A house can have up to three stories. You build on one story at a time: upper floors stand on the walls below, stairs climb from one story to the next, and a roof goes on top. When you stand inside, everything above you turns see-through so you can see the room you are in.
CONTENTS
Choosing a story
While placing a piece, the bar at the foot of the screen shows STORY 1, 2 or 3. Change it with the mouse wheel, or Z (down) and X (up). When you start placing, the story is set to the one you are standing on.
Upper floors and ceilings
A floor laid on story 2 or 3 is also the ceiling of the room under it: one piece, not two. An upper floor needs something holding it up: a wall under it on its tile, or another floor beside it on the same story. If not, the game says "Needs walls below it, or a floor beside it."
Upper walls
A wall, door or window on an upper story stands on the wall below it, or beside a floor or roof on its own story. A fence up a story needs a floor or a roof under it.
Stairs
Stairs are in the CONSTRUCT page's Wood, Stone, Iron and Endurium kits (Wood Stairs, Stone Stairs, Iron Stairs, Endurium Stairs). A flight fills one tile and climbs one story.
- Set the stairs on the story they start from. Press R to turn them to climb north, east or west.
- Leave a gap in the floor above: the tile over the stairs must have no floor. If there is one, the game says "The floor above is in the way: leave a gap for the stairs." Once the stairs are built, you can't lay a floor over them ("Leave the stairwell open.").
- You climb out onto the floor beyond the gap, so build a floor next to the stairwell on the story above.
- Stairs on story 2 need a floor or a roof to stand on.
- Furniture and other props can't stand on a stairs tile.
Roofs
A roof sits on top of the story you choose (the bar says ON TOP). It needs walls, a floor or another roof beside it. If it would only fit on another story, the game tells you which. Each tile holds one roof.
A roof is also a floor for the story above: you can stand on it, and put props, stairs, walls and fences on it. This lets you build a room on a roof. A roof with something standing on it can't be taken down or moved, and nor can the wall that holds it up, until what is on top is gone.
Under a roof or an upper floor you are under cover: rain and snow don't reach you there.
Seeing inside
- When you stand under cover (a roof or a higher floor over you), the covered area you are in counts as your room, and everything above your story eases to see-through, so you can see yourself and the room.
- While you are placing a piece, the cut is the story you are building on, so you always see what you are making.
- Anyone standing outside behind a building gets a soft see-through hole in the roofs round them, and the wall in front of them fades, so nobody is hidden behind a house.
- In the 2.5D view, the upper floor just south of a stairwell fades while someone is partway up the stairs.
Taking a house down
DISMANTLE takes the top piece on the story you aim at first. A piece that holds something up won't come apart until that is gone: take a house down from the top. A floor with a wall standing on it says "A wall stands on this floor. Take the wall down first."
Tips
- Build the whole ground story first, with walls on every side, then lay the upper floor across the walls' tops.
- Put the stairs against a wall and leave just one tile open above them.
- A room is cozy only when it has a floor, walls on every side, cover overhead and a light (see Comfort).
