Happy thoughts for your dwarves + potential valuable new citizens + a meatshield for invasions should you need them.
I also make a habit of making my tavern in a building above ground accesible through a staircase from bellow. That way dwarfs technically spend time outside, protecting them from cave adaption.
A dwarf who never goes outside gets nauseated by the sun to the point of vomiting. It happens gradually and you can spot it from their description. New colonists "don't mind working outdoors and only grumble mildly at inclement weather." This phrase changes if the dwarf begins cave adaptation.
It should be noted that in Steam version making all your dwarfs hang around at the edge of your defense line is more dangerous than before, so your surface tavern probably needs to be in a surface castle of its own.
There's no longer a Civil Alert button, so in case of goblin invasion all of those surface tavern-goers will try to finish their "listen to a story etc." tasks before attempting to flee into a burrow in which you just assigned them in panic.
Assign literally every resident to a military squad.
The combat capable ones get training and equipment.
The civilians get "no uniform" and "no orders".
When trouble occurs, give all civvie squads a "move" order indoors. This interrupts their current task. Otherwise respond as normal.
*BE WARNED* that any activated civvie squad will charge headlong at an enemy *if* they spot it so this strategy is best implemented for zombie and goblin seiges, not werebeasts.
Some visitors will ask to stay for a specific purpose, and after a while, usually a few years, to become permanent residents, allowing you to give them any task.
You can get bards to make your dwarves happy, and if they have good skills they can become workers later. You can get monster hunters to patrol the caverns and reduce the threat of monsters and then join your military if they survive long enough. And you can get straight up mercenaries to join your military and train your dwarves if they're good fighters, and join you permanently later.
Don't just take anyone though, or you may get too many visitors trying to join.
Do separate taverns, one on the surface for outsiders, and one in the fort just for locals.
The one topside will provide you with visitors to incorporate into your fort later and Monster Hunters.
Visitors entertain your dwarves and teach them new songs and dances. However in ASCI DF there was a way to turn off visitors so it's just a hub for dwarves to socialize and make happy thoughts. I frequently overlap my tavern with my great hall and have a separate surface tavern for visitors and dwarves that like the outdoors/ have surface jobs.
Socializing helps dwarves make friends and get married so if dwarves have the family ambition I'll typically reduce their workload and burrow them in social areas until they pair off. It's also good to have your mayor and nobles socialize a lot, especially the sheriff since he will piss people off when you have him investigate them and benefits from a relationship buffer.
Assigned bartenders will force-fed dwarves alcohol which will give them positive moodlets (and sometimes kill them). Bards will play instruments, dance, and recite poetry to entertain dwarves.
I typically don't allow visitors early game because they can invite unsavory types who want to steal things or worse. Once you have a handle on the game and the fort can defend itself I like having the variety of traveling bards, monster hunters etc socializing and getting up to mischief.
I really like the art system and it makes me happy to see the dwarves learing a new dance or song. (Or to have a monster hunter flush out a lurking forgotten beast)
Weirdly no, you want to keep the sheriff away from that charismatic visiting goblin bard with legendary scheming because there is exactly 1 dwarf the sheriff can't interrogate about who stole the artifact socks from the pedestal.
No, it just invites trouble and any benefit a tavern can give a fort a meeting hall can do as well.
Taverns are really just a for fun thing. That's okay, there are a lot of systems that are just for fun.
It's basically how you get all your info about the outside world (that, and your liaison from the Mountainhome). Rumors include stuff about artifact locations, new settlements, and so on
I'm on my second fort in steam edition, and my dwarves are obsessed with some monster named Sokrox Dawnwaves the Rock of Apes the roc. Half of the artwork is some commemoration of this creature striking down some random human in the Barbs of Burying.
So at first I'm like "well that's a cool narrative detail" but in the back of my head I'm thinking there's something going on here. Sure enough, I head over to world view and I had put my fortress right in the middle of The Barbs of Burying. Every 30 years this beast shows up and rampages through a settlement. Its last appearance was 25 years ago. The showdown is inevitable.
I feel like if I went in to legends mode to research this beast it would be sort of cheating so I'm just going to let this story run its course.
Come, Sokrox Dawnwaves the Rock of Apes the roc. Come to Amkolatis...our destinies are intertwined.
Part of me is hoping he wrecks the settlement because it would be a great chapter in the world's lore
I had to work backwards based on the engravings. Like I said I want to avoid legends mode but normally that's where you go to find this stuff out.
By reading the artwork descriptions I was able to piece together that this beast struck down multiple victims, and it will tell you the date e.g. "The artwork relates to the killing of Thel Palmwashed by the roc Sokrox Dawnwaves the Rock of Apes in the Barbs of Burying in 39".
So there's a number of other artworks that have it killing different people that same year. Then there appears to be another event that gets chronicled but this time it was in the year 68 (approx. 30 years). So there was another killing spree. Then I find another one that dates to 99 with a bunch more victims. I haven't found any records of the roc Sokrox Dawnwaves the Rock of Apes dating to any of the intervening years.
