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[callisto8413]

The 'n' key, on the item screen, allows you to go to a list of goods and items your civilization can product but may not be in your inventory.  I would suggest buying 1 unit of every type of milk available.  That isn't a lot of milk BUT each different type of milk comes with a free BARREL to carry them in.  One unit of cow milk comes with a FREE barrel.  One unit of goat milk comes with a FREE Barrel.

And the milk can be used for cooking, drinking or turning into cheese later.

PS - oh, and give one of your Dwarfs enough points to make them a Competent Ambusher  (8 points I think is enough).  That will make them a Hunter and Hunters come with a FREE bow! 

[Larix]

I'm a bit doubtful about trying to wring the maximum free containers out of embark points - that's pretty advanced stuff and in my opinion completely unnecessary for getting to know the game. For a first (and second) fort, i found 'Play now!' a good choice - gets to the main game right away instead of asking you to navigate yet another mess of nested menus.

Concerning ambusher - from what i've read, embark hasn't given free equipment for ambushers in quite a while. You have to buy it from the item menus or produce it yourself (or wait for an immigrant hunter). Come to think of it, giving embark skills to dwarfs doesn't give you free equipment for other professions (miner, woodcutter, smith), so it only makes sense.

[vanatteveldt]

I'm a bit doubtful about trying to wring the maximum free containers out of embark points - that's pretty advanced stuff and in my opinion completely unnecessary for getting to know the game. For a first (and second) fort, i found 'Play now!' a good choice - gets to the main game right away instead of asking you to navigate yet another mess of nested menus.

+1. What you need to start a fort is a pick, an axe, and plenty of food and booze. Everything else can be made on the spot as needed. Starting skills are nice but never needed, a novice miner will dig that tunnel just as nicely, he just takes (quite) a bit longer. And anyway, the play now starting skills are fine, matching skills to preferences and attributes is certainly not 'first fortress' stuff.

BTW I started with just following the fine tutorial, which seems a bit easier than waiting for hints from the forum...

[Pinstar]

Animal-wise I would suggest embarking with:
1 male and female cat
1 male and female dog
1 Ram and 1 ewe
1 Turkey Hen and 1 Turkey Gobbler

The ram/ewe are very cheap (compared to some of the other livestock out there) and can serve as an introduction to livestock and the clothing industry (as they both produce wool and the ewe will produce milk)

The cats...well lets just say we can't have a fortress without cats. They keep the vermen down.

The dogs will be useful to help detect stealthy foes. They'll also let you practice with training and assignment mechanics with animals.

The turkeys will introduce you to egg laying mechanics and be a very steady supply of food for very little work, and let you get into hatching the eggs, raising the polts and butchering them later when you want to get a little more advanced.

[vanatteveldt]

I usually don't bother with dogs, as due to the creature size bug the offspring is kind of useless in a fight, and you can put a kitten-on-a-leash as a burglar alarm just as well. And you will have plenty of kittens :-)

For a starter forest I would leave the grazers, and just take egg layers. If you want to play with milk and cheese making, take a boar+sow. If you're serious about the eggs, I would take more like 4 hens and a gobbler, they are cheap as dirt anyway.

[Sutremaine]

I'm a bit doubtful about trying to wring the maximum free containers out of embark points - that's pretty advanced stuff and in my opinion completely unnecessary for getting to know the game.

I dunno, taking one job to turn one barrel of milk into one barrel plus one unit of cheese seems like a really big improvement over taking one or two jobs to turn a log or tree into one barrel plus no cheese.

As far as 'advanced' techniques go, it's pretty simple.

[Pinstar]

I'm a bit doubtful about trying to wring the maximum free containers out of embark points - that's pretty advanced stuff and in my opinion completely unnecessary for getting to know the game.

I dunno, taking one job to turn one barrel of milk into one barrel plus one unit of cheese seems like a really big improvement over taking one or two jobs to turn a log or tree into one barrel plus no cheese.

As far as 'advanced' techniques go, it's pretty simple.

If you want to take this technique to its logical conclusion do this:

Press N for a new item, type in "brain"

Pick any brain from the list that only costs 2 points.
Repeat until there are no more 2 point brains left.

Go to the fish category and buy one of each kind of fish that only costs 2 points each

Go to the eggs category and buy one of every 2 point egg available.

Each brain, fish and egg will come with its own free barrel. You'll have PLENTY available for storage and brewing once they are cleaned out of their initial contents.

Not strictly needed for your first fort, but an easy way to squeeze out some extra freebies.

[FuzzyZergling]

Here are my suggestions for items:
1. Get rid of one of the axes (if you want more than one woodcutter you can make a wooden axe after you embark), ropes, quivers, and all that maple stuff at the bottom.
2. Take 15-20 of each seed, just in case.
3. Get some leather, which is cheaper than cloth and can be used for a lot of the same stuff. 10-20 should be fine.
4. Get like five turkey hens. They lay a bunch of eggs every month and are a good source of food.

Here are my suggestions for dwarf professions:
1. You'll want at least one miner and one woodcutter. You don't need to give them a lot of skill, but digging is pretty important so I'd have at least two miners.
2. Have one dwarf with maxed grower and nothing else. Farming is very dependent on skill, and you're going to want your farmer doing just that all the time and nothing else.
3. Have a mason and a carpenter, don't make them the same dwarf.
4. Have a cook and a brewer, don't make them the same dwarf.

[LordSlowpoke]

do you want a good fortress

embark with the following

10 female cat
10 male cat
5 tetrahedrite
10 bauxite block
20 plump helmet
20 prepared bumblebee brain
5 turtle
1 wooden training axe
1`charcoal
1 rose gold chest
make every dwarf a proficient liar

gl hf

[Tiruin]

Posting from work.

