As a long-time player of Farthest Frontier with over 800 hours played, discovering the map seed feature completely reinvented the game for me. No longer was I beholden to the whims of random map generation. With map seeds, I could finely tune world generation to my exact gameplay specifications.
In this ultimate guide, you‘ll learn how to leverage seeds to customize virtually every aspect of your maps. I‘ll cover topics like:
- Digit-by-digit breakdowns for manipulating biome, terrain, resources, and more
- Crafting the perfect starting landscape for your playstyle
- Optimizing maps for higher difficulties and specific win conditions
- Combining seeds with mods for maximum control over world generation
Plus I‘ll share some of my personal favorite world combinations that I still play to this day. If you want to experience the most immersive and tailored worlds that Farthest Frontier has to offer, this guide is for you!
How Map Seeds Work
Map seeds are basically predefined inputs for the complex algorithms that procedurally generate each new world. By changing the seed value, you change how the algorithm runs, and therefore the output.
Seeds are portrayed as simple base-10 numbers. So a seed of "1710929F5E" is actually instructing the generator to render a very specific world based on those digit parameters.
Here‘s a quick breakdown of what each digit controls:
1st-3rd: General world style (temperature, humidity, etc.)
4th-6th: Terrain morphology (mountains, valleys, plateaus)
7th: Biome selection (forest, desert, tundra, etc.)
8th-9th: Resource distribution
10th: River and lakes
11th-13th: Environmental effects (storms, anomalies, etc.)
But the most important digits for map customization are the 7th and 10th digits. I‘ll cover those in more detail next.
Choosing Your Biome with the 7th Digit
The 7th digit sets what broad biome classification your world will generate under. Each number value corresponds to a different biome option:
0 – Boreal Forest
1 – Temperate Forest
2 – Grassland
3 – Desert
4 – Savanna
5 – Taiga
6 – Tundra
7 – Steppe
8 – Wetlands
9 – Arid Highlands
So a seed ending with a 7 will give you steppe terrain, while a 9 will generate arid highlands.
But what exactly do those biomes entail? Here‘s a quick rundown:
Boreal Forest – Coniferous pine trees, rugged snowy terrain
Temperate Forest – Deciduous trees like oak and maple, rolling hills
Grassland – Open plains of prairie grass, few trees
Desert – Sandy dunes and high heat, oasis lakes
Savanna – Scattered acacia trees over brush and grasslands
Taiga – Densely packed evergreen firs, extremely cold
Tundra – Snowy, barren wasteland
Steppe – Low grassy plains, mildly wet/dry
Wetlands – Swampy marshes with wetland flora
Arid Highlands – Dry mountains and rocky cliffs
So let your preferred aesthetics and gameplay direct which biome number you pick. Do you want dense, lush forests full of forageables? Or perhaps a challenging desert start with scarce early resources?
Example Temperate Forest Seed: 171091915E
Example Arid Highland Seed: 1710929F5ENow let‘s see how we can use the 10th digit to really customize our terrain even further.
Controlling Rivers & Lakes with the 10th Digit
While the 7th digit determines broad biome classifications, you can hyper-customize your terrain features even more with the 10th seed digit.
The 10th digit sets how much surface fresh water will generate via rivers and lakes on your map. Here‘s the breakdown:
0 - No lakes/rivers
1-5 - Just a few small lakes
6-9 - Lots of lakes and rivers
A-E - Absolute max water So if you enter 0, expect a completely dry landscape. But inputting something A-F will literally fill your map edge to edge with rivers, lakes, and marshlands!
Some examples:
Seed ending in 0 = Completely dry
Seed ending in 3 = 3 small lakes
Seed ending in F = Water world!Being able to control water placement is extremely powerful for early gameplay. Need a port city site or reduce travel times in a territory-focused game? Customize a lake or river right where you want your first settlement!
The next section shows how combining your 7th and 10th digit choices lets you craft truly one-of-a-kind worlds.
