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[smjjames]

Okay, I'm trying to embark in a hot/borderline scorching desert region with streams running around and magma pools/pipes scattered about. I tried to embark in one part of that region and found it infested with hippos and carp, so I tried again further south. It's the same region, but a different stream I think, or maybe I really am downstream on the same one. Anyway, I embarked on an area where two streams met and I found that there was 14 or so pages worth of hippos, milkfish, carp, some stingrays thrown in, and the usual camels (of which there are only 6 camels).

SO..... do I abandon or what? I have just embarked on the area and I want to set up a fort there, but not sure. I know I could use marksdwarves on the fish, but the wiki says that hippos are as dangerous ingame as the real ones.

Edit: Just to clarify, the milkfish and stingrays I'm not too worried about, but we all know the reputation of carp.

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Here is a crude (emphasis on crude ) diagram of where my dwarves are, the o is the wagon and the rest roughly shows the two streams. The horizontial one is at a higher elevation than the first, about 8 levels or so. Theres already dead carp at the bottom of the waterfall (had accidentially unpaused a second). The waterfall is bound to kill some of them as I don't think a hippo would survive the fall intact.

[Derakon]

Just ignore them for now, and make certain you have enough booze that your dwarves don't go off to drink from the brooks. Once you get a military up and running you can train them by hunting wildlife.

[Byakugan01]

Capture and tame some of the hippos, then pit them into the carp. FUN for the carp ensues. The entire river turned red...(yes, I have done this, and yes it's EXTREMELY entertaining to do)

[loopoo]

Keep the carp for training your marksdwarves. Just, there are loads of Hippos, so don't piss em off. Be careful.

[Onlyhestands]

Capture and tame some of the hippos, then pit them into the carp. FUN for the carp ensues. The entire river turned red...(yes, I have done this, and yes it's EXTREMELY entertaining to do)

Wow, thats clever, that never occurred to me

[Byakugan01]

Capture and tame some of the hippos, then pit them into the carp. FUN for the carp ensues. The entire river turned red...(yes, I have done this, and yes it's EXTREMELY entertaining to do)

Wow, thats clever, that never occurred to me

I only did it out of desperation-the carp had ripped a leg off a dwarf and left him on the middle tile of a bridge, turning him into dwarf-bait that lured a steady bodycount of dwarves into their cavernous maws. No cbows-at least, no dwarf that could be spared to make them-so I checked and noticed i had tame hippos sitting in cages. Cue pit designation. It's now a favorite tactic of mine when I can do it, and you can do the same thing with alligators in a temperate biome. Or, for that matter, walruses near an arctic ocean.

The carp attack the hippos, but since the hippos have a massive size advantage they easily beat the carp even when the carp gang up on them.

[smjjames]

I've noticed that the hippos will generally just run away and avoid dwarves. I tested by having my woodcutter chop a tree not far from the river where some were on the banks, when he approached, the hippos dived right into the water.

This is simply while doing nothing that would provoke them (hunting and harrass wild animals). So, I guess as long as I don't provoke them, they should be fine. I'm still keeping clear of the river, both because of the carp and because I'm not sure if getting too close to the water would provoke them.

The dwarf traders escorts did go after them, but they'll go after anything.

Edit: Spoke too soon, a rampaging male one went after a couple of immigrants.

[AtomicPaperclip]

Can you upload that save?

I've never encountered hippos or carp

or two water sources meeting

[Stargrasper]

Can you upload that save?

I've never encountered hippos or carp

or two water sources meeting

Seriously?  Carp are a bane on the existence of nearly every player who's ever embarked on anything that wasn't a brook.  Just embark on a river(not a brook) and watch as you lose a half-dozen dwarves in a year to the same carp.

And then laugh as they die because you drained the river for the sole purpose of killing them off.

[Starver]

I've never encountered hippos or carp

You know, I wish I still (knew where I) had a save of my Ninja Hippos map.
http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=24694.0

[Byakugan01]

Um, ninja hippos? Care to explain?

[AtomicPaperclip]

They climbed up the well and got into his fort

Seeing as how a well takes up the same amount of tiles as an elephant, I'd imagine they could be rather large.

It's also scary to think about how large a wagon is when you think about that.

[Stargrasper]

It's only the size of a small house...what I want to know is why it takes only a single (block of) stone to build a 3x3 building and three to make a 5x5 building.  Yet that log that can also be used to make either a 1x1 bed or a 3x3 building...something's a bit off...Dwarf Fortress apparently repealed every single one of the laws of physics except hydrostatic pressure.  That one's there for the sole purpose of introducing newbies to Fun.

[Byakugan01]

It's only the size of a small house...what I want to know is why it takes only a single (block of) stone to build a 3x3 building and three to make a 5x5 building.  Yet that log that can also be used to make either a 1x1 bed or a 3x3 building...something's a bit off...Dwarf Fortress apparently repealed every single one of the laws of physics except hydrostatic pressure.  That one's there for the sole purpose of introducing newbies to Fun.

Not even non newbies are exempt from that one. Mistakes I made in a previous fort:
1 Worst: Not checking to see how many friends a dewarf had before using him as the bait to capture a skeletal sea serpent.
2. Being so busy channeling out the magma tunnel for my magma forges that I didn't check to see what might be in the way-like my central nexus. (aquifer saved me)
3. Not realizing what having an aquifer right above my head meant, and telling the dwarves to keep digging right under it
And that was just my 5th fort or so.