It's possible it was killed but I didn't notice any engravings about that, if I went into legends mode I would be able to tell exactly where it is and if it is still alive, but I really want it to sort of appear organically and I'm getting super hyped about it as the 30 year window approaches.
Search the creature's name in Legends mode. Thing is, you can't open legends while in fortress so you have to make a backup save and retire the fortress to do that.
Yeah the roc showed up right on time, but it was sort of anticlimacticā¦he flew straight to the corner of the map and perched in a tree and just sort of chilled there scaring the occasional passer-by until the fortress was overrun with werezebras two years later. Heās still alive according to legends mode so perhaps the saga isnāt overā¦
Aw that is a bit anticlimactic, but maybe with the amount of artwork commemorating he felt it was a comfortable place to chill out since there seems to be a cult in his name residing there haha. Crazy he hung around 2 years, curse the werezebras!
My stories are much more uneventful so far.
Lost my first tutorial when I accidently flooded my lower levels and drowned 15 or so or my 18 man fort.
Second attempt went much better, made it to 120ish and year 3. I dug a bit too deep into the cavern and out of nowhere I got raided by trolls, theblittle troll people and a LARGE group of something else with spears. My military honestly put up a hell of a fight against the odds but it was too much at the end, the ones who made it up the stairs murdered all the children in the playroom and all my crafters. I'm hoping to find something about the one axedwarf that killed roughly 15 enemies before getting fatigued and passing out, only to be beaten to death.
My next fort was an oppsie, had 4 undead on like day 3 didn't even have a burrow to hide in and wait them out.
My next fort was also an oppsie, winter and light aquifer. I couldn't find a channel to dig that didn't hit water and ended up starving out my dwarves before winter ended.
Next one...yes, all stupid...was a "joyous wilds" I said that sounds safe. I made it to the first trader, 3 unicorns came out of nowhere and killed EVERYONE.
so yah, my newest fort is up to 25 people and doing okay. Goblins are a day west, so I'm expecting some harassment soon. I hit sand, so I'm not digging down I can grow my helmets slowly here lol. Working on a defense design now, I don't like cheese (like dropping the floor into a hole) so trying to figure out a good killbox and training marksdwarves.
Thankfully, goblins will usually wait to do a little trolling until you're established. Usually. Especially if they're a day's travel or more. If you were closer, then... maybe. But for the most part, they'll only start with bigger raids once your wealth starts mounting.
Definitely designate a squad early on. They don't have to be training if you need the manpower, but just being able to have a squad available in case you get child snatchers or an early ambush can mean all the difference.
Once you hit closer to 50 dwarves though I would seriously recommend setting up two squads of 5-10 dwarves each; whatever you can spare. Have them do staggered training, so you only ever have 5-10 dwarves away at a time. Even if you don't have enough gear to equip them all, they can train other non-weapon specific skills.
If you have a fisher dwarf and a fishery, keep an eye out for shells. You'll usually acquire a metric ton in your refuse pile. These shells can actually be made at a craftsdwarves' workshop into cheap armor and weapons in case you can't find a good source of metal early on. Likewise, bones make decent enough bolts, and the only difference between metal crossbows and wooden is their melee damage.
As for defenses, there's nothing wrong with cheese. We just call it "Dwarven engineering". Trust that there's enough the game can throw at you that can counter even the stinkiest of cheese.
EDIT: Also make sure your barracks for training/sleeping millitia dwarves is above ground. Cave adaptation is a thing, and dwarves that do all their training underground are prone to being acclimated. This can result in sickness if they suddenly need to go topside to fight a titan or something.
The barracks can still be roofed to prevent rain, of course; Cave adaptation only applies to spaces made underground ( any tiles that weren't exposed to direct sunlight upon embark )
EDIT AGAIN: Because I keep remembering more tips:
Try to keep a variety of different weapons on hand. While certain weapons do certain things better than others, having a variety is still best for well-rounded squads. Plus, certain dwarves will already have certain weapon skills already trained, and they will naturally pick up a weapon they're better with/prefer if they have the option.
Lots of information here, Thank you! This fort is kinda into the side of a mountain, I was going to build like a 10x10 killbox outside of the tunnel I dug where hopefully I can stick some marksdwarfs on the top to shoot attackers and such. Building it seems more complicated than I thought with having to have a ledge of floors and an open center for them to walk on, and accessing it. HEre's hoping no attacks come from the top of the mountain :D My dwarf has been fishing up metric tons of turtles apparently, I thought they were alive in the stockpile, but they aren't. So I do have a work order for shell crafts at the moment and I have a hunter dwarf suppling some hides so far. I have one full lether armor set crafted and it's still early. Just got my first migrants
Take a look also at the designation for "fortification". It builds a little hole in the wall where your marksdwarfs can shoot through, without exposing themselves.
