The Key to the City and Executive Hammer are exclusive items that can only be acquired through giving royal trinkets to the Pig Queen. The Key unlocks the City Planning Tab, a high-end crafting tab similar to the ancient or volcanic tab. The executive hammer can permanently destroy structures from the city planning tab and return half the resources used to build it. This guide will focus on how to effectively build your own hamlet using these items and how to effectively reap the most benefits.
Gathering Trinkets
The first step to begin building your city is to gather two royal trinkets to gift to the Pig Queen for Royal Gallery Keys. The best way to do this is to kill a single hippopotamoose for its antler and kill one or two platypines for their quills and make a bird whistle. Using the bird whistle, summon the BFB and collect the Regal Scepter from the island before heading back to your first island. Then, when traveling to the palace island, collect the jeweled truffle before exiting and making your way to the palace. Redeem both trinkets with the Pig Queen and collect the Key to the City and Executive Hammer. Alternatively, if you cannot acquire two trinkets, simply collect one and get just the Key.
Gathering Resources
Once you have the tools you need for making your hamlet, you will need the resources to build before you start building. All shops require 4 boards and 4 pig skin, as well as additional items specific to the shop. If you want, you could also build a slanty shanty for your own town, giving yourself a place to live. This will require cut stone instead of pig skin, and will also require 30 oincs, so you will need to spend some time in one of the towns accumulating riches. You can of course gather boards by crafting them, but you can also gather boards by hammering the counter in a pig shop. Simply wait in the shop until night or offer the trader an item they won't accept. After a few seconds, they will leave their station, allowing you to hammer the counter. This does not anger or provoke any pigs, and the shop will still work just as fine. Pig skin can be collected by killing pigs, but if that does not appeal to you, you could always collect Pig skin? from vampire bats. If you find yourself all out of options, you could use the Executive Hammer to destroy existing shops or houses to collect the necessary resources. Just remember that doing so will provoke any Royal Guards nearby.
Before you begin the build phase, consider a space to place your hamlet. The beginning island and palace island both contain pig towns, so building on one of those may be annoying if your build space is limited by that of one of the other towns. Remember that you will also want to keep your citizens safe from harm, so avoid building it near places pigs will come into harm, such as the fountain of youth, or the deep rainforest.
Buildings to Prioritise
First, you will want to build a city hall. This means that you can build town houses and pigs will pay tax every eight days. This can be a reliable way to earn money, however know that this method is very slow at first until you can accumulate lots of pig skin. However, if you already have more preferred ways of earning money, you can skip this step and just build town houses for more pig traders. Also, if you wish to have a building to base in, make a slanty shanty close to points of interest, such as shops. Once you have a town hall built, it is no longer necessary to enter it, so you may build points of interest further away from it. Also, you will definitely want to build all of your shops close to each other and your base for easy shopping.
The first shop you will want to build is Pigg and Pigglet's General Store. This is useful because it can be crafted at a relatively cheap price and is the only source of cloth, other than hammering the deflated balloon at the start of the game. It can also sell flint, which is useful in a hamlet world where boulders are rare and flint cannot be found on the ground.
The Boar's Tusk Weapon Shop is another great shop, as it is easy to craft and has good weapons for sale that cannot be gathered anywhere else, such as coconades and tooth traps. It also can occasionally sell a cutlass supreme, a weapon with as much damage as a dark sword but with more durability and no sanity drain.
The another shop you will want to build soon is a mineral exchange. Whilst you can not buy items, this shop can be useful for making tenpiece and centapiece oincs for more compact storage. It can also be used as an easy source of gold.
The Flying Pig Arcane Shop is easy enough to craft, requiring only one nightmare fuel on top of the regular four boards and four pig skin. The shop sells items from the magic tab, and is the only way to get living logs asides from killing elder mandrakes and a rare chance from smashing pots.
If you have enough iron, craft the ball pein hammers you need for 'The Sty' Oddities Emporium. This shop sell many high-end late game items, and many boss drops that would otherwise be unobtainable in hamlet. However, note that many recipes for items crafted from boss drops can only be crafted with blueprints from The Tinkerer's tower, which is one of most expensive shops as it requires two blue gems for magnifying glasses.
The Sow's Ear Hat Shop is a extremely mediocre, as it costs two top hats plus four boards and four pig skin. Most of the items sold there are not very useful, given that no season exists in hamlet where temperature is a problem. However, it can sell some useful exclusive items, such as moggles, tam o' shanters, pith hats, and rabbit earmuffs. The latter can be used to negate Queen Womant's horn attack, and can be extremely useful to buy as rabbits cannot be found elsewhere in a hamlet world.
Curly Tails Mud Spa is the only place anti venom and coffee can be found, however it has a considerable cost. The best way to make one is by buying the honey poultices from already existing Mud Spas.
The Sterling Trough Deli can be slightly complicated to make, as bees do not exist in hamlet and the only way to get honey is through finding it in Mant Nests. However, honey ham can be bought from an already existing deli for 20 oincs, which is a considerable price, however the shop can contain many effective healing foods, including waffles.
Swinesbury Fine Grocer's has a considerable cost, especially since eggplants are uncommon at best. The best way to get the ingredients are to either steal or purchase one eggplant from an already existing shop, then destroy it with the Executive Hammer. If you have the money to spare, you could also buy all the eggplants in the store, and buy the cheapest items if eggplants are not present. This shop can be easily used to make crock pot foods for cheaper prices than that of the Deli.
Miss Sow's Floral Arrangements is the last shop mentioned here, and is also the least useful. It mostly sells seeds of different types, which is not that useful since farms are not very reliable food sources, however this shop can be useful if playing as Wormwood. It also sells berry bushes, allowing you to make berry farms and make money off usher pigs. However, one of the most useful items sold here are pine cones. These are the only tree in the game that will produce 3 logs and 2 seeds all year round in hamlet or reign of giants. However, once you have enough of each item, this store becomes much less useful.
Once you have your town houses and shops in place, consider making some watch towers to protect your town and provide additional fighting support. The easiest way to amass lots of watch towers is to massacre Royal Guards around the outskirts of existing pig villages, then use the halberds and pig skin to make the watch towers. As a finishing touch, add a hedge farm with some of your remaining oincs to further expand your profits.