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[Daris]

I finally picked up the new version and I'm doing another generation fort, with no immigration and no visitors.  While I'm sure this has been answered before, I went back 5 pages and didn't find it, nor did I manage to find it with a search: do I have to care about distraction?  It spams the dwarves' thoughts with brown, but brown seems to be the worst the thoughts get.  Are bad thoughts the only effects?  Or does being distracted impair their skills?  I can counter bad thoughts pretty easily, and giving everyone a personal palace for a bedroom is simple, whereas actually meeting all their needs is literally impossible.  If their stress stays negative, do I have to care about their distraction?

[Shonai_Dweller]

I finally picked up the new version and I'm doing another generation fort, with no immigration and no visitors.  While I'm sure this has been answered before, I went back 5 pages and didn't find it, nor did I manage to find it with a search: do I have to care about distraction?  It spams the dwarves' thoughts with brown, but brown seems to be the worst the thoughts get.  Are bad thoughts the only effects?  Or does being distracted impair their skills?  I can counter bad thoughts pretty easily, and giving everyone a personal palace for a bedroom is simple, whereas actually meeting all their needs is literally impossible.  If their stress stays negative, do I have to care about their distraction?

The important one in the thoughts page is 'overall'. If dorfs are distacted 'overall' then you need to address some of their needs otherwise they'll work more slowly than usual.
Inns and temples generally help. Some dorfs are currently beyond help due to annoying combinations of currently unfulfilable needs. Set these saps working in non vital roles.

[Mostali]

,,,but brown seems to be the worst the thoughts get.

It gets worse.  Thoughts can go yellow and red.  At around 10 years you'll have dwarves with red thoughts for friends and family.  I think an individual brown is just the signal for the dwarf to take care of the need, and if that's true then there's literally nothing you can do about preventing brown thoughts.  Even if it's not the case, don't worry about brown thoughts too much.  As Shonai_Dweller said, look at the "Overall".

[Daris]

I finally picked up the new version and I'm doing another generation fort, with no immigration and no visitors.  While I'm sure this has been answered before, I went back 5 pages and didn't find it, nor did I manage to find it with a search: do I have to care about distraction?  It spams the dwarves' thoughts with brown, but brown seems to be the worst the thoughts get.  Are bad thoughts the only effects?  Or does being distracted impair their skills?  I can counter bad thoughts pretty easily, and giving everyone a personal palace for a bedroom is simple, whereas actually meeting all their needs is literally impossible.  If their stress stays negative, do I have to care about their distraction?

The important one in the thoughts page is 'overall'. If dorfs are distacted 'overall' then you need to address some of their needs otherwise they'll work more slowly than usual.
Inns and temples generally help. Some dorfs are currently beyond help due to annoying combinations of currently unfulfilable needs. Set these saps working in non vital roles.

Does the "overall" correspond with the yellow down-arrow?  If so, that's seems to be pretty easy to avoid.  I ran these seven dwarves like mules for the first 10 years of the fortress and only saw that a couple of times.

It gets worse.  Thoughts can go yellow and red.  At around 10 years you'll have dwarves with red thoughts for friends and family.  I think an individual brown is just the signal for the dwarf to take care of the need, and if that's true then there's literally nothing you can do about preventing brown thoughts.  Even if it's not the case, don't worry about brown thoughts too much.  As Shonai_Dweller said, look at the "Overall".

We're currently in year 18, having embarked in year 2.  Their needs will go red, but their thoughts never seem to.  Example:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Alan here likes to eat giant crow and drink single-grain wheat beer, and there has never been any of either of these things in the fortress.  So he's gone 16 years now without his favorite foods, and his need for decent meals is red.  But you can see near the top that the thought this has generated is brown, and he is merely "uneasy" about it.  I have yet to see any of those thoughts turn anything but brown, even if the unmet need has become red.