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Frequently asked questions

What's the state of the project?

Project is still pretty heavy in development! It's still missing a lot of major features. What's currently available is building construction, unit training, a couple of building interfaces, as well as secondary pages like production-overview, village-overview, map, preferences,...

I'm currently working on a rework of the game engine. This rework will allow us to scale properly, which we need to simulate thousands of villages. This work is sadly taking the majority of my time, so other features are currently blocked due to that.

Is there a project roadmap available?

Due to the nature of this project (I get work on it only in my free time), I'm not willing to commit to any specific timeline for any features. That being said, here's the general plan for upcoming development:

  • Engine rework (currently in development)
  • Combat mechanics
  • Trading mechanics
  • Hero adventures, inventory,...

Bug fixing and other minor works will be made between these features.

Are there game design differences between Travian and Pillage First!?

Yes, there are a few! The main ones include planned new buildings, the removal of the capital village mechanic, expanded artifact system, planned new hero items and more NPC interactions. Mechanics are always up for discussion, so feel free to leave your thoughts! Game design is an ongoing conversation in our Discord server, so feel free to hop in and share your thoughts!

Can this project be converted to multiplayer?

Yes! This project was actually rebuilt from the ground up to make it as compatible as possible with a potential backend integration.

That being said, the current goal is to keep this repository as a standalone, offline-first app focused on single-player gameplay.

One of the hopes for the future of this project is that someone might eventually fork the project, restructure it, and connect it to a backend, enabling a multiplayer experience. Most of the frontend can be completely reused, making the transition easier than starting from scratch.

If you're passionate about backend development and want to help bring multiplayer to life, feel free to reach out!

How does the game continue running if the app is closed?

In a nutshell, whenever you open a game world, we simulate every event that would have taken place, had the app been open all this time. These events would happen at some time in the past, but since app can't run without the browser being open, we resolve these events now. This means you can be attacked while offline, since this attack would also have happened if you were online. The major downside is that we can't know which events have happened until we actually open the game world and simulate the timeline. This means we can't let the player know if they're under attack, because the only way for us to know whether an attack has been triggered is to actually open the game.

Why not stick with the original?

While I love Travian, I (and many more like me) just don't have the time to commit to it anymore. Pulling all-nighters, finding duals from across the world and making sure account is covered 24/7 was fun in middle school, but it's not something I want to (or even can?) engage in now. I want to be able to take a break, whenever life gets in the way, and for the game to respect that.

I want this game to be a more accessible, customizable and time-friendly version of Travian.

Is this project in danger of being taken down due to copyright violations?

We've made a lot of effort to differentiate this game from Travian. Even though Pillage First! is inspired by Travian, we've made (and plan for more) fundamental gameplay, technological & design differences between games.

Codebase has been written completely from scratch. We're not using Travian codebase as a reference or any other reason in any stage of development.

Art is completely handmade. We don't use or allow any Travian assets. Furthermore, we don't use and don't allow AI-transformed Travian assets to be used in this project.

We also include legal notices on the page to explicitly differentiate this project from Travian.

Does the game continue even if I close the app?

Yes! You're free to close the app at any time and the game will pick off right next time you open it again! Units will continue to be trained, buildings will continue to be constructed and troops will continue to raid exactly as they would if you kept the app running.

Are game worlds stable between new releases?

Sometimes, but most often not. Despite this project being developed in my free-time only, we still have a relatively high update cadence. Typically, we push out 3-5 (mostly minor) updates per week. Most of these updates are completely safe and don't affect the underlying data structures that the app requires, but not always. Sometimes, even minor changes break the game world, either completely, or partially.


Until full release - Until the full release of the game, I don't intend to keep worlds compatible between changes. This means game worlds should be expected to break relatively regularly and should only be used for testing the game out. I can't afford to spend time migrating old game states to new structures to keep compatibility, due to this slowing down development quite a bit.

After full release - After the game is officially released, I will commit to keeping game worlds stable between releases. This means that with each a game change, I'll also provide a script to migrate old game states to new ones. This process should be completely transparent to users.

Why single-player?

There are a few key reasons I chose to focus on single-player:

  • Customizable gameplay - Each of us has a different expectation of the game. Some players prefer speedier game worlds, some prefer more difficult opponents, while others look for a more peaceful coexisting with their neighbors. This isn't something that we can offer in a multiplayer setting, where you have no control of other players' actions. Thus, one of the goals of this app is to give you the power to customize your gameplay as much as possible. You'll be able to choose speed, difficulty (NPC troop levels,...) and more at server creation form!

  • Respecting your time - Most of us are not in high school anymore. Waking up at 3am to send out attacks may have been a valid strategy 10 years ago, but it's out of the question now. Because we realize real-life takes priority, we plan on adding multiple mechanism to help you balance game needs:

  • Unlimited vacation mode, available at any point for any reason

  • Ability to disable attacks while you're offline

  • Moderation cost & complexity - multiplayer comes with a whole layer of moderation challenges, things like chat filters, reporting tools, cheat prevention, account and support systems. They're not just one-time features either; they need constant upkeep and care. For a solo developer, that's a massive investment of time and energy that could easily overshadow the development of the actual game. Single-player allows me to limit the scope of the project and deliver faster.

  • Offline-first - One of the goals of this project is to allows players to load the app once and then have it work fully offline. This makes it more accessible to players with limited or unreliable internet access, and ensures the experience is consistent regardless of connection quality.

Is there an in-game Wiki available?

Not yet, but I can (officially?) confirm there's one in the making!

It's going to include units (cost, attack and defence upgrade tables and durations), buildings (cost, upgrade durations), hero (exp tables and revive cost) and some general advice and tips.

Is 10x the highest supporter game world speed?

Yes. This might get revised upwards in the future. The limiting factor here is players' own devices. Since the app runs 100% on your device, we can't really guarantee good performance. Higher speed game worlds require more device resources, and maxing these out could cause lag, excessive battery drain and other issues.

A 10x speed appears stable even on lower-end devices, which is why this speed was determined to be the higher limit for now.