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[yasic]

Hello, I have just a few questions for my fort if someone doesn't mind answering. I would appreciate any direction or hints in general as well.

Description of my status so far: my fort is 6 years old, has 220 dwarves, 98 of whom are babies/children (due to the dwarfsplosion bug of last version). I have three main industries: Clothmaking, brewing, and cooking, and currently have enough stock between them to buy every item from every caravan for the next 3 years if not more. In terms of military I have three squads of axedwarves wearing full iron armor and steel axes, and 1 squad of marksmen. I am currently (slowly) making more weapons and armor to equip 2 more melee squads once my children grow up. I would like to have a squad of silver hammerer's but I don't have enough silver yet to do this.

First up: I have way to many bins. I keep buying cloth/leather from merchants and selling them finished goods but this increases my bin count every time. I seriously don't know what to do with them all, I already have 4 large stockpiles dedicated to nothing but bins and I am almost running out of space on the 4th. What should I do? I tried selling them once but it was a pain in the ass finding the bins among all the other junk and seems like a huge waste of time.

Second: So far goblin sieges have been cake. They usually bring some 50 goblins and 6 trolls or so twice a year, and two squads of moderately trained axemen in full iron took them out without a single injury (except an unarmed baby one dwarf decided to bring into the fight for some reason). Now my original squads are much stronger and better equipped and I have additional squads in training. Do sieges get stronger or better equipped with time or did I face the worst of them? Do I need to plan for them or am I pretty much set?

Food: I have a shit ton of it, partly because I always buy out every single bit available to fuel my food making industry. How long does it take for food to rot? If I convert most of my food to prepared meals, does this make it last longer? I want to make a huge stockpile in case I ever need to close my fort from the outside world (for whatever reason) but I don't want to invest the effort if all food rots after a year or two. Same question with booze.

Plans: My current plan is to open up and start exploring the caverns in 8 years. This is because most my children should grow up then and I will be able to replace my military in case it all dies to whatever terrors lurk below. Am I right to play it safe (I rather like my fort and would prefer not to start over if reasonably possible), or is the topmost layer reasonably safe for my fort?

Future fortresses: As I lacked proper planning on my main fort for thinks like a mist generator and better room layouts, I was considering building a new fort once I do hit the first cavern layer for better design and just for amusement. Make routs for my industry more optimal, and more aesthetically pleasing. Perhaps build it into the side of the cavern with 'glass walls' for windows or something silly like this. My two concerns are that it will take too long for my dwarves to carry goods to the trading post, or that It would take too long for my military to move between the caverns and the surface to fight whatever threats are out there. For those that did try it: are my concerns valid or is the time traveling up/down negligible? Are there other issues I am not year aware of that I should plan for?

I appreciate any and all tips you can offer.

[Deboche]

For the first, stockpile those bins near the depot, then they'll be the first items on the list and make a macro of Enter Down to select them all

For the second, I don't know. My sieges have been one squad everytime. You can always go after forgotten beasts or dig down into the circus

For the third, why would you need food in case you get sieged? Don't you have underground farms? You can even have protected overground farms and have it all keep running even if there's a siege.

As for the caverns, breach them as soon as possible to get fungus to come into your fortress so you can have underground pastures and even trees should you need them. There's no terror down there except the occasional forgotten beast but you can always wall off the breach and the spores won't go away.

As for making a new deeper fort, do it when you find magma so that you can use magma smelters, forges, kiln and glass. I don't think it's worth it though because of the new trees and how many logs they drop - charcoal is really plentiful.

When it comes to saving time, the only tip I have is to always build your forts vertically since travelling up and down stairs is much faster than having to move along the terrain. Ideally I always build an elevator which is just one stair going from the surface(or whatever I've built there) down to the deepest reaches of the fortress so that dwarves can easily go from rooms to kitchen to workshops to stockpiles and so on.

[Ornstein]

A central elevator is very good for mobility, ease of access and future planning. A single tile may do the trick, but leave room for expansion in this central shaft. If you can introduce a waterfall through it later it can become a useful tool to prevent tantrumspirals, as well as a mechanic to clean your populace swiftly to prevent FUN from dangerous blood.

There are many ways to dispose of the bins, if you're looking for a weaponized version then I would suggest building a bridge (non retracting) and then construct a small platform from which you dump things  from above onto the bridge. You may need to monitor the weight as to not overburden the bridge, but executed properly you can use this as a junk chucker. Inaccurate, but amusing. Alternitavely do the same thing anywhere else and just atom smash them.

