You have to work your way up there. You start with 100 Workers as a resources. Every building needs workers. And yes in the beginning you can only build foresters to generate wood. With enough wood you can also build “Hunters” or “Farms” though, which generate food. With wood and food you can eventually build “Huts” which produce workers. And very costly mines, if placed on the mountains produce gold (which is in this version the endgoal). The current balancing is quite difficult and requires careful planning in order to place even a single mine throughout one playthrough.