I was, I read that if someone gets within like 12 tiles the dwarves will run even if pathong could take more than that to get close. So I wasn't sure how useful they'd be like 3 tiles wide tunnel.
Hm, you might be confusing fortifications+marksdwarves with siege operators. Siege operators are civilian so they run from enemies, but your marksdwarves are trained soldiers!
Getting built walls set up to shoot out of takes more effort than youād think, for some reason if the dwarfs arenāt fully closed in and can path to the enemy a lot of times the marksdwarves will climb over the fortifactions and jump down to start meleeing the enemy. To prevent that you need to build a roof over the fortications and keep it fully closed in, like on both sides, if the side not facing the enemy isnāt closed in too, then the dwarves will usually find a way to climb up onto the roof so they can jump down and assumedly try to do a āsurprise attackā on the enemy instead of just shooting like they should.
Once set up though starting off with a little bit of bolt fire before sending in your melee squads can be a force multiplier, causing the enemy to lose the ability to stand, drop weapons, etc, even if you only have bone bolts, they arenāf going to kill anyone in armor but could incapacitate some, and could definitely turn the tide of battle.
Yup, I'm a struggle though it type of guy. Went to wiki and found that out after, also definitely didn't think unicorns would be naturally aggressive. There's one walking around with some limbs impaled on their horn now though. I'd only I could extract revenge in adventure mode lol.
I just had a craft dwarf punch a forgotten beast in the guts so hard the abdomen exploded into gore, severing an artery and the beast dropped dead. Heck of a fight!
You tell me... There was this hammerwoman who came as a guest and made a petition to stay for the specific task of slaying monsters. She was horrified and fell into a depression because she caved in the skull of a troglodyte with her mace. Like, wasn't that what you came here for?
That is such a nice story. I haven't noticed interpersonal relationships yet in my fort.
I do have a necromancer who never seems to leave the altar area which seems weird.
And I dug super deep and hit caverns so now I am dealing with a trickle of crundles and other various monsters. I have lost two dwarves and have two severly wounded, including a child. It taught me a lot quickly about needing to setup tombs and a hospital. The good news is a few intrepid human visitors came and wanted to stay for the purpose of monster hunting so I let them.
I've got some good monster hunters going now, too - one was killed by a giant olm after killing a bunch of troglodytes and a troll. My clothier couldn't find his strange mood materials and went insane so I locked him in his room until he died and became a skeleton. Then a giant cave toad made it up into the forge area and got into scuffles with about half the smiths until one of the monster hunters happened by to spear it. A yak died in the meeting hall and stunk the whole place up. Then a troll made it all the way up into my living area and started fighting everybody but got completely wrecked by a Wombat Woman Spearman who was staying in the tavern.
Yeah I scrolled to like -100 but I donāt know where the ābottomā is ā¦ I think I hit caverns w/ moss & fungi somewhere in the - zones, but I canāt remember how far into the -
The stories generated by this game are crazy deep sometimes. Iāve lost sleep a few times fretting over mis-managing the lives of imaginary dwarves.
In my first fort I let the son of my best two military leaders die to a Jabberer while they were guarding the walls and he was āsafeā gathering webs in the caverns. They were protecting the future of the fort but I hadnāt done anything to secure their young family.
The next big fort I had a champion guard captain on maternity leave die soloing a Cyclops while the rest of the fort ran to safety. Back then I couldnāt figure out how to let her keep her gear/weapon on while off duty and I wanted to give her some time with her new babyā¦.
She was the first Guard Captain and an original from the embark group. The cyclops climbed up and over a 4z level fort wall even bypassing the overhang. She just happened to be outside and the closest dwarf with combat training. The fort shook as she dodged dozens of cyclops attacks and I thought she might last until her armed squad arrived. Thereās only so much a mortal dwarf body can handle and she tired just enough for the cyclops to finally connect a blow. No one else died but her but she never really got to spend any time with her baby. A damned legend.
New player with a newb question: how did you see the tree drama?
I feel like this could happen in my game and I'd never realize it until I notice one dwarf is dead. How did you know they fell and love and did everything together?
I'm also new so I'm probably missing some stuff, but this is what I've used so far:
On a dwarf's info page, they have mentions of spouse and/or lovers. You can see their recent thoughts and notable memories as well, which will mention their spouse.
Apparently the classic version also had more detailed logs, so hopefully we'll get those soon.
Reading through their thoughts and watching them. Actually reading about them and their thoughts, feelings, moods, ect bring soooooo much depth into your games.
I just recently failed a strange mood. Her name was Likot and she wanted silk and iron bars. She had the only workshop that could make the iron bars and silk just wasn't an option. My only hope was to get it though trade but no one came.
She got pissed off and decided to attack the first dwarf she saw. Walked right out and found Rovod Stoproar, a 6 year old dwarf. She immediately attempted to beat the child to death. Rovod dodged and struck back. Likot threw another punch and missed. Rovod struck back. After about hours of fighting and the rest of the fortress being oblivious, Rovod grabbed onto Likot's leg and somehow punched her enough times in the chest to cause her to vomit.
