I must stress the fact that most of the information I'm providing you is "found" by me by testing in the game. There might be errors and fallacies.
I recommend watching the full-game run (and reading description for it), as I think I did some things right on that. For example, I couldn't find any use for windows and plants.
Hotkeys can be found here, page 1: https://www.scribd.com/document/114311380/Theme-Hospital-Manual
When designing the hospital, you should focus on the route of the patients and staff in your hospital. Short routes means your dying patients make it to the treatment before dying and your hospital will be more efficient overall. This is the reason why, for example, GPs should be as near to the arrival point as possible and pharmacies near to the helipad. You can try to make rooms frame-perfect (a thing I didn't do); for example, turning animation of the patient costs one frame.
You need as professional staff as possible to get your hospital efficient. To save time from training any docs, hire Consultants wherever possible. New docs come out on the first day of the month. Hirable staff are not RNG, but hiring any staff member could affect the way other staff members are available. For example, hiring a handyman in Jan could affect available docs in Mar (not in Feb). It's really complicated, and I recommend testing different setups and choosing one, then going with that.
Example hiring build for Croaking Hospital: D = doctor, C = consultant R = researcher, P = psychiatrist, S = surgeon, N = nurse, H = handyman -Jan: 193-worth D, R, S-R, N -Feb: P, S-C, H -Mar: S-R, Sx2, C, N, H -Apr: P-R, R-C, C
Staff stay happy if they have enough salary vs. their experience, aren't too tired (you need staff room(s) with only couches) and are warm enough. One radiator/room is enough if the room is smaller than 8x8 (all your ideal rooms). Place radiators to the corridors to please your handymen. Over the time staff members are getting more experience, hence they get unhappy about their salaries.
Keep your docs, but especially surgeons, happy. When your surgeon-consultant wants a pay rise, he might want double the money he is getting already (that douchebag). If he doesn't get upset, he won't ask for more money. Giving small bonuses from time to time is handy.
The emergencies and epidemics aren't RNG either. You'll get the same emergency each time the same month.
Example: Eastville Hospital -Year 1 Jul: FC, 4 patients -Y2 Jan: OT, 2 -Y3 Aug: Decontamination, 5
You can dodge all epidemics by first removing your reception desks, then kicking epidemic patient out and then buying new RD. The health minister will not find to your hospital because you had no RD when he was trying to visit you. Check the video for this.
Earthquakes come in pairs - the first one doesn't do any damage, and the seconds one does. I suggest you to quick save after the first wave in case any of your machinery would blow up in the second wave. The EQs do randomly 1-6 damage to all your machines. You'll get more of those 6-EQs in the later levels. I found a small correlation with having a fire extinguisher in a room to the machine not blowing up, thought it should still be tested more properly. To avoid quickload/save, keep an eye on your machines' strength values vs. times used. Call for handymen when it looks dangerous. Replace hardware when the strength drops too much.
Reputation seems to be more important than I initially thought (when running the game). The exact formula of it's affection to the game is still a mystery to me. I think you can take bigger loans with better reputation and you'll get more patients.
The winning letter can appear only in the end of Mar, Jun, Sep or Dec (Battenberg only Dec).
That was everything I could think of now. Ask if you have any questions! :)
Nobody asked, but I still think I'll need to correct my previous message. I did an extensive experiment on fire extinguishers. It appeared that having a fire extinguisher or multiple ones didn't have any effect on the propability of the machine blowing up. I tested this with ~20 Jelly Vats with 0, 1 and ridiculous amount of fire extinguishers. If one wants to improve the run, the fire extinguishers should go.
What I've found by making tests no correlation with staff happiness and amount of windows. The only practicality would be to better see if the room has a radiator or not, but placing the windows takes time, so I don't place them myself.
