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## DefinitionEdit

Barren oriental lands (desert) can be made fertile by building norias. One noria makes the land around it about 75% fertile. Multiple overlapping norias make barren lands super-fertile: each noria raises the fertility multiplier of each field in its range by one.[1]

Using multiple overlapping norias, you can make it so farms only require a few fields placed to still maintain maximum 100% efficiency.

This technique is sometimes referred to as the noria exploit. Some players contend that this is probably an unintended game mechanic, but after three patches this has never been altered and no developer has ever said this functionality was unintentional. Therefore, many players prefer to call this a technique or advanced strategy rather than an exploit since strictly speaking this is not a cheat. Plus there is strong basis in reality that providing more irrigation to farmlands increases fertility, although granted there is a point where too much irrigation has a negative impact.

Also note using overlapping norias is essential to reaching the largest worldwide population levels possible since the ultimate limiting factor in the end-game is lack of land. So the overlapping noria strategy actually extends the growth potential of your empire, regardless of why or how it came to be.

The advantage is obvious: greatly reduced space usage.

The disadvantage is that all those extra norias cost maintenance.

Also, your norias will need refilling much more often: for each unit of product produced, ALL norias in range use 1 water.

Remember that you can refill all norias on an island in one go by shift-clicking the refill button. Also see Nomad's Secret, below.

## 100% productivity combinationsEdit

This section lists the number of norias you need to place in range of various farms to achieve 100% productivity.

Farm type
Number of fields on dry soil Number of fields on green soil
Number of norias required to have 100% productivity
3-field farms
1 2 3 1 2 3
4 2 1 5 2 0
4-field farms
1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4
5 3 2 1 7 3 1 0
5-field farms [2].
1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5
6 3 2 2 1 9 4 2 1 0
6-field farms
1 2 3 4 5 6 1 2 3 4 5 6
7 4 3 2 2 1 12 5 3 2 1 0

The noria exploit also works with trees (e.g., lumberjacks and charcoal burners), presumably in a comparable way, but the exact mechanics have not been worked out.

## Demonstration screenshotsEdit

Here are two screenshots of the noria exploit in action.

## Noria mechanicsEdit

The noria exploit works on both infertile (dry) and fertile soil, but requires twice as many norias for the same productivity boost when used on fertile soil. Whether the fertile soil is on northern on southern islands does not matter.

See the images for a demonstration of this difference.

The exact numbers are as follows.

### Dry soilEdit

Each field on dry soil counts as 10% of a field. This score is increased by 90% for each noria that is in range of the farm. Therefore, each field counts as one full field when one noria is in range.

The total score provided by all of the farm's field is divided by the intended number of fields, and the result is the farm's maximum productivity.

$p = \frac {f_d (0.1 + 0.9n)} {t}$ where

• $p$ is the farm's maximum productivity, limited to 100%;
• $f_d$ is the number of fields on dry soil;
• $n$ is the number norias in range of the farm;
• $t$ is the intended number of fields for this farm type.

For a 6-field farm (i.e. a rose nursery), this yields the following productivity table:

Maximum productivity

Dry soil

6-field farm

Fields
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
Norias 0 1% 3% 5% 6% 8% 10% 11% 13% 15%
1 16% 33% 50% 66% 83% 100%
2 31% 63% 95% 100%
3 46% 93% 100%
4 61% 100%
5 76%
6 91%
7 100%

### Green soilEdit

Each field on green soil counts as 100% of a field. This score is increased by 45%[3] for each noria that is in range of the farm. Therefore, each field counts as one full field when no norias are in range.

The total score provided by all of the farm's field is divided by the intended number of fields, and the result is the farm's maximum productivity.

$p = \frac {f_g (1 + 0.45n)} {t}$ where

• $p$ is the farm's maximum productivity, limited to 100%;
• $f_g$ is the number of fields on green soil;
• $n$ is the number norias in range of the farm;
• $t$ is the intended number of fields for this farm type.

For a 6-field farm (i.e. a rose nursery), this yields the following productivity table:

Maximum productivity

Green soil

6-field farm

Fields
1 2 3 4 5 6
Norias 0 16% 33% 50% 66% 83% 100%
1 23% 48% 72% 96% 100%
2 31% 63% 95% 100%
3 38% 78% 100%
4 46% 93%
5 53% 100%
6 68%
7 76%
8 76%
9 83%
10 91%
11 98%
12 100%

### Dry/green soil mixingEdit

It is possible to create a farm with some fields on dry soil and some on green soil. Productivity is then calculated on a per-field basis.

$p = \frac {f_d (0.1 + 0.9n) + f_g (1 + 0.45n)} {t}$ where

• $p$ is the farm's maximum productivity, limited to 100%;
• $f_d$ is the number of fields on dry soil;
• $f_g$ is the number of fields on green soil;
• $n$ is the number norias in range of the farm;
• $t$ is the intended number of fields for this farm type.

### Rounding errorsEdit

The game calculates each farm's base productivity and noria-boosted productivity separately and rounds each down to a full percentage point before summing them. This leads to small deviations from results obtained using the formula above with proper rounding.

The productivity values in the tables above take this into account and match the values as displayed by the game.

## The Nomad's Secret and Noria RefillsEdit

The Nomad's Secret is a Level II Oriental attainment that increases noria capacity by 500, 1,000, or 2,000 tons of water relative to base capacity. However, the cost for completely refilling a noria remains the same regardless of attainment level (a.k.a. capacity): 1,000 for a Small noria and 2,500 for a Large noria. This means you pay considerably less per ton of water at higher levels of Nomad's Secret, especially for the Small noria:

Nomad's Secret Rank Honor Increase to Base Relative Increase Capacity Cost / Ton Capacity Small noria 1000 to refill Large noria 2500 to refill 0 - - - 500 2.000 5,000 0.500 1 100 500 500 1,000 1.000 5,500 0.455 2 200 1,000 500 1,500 0.667 6,000 0.417 3 300 2,000 1,000 2,500 0.400 7,000 0.357

When you increase your attainment level, all your norias have water added equal to the amount of the relative increase, so it doesn't matter if you advance when they're full or empty. Still, if you don't have much money but do have some Honor, Nomad's Secret can add water for "free".

Nomad's Secret also reduces the annoyance of refills, especially if exploiting norias: you only need to refill Small norias one-fifth as often with the third rank of Nomad's Secret.

## NotesEdit

1. Actually it is slightly less than one, but this is the general idea.
2. Apiaries do not benefit from norias and thus the exploit does not function for this farm type.
3. As of patch 1.3 of the base game, the noria bonus on green soil has been reduced to about 15%.