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[Stout]

So I have been DFing for a while, and I mostly play for the fun of trying to survive.  I have come to the point where I can survive too easily even in areas that are haunted.  Using bridges and traps and walls, it is very easy to secure a safe fortress that enemies can't invade.

I am wondering are there any mods for DF that make it more into a hardcore survival game?

I have come across and read some of the "challenges" from the wiki that sound pretty interesting.  http://df.magmawiki.com/index.php/Challenges

But I was thinking of just making up rules for myself to make the game more of a survival challenge.  Here is the rule set I came up with to make the game much more hardcore.  If you have any suggestions/additions for the rule set please chime in ^^

-no bridges
-no walling in
-no traps
-no migrants
-no babies
-only allow 2 jobs per dwarf
-military counts as a job
-only allow half the fortress the ability to haul
-only allow each grower to grow 2 spots of farm land
-only allow each crafter to build no more than 10 items every season.
-brewing is untouched
-only allow miners to mine 10 spaces per season per miner dwarf
-Only way to produce more dwarfs is to "create" dwarf essence
-Every dwarf essence that is not used to "create" dwarfs can be used to increase miners space allotment by 5, or crafters build allotment by 5, or growers farm plot allotment by 1.

I was thinking of a way to make dwarf essence rare.  Basically I was thinking to give myself 1 dwarf essence every half year or have some sort of recipe.  Like I have to sacrifice 40 mined stones to a dwarven atomizer to "create" a dwarf essence.

Anyways any suggestions for the rule set?  or does anyone know of any mods that turn DF into a more HC survival game?

[farecoal]

Try the Genesis mod or Fortress Defense mod, both make the game more challenging. (Not from personal experience)

Setting rules is pretty good though.

[Smew]

My only issue with the Genesis mod is that you pretty much get completely wiped out around year 3 if you don't have a multitude of traps set up to handle centaurs, or if you don't already have armor for your dwarves, which, thanks to the depth that lava is normally at, I never do.

[IT 000]

-no migrants

Unreliable at the moment, first two waves are hardcoded to arrive, and the pop_cap is bugged and only works one out of ten times. Even then it's very unreliable, I've gotten around 40 on a 30 pop_cap

I was thinking of a way to make dwarf essence rare. [...]  Like I have to sacrifice 40 mined stones to a dwarven atomizer to "create" a dwarf essence.

And how would you do this when we can't have bridges?

Overall I believe this could use a little more thought, seems like a plausible idea, but I doubt it will raise the difficulty much. Many players already do most of the big stuff on your list.

[Mickey Blue]

I enjoy Fortress Defense II mod (though odds are it'll crush you), I use the following rules:

-No walling/drawbridging yourself off completely, must leave a three wide entrypoint.
-No cage traps
-No using exploits (danger rooms, sand embarking, etc)
-No magma
-I limit caverns to one layer (more for FPS then anything) and if I enter I cannot wall it off.  Another option is to turn caverns all the way off, limiting your water options, and eliminating all underground crops.
-No stealing from caravans
-Sometimes I limit what metals I am allowed to use for armor or weapons or both (disallowing steel being the most obvious).


Oftentimes I start on a dangerous biome (savage, frozen, etc).

[GreatWyrmGold]

All migrants must be dumped into a deep pit. All new dwarves must be from births.
If your fort lives long enough that inbreeding is a worry, let a migrant wave or two in. You deserve it.

Or, kill/wall out off all migrants and traders as well as all but one male and one female dwarf. Set up a paradise. Essentially, create Dwarven Eden. Keep apples away.

Or mod dwarves to be 1/100th of their size. They will fall like wheat to the scythe from everything.

Or only use guard animals as defenses. Or only traps. Or only wrestlers. Or only hunters (the civilian profession, not military marksdwarves). Or make a deathtrap with built-in flaws and use that to execute all of your foes.

Or mod the evil entity to be bronze colossi.

Really, the ideas are endless.

[ed boy]

Here's a good one:

You dwarves cannot produce or process anything.

That means no workshops, of any kind. The only thing you are allowed to build is a trade depot. You're not allowed to mine, or chop down trees, or gather plants, or anything.

The way you survive is by other civilisations (this works best with mods that add more civilisations). The trade depot will bring other civilisations. You need to get hostile with at least one other civilisation as quickly as possible. Once that is done, you can then kill the attackers they send, and trade away their equipment for supplies. You continue this for as long as possible.

In your starting embark, you will likely want to get your hands on some cheap weapons, and loads of food. You will want to embark on a water source, in a biome that won't freeze in the winter.

You will have to be very careful about how many dwarves you allow to live or die. If you keep too many alive, you will run out of food and the fort will starve to death. If you keep too few alive, you won't be able to kill the foreigners and the fort will be wiped out.

[Tiruin]

If you gen a world where your parent civ is dead, go use that, it fixes the number of dwarves you have and adds to the fun of it all  . Currently living 10 years with only <25 dwarves. No deaths yet and 2 warring civs (Genesis)

Also if you do get to use Genesis, make sure you do have centaurs and you are at war/ at strained relations with them. Their size gives them a nice advantage!

[Stout]

Thanks for all the input!  Yeah I am just throwing all migrants for the most part into burrows and locking them in with walls.  does well enough to kill them.  I have to try and gen a map with dead dwarf civ so I can be the only ones!  "FOREVERALONE"