Terra Nil

Terra Nil

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How to get Perfect Location (Vita Nova)
By Fytayn
Just a simple guide on how I got the achievement.
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Intro
This is a short guide I've made because of a comment I left in this guide: https://steamhost.cn/steamcommunity_com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2956355437 ...explaining how to get the Perfect Location Achievement in Terra Nil: Vita Nova. A user there, helzilla, requested that I make a short guide to better explain what I meant. So here we are.
Location & Setup
Start a new run of the first level, River Valley. You want to find a section of the map which is around 25 by 50 tiles with a single-tile-wide river running through the middle. The example image is 24 x 52 tiles. If there isn't a suitable location just retry until the map generates one. It is okay if the river bends or turns a bit just keep in mind you need usable tiles on both sides.

Now play the map as usual but do not touch this area. You want to progress all the way to the third stage, reclamation, before working on this area so you have all of the tools available to you. While doing this make sure to set the surrounding area up so you can burn your target section from two opposite corners. DO NOT UNLOCK THE RAINS. You can still do this with the rains going but it takes much more work.
Basic Terraforming
First priority is power for the area. If there aren't enough rocks in good positions you can use the Calcifier but make sure any rocks you form are far away from the center of your work area. You need enough coverage to be able to cleanse the Wasteland with Toxin Scrubbers but don't place them just yet.

You need to widen the river. Birds and Beavers need a good number of water tiles. You can widen the river using Excavators (make sure you build the Research Centre so it becomes the one-tile laser version). You can do this from the middle or from outside but be sure to leave the center a single tile wide so you can use the Animal Bridge to connect the two sides.
Use a Water Pump to fill in the excavated areas if you need to. After that place your Toxin Scrubbers to remove the Wasteland and then use the Loading Dock to remove all the buildings while leaving the Wind Turbines if possible.
Land Preparation
Think of the work area as being divided into quarters. You need two opposite quarters to be Forests, one of the remaining quarters to be Wetland and the one opposite to that to be Fynbos. The Wetland and Fynbos must both reach the center tile where the Animal Bridge will be. Choose your two Forest areas first based on which quarters you will be able to light fires near to but don't do anything yet.

First do the Wetland. Place the Animal Bridge on the center tile, if you haven't already, because you can't place it if one side of the River is a Wetland. By carefully placing Irrigators you can grow grass selectively to ensure an area you're converting to a biome won't go further than you want. This is part of why the rains make this whole thing more difficult as they convert Wasteland into Soil and then into Grass automatically. Place your first Irrigator so it includes the tiles in-line with the center of the area:
Place another Irrigator if one doesn't cover the whole Wetland quarter then place Hydroponiums on each to create the Wetland. The Frogs might move in but they will be very unhappy due to lacking Fynbos nearby. Don't worry if they move out as they'll come back eventually.
Final Stages
Our goal is to turn the work area into this:
Use Irrigators to add grass up to the Wetland on its side and just short of the middle on the other. Remember: the Fynbos quarter needs to reach the center tile so don't prepare the land in line with the Animal Bridge just yet. The single tile of Grass next to, and caused by, the River shouldn't be a problem even if it converts to a tile of Forest. Don't reclaim the Irrigators! Light both of those quarters using whatever you set up to do so. Once burned convert the destroyed buildings into Arboretums to spread the Forest over those two quarters. You may want to irrigate, burn and then place Arboretums in the quarter next to the Wetland first to try and get Deer to move in there rather than the other side.

Now use Irrigators to spread Grass over the Fynbos area. Place Beehives in a couple of trees right next to the Grass to convert it into Fynbos. Place a couple more Beehives in that Forest as food for Bears but don't place any in the other Forest quarter. Bears and Wolves can share some Forest but best to encourage Bears to be in one quarter and Wolves to join Deer in the other.
Completion
With everything set up you should have all six animal types for the map crossing over at the center tile:
  1. Birds just need River, including the center tile, and should have been the first to move in.
  2. Beavers need River and Forest so they should be happy and cross the center tile as well.
  3. Frogs need Wetland and Fynbos but won't go far to find it. They will cross a single tile which is why we needed the two biomes so close together.
  4. Deer are fine with Grass or Forest and should be crossing the Animal Bridge freely.
  5. Bears only need Forest with Beehives so they are set, though they should roam across the Bridge as well.
  6. Wolves need Forest to live in and Deer to hunt so wherever the Deer go they go, too.
So once all of the animals are completely happy, which should only take a minute, you get the achievement!

