I’d be interested to know how others start out Prepare Carefully on new embarks and then how it turns out. This is my current, non-cheating setup:
July 15 release – maybe with libraries, this time.
A new embark in mountains, 7 dwarves, warm, Untamed Wilds. Looked for temperate but this will do. Sold back most everything at embark for extra points, spent ‘em on single point variety skills, mostly. Upped points just in case and, yeah – elephants offered! Bought two (502 total) just to see how big they grow and whether we can keep ‘em fed w/o the baled hay option in the new releases. A couple of pet rocks because these dorfs like them, one dewbeetle, same reason. Put 4 points in Gatherer, helps a lot early, our only “skilled” dwarf. Only one point in Weaponsmith. Our single-points Axeman will double as woodcutter, animal trainer and ambusher; he has a hunting dog and is the only other dorf with multiple skills besides Books, our Leader. No bats this time, they’re now more trouble than they’re worth: taking cheap turkeys instead. Quick eggs then meat, tallow and leather = hardened leather for early armor. A pair of craigstooth boars for waranimals and sheared ivory. One bar of iron to get a decent axe for Axe, sold back one of the 100 point copper halberds. No, selling them both back: a couple of bars of copper and three rocks, 77 points saved for one cheap copper axe. But we can’t cut trees until we have that axe so, three cut logs now = 168 points saved for both halberds. Add in the 50 pt wheelbarrow, stepladder, splints, crutches, cloth, food, most seeds and nearly all the booze (we have a decent Gatherer joining us) and it adds up enough to cover the two elephants; this is not even a cheat. Ha! Bought sand just to get the cheap bags; one of our starting seven likes glass but, no points to spare, she’ll learn on the job. There’s some soil in this steep-sided mountain for digger training. A point in cooking, should become our trade goods expert fairly soon. Nobody has points in metalcrafting or gemsetting (some Greedy Little Bastards embark this is!) because we don’t have the points to spare but this mountain is chock full of ore including native silver and gold; we should do alright. Priority will be on early defense, Invaders On, all, with high skill levels. Many civs nearby in a 90 year world. Werebeasts and Vampires Off, though, unless worldgen mucks with us. Diagnose is the only medical skill to start out; taking a big chance early on.
15th Granite 92, early Spring.
The brook shown on the map turns out to be a river with 15 nearby AnimalMen/Monsters and crocodiles. More of an adjacent plain than expected but the mountain goes up 18 z levels. This game will be played without DFHack cheating but changing the ground silt to CLAY_LOAM because I like the color. No sand showing on any cliff face: soils, granite, mudstone. Setting up Therapist and – what the … ? Our great Gatherer seems to have more points in Growing; a misclick? Hmm. That might prove a problem, starting early to gather berries. There aren’t all that many berries but there’s some rope reed, rat reed and melons nearby, booze should be OK if we hurry and stay clear of the water. Step the first: use one of those rocks to make a forge and another for mason, the third for blocks (throne) while the diggers decide where to start in on that cliff and … guess we’ll need one of those visible granite tiles for a wood furnace, miscounted. A mated pair of yaks pulled the wagon, lucky that, dwarves are setting the animals in a defensive perimeter.