Putting It Together: Crafting Your Ideal Landscape
Using the biome and water controls above, you can start generating exactly the type of landscape you want for your game:
Lush Forest Haven
Seed: 171091915E
Biome: Temperate Forest
Lakes: Max waterWith abundant forageables and pre-grown fuel from the dense trees, this seed lets you hit the ground running on early expansion. However, you may need to chop back thick forests to make space.
Rocky Hills w/ Iron Ore
Seed: 171092953E
Biome: Arid Highlands
Lakes: A few small onesChallenge yourself on this mineral-rich, arid map. Scout the rocky hills early to locate surface iron deposits before worrying about farming. Just beware seasonal flash flooding from the small lakes!
Lakefront Paradise
Seed: 171092969E
Biome: Temperate Forest
Lakes: Tons of rivers/lakes Build a stunning waterside capital on this temperate, water-laden map. Naval trade routes will flourish! But watch out for early-game flooding if you build near sea level.
Desert Fortress Site
Seed: 171092300E
Biome: Desert
Lakes: NoneFound your cities around the rare fertile oasis sites on this otherwise barren, dry terrain. Raider attacks will struggle crossing the endless seas of sand between settlements.
The possibilities are truly endless! And we‘ve still only explored the 7th and 10th digits. Once you master "cherry picking" your favorite biomes and terrain features from a wide pool of options, you can create the perfectly customized world for your preferred playstyle.
Let‘s cover how choosing your seed for gameplay reasons is just as important as appearances.
Optimizing Seeds for Gameplay Difficulties & Win Conditions
Beyond aesthetics and personal preference, you can also leverage seeds for gameplay optimization. Certain seeds offer definite advantages or disadvantages depending on factors like:
- Selected difficulty level
- Desired win condition (prosperity, fame, etc.)
- Playstyle (peaceful builder vs aggressive expansionist)
- Production focus (farming vs. fishing)
Defensive Seeds for Higher Difficulties
On higher difficulties like Vanquisher, deadly raids frequently attack your settlements. When multiple raid parties converge on different sides of your territory at once, defenses crack quickly.
Seeds generating natural chokepoints give major strategic advantages. Maps with central mountain rings, peninsulas, island clusters, or deep maze-like valleys limit raider approach angles.
You can bait enemy warbands into ambushes at these positional bottlenecks. Here‘s an example volcanic caldera seed perfect for tactically fending off waves of invaders:
Volcanic Fortress Seed: 1710999A5E
Of course, such seeds also limit your empire‘s expansion angles too. Adapt your layouts and districts accordingly!
Balanced Seeds for Prosperity Victories
If pursuing a wonder-fueled prosperity victory, look for seeds offering a balance of all resource types. For example, this balanced seed has decent farming districts, mountainous mines, and lakeside docks:
Balanced Prosperity Seed: 172192AA5A Compare that to a map favoring just one industry, which risks resource scarcity bottlenecks.
Naval Supremacy Seeds
For water-reliant fame victories based around trade routes and naval domination, prioritize island-heavy archipelago seeds such as:
Naval Supremacy Seed: 161109895B You‘ll have unrivaled maritime reach but very limited land farming. Adapt your build and research orders accordingly!
In addition to the major gameplay implications above, certain seeds may better suit your personal playstyle too.
Do you prefer turtling up behind impenetrable walls of defense before eventual explosive expansion? Look for peninsular or cavernous maps to hide away on. Or do you oversee sprawling rural countrysides linked by bustling trade routes? Vast, flat plains seeds support that best.
Truly, by choosing seeds strategically rather than just for aesthetics, you can build tailored advantage into your worlds from the very start.
Now let‘s see how external tools can take seed manipulation to even greater heights.
Advanced Seeds: Mods, Tools, and Community Maps
While the digits breakdown above should empower basic seed creation, more advanced users can utilize external tools to customize worlds even further.
