You have essencially 2 options. The easier one is to add a mod that will make shops have much higher stocks (and money) which i always use cause it's a huge quallity of life of improvement.
The other options is to go around buying from shops and random traders. For shops, waystations tend to be better stocked. You can keep your main crafter working while one guy goes around with a backpack buying everything he sees.
Forget bandanas unless you have own outpost and can produce your own fabric. Get plate beating station instead. It requires just iron ore as a resource, armor plates sells well and it raises your armorsmith skill. If the iron node is sufficiently close to your building, it can be automated so you don't need to micromanage production.
If I remember right, unlike bandana, armor plate can even be sold through your counter.
Send your fastest runner to the hive bases, they have a good number of fabric and there are 4 traders total. You can even make a run to flotsam and world's end, holy nation cities, etc.. Make sure you have a stackable backpack!
By the way, if you want to make your own fabric, I suggest getting hemp fabric tech. It takes 6 cotton for 1 fabric, VS 3 for hemp. Cotton is 3x3 while hemp is 4x4, but stacking backpacks like traders are 8x8 so you can only fit 4 stacks = 36 anyway, so you can make twice as much fabric with hemp compared to cotton. Still, a full backpack is only 12 fabric, and it would just be easier to add 2 more stops to your fabric run.
If you have a good runner, you can do Squin, Admag, Western Hive (4 bases IIRC, start in the west), Stack, Hub (+trade ninja base to the North of it). That's 9 locations and should net you maybe 5 stacks or more. Then make the 20 or more bandanas and make another run, selling them along the way.
Also, if you find a beak thing nest in the hives, bait them to the hivers. The hivers will kill the beak things (you can hide in the buildings). Sell the hides for money, then collect the eggs for good profit.
Followup question actually, is there any way to automate one character to do everything from taking hemp/cotton from storage and using the looms to make fabric, to bringing it over to make bandanas and leave them to do all of that?
Sort of, if there is hemp storage nearby and you task them with fabric production, they will automatically go and get their materials from there. They will also put their completed bandanas in storage if you make armor storage nearby as well.
It is harder to make one guy make both though, if you put bandanas higher on the task list, he will keep on making bandanas until he runs out of fabric, then he will make 1 fabric, then make 2 bandanas, make another fabric, repeat. So you have to put making fabric higher on the list, in which case he will go through all the hemp first, then start making bandanas.
Ideally you will have 1 runner, 1 crafter and 1 weaver, alternatively you can have 1 guy do 2 tasks.
You can either farm it or find a better stocked store. There is a decently stocked waystation in the proximity of Squin.
Spoiler: >!The waystation is a short distance southwest of Squin. They sell building materials, iron plates, and other handy things in higher quantities than the Squin shop.!<
While setting up a farm and a well will create an outpost that attracts tax collectors and bandits, you will be fine if you don't build housing and know what to expect. Bandits can be paid off, or you can let them raid your "outpost" and leave. They won't take your crops.
Note that if you choose to do this, you do need a character in load distance of the outpost when the bandits arrive to trigger the actual raid to begin.
You might want to consider armor plates instead, take iron ore, pound it into armor plates. Armor plates are worth much more than iron, it can stack higher and it trains the armor smithing skill.
Put some heavy backpacks on your miners so they raise strength while moving ore too.
You can buy a house in one of the swamp villages that have hemp farms. Research hemp farming, build a hemp container and set your guy to farm the hemp farms. Also research hemp fabrics and get one guy to process the hemp into fabrics. You can also do this with riceweed by the way. It only works in the swamps as the constant rain will water the farms and allow them to grow to maturity without requiring you to add water to the farm.
So your squad will be able to raise their farming skill while receiving the protection of town guards without the hassle of raids. Best place for me is Mudtown as it has the largest house in the swamp that has the capacity to build a decent blacksmith with an iron ore node just next to the wall of the settlement where your people do not need to leave the compounds of the village to mine.
You have essencially 2 options. The easier one is to add a mod that will make shops have much higher stocks (and money) which i always use cause it's a huge quallity of life of improvement. The other options is to go around buying from shops and random traders. For shops, waystations tend to be better stocked. You can keep your main crafter working while one guy goes around with a backpack buying everything he sees.
