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[Callista]

He healed up from all his injuries, and looked fit as a fiddle...except that his Lower Spine is marked blue, and he has "Lost the ability to Stand".  He now crawls around the fortress, and is too slow for military duties, or even for hauling (it was painful to watch him attempt to carry a heavy ammo bin to pick up spare bolts).  I've relieved him of all hauling duties and he now hangs out around the dining hall feeling useless.

Nerve damage to great warriors is such great sadness.

Actually, he needn't be useless. Just give him a job that doesn't mean moving around much. I had a dwarf in a similar situation, and I simply turned off all labors, burrowed him near the depot, and had a dependable broker for the rest of the fort's lifetime. Guy never failed to show up to trade.

[Captain Willy]

Wow reading all your post, I found out how great my hospitals are. All my forts dwarfs never die from bad doctors/forgetful doctors, they are always there as soon as a patient arrives. But I guess that balances out with the other problem I have in my fortress that others seem not to have...

[Telgin]

Yeah, this is something I do enjoy in the game.  When a badly wounded dwarf is rushed to the hospital in time to be saved, I breathe a sigh of relief.  If they don't make it, I at the very least feel frustrated, and often feel a small bit of sad.  If the situation is particularly unfair or unfortunate, I feel even more frustrated or sad for the victim.

An example of this would be in my community fort I had a case where there was a construction accident that ended up severely wounding two of my citizens.  They were rushed off to the hospital with broken limbs and ribs.  One came this close to dying of infection, but she survived with lasting crippling injuries.  I felt bad for her, but was thankful that she lived.  My stupidity nearly cost her life.

In my current fort my military frequently suffers injuries and the occasional dagger to the brain through a helmet.  I get a feeling of accomplishment when they're back on the front lines, and I feel genuinely unhappy when they are killed.

[Mimidormi]

To nurse a dwarf back to health is one of the least discussed joys of this game!

I had a fort on a rocky wasteland, near a river. The expedition leader/founder was surprised by a goblin ambush, outside the walls, and took a bolt to a kidney. She passed out from the pain, when all of a sudden one of her friends, which happened to be a miner and founder as well, sprang out of the walls and got the attention of the goblin squad, retaliated murdering one after another with her trusty pick.. not without injuries, though.

They were both brought quickly to safety inside. The leader got treated almost flawlessly, her bolt removed, the puncture washed with soap and water, sutured and dressed.
The miner lost the ability to stand cause of a severed nerve, and on closer inspection she had the two-handed copper sword that wounded her still lodged in her leg. Even though the sword was dumped shortly after and she got treated quickly just as her friend, infection already set in.

Her days were thus numbered. A brave dwarf that had denied to her the mercy of a swift death. Yet she didn't resign to her fate, and with hidden reserves of vitality she tackled on new challenges. She took on military training, picks of course. She forged her own crutch and learned to use it, ending up walking even faster than her peers. She volunteered to dispatch the most dangerous of forgotten beasts, three of them under her belt after a couple of months.
On her free time she was always training by the armor stand on the barracks on the courtyard above ground (to avoid cave adaptation), not far from the well over the river.

The well.. which was visited daily by her friend, the leader. Which took to clean herself compulsively after the incident. Because of that bug, in which dwarves try to clean stains off their inner organs. She had a blood spatter left on her kidney after the operation. Her compulsive cleaning really looked like she was afraid of the same infection that was consuming her friend and savior.

They met each other daily, most likely without even needing to talk. The only two on that barren surface. Maybe the cleaning was just an excuse to stay close yet not too close. Maybe the training was just a way to forget about the pain. Everything was there. Guilt, resentment, anger. Determination, courage, forgiveness. Gratitude. Ultimately, acceptance. The knowledge that they would have given their lives for each other, and that if that was the last day they would have spent together, it would have been spent well.

The miner healed over time.

[Russell.s]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

To nurse a dwarf back to health is one of the least discussed joys of this game!

I had a fort on a rocky wasteland, near a river. The expedition leader/founder was surprised by a goblin ambush, outside the walls, and took a bolt to a kidney. She passed out from the pain, when all of a sudden one of her friends, which happened to be a miner and founder as well, sprang out of the walls and got the attention of the goblin squad, retaliated murdering one after another with her trusty pick.. not without injuries, though.

They were both brought quickly to safety inside. The leader got treated almost flawlessly, her bolt removed, the puncture washed with soap and water, sutured and dressed.
The miner lost the ability to stand cause of a severed nerve, and on closer inspection she had the two-handed copper sword that wounded her still lodged in her leg. Even though the sword was dumped shortly after and she got treated quickly just as her friend, infection already set in.

Her days were thus numbered. A brave dwarf that had denied to her the mercy of a swift death. Yet she didn't resign to her fate, and with hidden reserves of vitality she tackled on new challenges. She took on military training, picks of course. She forged her own crutch and learned to use it, ending up walking even faster than her peers. She volunteered to dispatch the most dangerous of forgotten beasts, three of them under her belt after a couple of months.
On her free time she was always training by the armor stand on the barracks on the courtyard above ground (to avoid cave adaptation), not far from the well over the river.