Seeds of the Week
The Farthest Frontier modding community actively shares top quality seeds each week on the official Discord and Steam Workshop pages. Try out community creations for inspiration or kickstart your next game on an already optimized map.
Here were some recent community favorites:
Week 1 Winner – Archipelago Empire seed by user Umyaya
172192335D Week 2 Winner – Riverfort strategy seed by user LordoftheBums
1601839F3EWeek 3 Winner – Volcanic Peninsula seed by user MagmaMuse
1881000357ECustomization Mods
A variety of player-made mods allow tweaking world generation in ways no base seed can achieve. Want more mineral deposits? Specific tree types? Weirder anomalies? Mods add a whole new layer of customization.
Here are some of my personal favorites:
Geological Landforms – Adds breathtaking rock formations and cave systems unseen in vanilla generator.
Dynamic Ecology – Alters climate patterns over time for shifting biome distributions each era.
Hydrascape – Create floods, monsoons, geysers and lavafalls for water effects beyond just rivers/lakes.
Catastrophic Events – Volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, meteor strikes and more ravage your lands over time.
External Map Design Tools
If even mods don‘t provide enough control over your world, external generator tools let you hand-design maps from scratch. Advanced users can build fully custom landscapes down to exact terrain heights, resource deposits, roadways, landmarks, and more.
Here are the best external map design apps:
Fractal World Designer – Powerful world customization, but very complex UI.
Frontier Cartography Suite – More user friendly, great for newer creators.
Farr Seeder – Specialized just for seed manipulation, but less total customization capability.
While casual users likely don‘t need external tools for basic seeds, power users gain immense creative control from leveraging mods and apps in tandem with generator tweaking.
Now that we‘ve covered both basic and advanced manipulation techniques, I want to share some of my all-time favorite mapped worlds that still entertain me hundreds of hours later.
My Top 3 Can‘t Miss Custom Seeds
I‘ve played Farthest Frontier across probably 50+ worlds at this point. But even after all that exploration, these 3 custom seeds still stand out as my favorites to this day:
1. Volcanic Stronghold
1881000357EThis challenging seed spawns you on a rocky, Iron-rich volcanic island. Chop back the dense pine forests around the lava-spewing peak to build an unconquerable fortress city overlooking fiery doom!
The offshore tropical isles offer a sharp visual contrast with plenty of farming potential too. Just be ready to fend off frequent volcanic eruptions and ash storms in the early eras.
2. Great Sands Oasis
171092300EFound your settlements around the rare, fertile oasis sites dotting this otherwise lifeless endless desert. Massive sandstorms constantly blast the dunes, making travel extremely harsh.
Raiders will struggle to reach your cities across the expansive wastes. But securing enough food early on before farms unlock will test your skill. This is one of the most challenging seeds I‘ve played.
3. Isle of Mist
161109895BBuild tall, glittering island cities wrapped in a dreamy, otherworldly fog upon these mist-shrouded isles. Take advantage of the extremely rich fishing grounds and maritime trade routes.
But beware – the seas hide paranormal dangers! Ghostly apparitions, haunted shipwrecks, freak whirlpools, and worse threaten sailors who dare cross into the veil of mist. Not for the superstitious!
Let me know which seeds you find most fun. And happy world building!
Conclusion
I hope this guide has opened your eyes to the incredible customization potential map seeds offer Farthest Frontier players. By tapping into just a small slice of the 2+ trillion possible worlds, you can craft vastly unique experiences every single game.
The ability to essentially develop and populate your perfect, tailored kingdom from the ground up revolutionized my personal enjoyment of FF. And I know it will do the same for you too once you master seed manipulation and make your first fully custom map.
So what are you waiting for? Stop relying on random chance and take control of your next epic journey as lord of a domain designed specifically to match your wildest fantasies as ruler. The power lies in your hands now – so use it wisely!
Let me know which stunning, challenging, or just plain crazy seeds you discover out there. And happy pioneering my friends!