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[Mike_B20]

After exploring a lot of different options in my fortress, including designing and building defence trap systems and beating off several assaults I find my fort accumulating stockpiles of various "stuff", none of it very necessary.
I'm also giving my dwarves jobs just to keep them busy.
My food and drink stockpiles are both over 4k and I have more wood than I'll likely ever have a need for.
I'm exploring a cavern but am wondering what it's good for; I have no need for anything inside it; my gem stockpile is overflowing and I have plenty of silk from trading.
The Forgotten Beasts are fun but their resources aren't really needed.

What's the point of gameplay when the initial challenges have been met and there's so much of everything in the way of resources?

[NJW2000]

Megaprojects. The deepest of challenges (HFS). These are the most obvious.

A long fort, with lots of stories?

I'm not sure, but some people claim larger forts get larger seiges. Science?


Challenge embarks, maybe, evil reanimating terrifying oreless aquifer treeless glaciers that melt 3 seasons out for four with every invading race, or something?

Mods?

[MonkeyHead]

I suppose the best answer is whatever you want the point to be. Many players, once resources are abundant and the fortress secure from all who threaten it, go nuts with building... well, pretty much anything. Follies, megaprojects, insane works of engineering, batshit crazy monuments, utopia style cities, elaborate artistic architecture, dragonfire pillboxes, supersoldier programmes, ocean harvesting, flood the world with magma style shenanigans, and so much more besides...

Of course, you could just retire a site, and see what happens to it as time progresses, or even go back and adventure there.

Due to this anticlimactic nature of a successful fort, many veteran players like to test themselves with one or more arbitrary restrictions or difficulty inducing choices. Yes, it is easy to establish a fort on a nice temperate wooded hill with a small river, but what about in a haunted glacier? Or next to a tower chock-full of un-dead? The permutations are endless.

[PatrikLundell]

The advantage of sandboxes is that you're more or less free to do what you want. The disadvantage of sandboxes is that there are no set challenges and no "win" states, so it's up to the player's imagination (although external input can be used, of course. A single pick challenge can be an interesting challenge, for instance).

I've chosen a number of restrictions (no metal, so goblinite is the only source, except a small embark/caravan supply of non weapon grade metal for mood and mandate purposes; an aquifer, which is both a restriction and a useful resource; limited/no surface wood supply). In most fortresses I've explored one or more DF mechanics (pump stacks, for instance). The latest one is/was HFS conquest. Embarking close to black towers and goblins to ensure sieges is a must for me (some people want peace and quiet to work on their mega projects undisturbed, as a contrast).

When it comes to all the junk accumulated it's best to use the caravans as garbage trucks. Old clothing can be disposed of in refuse piles, but magma dumping results in bad thoughts in the creator when masterworks are destroyed.

You can ensure all your dwarves use masterworks furniture and equipment exclusively (requires a large garbage disposal capacity for all the inferior stuff). You can also do home decoration by color matching rooms.

Edit: When it comes to food, I find it a challenge in itself to reduce the excess production from silly down to just a bit. My latest fortress of less than 80 dorfs have over 20000 units of food after 25+ years.

[Daris]

There's nothing wrong with having idle dwarves.  If your production is outrunning your consumption, stop producing.

I'm fairly new to this game, and my current challenge to myself is a fort with no migration, where all population growth comes from natural increase.  I have long-term goals, but the entire fort operates in slow motion and not from low FPS - it takes literally years to fill out a militia squad, and for 13 years only my starting 7 dwarves were working.

This is an entirely self-imposed project and it's also open-ended.  With no militia for decades, I had to figure out how to deal with external threats without them.  It was fun.  It's still fun.  I'm really attached to all my dwarves and it's actually making me sad to see the oldest one approach 150.

This is my personality, though.  You may be totally bored with something like what I'm doing, and want to do something very different.  You make your own fun with this game, which is why I like it, personally.

[Cuchulain]

Personally, I'd start by forbidding yourself some of the easier ways to avoid trouble. No easy-make traps - if you want your entrances trapped, you need to get creative. Perhaps not even that. Forbid yourself to wall off invaders - no "seal the doors" orders, everything is responded to with the military.

Then perhaps you might think of writing up the stories and sharing them. Perhaps get involved in a succession fortress or two. Try the challenge embarks - find the hardest one. Is there any biome you haven't embarked on yet? Give it a go!

[Flying Dice]

Redownload 0.34.11. Add in a bunch of extra hostile sieging entities. Gen a world overflowing with undead, hostile civs, and megabeasts. Embark in a Terrifying biome. In your new fortress, never ever wall off completely to avoid fighting something.

Once you hit a certain skill threshold it's easy to keep a boring, safe fort going forever. That's why you challenge yourself and make the game harder.

[Sutremaine]

Replace everything non-masterwork in your fortress with masterwork items. Make your dwarves' dreams come true. Put your slowest dwarves into military training to allow them to outrun lag. Refine the production chain for an industry to make the shortest walking distance possible. Look through the DF forums for some science to do.

[Shonai_Dweller]

Retire your fortress, read what's been happening in the outside world. Reclaim sites destroyed by beasts, send in an adventurer to drive out the goblins who took over the rest of your civilization's sites while you were busy. Build a line of fortresses cutting Elf territory in half. Hunt down all the enemies of your civilization. There's a whole world going on out there, no need to stick to one site forever if you're bored of it.

[Dozebôm Lolumzalìs]

Agree. One of the key parts of DF is that you should really stick to just a few worlds. If players don't learn that, their computer gets filled up much too quickly. I know mine did, heh.

Now that there's a "retire" command, it's even easier for you to accept letting go of one fortress and exploring further.