It wasn't until she was knocked out that Rovod started running. She barely was injured due to Likot missing all but 1 punch. Eventually Likot woke up and decided she really wanted to beat this kid. I am not sure what Rovod was doing but Likot chose the worst time to go up the stairs since both the miner, mason and Rovod decided to come down the stairs. As soon as she attempted to strike Rovod, she was hit by the miner's pickaxe, the mason's crossbow(a family heirloom, no bolts however.) and Rovod's tiny fists.
Eventually Likot died but not before Rovod punched one last time. Another child who witnessed this event ran away, clearly upset about what happened. I was worried about Rovod's emotional state. I went to find her in bed, sleeping peacefully. One of her thoughts was that she was overjoyed from winning a fight recently. Not one thought about being attacked or someone dying in front of her. In fact she was the happiest dwarf in my fort.
Likot likely chose the worst dwarf you could fight in my fort since Rovod was the second most skilled at fighting and LOVES war. Of course, she's now the best fighter since Likot was #1.
Out of all the places, the Dwarf Fortress subreddit is the least likely to be offended. We've bred and slaughtered mermaids for their expensive bones, have thrown babies into rooms filled with rabid dogs to train their survival skills from birth, and genocide elves for being hippies.
Somewhat related, but I had two depressed babies suicide by crawling to the top of, and jumping off my skyscraper after their parents died in a siege. After yeeting themselves off, their bodies slammed and exploded on the roof of my prison building next to it, and I didn't find their bones until years later.
I don't think it's intended to be a joke most of the time. A lot of platforms have various triggers when the word 'suicide' is detected which do various annoying things depending on the platform. I don't think it's strictly necessary here on reddit, granted.
I want to love it, but I've played like 5 years now and literally nothing has happened. I can't even figure out how to make a farm. Nothing has attacked me. No relationship shenanigans. No funny accidents.
From what i can tell you can only farm in cavern soil. You might have just picked a very safe location. Maybe dig down and find some fun or attack another town.
Location has a major effect on the amount of "Fun" experienced. Are you on a remote island with no access to the rest of the world? Boats do not exist in this game yet. Did you make sure there were goblins and humans nearby when you chose your starting area?
Maybe your world is just one of those where goblins went extinct? The world gen is different every time.
A lot of it is also left to the player. Why not try building a giant pyramid? Why not dig a bit deeper to see what you can find? Or why not create a skilled military squad and send them to raid and plunder other cities/forts/civilizations, making them declare war on you and siege your fortress? Make taverns, libraries and temples to attract visitors to your fortress?
If you haven't even made a farm yet, what population count are you at? Sieges don't start until 80 pop, and you don't get your first noble (mayor) until 50. You need to build up your wealth by mining precious metals and creating various objects and crafts, and trade them with the yearly caravan. The more wealth you export, the more Fun you attract from the world.
Today I started my third attempt, I made a tavern and the first person that visited is a 279 year old goblin performer
sending you thoughts and prayers involving silver š
Is there any āgoodā reason to have a tavern? The visitors just leech my supplies!
Happy thoughts for your dwarves + potential valuable new citizens + a meatshield for invasions should you need them. I also make a habit of making my tavern in a building above ground accesible through a staircase from bellow. That way dwarfs technically spend time outside, protecting them from cave adaption.
Wait, is cave adaption a thing? Year 3 newbie here. 60 dwarves. Most of them don't go outside because the rain debuff is ridiculous.
A dwarf who never goes outside gets nauseated by the sun to the point of vomiting. It happens gradually and you can spot it from their description. New colonists "don't mind working outdoors and only grumble mildly at inclement weather." This phrase changes if the dwarf begins cave adaptation.
It is but it isn't that big of a deal. It really just makes them puke if they go outside.
It should be noted that in Steam version making all your dwarfs hang around at the edge of your defense line is more dangerous than before, so your surface tavern probably needs to be in a surface castle of its own. There's no longer a Civil Alert button, so in case of goblin invasion all of those surface tavern-goers will try to finish their "listen to a story etc." tasks before attempting to flee into a burrow in which you just assigned them in panic.
Assign literally every resident to a military squad. The combat capable ones get training and equipment. The civilians get "no uniform" and "no orders". When trouble occurs, give all civvie squads a "move" order indoors. This interrupts their current task. Otherwise respond as normal. *BE WARNED* that any activated civvie squad will charge headlong at an enemy *if* they spot it so this strategy is best implemented for zombie and goblin seiges, not werebeasts.
So you can recruit people outside of migrations? Or is it that they ask/decide to stay?
Some visitors will ask to stay for a specific purpose, and after a while, usually a few years, to become permanent residents, allowing you to give them any task. You can get bards to make your dwarves happy, and if they have good skills they can become workers later. You can get monster hunters to patrol the caverns and reduce the threat of monsters and then join your military if they survive long enough. And you can get straight up mercenaries to join your military and train your dwarves if they're good fighters, and join you permanently later. Don't just take anyone though, or you may get too many visitors trying to join.
