Solitary confinement works by preventing the dwarf being exposed to more bad thoughts while still allowing them some good thoughts. On average a dwarf in solitary confinement will tend to get happier over time provided his confinement isn't awful. Also many happy thoughts (such as the one from a waterfall) last for quite a long time and it wont matter if s/he goes for a few months without being re-exposed to the source of the happy thought.
I've used solitary confinement to rehabilitate dwarves from old forts who arrive in a very unhappy/miserable state. As well as preventing their unhappiness from spreading to happy dwarves (which can and will trigger a tantrum spiral), they also quickly recover their happiness since there's just nothing they can get upset about in solitary confinement. Dwarves simply don't suffer from boredom or social isolation so provided they have a bed, food, drink and a table and chair they'll only get happier. This is especially so if the table and chair are made out of solid gold (The cells were also exposed to waterfall mist through fortifications).
When I was doing this, it was amazing how quickly their mood deteriorated when released from their bubble. So I kept them in solitary until they were ecstatic and only then released them.
Locking them in the bubble usually isn't necessary. I assigned them the bed and burrowed them in their room. They generally stayed put in their room and other dwarves could still go in, for example to enable them to do their profession while confined (I built a kitchen in the bubble of a miserable master cook). But if they were tantruming I locked the door. And then when it was time to release them, I removed them from the burrow but let them keep the luxury room for a bit longer, like until another dwarf needed it.
But the point with being a lot of work to set up, is it's easy for half a dozen dwarves, but if you're trying to split up fifty or a hundred dwarves into individual bubbles then it's simply going to get tedious. Still easy, but tedious.
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Topic: losing my fortress to a tantrum spiral... any ideas (Read 2960 times)