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[adam35413]

I have played through 10 or so embarks, and I feel like I have a tentative grasp on the core aspects of the game.  The past few embarks have been fairly uneventful, so I am looking for some suggestions on good embark parameters.  To date, I have been following the wiki's suggestions for good/safe starting locations.  I'd like an embark that has some more interesting things going on, but is still manageable for a relative novice like me.

Any suggestions for a good set of embark search criteria would be appreciated!

[Jahsg]

Aquifer in a non freezing biome, nearby necromancer towers, ocean with no rainfall

[Em3rgency]

Either one of the above is good for intermediate. Take two or all of the above for exponential increase in difficulty.

[slothen]

what's the big deal with "ocean w/ no rainfall?"

[vjek]

what's the big deal with "ocean w/ no rainfall?"

Pumps or caverns for fresh water, and no trees, I presume?  It seems like a good way to drive the player towards the constant danger of the caverns.  Of course, with an aquifer, as long as it doesn't cover the whole embark, you have infinite fresh water completely without risk, so... /shrug

Necro towers can be exciting, to be sure, if they bring enough undead with them.

[Em3rgency]

The aquifer should be a solid layer on the whole map for this to be an intermediate challenge. If its several layers thick, extra fun! I had to punch 6 Z levels of aquifer once... My dwarfs didn't see stone for 5 years.

[thegoatgod_pan]

Settle a cavern!

[jellsprout]

Depending on your playstyle, no metal can range from fairly simple to pure nightmare. Alternatively you can simply try an embark without iron and/or flux.
Another tricky embark is one without any water or wood on the map. Not on surface and especially not in the caverns. You can only get wood from the caravans, you must keep booze production high so your dwarves won't dehydrate and you can't muddy rock for more farms.

[StruckDown]

I embarked on a terrifying glacier once. It wasn't too bad. The lack of rain makes it easier to manage.

[Centigrade]

Depending on your playstyle, no metal can range from fairly simple to pure nightmare. Alternatively you can simply try an embark without iron and/or flux.
Another tricky embark is one without any water or wood on the map. Not on surface and especially not in the caverns. You can only get wood from the caravans, you must keep booze production high so your dwarves won't dehydrate and you can't muddy rock for more farms.

I never understood why the lack of fresh water was a concern. You folks let your non-hospitalized dwarfs drink nasty, elf-loving water?

[jellsprout]

The lack of water means you can't wash your dwarves either. So one syndrome spewing titan and eventually everybody will rot to death. But more importantly, it means you won't be able to grow any trees ever. Then there are some more minor problems, such as not being able to farm on rock and not being able to make obsidian farms, but I don't think that will bother many people. It is not expert level difficulty, but it creates some challenges for the intermediate player.

[I am Leo]

Also wounded dwarves only drink water, without it a broken leg is a death sentence.

[fractalman]

Glaciers are, in fact, intermediate.
Just bring PLENTY of food and booze and wood on embark, so you have time to set up your first quasi-controlled cave in.   

Alternatively, have a small fraction of your map be passive-reanimating. or a small fraction be NON-reanimating, and use the corner for dwarven burial. 


Pure-reanimating glacier, however...
Three unslabbable trader migrants show up. One goblin seige.  One titan. One poorly equipped military (no iron ores). one helmet snake that singleheadedly disabled the entire military.  This, after reaching a population of 90-100 and bamboozling traders with epic roasts. 
one abandon fort command. 

so.  yeah.  do a glacier.  But not reanimating. or reanimating, but not 100%

[slothen]

I had a very fun embark on a badlands biome.  No surface trees, plants, or water, and I had an aquifer with only 1 layer of soil in places.  It was pretty fun, good challenge, and eventually ended up being a great embark location.  After getting through the aquifer with pumps, I immediately busted through to the third cavern layer and excavated out dozens of 10x10 soil rooms for cavernous plant/tree growth.  Also, if I opened up soil layers to the sun, I got all kinds of grasses for grazers (although moss would've worked fine) without any plants/trees growing.  I ended up getting all my iron from goblinite smelting as well.  Only real downside was that it was a savage badlands, but I saw more giant ticks and flying thrips men than any interesting fauna.

[laularukyrumo]

I recently genned a world that might be... well... interesting. Got a human tower sitting in the middle of a terrifying swamp, with an aquifer (obviously, since swamps have super poor drainage), and I also jacked up the megabeast/titan/demon settings in worldgen to Battlefailed extremes.

Sounds like Fun with a capital FFFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUU--

EDIT: And it's in a Scorching biome. Oh boy. Prepare the doom ships.