On the caverns I concur with Deboche, you are more than ready to open them up and delve deeper. Underground pastures makes animal management easier, less travel time for your dwarfs. Although,  I have yet to create a working tree farm in 40.xx, perhaps allowing for multiple Z levels would help?

As far as siege difficulty, eventually you may incur the wrath of a general who can be a severe threat or a chump. But more insidious threats are the RNG blessed foes who may prove nigh invulnerable. A bronze colossus for instance, has traditionally proven quite effective at holding his own against axe dwarfs.

If you seek magma, you do not have to go to it. Magma pumps, mine arts, and magma pistons are all techniques you can use. Plus, these methods lend themselves more readily to weaponization and utility.

[Deboche]

On the caverns I concur with Deboche, you are more than ready to open them up and delve deeper. Underground pastures makes animal management easier, less travel time for your dwarfs. Although,  I have yet to create a working tree farm in 40.xx, perhaps allowing for multiple Z levels would help?

You do need more than 1 z level. I'm hoping to make one and now that trees are so big, it doesn't need as big an area as before.

[Bumber]

There are many ways to dispose of the bins, if you're looking for a weaponized version then I would suggest building a bridge (non retracting) and then construct a small platform from which you dump things  from above onto the bridge. You may need to monitor the weight as to not overburden the bridge, but executed properly you can use this as a junk chucker. Inaccurate, but amusing. Alternitavely do the same thing anywhere else and just atom smash them.

Weight isn't an issue. Items are weightless (I think) and the weight is non-cumulative anyways.

http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Bridge

Bridges will not operate if any one creature of size 1200000 is on them. This weight limit is not cumulative - a bridge will still retract if a hundred goblins are standing on it, but a single rutherer accompanying those goblins will prevent the bridge from operating. Attempting to lower a drawbridge onto such a creature (in order to atom-smash it) will cause the bridge itself to deconstruct.

Edit: Items in minecarts might have weight though. I can't find much info on the wiki about it.

[Ornstein]

So in theory a quantum stockpile could become a quantum catapult projectile.

[yasic]

Thanks for the tips.

I shall dig deeper tonight to the cavern, will see how it goes.

As far as underground pastures, any rock that I wet somehow will end up growing eatable grass? And keeping it only 1z high prevents trees? Sounds like a perfect way to keep livestock, might need to make a whole livestock layer for this!

As far as holding the food, I imagine if shit hits the fan it will be my children who are left while the adults died valiantly trying to fight away the evil hordes (or each other), so farming might not be that easy. Plus I have a lot of food and just curious in general to how fast it rots.

[greycat]

There are many ways to dispose of the bins, if you're looking for a weaponized version then I would suggest building a bridge (non retracting) and then construct a small platform from which you dump things  from above onto the bridge. You may need to monitor the weight as to not overburden the bridge, but executed properly you can use this as a junk chucker. Inaccurate, but amusing. Alternitavely do the same thing anywhere else and just atom smash them.

Weight isn't an issue. Items are weightless (I think) and the weight is non-cumulative anyways.

Items certainly have weight, but as far as I know, bridges don't care about the weight of items sitting (or dropped) on them.  The wiki says they care about creature weights, though.

[Bumber]

Items certainly have weight, but as far as I know, bridges don't care about the weight of items sitting (or dropped) on them.  The wiki says they care about creature weights, though.

Yes, I meant that within context. Loose items don't have weight, as far as bridges and pressure plates are concerned. Pressure plates make an exception for minecarts (and the items within,) but I don't know if bridges make that exception. It's probably a non-issue unless the minecarts are filled with slade goods.

[Deboche]

As far as underground pastures, any rock that I wet somehow will end up growing eatable grass? And keeping it only 1z high prevents trees?

As far as holding the food, I imagine if shit hits the fan it will be my children who are left while the adults died valiantly trying to fight away the evil hordes

Yes and I think so. You can also make underground farms on wet rock. As for above ground farms, just wall them in, make a roof and have the access be by stairs

Shit shouldn't hit the fan that easily. Make sure you have bridges to keep enemies out, traps in case they get in and a military is kinda academic, use it for getting rid of forgotten beasts and titans - though you should train them with enemies as well.

[Ornstein]

Oh, and watch out for the Giant Cave Spider. You can have a great melee force and have it get wrecked by just one.