The well.. which was visited daily by her friend, the leader. Which took to clean herself compulsively after the incident. Because of that bug, in which dwarves try to clean stains off their inner organs. She had a blood spatter left on her kidney after the operation. Her compulsive cleaning really looked like she was afraid of the same infection that was consuming her friend and savior.

They met each other daily, most likely without even needing to talk. The only two on that barren surface. Maybe the cleaning was just an excuse to stay close yet not too close. Maybe the training was just a way to forget about the pain. Everything was there. Guilt, resentment, anger. Determination, courage, forgiveness. Gratitude. Ultimately, acceptance. The knowledge that they would have given their lives for each other, and that if that was the last day they would have spent together, it would have been spent well.

The miner healed over time.

I'm meant to be studying, but ended up here reading this instead. I just wanted to say that was a beautiful little story! You write well . Every time I play DF I'm torn between making invincible, automated trap protected forst, and actually letting my military out and about. The traps get boring quickly, but every time a dwarf dies I feel such a rush of sadness. Even useless fishery workers have families and friends. I can't help but imagine an empty chair in a dining room, or a little spot by a river where his fellow dwarves will walk and remember him. 

[burn_heal]

That's just so beautiful

[Mimidormi]

Thank you . At the time i had no idea infections could heal, so i thought she was a goner for sure. The coincidences such as the trips to the well and the armor stand outside just added up to what felt like a story unfolding while playing.

I do believe that while the game is notorious for its dark humor deriving from the freedom we have over efficiency and detail ("Say, i could butcher merpeople for profit!"), at the same time it has an inherently huge video game caring potential.

[burn_heal]

True, there seems to be the idea that dwarves in this game are slaves for us torture for our amusement, or there to suffer for our mistakes.

I can't help but feel some tenderness for that injured crossbow-dwarf who ran out of bolts but instead of retreating charged at a full squad of goblins by himself and started bashing them over the head with his crossbow. Such beautiful stupidity...

Dwarf Fortress is an often dark, twisted, gory, miasma-filled place, but I think there's room for moments of warmth.

[Captain Willy]

Wow I did not expect such heart warming tales, I guess I'm not the only one.

Cheers to the dwarfs we hate them, they piss us off, but bringing a dwarf back from the brink of death is always rewarding! 

[musicmastermsh]

In a fortress with migrants disabled and numerous goblin thieves stealing about a third of my babies, I have to nurse them all back to health or I'll run out of haulers!  The game takes on a very different feel when you have to use each dwarf to the best of its abilities, each twelve year old child is a precious commodity, and even a single tantruming dwarf is a major disruption.

[Shininglight]

Yay! I finally managed to rehabilitate a squad or two of my dwarves after a necro siege. I spent an entire year setting up an efficient medical staff and opened the gate. I lost one dwarf to dehydration, another went batshit insane and ran around babbling. However i got a legendary marksdwarf out of it and managed to save him via medical staff. I feel AWESOME.

[Ruhn]

I've got one speardwarf that was pretty elite before the last goblin siege happened.

The Dwarf caravan arrived at about the same time and I was trying to get them inside safely.  Our hero was the first one from a spear squad to get to the rally point outside the main gate.  A group of 6 Trolls came up from a different map edge and he faced them alone.  It was a bloody mess.  Most of the Trolls were dead by the time assistance came, and they were able to help with a couple more Trolls that showed up late.  Our hero ended up with a title and no left arm.

The hospital was just expanded with gem encrusted beds and cabinates.  They patched him up and he left before making a full recovery.  I tried to make him a squad leader, but he is "too injured" to pick up equipment.  I will let him do civilian jobs for a year and try the squad leader thing again.  He's such a hero I want to do anything I can to make his life better, even made a lead statue for his bedroom since it's his favorite metal.

[Hans Lemurson]

I will let him do civilian jobs for a year and try the squad leader thing again.  He's such a hero I want to do anything I can to make his life better, even made a lead statue for his bedroom since it's his favorite metal.

I think he can still act as a teacher for young recruits to show them his awesome skills, or if you're going to retire him to civilian life, I think the stats that make for good warriors also yield good metalworkers.

[Mutagen]

I too enjoy watching my medical staff save lives. I can't really put my finger on why, considering that I generally don't care if my dwarves die.

[Mageziya]

I love this feeling.

My first medical success:

A marksdwarf squad had just executed a minotaur. 2-3 casualties and one seriously injured dorf. The dwarf had something along the line of a smashed shoulder, smashed foot, and a broken leg? Either way, one of my sane dwarfs carried him to the hospital, where he was treated and what not. Later, when I checked up on him, I noticed he had an infection. As my fort had no soap, I scrambled to produce some. The infection later went away and he made a full recovery.

9 months or so later, he was slaughtered along side every other dwarf in the fort in an absolutely massive siege.

Godspeed, that magnificent bastard's soul.