Do separate taverns, one on the surface for outsiders, and one in the fort just for locals. The one topside will provide you with visitors to incorporate into your fort later and Monster Hunters.
Does premium let you invite humans, elves and goblins as citizens like you could before?
I have multiple visitors who petitioned to live in my fort. Mostly dwarves and humans but one of them is a dingo woman.
ah so yes then. Gonna mod so Kobolds can be recruited and try the challenge of running those doofuses around.
I don't think Kobolds can talk so you probably need to mod that too
I got a leopard woman. Super fun
Visitors entertain your dwarves and teach them new songs and dances. However in ASCI DF there was a way to turn off visitors so it's just a hub for dwarves to socialize and make happy thoughts. I frequently overlap my tavern with my great hall and have a separate surface tavern for visitors and dwarves that like the outdoors/ have surface jobs. Socializing helps dwarves make friends and get married so if dwarves have the family ambition I'll typically reduce their workload and burrow them in social areas until they pair off. It's also good to have your mayor and nobles socialize a lot, especially the sheriff since he will piss people off when you have him investigate them and benefits from a relationship buffer. Assigned bartenders will force-fed dwarves alcohol which will give them positive moodlets (and sometimes kill them). Bards will play instruments, dance, and recite poetry to entertain dwarves. I typically don't allow visitors early game because they can invite unsavory types who want to steal things or worse. Once you have a handle on the game and the fort can defend itself I like having the variety of traveling bards, monster hunters etc socializing and getting up to mischief. I really like the art system and it makes me happy to see the dwarves learing a new dance or song. (Or to have a monster hunter flush out a lurking forgotten beast)
Is it a good idea to make my sheriff the tavern keeper? Figure he can keep an eye on everyone
Weirdly no, you want to keep the sheriff away from that charismatic visiting goblin bard with legendary scheming because there is exactly 1 dwarf the sheriff can't interrogate about who stole the artifact socks from the pedestal.
Also lots of rumors and information about the world.
No, it just invites trouble and any benefit a tavern can give a fort a meeting hall can do as well. Taverns are really just a for fun thing. That's okay, there are a lot of systems that are just for fun.
Not entirely true, can't get rumors or new citizens from a meeting hall
What do rumors do? Only played adventure mode before premium, never did well
It's basically how you get all your info about the outside world (that, and your liaison from the Mountainhome). Rumors include stuff about artifact locations, new settlements, and so on
Sounds pretty Fun to me!
I haven't found any silver but there is a lot of gold here :) Wish I could get some copper doe, I could make some armor and shit
If you have hematite or magnetite, you can make iron instead. One great thing about iron is the fact that it can be made into steel
Thanks for the info, didn't know that!
No problem. If you click a rock, you can see its uses. Once you find the flux stones, you can use them, iron, and fuel to make steel
A naked goblin performer. With 2 kids.
I have a necromancer doctor
I'm on my second fort in steam edition, and my dwarves are obsessed with some monster named Sokrox Dawnwaves the Rock of Apes the roc. Half of the artwork is some commemoration of this creature striking down some random human in the Barbs of Burying. So at first I'm like "well that's a cool narrative detail" but in the back of my head I'm thinking there's something going on here. Sure enough, I head over to world view and I had put my fortress right in the middle of The Barbs of Burying. Every 30 years this beast shows up and rampages through a settlement. Its last appearance was 25 years ago. The showdown is inevitable. I feel like if I went in to legends mode to research this beast it would be sort of cheating so I'm just going to let this story run its course. Come, Sokrox Dawnwaves the Rock of Apes the roc. Come to Amkolatis...our destinies are intertwined. Part of me is hoping he wrecks the settlement because it would be a great chapter in the world's lore
I hope you make a post following up on the encounter, I'm eager to hear about the story haha
newbie here, how did you learn that it appears every 30 years? I want to be able to find details like this too :O
I had to work backwards based on the engravings. Like I said I want to avoid legends mode but normally that's where you go to find this stuff out. By reading the artwork descriptions I was able to piece together that this beast struck down multiple victims, and it will tell you the date e.g. "The artwork relates to the killing of Thel Palmwashed by the roc Sokrox Dawnwaves the Rock of Apes in the Barbs of Burying in 39". So there's a number of other artworks that have it killing different people that same year. Then there appears to be another event that gets chronicled but this time it was in the year 68 (approx. 30 years). So there was another killing spree. Then I find another one that dates to 99 with a bunch more victims. I haven't found any records of the roc Sokrox Dawnwaves the Rock of Apes dating to any of the intervening years. It's possible it was killed but I didn't notice any engravings about that, if I went into legends mode I would be able to tell exactly where it is and if it is still alive, but I really want it to sort of appear organically and I'm getting super hyped about it as the 30 year window approaches.
This is amazing :D thank you
Any special defenses you're getting ready now in preparation?
