not another menu where you choose products and create trade routes. Instead, you employ and interact with managers that take care of your buildings. You get to choose to what extent the manager will be exercising their privileges for the production of goods - you can granularly define the control they have over your buildings, and, depending on their skill, they can work together with your other businesses to use complex production chains. But don’t fret, our AI will not break out of its confinement. The managers will have learned their lesson and will no longer be stealing carts that are not assigned to them!

Control what the Master can do in terms of various tasks in your business - choose if you’d like to do it yourself, or if the Master will have free rein! The visuals and contents of this menu are subject to change - it is a work in progress.

Balancing Building Managers

In The Guild 1 Remake: Europa 1410 , you will assign the management of your buildings to one of two types of building managers. Every building manager comes with their own skills and perks, and you can set their priorities and allowances granularly. The first type of manager is the Overseer, who will not completely take over your business but will ensure that production keeps going while your own skills will still have an impact on the productivity of your business. But you may be wondering, what does an Overseer do?

Overseers instruct other workers and supervise the production of goods, but the Overseer does not stop working - they also contribute to production and can be assigned to tasks. In that regard, the overseer is just another worker that takes on the additional duty of, well, overseeing your business - without sacrificing any of their productivity. Once a worker has gathered enough XP to become an Expert, they can be assigned as an Overseer. If you’d like to speed up this process, training them will allow them to quickly gain more experience, which means they can become an Overseer sooner. Just like with your other employees, you have to make sure that you treat them nicely and pay them well; otherwise, they’ll be off to find a different employer!

Alternatively, you can assign your dynasty member as a Master, in which case your own skills won’t affect the business' productivity anymore. It will instead be your family member’s skills and attributes that help or hinder production at the place they’re taking over. Family members can help manage your workshop much sooner than a worker can gain experience and get promoted to an Overseer position, so it would operate much like a family-run business - even if your family member is not the most competent choice.

Though it is easier and quicker to assign a dynasty member as a Master (rather than elevating an employee to Overseer), you have to weigh the benefits and effects on other aspects of your playthrough. Assigning a Master means that your own skills don’t matter anymore for production in this workshop, and the relation with the assigned family member can change over time and even their loyalty to you can falter. This can lead to interesting - and potentially undesired - situations.

Of course, assigning a family member as a Master can also make them unavailable for other activities that would benefit your business or your dynasty.

Choosing between a Master and an Overseer is a strategic decision. Family members as Masters will be available relatively early in your playthrough, and this will prepare your heir for business experience and leadership when your own time comes to an end. On the other hand, Overseers already come with professional expertise and their loyalty is tied to the wages you pay them.

In comparison to previous Guild games, we aim to have more gameplay involving and surrounding members of your dynasty - the possibility and consequences of assigning them as Masters is but one facet of our vision that is coming to reality during the remaining Early Access phase!

In the future, building managers will also have special perks in the form of passives, which can positively affect all of the business dealings under the building manager’s purview. But also, buildings owned by the city will need a designated person who cares for them. Once these features are ready, we’ll make sure to share more details about them - please stay tuned.

The Building Ledger

In order to track how profitable your businesses are, we will be introducing the Building Ledger for each business building you own, which will include detailed information about your business' goods and production, bought resources, and sold products. This is the perfect way for you to check if your building manager is productive and effective, and you can then decide if you would like to keep them on board as your building manager, or replace them with someone more capable. You might even decide to pay your Overseer a one-time bonus as a reward for their diligence!

Production chains

Eventually, you will upgrade your business and start producing higher-tier goods to increase your profits. But these goods come with more complex production chains, and to ensure you always have a supply of intermediate products, you might decide to craft them yourself in another building.

A new setting will allow you to close storefront slots to the public, which turns them into exchange slots between your business buildings and allows your managers to trade goods among themselves.

For example, if you were a Tailor and in need of fittings made by your Smithy, you can assign a storefront slot specifically so that Building Managers can send carts and take the fittings from that reserved storefront slot - without worrying that there will be none to take from your Smithy. It sounds like items in the reserved storefront slot will be safe and sound, but beware - your business can still be robbed, and items may still be stolen from this special slot. Make sure your business' security is up to standard, and keep an eye on the city quarter’s crime rate stat.

Economy Improvements

Speaking of stealing, your cart will now be less likely to be waylaid and stolen from - AI will take the cost-benefit of attacking your cart into better consideration. There will be substantial improvements in how Masters handle your business, in addition to giving you the opportunity to control Masters' privileges.

You may also notice that some items are now quicker to craft, so make sure to take advantage of this to grow your business. But beware - it may be tougher to turn a profit in some cities, as each city is unique in its economy and pricing. Kuttenberg, for example, has lower prices for silver resources, whilst items in Graz are generally more expensive compared to other cities. Keep in mind that buying or selling at the Marketplace is easy and quick, but sometimes you need to accept (or suffer through) a longer travel time and head to Resource Sites in case the Marketplace runs out of stock. You can also attract local business owners or visiting customers (who pay a much higher price than the locals!), as selling items in your Storefront would mean you save money on repairing carts and save yourself from worrying about losing goods from your cart being attacked. If you want to increase the chances of items being bought from your Storefront, make sure the surroundings of your business are palatable - high crime and unrest lead to penny-pinching customers! Unless you are selling weapons, of course.

Marriage and Dynasty Improvements

In terms of getting married, the upcoming update will allow you to remarry should your spouse pass away. If your heir or children end up marrying someone you deem unworthy, you can choose to meddle and get rid of the spouse of your family member, if you so wish. To make sure that you approve of everyone and anyone who marries into your dynasty, you will now be able to pick the potential spouse for your children - if they begin courting someone of a lower title, you can put an end to it and choose a better life partner for your child to court. As the head of your dynasty, you clearly know best - so pick someone rich and capable of having offspring to ensure the continuity of your legacy!

And once you have a little bundle of joy brought into the world, you can rejoice and welcome a new potential heir! Celebrate childbirth through a special ongoing event, where you can bestow a name of your choosing.

At the end of it all, when the need to pass the torch arises, you will also mark this milestone moment through a special ongoing event. As the mantle gets passed, the weight of inheritance is now visually represented. Family members can contest your claim and demand a bigger share for their own inheritance - you can choose to satisfy them with coin, or put your foot down and assert dominance as the new head of the family. Just remember that your actions will have consequences - it’s best to have a higher set of varying skills (depending on how you choose to go about your speech - whether you are courteous or assertive) to convince them of your ability to lead your dynasty to greatness.

Whether you’re optimizing your business, plotting your political schemes, or enjoying the growth of your dynasty, we’re excited for you to dive into the game once our update is out on the 29th of October.

Thank you all for playing and sharing your feedback so far, and for helping us make Europa 1410 the best it can be throughout the Early Access period. Please stay tuned for our upcoming update and more!