If some of the animals aren't crossing the Animal Bridge you can use the Sonic Beacon to nudge them towards it or the Animal Observatory to drop them literally right next to it so their living space will definitely include it. Then you simply wait for them to be completely happy. You can also use the Observatory if the map was already full of animals and so more can't spawn in the area. If the Animal Observatory is removed (again) you have to ruin their existing habitats elsewhere in the map so they leave there and respawn in the prepared area.

Here's how mine ended up:

I didn't do it quite right. I didn't manage things very well so I cut more rivers to separate the quarters so I could burn each safely. The Wetland didn't reach the Animal Bridge and the Frogs wouldn't move through the Forest and River to reach the Fynbos. Luckily I had left some Grass in the Forest next to the Wetland so I converted it (you can see it in the top-middle of the screenshot) and that encouraged the Frogs to cross the River to reach the Fynbos. Hopefully, with my near-failure, I've helped you do a better job.
10 Comments
Adro69 6 Jan @ 11:35am 
thank you so much i finally did it, the coordinates of CheerfulSpider were reaaly helpfull for me, it was not easy so thank u again
:MonkThumbsUp:
NyaNyaPatricia 14 Dec, 2024 @ 4:31am 
Thank you so much for this guide and the coordinates! Although I didn't folllow it step by step and just used it as a "suggestion", it was very helpful along with the coordniates provided by CheerfulSpider! I think what also made it easier for me was lowering animal happiness goal and needs down to the lowest setting, so if you are struggling with this achievement, I definitely recommend doing so aswell. (I also did it with Zen Mode enabled) :nekoheart: Such a complicated achievement in my opinion, but it's quite interesting!
Fytayn  [author] 1 Dec, 2024 @ 5:27pm 
Thanks CheerfulSpider for the coordinates. Helpful for people who don't wanna keep trying to generate a good location. Yeah, EmceeN, the bridge is very important. It's what almost messed up my run, having the Wetlands not go quite up to the bridge meant the Frogs didn't reach the Fynbos. They're picky like that...
EmceeN 1 Dec, 2024 @ 5:17pm 
Semi-followed this at CheerfulSpider's co-ordinates and it worked!
A couple of pointers from my experience:
1) On those co-ordinates, I used the area in the bottom left of the map for my target area.
2) You will have a bit of trouble keeping such a large area free and getting to 100% greenery. Luckily you can green up your proposed forest/fynbos area in stage 1 without ruining this. Once you've greened it all, you can plant fynbos so that there's some on either bank, set fire to them so the whole target area is ash, and re-green all but your forest areas. Just be very careful to leave the area of your proposed bridge free of forests.
3) What is absolutely crucial for this guide to work is the single-tile log bridge between wetland and fynbos. Unfortunately you cannot place a log with wetlands on one side, so make sure to place the log *before* you put down wetlands there. Otherwise you'll have to restart the phase.
Mono_Chrome 19 Nov, 2024 @ 2:45pm 
I've been trying to get this achievement for weeks now- thank you so so so much for posting this. Worked like a charm on my first try! <3
DangerGnat 16 Nov, 2024 @ 11:50am 
Excellent guide! Got it on the first try.
CheerfulSpider 25 Oct, 2024 @ 9:16pm 
This was extremely helpful, thank you.

I was able to complete the achievement here: 73.324ºS 9.544ºW
TheEnd1966 4 Oct, 2024 @ 3:42pm 
Muchas gracias, conseguí el logro gracias a tus consejos
helzilla 14 Sep, 2024 @ 10:38am 
This is wonderful! I ended up getting the achievement by accident after leaving my comment on the other guide, but this illustrates your method really well. I'm sure this will be helpful for anyone else struggling to meet the Perfect Location recs!
CptShrike 30 Aug, 2024 @ 9:00pm 
Wonderfully helpful! It took more than a few resets to find a good map, and then a lot of luck and practice to get it going, but this guide absolutely got me there in the end! Just be careful to watch where your wetlands spread, and you should be fine.