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[Apostolos]

I have been playing around with my logistics somewhat trying to find a good way to segregate groups of dwarfs.  With my starting 7, I can setup a fairly self sufficient group.  If I add 2 or 3 from the first migratory wave that really rounds everything out as I think about 10 is a good number. 

Here is my problem though:  Once you get your farm up and running, you only have 200 seeds for each type of plant which is plenty in and of itself.  Bags though can carry 100 of them and if you have a few bags of seeds by your farm, I am trying to figure out how to disseminate the food to the other sections of my fortress.  IF you have say just 2 burrows early with about 20-25 dwarfs, how is the 2nd group going to get its food?  How do you guys deal with multiple burrows and keeping your populace separate?  Do you have a large food depot with overlapping burrows in that one area so they can all get food and alcohol?  Or do you guys do it some other way? 

I was trying to do a few things with this:  Keep friendship links low so as to combat any temper tantrum spirals and at the same time keep efficiency up with regard to walking distance (although I am not going for min/max here.. just to help make sure I can keep who is who separate in my head while trying to manage what is going on.

[Verjigorm]

Are you really having a massive problem with Tantrum spirals still?   The seem to be much harder to trigger now.   Or maybe I've just stopped killing dwarves in random ways in large quantities?   I certainly don't accidentally on purpose flood my fortress anymore.   I've stopped letting mountain gnomes nick my booze all at one time.   The tree's are not bombing us anymore, so your planter shouldn't just be randomly killed.   Training is so awesome now that danger rooms arn't even worth the risk of injury.   

I find roasts, grand dining rooms and individual rooms tend to make dwarves pretty happy.   Access to clean water means you don't lose injured dwarves to dehydration.   And keep'em busy.   Busy dwarves are not socializing and making friends, but they are ALSO gaining skills which will allow you to generate happiness(through more masterwork tables and statues and chairs and beds) in some way.   The more happiness your dorfs have, the less stress they will feel, and you can normalize them.   

Also, Military training.   Wanna prevent tantrums?  Keep as many dwarves as possible under orders.   They gain skills and attributes rapidly.   They don't just become better fighters, they will become better socializers(I think it's through attribute and observer gain).   Lots of indimidation, but lots of conversationalist, consoler, comedian, etc.   It's the best thing a dwarf can do if he's not making valuable goods.

Unlike earlier versions where military training was slow and tedious, currently, it's amazing.  After 6 months, your dwarves will be stronger, faster, tougher, better fighters and more disciplined.   They will have gained ranks in student and teacher.   I don't know what the advantage of Teacher and Student are, but dwarves with higher levels of student seem to pick up skills rapidly.    I wonder if that's why they are generally better with social skills?   They have a bonus to skill gain from student, so they hit higher levels quicker?

I think rotating dwarves in and out of the military is probably where it is at for preventing tantrums.  While the dwarves are training, they will be gaining skills and attributes that will help in the fortress(strong, fast, hard to tire stone haulers?   Sounds amazing!), which will allow you to keep more dwarves happier.   They should also acquire good social atrributes, which should help them trigger happy thoughts in other dwarves more often.   They should have a higher threshold to bad stuff happening, as well as less exposure(if they train in a barracks, they arn't getting horrified going to the refuse stockpile) to bad stuff, except when REALLY bad stuff happens.

Say, this would be a theoretical set up:  70 dwarves, 50 of them are in the military and training.   16 of them are year-round soldiers:  if they take a break from training, they are stationed or defending a burrow.   Or pump operating.  But training is my favorite.   24 of them are in 6 man squads, set to 3 months training, 9 off.   Or 4/8.

My biggest fear is the combat drill thing.   Turns out that dwarves love to do combat drill.   They absolutely love to do it, even if they're not active.    I sometimes fear that you could end up with military dwarves who do lots of drills, and don't do a lot of hauling.   IF it works well with skilled crafts, then you could do some cool things with having your entire fort cycle through military training:  after four years of that, those dwarfs would be bad mama-jammas, and problably extremely resistant to tantrums. 

[Reelya]

Separate burrows can be nice for efficiency as well, you can make a burrow only including the work and sleep areas for the farmers. It's not just about tantrums. When I was experimenting with this, I did not make burrows of 10 vaguely-related areas, I made a farmers' burrow with 2-3 farmers and JUST the areas the farmer needed to go. I'd then make overlapping burrows with the stockpiles fed from the farms and into different industries, but I didn't do too much complication other than the farms. Once it's set up, assigning dwarves to the job area is pretty easy, I'd set a custom profession name, set their labors and assign a burrow. I gave them a communal bedroom but individual beds/bedrooms would be do-able too.

The burrow prevents them from wander off on breaks which cuts into productivity when they're meant to come back, plus it means that they don't scatter about hauling seeds from the dining room or risk wandering onto the surface during breaks, thus risking your high skilled dwarves, or wasting the time of experts in long hauls. I had an unskilled hauler/mechanic/construction caste for all the cross-fort stuff, and use feeder stockpiles to ensure everyone gets a steady supply.

The problem is that this idea is going to be less tenable in the future versions since tavern zones are replacing breaks. Constraining dwarves into a tiny work area for movement efficiency might be detrimental to their wellbeing if they can't access a tavern.