Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Nsidious]

So, I'm about to start this fortress and I'm preparing for the journey when the realization hits me that I really have no idea as to what I'm doing, or the justification for it. xD So, I'd like some advice as to what I should bring/starting skills for the following embark site:

Clay
Deep Soil
Shallow Metals
Deep Metals
Flux Stone
(with a river)

I found this place while just going around the world map so I thought I'd treat myself to a NOT sinister/haunted/terrifying embark xD I think the area is woodland and it's either whatever neutral is, or calm. I know it's easy, but I'd like some interesting ideas on what to do/how to start. If anyone wants me to do anything in particular to the fortress just say so and I'll see what I can do xD hahaha

[weenog]

This is a long read, but it could help you understand why you need certain things, so you can make your own informed decisions instead of just cloning what other folks say they use. Starting Builds

[WealthyRadish]

Here's a fun embark strategy...

Don't bring anything except two native copper ores, a fire safe stone, and an anvil. Check each dwarf's preferences until you find one that likes a valuable metal (platinum, aluminum, gold, or steel) and make that dwarf a proficient metalcrafter (weaponsmith if it's steel). Put every remaining point into that metal's ore. If nobody likes valuable materials, instead try finding one who likes a valuable trade good (any trap component, any weapons, or mechanisms) and bring as much silver as possible, making that dwarf a proficient mechanic or weaponsmith. If no preferences line up, just pick anyone, or abort and find the site again.

Deconstruct the wagon, and make a mason's workshop and carpenter's workshop out of the wood. Turn the fire safe stone into blocks, and make a wood burner, smelter, and forge. Make a wooden training axe at the carpenter's workshop, and start chopping more wood. Use the copper to make picks, and get a dwarf gathering plants for booze/food. From then on, devote all labor to keeping the chosen dwarf producing as valuable of goods as possible. The reason for being picky with the preferences is to increase quality, even early on. You should be generating masterworks long before the first caravan, which you can then buy out with the ricockulously valuable goods. If it was a dwarf who likes an expensive metal that you weren't able to bring much of, train them up with whatever cheap junk is available before moving them to their preference. Make it a goal to NEVER let this dwarf stop making valuable things, and devote every other dwarf with expensive tastes to wealth creation as they arrive. With the fort swimming in massive amounts of early (and continuously rising) wealth, it should be a challenge to keep pace with invasions/migrants.

[Nsidious]

Sounds like fun! But super hard, I'll have to try that on my next one xD

[SixOfSpades]

One thing you may want to consider is how much you want to use/abuse the game mechanics when planning your starting build. Different people will have different opinions on just about each of the following:

* And We'll Throw in the Barrel For Free: As the wiki states, buying very small amounts of a very large variety of goods will net you a large variety of virtually-free containers. A dimple cup spawn costs only 1 point and comes inside a bag--potentially a pig tail fiber bag that costs 60 points if you bought the bag itself. Buy 1 unit of every kind of meat & milk there is for a buttload of extra barrels (Newbie tip: Barrels are pretty much ESSENTIAL). Etc. Is this an exploit? Your call.

* Most dwarves automatically get wool/fiber/silk clothes as their starting gear. Those who start the game with "Ambusher" as their highest skill, however, get a free crossbow, quiver, stack of bolts, and leather gear instead of cloth.

* Wooden training axes are every bit as effective at cutting wood as the finest steel battleaxe. That's right, you can hand your dude a piece of cactus and tell him to chop down an oak tree with it.

* Some people like to abort their embarks over & over until they find a dwarf whose preferences they like: A dwarf who likes materials that the player believes will be on-site, or goods that they're going to want to make in large quantities & not export. (A dwarf that likes orthoclase, steel, beds, gauntlets, and sheep wool is a good example.)

* Chaining off the last one, these preferences only matter if the dwarf in question is a noble who makes mandates. The title of mayor goes to whichever dwarf has the most ranks in social skills--even if he/she only arrived at the fort a week ago and has 0 friends. So some people give their "chosen one" 8 to 10 ranks in social skills, just to help make sure he won't be supplanted by some idiot migrant whose only skills are Adequate Crutch-Walker and Talented Consoler. [Alternative solution: Check the nobles list every summer, and if your dude has been "voted" out, re-appoint him back in.]

* Savescumming: Something happened that you would rather undo? Ctrl-Alt-Delete and force the game to quit without saving, then reload your save & try again. Some people do this for trivial reasons ("A tile got deconstructed at the wrong time, and fell through & broke a layer of pasture land, and now my fort will never look right becuase you can't build dirt"), while others do it only for major catastrophes/bugs. As far as embarking is concerned, you might do it in order to take a closer look at the site: Hit "Play Now," and examine the landscape. It might be as simple as casting your eye over the hillsides & seeing what minerals are exposed, or you could also bring along 7 picks and drill a bunch of core samples before quitting, starting again, and re-embarking with your REAL party as if the site were still perfectly virgin.