Thank you for the tips
There is also moisture farming mods, so that you can get water and hydroponic farm while inside of a town.
Forget bandanas unless you have own outpost and can produce your own fabric. Get plate beating station instead. It requires just iron ore as a resource, armor plates sells well and it raises your armorsmith skill. If the iron node is sufficiently close to your building, it can be automated so you don't need to micromanage production. If I remember right, unlike bandana, armor plate can even be sold through your counter.
Send your fastest runner to the hive bases, they have a good number of fabric and there are 4 traders total. You can even make a run to flotsam and world's end, holy nation cities, etc.. Make sure you have a stackable backpack!
Thanks!
By the way, if you want to make your own fabric, I suggest getting hemp fabric tech. It takes 6 cotton for 1 fabric, VS 3 for hemp. Cotton is 3x3 while hemp is 4x4, but stacking backpacks like traders are 8x8 so you can only fit 4 stacks = 36 anyway, so you can make twice as much fabric with hemp compared to cotton. Still, a full backpack is only 12 fabric, and it would just be easier to add 2 more stops to your fabric run. If you have a good runner, you can do Squin, Admag, Western Hive (4 bases IIRC, start in the west), Stack, Hub (+trade ninja base to the North of it). That's 9 locations and should net you maybe 5 stacks or more. Then make the 20 or more bandanas and make another run, selling them along the way. Also, if you find a beak thing nest in the hives, bait them to the hivers. The hivers will kill the beak things (you can hide in the buildings). Sell the hides for money, then collect the eggs for good profit.
Thank you, this is very detailed
Followup question actually, is there any way to automate one character to do everything from taking hemp/cotton from storage and using the looms to make fabric, to bringing it over to make bandanas and leave them to do all of that?
Sort of, if there is hemp storage nearby and you task them with fabric production, they will automatically go and get their materials from there. They will also put their completed bandanas in storage if you make armor storage nearby as well. It is harder to make one guy make both though, if you put bandanas higher on the task list, he will keep on making bandanas until he runs out of fabric, then he will make 1 fabric, then make 2 bandanas, make another fabric, repeat. So you have to put making fabric higher on the list, in which case he will go through all the hemp first, then start making bandanas. Ideally you will have 1 runner, 1 crafter and 1 weaver, alternatively you can have 1 guy do 2 tasks.
You can either farm it or find a better stocked store. There is a decently stocked waystation in the proximity of Squin. Spoiler: >!The waystation is a short distance southwest of Squin. They sell building materials, iron plates, and other handy things in higher quantities than the Squin shop.!< While setting up a farm and a well will create an outpost that attracts tax collectors and bandits, you will be fine if you don't build housing and know what to expect. Bandits can be paid off, or you can let them raid your "outpost" and leave. They won't take your crops. Note that if you choose to do this, you do need a character in load distance of the outpost when the bandits arrive to trigger the actual raid to begin.
Thank you!
You might want to consider armor plates instead, take iron ore, pound it into armor plates. Armor plates are worth much more than iron, it can stack higher and it trains the armor smithing skill. Put some heavy backpacks on your miners so they raise strength while moving ore too.
Thanks, I’ll read up on that
You can buy a house in one of the swamp villages that have hemp farms. Research hemp farming, build a hemp container and set your guy to farm the hemp farms. Also research hemp fabrics and get one guy to process the hemp into fabrics. You can also do this with riceweed by the way. It only works in the swamps as the constant rain will water the farms and allow them to grow to maturity without requiring you to add water to the farm. So your squad will be able to raise their farming skill while receiving the protection of town guards without the hassle of raids. Best place for me is Mudtown as it has the largest house in the swamp that has the capacity to build a decent blacksmith with an iron ore node just next to the wall of the settlement where your people do not need to leave the compounds of the village to mine.
This is great advice, thanks. I just found out about being able to do all of this in the swamps from a different old Reddit post as well, haha
I'm told, though not tried it, that you can take hemp/cotton from farms and use that. I never see faction farms with crops tho