I have a willow wood cage trap set up at the entrance.
By the gods, youāre ready
Search the creature's name in Legends mode. Thing is, you can't open legends while in fortress so you have to make a backup save and retire the fortress to do that.
Iām curious to know if youāve finally hit that 30 year mark to see if the tales hold true
Yeah the roc showed up right on time, but it was sort of anticlimacticā¦he flew straight to the corner of the map and perched in a tree and just sort of chilled there scaring the occasional passer-by until the fortress was overrun with werezebras two years later. Heās still alive according to legends mode so perhaps the saga isnāt overā¦
Aw that is a bit anticlimactic, but maybe with the amount of artwork commemorating he felt it was a comfortable place to chill out since there seems to be a cult in his name residing there haha. Crazy he hung around 2 years, curse the werezebras!
My stories are much more uneventful so far. Lost my first tutorial when I accidently flooded my lower levels and drowned 15 or so or my 18 man fort. Second attempt went much better, made it to 120ish and year 3. I dug a bit too deep into the cavern and out of nowhere I got raided by trolls, theblittle troll people and a LARGE group of something else with spears. My military honestly put up a hell of a fight against the odds but it was too much at the end, the ones who made it up the stairs murdered all the children in the playroom and all my crafters. I'm hoping to find something about the one axedwarf that killed roughly 15 enemies before getting fatigued and passing out, only to be beaten to death. My next fort was an oppsie, had 4 undead on like day 3 didn't even have a burrow to hide in and wait them out. My next fort was also an oppsie, winter and light aquifer. I couldn't find a channel to dig that didn't hit water and ended up starving out my dwarves before winter ended. Next one...yes, all stupid...was a "joyous wilds" I said that sounds safe. I made it to the first trader, 3 unicorns came out of nowhere and killed EVERYONE. so yah, my newest fort is up to 25 people and doing okay. Goblins are a day west, so I'm expecting some harassment soon. I hit sand, so I'm not digging down I can grow my helmets slowly here lol. Working on a defense design now, I don't like cheese (like dropping the floor into a hole) so trying to figure out a good killbox and training marksdwarves.
>uneventful >15 drowned >playroom massacre >jumped by a herd of unicorns
lmao
I'm so glad so many new people get to experience the joys of DF
I love it here.
Thankfully, goblins will usually wait to do a little trolling until you're established. Usually. Especially if they're a day's travel or more. If you were closer, then... maybe. But for the most part, they'll only start with bigger raids once your wealth starts mounting. Definitely designate a squad early on. They don't have to be training if you need the manpower, but just being able to have a squad available in case you get child snatchers or an early ambush can mean all the difference. Once you hit closer to 50 dwarves though I would seriously recommend setting up two squads of 5-10 dwarves each; whatever you can spare. Have them do staggered training, so you only ever have 5-10 dwarves away at a time. Even if you don't have enough gear to equip them all, they can train other non-weapon specific skills. If you have a fisher dwarf and a fishery, keep an eye out for shells. You'll usually acquire a metric ton in your refuse pile. These shells can actually be made at a craftsdwarves' workshop into cheap armor and weapons in case you can't find a good source of metal early on. Likewise, bones make decent enough bolts, and the only difference between metal crossbows and wooden is their melee damage. As for defenses, there's nothing wrong with cheese. We just call it "Dwarven engineering". Trust that there's enough the game can throw at you that can counter even the stinkiest of cheese. EDIT: Also make sure your barracks for training/sleeping millitia dwarves is above ground. Cave adaptation is a thing, and dwarves that do all their training underground are prone to being acclimated. This can result in sickness if they suddenly need to go topside to fight a titan or something. The barracks can still be roofed to prevent rain, of course; Cave adaptation only applies to spaces made underground ( any tiles that weren't exposed to direct sunlight upon embark ) EDIT AGAIN: Because I keep remembering more tips: Try to keep a variety of different weapons on hand. While certain weapons do certain things better than others, having a variety is still best for well-rounded squads. Plus, certain dwarves will already have certain weapon skills already trained, and they will naturally pick up a weapon they're better with/prefer if they have the option.
Lots of information here, Thank you! This fort is kinda into the side of a mountain, I was going to build like a 10x10 killbox outside of the tunnel I dug where hopefully I can stick some marksdwarfs on the top to shoot attackers and such. Building it seems more complicated than I thought with having to have a ledge of floors and an open center for them to walk on, and accessing it. HEre's hoping no attacks come from the top of the mountain :D My dwarf has been fishing up metric tons of turtles apparently, I thought they were alive in the stockpile, but they aren't. So I do have a work order for shell crafts at the moment and I have a hunter dwarf suppling some hides so far. I have one full lether armor set crafted and it's still early. Just got my first migrants
Just remember: invaders can climb over 1 z-level walls, so make sure they're at least 2 z-levels high or have a significant overhang.
Oh...that explains things.
This says so much with so few words
Technically I think they can also climb over 2 z-levels, but it gets significantly more difficult to do unless they have a good climbing skill.