[Panando]

You can pretty much remove everything except the picks, axes and anvil. The two pack animals can be butchered for food. So there's no need to bring food. You can gather plants and brew them and plant the seeds, so there's no need to bring seeds or plump helmets (although you can bring 10 plump helmets if you want, and brew them - it's cheaper than bringing wine). You don't need hospital supplies, because no-one should be injured before the first caravan (at which point you can buy all the cloth and thread you desire, along with buckets, splints and crutches). And you really don't need random crap like ropes. You just don't.

Having deleted all that stuff, you'll have heaps of points. Spend it on metal ores, coal, stones, logs, leather - all these raw materials will help you get your fortress up to speed very quickly.
If you want you can bring 1 lye (to make soap) and a few bags of gypsum plaster to help stock your hospital, it's cheaper than almost anything (for example bags of plaster are way cheaper than splints) and is a pretty good buy.

The only animals really worth bringing are dogs and egg-layers. You can bring a cat if you really want to, but consider trappers, since you can trap vermin, transfer them into a (constructed) cage, and later de-construct the cage and sell it to the elves for a laugh.

[Triaxx2]

I disagree with not bringing at least one rope, and one bucket. Those let you get a well going quick, in case you run into a booze issue. The reasons are A) rope requires a few steps to produce which uses several materials. and B) Buckets will take wood, which might be more useful doing other things, like beds.

[Broken]

But you can bring logs, that cost less than a bucket.
That said, raw materials is the way to go to maximice points, unless you are in an evil biome because
then the priority is to dug yourself as quickly as posible.

[drh]

Items, gear, and equipment:

Typically I strongly prefer bringing raw materials over any finished goods. Usually an anvil, a few bars of copper to make picks, and logs to make training axes for woodcutters. A handful of stone blocks to get the initial forge and carpenter shop going. Some cloth, but mostly thread and leather. Enough food and drink to last at least a season, in case of the worst.

I'll also take a few turkey hens, a pair of male cats, and three dogs (two female, one male).

Skills:

One dwarf to handle all administration and healthcare, the rest are split between masonry, mechanics, and farming, and maybe weapon/armorsmithing. As migrants arrive administrative load will be distributed and if they don't bring needed skills with them, they'll be trained.

[khearn]

I disagree with not bringing at least one rope, and one bucket. Those let you get a well going quick, in case you run into a booze issue. The reasons are A) rope requires a few steps to produce which uses several materials. and B) Buckets will take wood, which might be more useful doing other things, like beds.

Have you tried not running into a booze issue? They're easily avoided. It's not like it's a random event ("Curses, a booze issue!" or "A vile booze issue has arrived!").

I never bring a rope, and never need a well until I set up my hospital, because I always get a plump helmet farm going during the first month, and a still shortly thereafter. So I never have to worry about a booze issue.

[Triaxx2]

Great, but I always end up with the farmers not planting so I can't get anything done, which means the Still stalls out, and the order gets cancelled and I either have to abandon what I'm doing, which is usually vital to keeping the booze drinking organs inside the dorfs, rather than outside them, or I'll forget all about the order and not remember until I'm getting 'thirsty' arrows flashing. Usually sometime around winter setting in.

Why would you ever bring wood except in a desert? There's three logs in the wagon, which is enough to get a carpenter's workshop and two training axes out cutting more trees.

[Loud Whispers]

Why would you ever bring wood except in a desert? There's three logs in the wagon, which is enough to get a carpenter's workshop and two training axes out cutting more trees.

1. When you have no access to trees.
2. When there are no trees.
3. Combination of the above.

[Xenos]

Why would you ever bring wood except in a desert? There's three logs in the wagon, which is enough to get a carpenter's workshop and two training axes out cutting more trees.

1. When you have no access to trees.
2. When there are no trees.
3. Combination of the above.

4.  When you refuse access to those filthy filthy hussies the elves love so much that you bring much fungiwood on embark for beds and wall yourself off from the surface in the first spring.  Any migrants who bring a pick can dig down to the caverns to get spores for your sealed off fort of legendarily social and militaristic dwarves.

[Triaxx2]

No trees? Desert. No trees because it's a vertical wall? High Desert. No Trees because it's a frozen biome? Frozen Desert.

[Maklak]

Bringing things like buckets, ropes and quivers is a matter of convenience. Sure, it is always cheaper to bring material and set up temporary workshops, but that needs some time and space.

I like to bring milk for food, but butchering animals is even cheaper. If you gather herbs or bring plump helmets to distil after embarking, make sure to adjust Z->cooking to not cook plants or booze.

My favourite embark trick it to bring as much bronze ores as you can. It was overpowered in 0.31 (especially if you had an armoursmith and a weaponsmith with you), but got absolutely blown out of proportions in 0.34.11. For 492 embark points I got 32 malachite, 32 cassiterite and 36 bitunious coal (you want 9 coal per 8 ores) as well as an anvil and 3 granite to make workshops. Actually scratch that, use a log to make a temporary mason's workshop and convert one granite boulder into four blocks. Anyway, it produced 256 bronze and 256 coke. Enough to make all the picks and axes I need, outfit several squads, get every dwarf with no moodable skills to make some bolts and a piece of armour, make some serrated disks for sale or traps, train weaponsmith and armoursmith from starting level 5 and still have leftovers by the time I make steel.