I'd suggest ONLY ONE PAIR OF CATS, and no dogs (if you plan on us teaching you to make 2 of your dwarves into an early military ).
One pair of cats is rightly enough...

Dear gods I wish I had time to expound on this.

[LordSlowpoke]

Posting from work.

I'd suggest ONLY ONE PAIR OF CATS, and no dogs (if you plan on us teaching you to make 2 of your dwarves into an early military ).
One pair of cats is rightly enough...

Dear gods I wish I had time to expound on this.

i will compromise on 9 female cat and 1 male cat for 10 cats total

[Tiruin]

I'd really like people to expound on why certain items need to be chosen--we're talking to newbies here: what we may see as practical won't be seen as such without saying why.

[vanatteveldt]

I'd really like people to expound on why certain items need to be chosen--we're talking to newbies here: what we may see as practical won't be seen as such without saying why.

Okay, I'll bite.

I usually embark with something like:

Equipment:
2 picks - picks are too important to lose one miner to an accident, and having two miners greatly speeds things up
1 or 2 axes - for woodcutting. I consider using wooden axes to cut wood an exploit

Metalworking gear:
1 anvil
10 bituminous coal. This will get you 80 fuel, which is more than enough to jumpstart metalworking. In a pinch, the coal can be made into blocks, e.g. for breaching an aquifer, for which 40 blocks is generally enough.
10 malachite or copper nuggets and 10 cassetirite. This will yield 80 bronze using only 10 fuel which is enough to make some good arms and armour for early military
1 charcoal. This is useful so you can immediately start using the coal without needing a wood furnace first

Cloth stuff:
some thread and cloth, for emergency healthcare. I've never actually used them but they're fairly cheap.
5 or so bags. I like quarry bushes and bags are needed for processing them.

Food:
Whatever is default, it has always lasted me long enough to get my farming set up.

Animals:
1+1 cat, for vermin hunting and sentries/bait
1+5 of some species of fowl. Apparently turkeys are best food wise, but I like peafowl for their blue feathers
Sometimes, 1+2 swine
Rarely, 1+2 sheep or goats

Dwarfs:
2 axedwarfs, 5 axe, 2 teach, 1 each armor, shield, dodge. One of them generally helps mining as well.
1 miner. You really want a full time miner.
1 farmer. As said above, you really want a farmer that is good at its job asap, as that will make the whole food industry more efficient.
1 mason. My mason is often busy around the clock making doors, cabinets, coffers, etc.
1 mixed noble - diagnoser, appraiser, judge of intent, consoler, pacifier
1 carpenter + stone crafter. You need both: carpenters make beds, wheelbarrows, and bins, and stone crafters make rock pots and rock crafts, which are often my first export product. However, you don't really need them full time, and we don't have eight dwarfs.

I generally only give dwarfs one skill max. They pick up other jobs (cooking, distilling, etc) as needed, but as soon as possible these are taken over by a migrant so the dwarf can specialize in one job. If I have points left I can give some points, but I think these are better spent bringing more coal, cassetirite, or lumber.

I leave out all the wooden stuff, that can be made quite easily. If the embark has a lack of trees, it can pay to bring some lumber as well.

[Pinstar]

I'd really like people to expound on why certain items need to be chosen--we're talking to newbies here: what we may see as practical won't be seen as such without saying why.

Okay, I'll bite.

I usually embark with something like:

Metalworking gear:

10 bituminous coal. This will get you 80 fuel, which is more than enough to jumpstart metalworking. In a pinch, the coal can be made into blocks, e.g. for breaching an aquifer, for which 40 blocks is generally enough.

Coal is not always available to embark with depending on what region they are in. Coal is GREAT if it is available, but you can't force an embark to rely on it.

To explain further: The reason bituminous coal is so good is because it gives you 9 coke when smelted, but each unit only costs 3 embark points, compared to the 10 points if you wanted to embark with coke (refined coal).

Why do you care about coke? Fuel.

The smelter, the metal forge, the glass kiln and the clay kiln ALL require 1 unit of fuel per job.
This fuel can take one of two forms: Coke or Charcoal (Either works just as well as the other).

Embarking with a lot of fuel will ensure you can setup these workshops and use them without worrying about if your fort location has a natural supply of fuel or not. This lets you make metal armor and weapons (which are far superior in combat ability to bone, leather and wood) to help defend your fort.


Later on, you may eventually discover some magma after digging down very far. Tapping into the magma will allow you to build "magma" versions of the smelter, metalsmith, glass kiln and clay kiln. The magma versions allow you to produce goods from them without the need for ANY Coke or Charcoal, allowing you to make as many metal/glass/clay items as you have the raw materials to produce.

Regarding clay and glass, they are generally good for furniture and decorations. Stuff made from them is worth more than stuff made from stone or wood. They still serve the same function but their value makes your rooms worth more (which makes dwarfs who live or work in them happier) and also makes items that fetch more when sold at a caravan.

Because traditional fuel is a generally limited resource but magma is an effectively unlimited resource, most players who embark with traditional fuel will only use it for metalcrafting and save the glass, clay and non-weapons-grade-metals (Like gold) for when they have magma workshops setup.


Setting up magma industries is a more complex item...but also very important. Don't concern yourself with it at the moment. All in good time.

[vanatteveldt]

Well, in my experience it is available more often than not. And if there is no bituminous, you can take 20 lignite. If there is no lignite either, take some more wood... and if you're out of points, start chopping :-)

Bringing coke is certainly not need or required for the embark (only the anvil and one lump of metal are, really, the rest can be made as needed), but if it is available it makes getting a metal industry setup so much easier, which makes it easier to get a military up and running, which is a good idea in most cases...