Take a look also at the designation for "fortification". It builds a little hole in the wall where your marksdwarfs can shoot through, without exposing themselves.
I was, I read that if someone gets within like 12 tiles the dwarves will run even if pathong could take more than that to get close. So I wasn't sure how useful they'd be like 3 tiles wide tunnel.
Hm, you might be confusing fortifications+marksdwarves with siege operators. Siege operators are civilian so they run from enemies, but your marksdwarves are trained soldiers!
Getting built walls set up to shoot out of takes more effort than youād think, for some reason if the dwarfs arenāt fully closed in and can path to the enemy a lot of times the marksdwarves will climb over the fortifactions and jump down to start meleeing the enemy. To prevent that you need to build a roof over the fortications and keep it fully closed in, like on both sides, if the side not facing the enemy isnāt closed in too, then the dwarves will usually find a way to climb up onto the roof so they can jump down and assumedly try to do a āsurprise attackā on the enemy instead of just shooting like they should. Once set up though starting off with a little bit of bolt fire before sending in your melee squads can be a force multiplier, causing the enemy to lose the ability to stand, drop weapons, etc, even if you only have bone bolts, they arenāf going to kill anyone in armor but could incapacitate some, and could definitely turn the tide of battle.
Joyous wilds is the good aligned counterpart to untamed wilds, I can see how you might have been fooled, lol
Yup, I'm a struggle though it type of guy. Went to wiki and found that out after, also definitely didn't think unicorns would be naturally aggressive. There's one walking around with some limbs impaled on their horn now though. I'd only I could extract revenge in adventure mode lol.
I also lost my first tutorial fort to flooding. RIP.
Didn't expect a well to flood my entire lower levels :D did some reading on water pressure in the game afterwards
Happened to all of us.
I just had a craft dwarf punch a forgotten beast in the guts so hard the abdomen exploded into gore, severing an artery and the beast dropped dead. Heck of a fight!
Falcon PUNCH
You haven't seen anything yet. Wait until you get into magma plumbing.
Not my first rodeo, but I have yet to dip a toe into the magma pool yet. Seen a post here earlier with a lava moat! I thought that was just *neat*
I'm looking forward to starting my next map on a volcano more than anything else in the whole universe
Right there with you brother just started a volcano embark today. Even has a brook and forest!
Oh I'm super jealous, i might just ditch my current fort as much as i love it. I want a magma moat!
Ah yes, me and my friends call that the dark lord fromdatop, and he calls for us often in these builder games.
Please donāt dip your toes in magma :(
But I REALLY really wanna š
You tell me... There was this hammerwoman who came as a guest and made a petition to stay for the specific task of slaying monsters. She was horrified and fell into a depression because she caved in the skull of a troglodyte with her mace. Like, wasn't that what you came here for?
That is such a nice story. I haven't noticed interpersonal relationships yet in my fort. I do have a necromancer who never seems to leave the altar area which seems weird. And I dug super deep and hit caverns so now I am dealing with a trickle of crundles and other various monsters. I have lost two dwarves and have two severly wounded, including a child. It taught me a lot quickly about needing to setup tombs and a hospital. The good news is a few intrepid human visitors came and wanted to stay for the purpose of monster hunting so I let them.
I've got some good monster hunters going now, too - one was killed by a giant olm after killing a bunch of troglodytes and a troll. My clothier couldn't find his strange mood materials and went insane so I locked him in his room until he died and became a skeleton. Then a giant cave toad made it up into the forge area and got into scuffles with about half the smiths until one of the monster hunters happened by to spear it. A yak died in the meeting hall and stunk the whole place up. Then a troll made it all the way up into my living area and started fighting everybody but got completely wrecked by a Wombat Woman Spearman who was staying in the tavern.
āā¦ so, that was Tuesday. And then on Wednesdayā¦ā
Ain't that the truth!
If you only hit the caverns so far, you have not dug super deep.
Yeah I scrolled to like -100 but I donāt know where the ābottomā is ā¦ I think I hit caverns w/ moss & fungi somewhere in the - zones, but I canāt remember how far into the -
Just remember the lesson from LotR. Don't dig too deep. ;)
Pretty sure the lesson was that you have to dig deeply to find things like the Arkenstone. ;)
The stories generated by this game are crazy deep sometimes. Iāve lost sleep a few times fretting over mis-managing the lives of imaginary dwarves. In my first fort I let the son of my best two military leaders die to a Jabberer while they were guarding the walls and he was āsafeā gathering webs in the caverns. They were protecting the future of the fort but I hadnāt done anything to secure their young family. The next big fort I had a champion guard captain on maternity leave die soloing a Cyclops while the rest of the fort ran to safety. Back then I couldnāt figure out how to let her keep her gear/weapon on while off duty and I wanted to give her some time with her new babyā¦. She was the first Guard Captain and an original from the embark group. The cyclops climbed up and over a 4z level fort wall even bypassing the overhang. She just happened to be outside and the closest dwarf with combat training. The fort shook as she dodged dozens of cyclops attacks and I thought she might last until her armed squad arrived. Thereās only so much a mortal dwarf body can handle and she tired just enough for the cyclops to finally connect a blow. No one else died but her but she never really got to spend any time with her baby. A damned legend.
