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[Emperor Wofly]

My first few fortresses have been decent, considering I'm so new to this game. But I keep running into a problem on a majority of my fortresses, the water that my dwarves drink from will freeze over in the winter. As you expect, this causes death, unhappiness and general mayhem fun and seems to be the root cause to the demise of many a fortress. How can I prevent such catastrophes fun from happening?

[DS]

Water sources in cold maps only freeze if they are out in the open. By draining, pumping, or channeling water from whatever source you have available into an underground area that you've dug out and made available to your dwarves (with a well, or even just a nearby ledge or ramp leading down into the reservoir), you can prevent a portion of it from freezing in the winter.

However, I would actually recommend having a farming/brewing industry up and running by the time winter arrives, or otherwise have enough alcohol stocked up to last until spring. Drinking only water slows down your dwarves anyway, so it's more efficient from a production standpoint as well. I understand you're still quite new to the game (and I still remember how daunting even basic industries were for me back then), but food and alcohol production is such a crucial element of any successful fortress, I would recommend learning at least the basic ins and outs sooner rather than later.

[Emperor Wofly]

Dwarves can survive off of just alcohol? I guess my puny human liver is nothing compared to those of the great dwarven race.

[DS]

The biological differences between humans and dwarves are numerous, but the most notable is a dwarf's dependance upon alcohol. We humans merely enjoy alcohol intoxication. To a dwarf, alcohol is far more than a mere luxury.

[Emperor Wofly]

 Also, apparently dwarves can conjure alcohol out of thin air since it appears that the brewing process doesn't consume any materials, so this is a very efficient way to keep your dwarves nice and hydrated.

Edit: Apparently you have to use plants, so basically it is even more efficient since it gets rid of that elven garbage.

[Palpatine]

Dwarves can survive off of just alcohol? I guess my puny human liver is nothing compared to those of the great dwarven race.

Hello, I'm only responding because you sound quite new to this rather complex, but !!FUN!!, game.  So I'm uncertain if you're already aware that Dwarves also need food, just less of it per season than alcohol.  I believe the wiki says dwarves need two units of food a season, and four of alcohol.  Food can be either meat or certain plants.  So growing certain crops can both feed your dwarves and allow them to brew their opwn booze.  The wiki can tell you a lot more.

[weenog]

IMO one of the first things you should do with any new fortress is put in a 3x3 farm plot that grows plump helmets in all four seasons.  Don't worry about planning or aesthetics, just shove it into the soil layers (including sand or clay) you're digging through to reach rock; it won't obstruct dwarf movement so you can even put it in your entrance corridor if you want to.  Plump helmets are boring, but they can be essential for survival to a new fortress, and even a mature fortress may still use them as a staple crop.

They grow quickly, so with an attentive farmer you should have a lot of them.  They grow in all four seasons, so you don't suffer cyclical shortfalls like you can with other underground plants.  They can be eaten raw, no cooking required.  They can be cooked into meals, gaining a quality level and providing dwarfs happy thoughts.  Most importantly, they can be brewed into dwarven wine.  In the beginning, you should not be cooking them.  Cooking (unlike eating or brewing) destroys the seeds ("plump helmet spawn"), making you unable to plant more.

As your fortress grows and you come up with enough surplus goods to trade (or enough surplus dwarfpower to gather wild plants), you will probably want to experiment with farming different plants.  This is a good thing, different plants have different uses, and you can get more happy thoughts by giving dwarfs their favourite kinds of booze, as well as reduce unhappy thoughts brought on by monotony ("tired of the same old booze").  As you get more space dug out, and can start putting things where you like them instead of in the first available parking spot, you might want to remove that first farm plot and put farms elsewhere.  But don't neglect to have a small plot of plump helmets growing.  They're simple, easy, and can sometimes be the difference between life and death for your fortress.

[Drecon]

Honestly, the first thing I always do with any fortress is set up my above-ground farming. (kind of a necessity, as I always start the game without spending embark points)

Like it or not, alcohol is the blood pumping through your fortress, which makes the still of course the heart of the fortress.

[Emperor Wofly]

I guess working on farm plots would be a good idea, I've just been focusing on gathering plants and the occasional bit of meat, but I keep getting this thing where I don't have a plump helmet spawn, what's that mean? Is that the seeds or something?

[weenog]

I guess working on farm plots would be a good idea, I've just been focusing on gathering plants and the occasional bit of meat, but I keep getting this thing where I don't have a plump helmet spawn, what's that mean? Is that the seeds or something?

