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[Arphahat]

In my fortress, I bumped into some of the hidden fun stuff and my fortress is wiped.  I decide to retake and successfully kill everything that moved in.  However, some dwarves died, some got injured.  Apparently, death and injury is too much for these poor, poor military dwarves, everyone goes crazy, tantrum spiral until everyone is dead.

I decide to retake again, thinking it should be easier with none of the hidden fun stuff to contend with, but I still have to attack some things.  Same shit again.

Is it actually possible to retake a fortress?  So far, it seems like an aggravating waste of time.  Not because there is much resistance, but because the dwarves keep f'ing killing each other.  ARGH!!!!

[Magua]

Yes.

All you really need to do is keep two or three dwarves alive (until immigrants come in the next season).

If you get to the point where you've killed everything, you can stick dwarves in bedrooms and lock the doors, so hopefully they'll take out their frustrations on the bed or whatnot.

[bombcar]

Could you retake by building on the surface first and getting everyone ecstatic before heading down?

[Archaeologist]

Potentially, though it would be a great deal of effort.  First, you'd have to wall off the fort from any roaming HFS or animals like Batmen.  Then you'd have to move the wagon supplies into a hastily constructed above ground fort built from the spare stone lying around.


Also remember that most of the dwarf reclamation efforts aren't focused on supplies.  usually the idea in theory is rush in, kill everything, and then gather all the fort's old still good supplies, and prepare for migrants.

So you'd need to bring extra supplies to hold you over till you constructed a decent quality fort out of the old supplies and furniture.

Then you have to get everyone raring to smash down the wall blocking the entrance to the fort, and rush into the dark, dingy, miasma filled tunnels full of strange creatures and hard to see monsters at every turn.

Yeah.  Fun.

[Narmio]

I've experienced this too - the negative thoughts from all the things you have to do to reclaim a fort pile on long before you can get anything happiness-inducing up and running.

I'm wondering if it wouldn't be a bad idea to suggest a new Happy Thought to Toady:  "Excited at the glorious prospect of reclaiming dwarven land".  Give it to all the dwarves immediately on reclaim.  It's realistic that dwarves would be in high spirits about taking back a fortress, so a one-off "happiness credit" makes sense.  It would fade after two seasons as normal, by then you should have food, booze, rooms and dining sorted out.

[Aqizzar]

Another possible fix would be personalities.  DF can already force Adventurers to be generated with adventurous personalities, so why not give all members of the reclaim party stress-resisting personalities?  Or have them all start off with the "getting used to tragedy" or "doesn't care about anything" tags.

[Arphahat]

I like both the happy thought idea and the forced personalities.  At the very least, they should be an army, not a big family that can't bare the thought of losing one their own.

I've thought about trying to dig a mini-fort when I first get there, but, as mentioned, it would be hard to convince them to not go and sleep in the beds already there.

I guess I'll try to stick them in their rooms, but it might be too late already.  I am down to eight again, and most are pretty depressed.  I might just cheat it and alter their moods with Dwarf Companion.

[(name here)]

also, no friendships at the start would be a good idea.

[bombcar]

I'm wondering if it wouldn't be a bad idea to suggest a new Happy Thought to Toady:  "Excited at the glorious prospect of reclaiming dwarven land".

This is what I'd lean towards; it's basically Balin retaking Moria, after all.

Drums! Drums in the deep!