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[Exitstrategy]

I'm still really new to Dwarf Fortress, but I've bot a firm enough grasp to make a fort that can sustain itself for 3-5 years. I was thinking of imposing some sort of challenge on my next fort (my current one is on the verge of a tantrum spiral thanks to general dorfiness involving a both my miners trapping themselves in a pit. One died of thirst just before they dug themselves free.).

My question is simple: What sort of challenge should I impose on myself? I'll chose the best (or most popular) answer.

[sadpickle]

Hi Exit, I'm a noob as well lol. One of the things I have started to do is trapping goblin greeting company en masse so I can throw them into a beautifully designed hole in the ground, where they are stripped to just a weapon and must fight for their lives against hardened gladiators. Dwarfinators?

A tie-in challenge is to build enough masterful armor to equip a full melee squad to the beards.

tantrum spiral

All I can say is, gigantic dining room. They become less suicidal when their watering hole is fancy.

[drivec]

no danger room. open fort(cant wall off, bridge, or lock a dock to keep stuff from getting in your fort. one further could be no traps of a certain type or no traps at all.

some people can come up with  some crazy stuff but i think these are pretty good points to start off.

[thiosk]

There was a whole thread of these not to long ago.

Classics are above ground fort, no marks dwarves, oh and terrifying biome.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Aboveground fort. Only mines and some storage underground, the latter only a level so.

[GuardianTempest]

Here's a challenge I ALWAYS do: The Siege Force

Use justembark to embark within walking distance of a village (Or fortress), hide underground and bide your time then take over the village and kill every non-friendly. You fail if you take so long the villagers die of old age.

[ExecratedDwarf]

I suggest that instead of imposing limits on yourself to make things harder, since general dorf antics will do so, you attempt to design an aesthetically pleasing fortress. Pick a staircase design, decide on specific shapes for bedrooms, tombs, dining halls and all others. Decide if you're gonna have special rooms for legendary dwarfs. Try to make it as awesome as you can. Make sure that you always appease nobles, have a hammerer and sheriff to deliver justice, enough jail cells to contain criminals. And then please show us and tell us the story of your rise to glory!

[Bartholomew The Pious]

I am currently thinking about making a 10-Dwarf Lasher Squad. Maybe you could do that exit and tell me how it goes? Would be nice to have a guinea pig before I do something stupid :S

[Exitstrategy]

I've been avoiding certain traps because I'm just effing failing at linking them up. I know I'm doing something wrong, I just don't know what that is. I've already built some nice drowning traps (one of which worked so well it would slam enemies into a wall on the other side of a river, knock them out and they would drown while getting washed away), and I have a nice little spike pit in this fortress.

I've never had a stone drop or cage trap built and work.

[sadron]

Hey now, you're newbies, not noobs, don't insult yourselves. There's a difference between the two.

[Clover Magic]

Failing at linking them...?  Stone and cage traps don't need to be linked to anything.  All you need is a mechanism and free stones/cages.  Order the trap to be built somewhere the enemy will walk, and your mechanics will take of the rest.  They'll build it, and load it with a free stone/cage, and reload it as necessary.  Remember that they won't work on trapavoid enemies (like kobolds) or things like friendly merchants and diplomats.

I personally like embarking on evil biomes - it's really a crapshoot between just getting some goblin blood rain every once in a while that annoys your dwarves, or spawning hordes of zombies and a cloud of evil something-or-other that turns anything living it touches in nigh-unstoppable murder machines.  Or a vicious goo rain that causes your dwarves to blister all over and then vomit to death.

It depends on what you like to do.  If you like building, embark on a massive megaproject.  If you like fighting, leave your gates open for goblins and organize your army into an efficient machine.  Or build an aboveground fort of dressmaking dwarves, just because you can.

[Exitstrategy]

So, I could have made  a ton of these traps... -_- Fail...

So far I'm liking the evil biome thing. When selecting said evil biome, would it just be any of the terrifying/haunted areas?

[Clover Magic]

Yeah, but they do take some challenge away, since goblins and most megabeasts are not trapavoid, so a dragon can wander onto your map and get itself stuck into a wooden cage.  Forgotten beasts, titans, and demons are all trapavoid, however, so don't expect trapping your caverns to protect against them.

Any biome labeled as "Sinister/Haunted/Terrifying" is evil, yes.  The more savage the area is, the more likely you'll get really nasty syndromes or zombies, so a Terrifying biome is a lot of !!FUN!!, while a Sinister biome is tamer and more able to be survived.

[vadia]

the wiki has a page of challenges and megaprojects.

[Exitstrategy]

Hmm... The evil biome thing sounds fun (both types of fun). I think that will be my next fortress. It's going to be a while-ish before I embark onto a new fortress. I pulled out of the tantrum spiral before it really began. I did lose 2 glassmakers to possessions, but that's because I have essentially no sand here and I walled them into their workshop.

Its year 3 and so far my current fortress, Faithdye, is standing strong. I've chopped down a bunch of trees, and the elves have no issues with me still. My largest problem so far, despite being in untamed wilds, has been some failed kobold thieves who run as soon as they're spotted. None of them made it into the entry hall.