Summary:
1) My many-year old Orc fort crashes when I slaughter a squig.
2) Can't generate new game on 1.23 no matter what settings.
I was playing Orc fort for quite a while (several game years) in MDF1.13. Then eventually I crashed, and would crash over and over about 2 minutes after reloading. I tracked it down to a single job: I had turned on DFhack Autobutcher, that queued up a [Slaughter Squig] job, and when the squig was brought into the butcher shop the game would immediately crash. Cancelling or suspending the job allowed me to continue indefinitely, but any time I tried to butcher any squig in any way, even manually assigning the job, it would instantly crash. I certainly have butchered squigs in the past in this game, and was able to create a new embark with every caste of squid and butcher them without problems.
Ok, so something's wrong. I copied over my save file into a fresh install of v1.23. The problem continues. Damn.
Ok, let me start a new Orc fort to play then. I like laying out my fort architecture more than fighting beasties anyway. Nope! 1.23 crashes on world creation, every time. It crashes while *setting up to* generate world from parameters (before selecting a predef world map). I loaded the default profile. It gave me an error about colour palette and said "No settings have been changed" (even though ALL settings other than colours that were different in the profile HAD been changed - this is another bug all its own) and crashed when I tried worldgen. Changed colour palette. Crash crash crash. I turned off all the MDF creatures options and a couple of other things that are new since v1.13. It still crashed several times but did allow me to choose a map (Icy Myr) several times, but then crashed after generating it or when trying to "Start Playing" on a new map. Didn't make it to the embark screen even once in about 50 tries.
I loaded up 1.19 and made several maps, chose embark locations, and embarked several times without fail. Unpacked a fresh copy of 1.23 from the zip file and crash crash crash.
1) Can anyone else make a new game in 1.23?
2) Does anyone wanna help me salvage my game where I can't slaughter squigs?
1. The issue with 1.23 is a memory issue. its been mentioned several times. For around 99% of all players reporting crashes in 1.23 the major fix is to use the LAA utility in the MWDF utilities folders... After you run it, it is self explanatory. that should fix all your current crash issues with worldgen and load.
2. its possible you have a bugged squig definition... that would be my bet. the whole multiple split caste thing is rather annoying, and could of possibly bugged out. I hate squigs... I embark with 2 terrier squigs and hope I catch some kind of cat or moleweasel. personally the pet selection is the worst in orcfort by far. I just can't find a set orc like animals besides cragtooths that I want to raise, and their not orc specific pets they are apart of the dwarf DDD set. I wish the squigs had more mixed sets.... say breeders that function as terriers and eaters that are woolys etc....
maybe they have gained non expressed names, or they have become sentient? who knows why they crash?
@forsaken1111Squigs are a poor orcs best friends. basics are that they are a split caste system where you have breeders(females), growlers(war/hunt males), eaters(fat males for heavy meat production), Woolies(wool bearing males), and terriers(male vermin catchers). the breeders have large broods, but you don't know what you got till they get a year old(except the females, you know they are breeders). If you start with say 5 breeders and 2 terriers. the 5 will drop around 20 pups in a few months, a year later you will have about 4 of each group besides your starting batch.... but that's random it could be all terriers or all woolies... Your not guaranteed a particular variety... when I do raise them I keep all the growlers for hunting/war companions, 5+ woolies for wool production, 2 to 4 terriers that I give free reign to the embark, 5 breeders to keep the pups coming and slaughter the rest.
But no matter what happens, it seems around 7 to 10 years in everyone gets a squig bug that kills the entire system... you can't butcher any of them... At which point I
put them under a fluidcaster and burn them all cage them and sell them all to the next trader and buy other animals to replace them.
personally, I would rather just be able to select the variety and grow that one variety so if I don't want woolies I don't bring woolies....