Assuming you do, in fact, have plump helmet spawn, it's a problem of the new hauling behaviour.  Haulers will take containers to items to pick them up, put them in the containers, then put the containers back into the stockpile.  The problem is that if a planter selects a seed in a container to do a job, and then a hauler grabs that container and runs off to collect another seed, the planter sees the first seed isn't where it was expected to be, and reports it missing.  This can happen with a lot of things, but you see it most often with farming because seeds go into containers which themselves go into other containers, and because a cancelled farm job will queue itself up again (and possibly be cancelled again) rather than just ceasing to exist.

There are workarounds that reduce the error message spam, but explaining those will have to be done by someone with more time available this afternoon.

[Emperor Wofly]

Assuming you do, in fact, have plump helmet spawn, it's a problem of the new hauling behaviour.  Haulers will take containers to items to pick them up, put them in the containers, then put the containers back into the stockpile.  The problem is that if a planter selects a seed in a container to do a job, and then a hauler grabs that container and runs off to collect another seed, the planter sees the first seed isn't where it was expected to be, and reports it missing.  This can happen with a lot of things, but you see it most often with farming because seeds go into containers which themselves go into other containers, and because a cancelled farm job will queue itself up again (and possibly be cancelled again) rather than just ceasing to exist.

There are workarounds that reduce the error message spam, but explaining those will have to be done by someone with more time available this afternoon.

That's helpful, as i was always baffled when they couldn't find a spawn when I clearly read that we had hundreds of seeds.

[Solon64]

Assuming you do, in fact, have plump helmet spawn, it's a problem of the new hauling behaviour.  Haulers will take containers to items to pick them up, put them in the containers, then put the containers back into the stockpile.  The problem is that if a planter selects a seed in a container to do a job, and then a hauler grabs that container and runs off to collect another seed, the planter sees the first seed isn't where it was expected to be, and reports it missing.  This can happen with a lot of things, but you see it most often with farming because seeds go into containers which themselves go into other containers, and because a cancelled farm job will queue itself up again (and possibly be cancelled again) rather than just ceasing to exist.

There are workarounds that reduce the error message spam, but explaining those will have to be done by someone with more time available this afternoon.

That's helpful, as i was always baffled when they couldn't find a spawn when I clearly read that we had hundreds of seeds.

As said, it would take quite some time to explain here how to workaround the new hauling behavior with regards to seed cancellation spam.  I would try but I tend to be extremely wordy and obtuse and would probably confuse the ever loving goodness out of you (what's left of it anyway, after playing DF for a bit you tend to find you have very little in the ways of morals left).

I recommend looking at the DF wiki (AMAZING resource for all things DF) and/or searching the forums.  It involves custom stockpiles, stockpile linking, and changing the number of barrels available for a given stockpile to 0.  That's the quick synopsis

[chaosgear]

If your fortress is on an area with an aquifer, you'll never have to worry about dehydration. Aquifers are an infinite source of water, and since you won't likely be exposing them to open air, they won't freeze.

Of course, having an aquifer presents a different problem all it's own.

[thegoatgod_pan]

You should funnel some water underground anyway. You will need water. Just read up on water pressure (which mostly comes down to using diagonally adjacent tiles to depressurize water)

See, the dwarves will always drink alcohol except when wounded. Wounded dwarves will need water, to drink and to be cleaned. I think detox is part of the dwarven regeneration process, and motivates them to get better.

To put water underground you need to understand the weird way "underground" vs "open air" works. It is quite counter intuitive: if a square has ever been exposed to daylight, even for a few turns, even if since then a castle has been built on top of it, it is still "open air" and subject to freezing.

If a square has never been exposed to daylight, if it has always been underground, you can remove all the soil around, besides and below it away except one bit above it hanging on a support, and it will still be "underground dark".

Just imagine light in dwarf fortress as individual tiles of vertical z-levels reaching from the sky to stop at natural soil and rock, ignoring all artificial constructions in the way. Where light touches, temperature will vary by season. Where it doesn't, it is always warm.

[JonhyBee]

Hello, I am a long time lurker but I dont post much. Just wanted to point out that the work around the seed bug is not so complicated if you know how to set up a stock pile.

Just set a food stockpile near your farm, open its settings and forbid all food except seeds. Then make the number of accepted barrels in this stockpile 0 and your all set. This is all I do and I never get that message.