Print

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

[StubbornAlcoholic]

I'm finding a lot of DF seems to be about maximising what you can get done over a certain period of time through thinking beforehand about what your objectives are.

Whether it be building enough beds to keep your migrants in reasonable living quarters, setting up your workshops so they run smoothly, training your military up adequately for when you inevitably need them or preparing coffins for when said soldiers rapidly become mangled tin cans...it's all down to forethought and planning.

After losing a fortress to an enormous Undead siege, it struck me that I know very little about building good defence into my fort from the ground up. Much of my architecture, for example, didn't lend itself to fortifications. That made it tough to establish good areas to fight in when they became essential.

My latest fort, I've made a slightly more defence-oriented start by parking my entrance in a valley. I've walled off unneccessary pathways through the valley and then dug a trap-filled channel to my main opening drawbridge. Additionally, this time I dug my living quarters straight down until I hit a plentiful amount of magnetite, allowing far more prompt acquisition of advanced metal traps and gear. A lovely side effect was that the Giant Axe Blades I have as surplus seem to be loved by the Dwarf caravan, and I got a ton of goods for them.

The tradeoff was that I nearly starved/died of thirst completely, because my still production was very wonky. Tense stuff

How do the veteran longbeards here like to approach these problems in the early game, when you're often trying to get your booze/food/beds/offices set up as a priority, yet need to lay a groundwork for later? I think it'd make for an interesting discussion

[krisslanza]

Wait, I'm supposed to be setting up farms, dining halls, bedrooms, and trade goods? I always get caught up in trying to design the bloody fortress still!

My own inability to prioritize aside. I typically try to set up a 'citadel' first, just some turrets and walls so I have some level of safety in case things go south. I generally design it with only one entrance, with a bridge that can be retracted up to protect the juicy inhabitants.

Of course, this largely depends on the surroundings. If it's calm, or not a particularly dangerous area, you may no need to immediately wall off an area.

[MasterShizzle]

I usually do one z-level for a specific purpose. So most of the bedrooms are on one level, most of the (non-heated) workshops on another, forges or magma forges on a third, a big empty level for stockpiles, etc.

This approach lets me dig out and see what a floor is made of before determining its purpose. If I find something like a big magnetite cluster, for example, I'll usually alter the floor plans to make that my dining hall. If a level is pockmarked with veins of something good, then I'll put the bedrooms there to increase room values for everyone. All of this narrows down to a standard entrance layout that most of my forts use, with a walled-off courtyard outside for training military and growing above-ground crops in relative safety.

Aside from a defensible entrance and farm plots on the first soil level, the rest of my fort just goes with whatever Armok gives me and whatever seems efficient. I keep the food stockpile and kitchens/stills next to the dining hall. I put bedrooms away from other industries so that I have room to add more later on. I make sure to put the empty stockpile floor adjacent above or below the workshops. I always leave room on the floor below my hospital (usually across from the dining hall, where it's accessible) to dig a reservoir below and put a well eventually. And no matter what, the dining hall and bedrooms are dug out of stone and not soil, so that I can smooth/engrave them later.

[melphel]

The first room I dig out is just storage space to get everything inside, this is where I will put some beds and assign a dormitory, as well as a couple tables and chairs for a dining room.  This is what the dorfs will live in for the first couple seasons while everything else gets dug out.  If it is a particularly vicious area, I will door/hatch the entrance.  Eventually, my farms will go in this room, with a walled and covered area above on the surface for surface farming.  The actual entrance will be elsewhere, so the only way to get to that room when the fort is set up is from below.

Having that room there grants me some time to think about the fort and entrance.  I'm a fan of the walled courtyard behind a dry moat.  The barracks will be first room inside the entrance (so everything has to go through it before reaching the rest of the fort) and likely be constructed above ground next to the courtyard.  From the barracks to the entrance I will have pastured wardogs by the dozen.  The courtyard itself likely won't be directly attached to the barracks, but instead be accessible from below like the farms, here I will pave the area with metals and set up a statue garden meeting area to stave off the cave adaptation.  Since the courtyard is open air, it is important that the whole thing be on high ground, as I have had goblins camp on top of a nearby hill and shoot over the walls.