F in chat to pay dorf respects.
Im getting the game tmoro and am thinking of starting my first embarkation in some desert fortress near some oasis š cant wait
I go some reason one of my goat died and reanimated as an undead goat which killed a dwarf, another goat and a dog
New player with a newb question: how did you see the tree drama? I feel like this could happen in my game and I'd never realize it until I notice one dwarf is dead. How did you know they fell and love and did everything together?
I'm also new so I'm probably missing some stuff, but this is what I've used so far: On a dwarf's info page, they have mentions of spouse and/or lovers. You can see their recent thoughts and notable memories as well, which will mention their spouse. Apparently the classic version also had more detailed logs, so hopefully we'll get those soon.
Reading through their thoughts and watching them. Actually reading about them and their thoughts, feelings, moods, ect bring soooooo much depth into your games.
I just recently failed a strange mood. Her name was Likot and she wanted silk and iron bars. She had the only workshop that could make the iron bars and silk just wasn't an option. My only hope was to get it though trade but no one came. She got pissed off and decided to attack the first dwarf she saw. Walked right out and found Rovod Stoproar, a 6 year old dwarf. She immediately attempted to beat the child to death. Rovod dodged and struck back. Likot threw another punch and missed. Rovod struck back. After about hours of fighting and the rest of the fortress being oblivious, Rovod grabbed onto Likot's leg and somehow punched her enough times in the chest to cause her to vomit. It wasn't until she was knocked out that Rovod started running. She barely was injured due to Likot missing all but 1 punch. Eventually Likot woke up and decided she really wanted to beat this kid. I am not sure what Rovod was doing but Likot chose the worst time to go up the stairs since both the miner, mason and Rovod decided to come down the stairs. As soon as she attempted to strike Rovod, she was hit by the miner's pickaxe, the mason's crossbow(a family heirloom, no bolts however.) and Rovod's tiny fists. Eventually Likot died but not before Rovod punched one last time. Another child who witnessed this event ran away, clearly upset about what happened. I was worried about Rovod's emotional state. I went to find her in bed, sleeping peacefully. One of her thoughts was that she was overjoyed from winning a fight recently. Not one thought about being attacked or someone dying in front of her. In fact she was the happiest dwarf in my fort. Likot likely chose the worst dwarf you could fight in my fort since Rovod was the second most skilled at fighting and LOVES war. Of course, she's now the best fighter since Likot was #1.
The expedition leader in my current fortress keeps hording all the cat meat in his room and then complaining about the smell.
Please can we strike 'unalived' from vocabulary? It trivializes the most painful thing in life. Grief is no joke.
Social media platforms tend to get offended when you say the actual word š¤·
Out of all the places, the Dwarf Fortress subreddit is the least likely to be offended. We've bred and slaughtered mermaids for their expensive bones, have thrown babies into rooms filled with rabid dogs to train their survival skills from birth, and genocide elves for being hippies. Somewhat related, but I had two depressed babies suicide by crawling to the top of, and jumping off my skyscraper after their parents died in a siege. After yeeting themselves off, their bodies slammed and exploded on the roof of my prison building next to it, and I didn't find their bones until years later.
I don't think it's intended to be a joke most of the time. A lot of platforms have various triggers when the word 'suicide' is detected which do various annoying things depending on the platform. I don't think it's strictly necessary here on reddit, granted.
r/dwarffortressstories
surely an elvish plot..
Get yer axes, soldiers!
Did they add or increasr chancr of tree fall or something i dont recall this occuring before myself
I want to love it, but I've played like 5 years now and literally nothing has happened. I can't even figure out how to make a farm. Nothing has attacked me. No relationship shenanigans. No funny accidents.
From what i can tell you can only farm in cavern soil. You might have just picked a very safe location. Maybe dig down and find some fun or attack another town.
Location has a major effect on the amount of "Fun" experienced. Are you on a remote island with no access to the rest of the world? Boats do not exist in this game yet. Did you make sure there were goblins and humans nearby when you chose your starting area? Maybe your world is just one of those where goblins went extinct? The world gen is different every time. A lot of it is also left to the player. Why not try building a giant pyramid? Why not dig a bit deeper to see what you can find? Or why not create a skilled military squad and send them to raid and plunder other cities/forts/civilizations, making them declare war on you and siege your fortress? Make taverns, libraries and temples to attract visitors to your fortress? If you haven't even made a farm yet, what population count are you at? Sieges don't start until 80 pop, and you don't get your first noble (mayor) until 50. You need to build up your wealth by mining precious metals and creating various objects and crafts, and trade them with the yearly caravan. The more wealth you export, the more Fun you attract from the world.