The top of the walls will be fortified and made accessible from the barracks.  I usually make very vertical forts, so I have room to spread out and make a ring of fortified towers, again accessible from below, out and around the main walls.  These help when an enemy siege will camp outside of bolt range from the main wall.
Often I dig out a soil layer to connect these towers, which can become a tree farm later on.

Once I have a good spot for the entrance picked out, I begin digging down from my temporary room over to that location, and then down further to where the workshops, bedrooms, dining hall, etc will be.  Only after that is set up do I dig up to where the entrance will be.  I may have a drawbridge closing the other temporary entrance until the real entrance is built.  This should be completed in about a year, so barring a necro siege, I don't have much to worry about (and if a swarm of zombies do show up then....well I didn't stand a chance anyway)

[starshard0]

I like to create a temporary fortress, where my dwarves live and work for the first year or two, while I design the actual fortress, which may or may not connect to the original fortress. This allows me to balance the needs of my dwarves early on, with the need to have a defensible fortress during sieges later.

[Loud Whispers]

How do the veteran longbeards here like to approach these problems in the early game, when you're often trying to get your booze/food/beds/offices set up as a priority, yet need to lay a groundwork for later? I think it'd make for an interesting discussion

I used to build housing/defence separately, then I realized - it's just that much easier to move your Dwarves into your defenses! Oh and I pretty much sacrifice every single industry that isn't farming or masonry.

[pixl97]

I tend to have a single entrance to my fort, and put the barracks along it. When I have the materials I'll make the entrance a down ramp then back up so it can be turned in to a bridge airlock (invaders get the bottom of the bridge they can't attack..

Burrows are also great, any dwarf that shouldn't be running off to strange places gets stuck in a burrow with the workshops,farms, bedrooms, and dining. Miners, wood cutters, fishers, and hunters get free reign until a siege shows up. The effect of burrows cannot be underestimated, it keeps Urist close to his workshop, instead of on the far side of the map drinking under a tree until he gets raped to death by a giant eagle.

[StubbornAlcoholic]

I like to create a temporary fortress, where my dwarves live and work for the first year or two, while I design the actual fortress, which may or may not connect to the original fortress. This allows me to balance the needs of my dwarves early on, with the need to have a defensible fortress during sieges later.

This is a fantastic idea ^^

How do sieges respond to multiple "mini-fortresses" on one map, out of curiosity? They all just pile in for the one with the most Dwarves I presume?

I was thinking of building a "convenience entrance" to my fort so that Dwarves can access the surface more easily sealed with a drawbridge/floodgates, then have a "deathtrap entrance" filled with retracting bridges, chasms and the like that becomes the only entrance during dangerous periods.

[Meistermoxx]

P2W

[StubbornAlcoholic]

P2W

I prefer playing to lose slightly less quickly

[Loud Whispers]

How do sieges respond to multiple "mini-fortresses" on one map, out of curiosity? They all just pile in for the one with the most Dwarves I presume?

They go for the quickest to reach killable creature.

[Meistermoxx]

P2W

I prefer playing to lose slightly less quickly

I meant posting to watch.

[MadocComadrin]

But you didn't post to watch; you posted 2 watches. D:

[Ruhn]

I've had similar thoughts about making the entire fortress defencible, not just the main entrance.  In my current fort the first 2 levels from the surface are defense-oriented, with extra doors & vertical bars(portculi) & drawbridges & fortifications.  I also have stockpiles of weapons and armor in these levels in case a small group gets cut off and needs to prepare for a last stand. 

I've been working on a design for an underground tower/keep that can be used for dire emergencies.  It would only have 1 entrance which would be hevily covered by archer galleries.  I've heard that a locked floor hatch on top of stairs can't be destroyed, so I'm going to incorporate that also to help against building destroyers.

[Wrex]

The easiest is to make a self sustainable fort with only one way in that you can seal with a drawbridge.