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[Dampe]

So, I think I'm finally starting to get the hang of Fortress Mode, and I'm wondering if this embark team looks any good.

Two miners, each with Adequate Miner. Adequate's kind of low, but they should be getting plenty of experience early on.

One woodcutter/warrior, with Adequate Woodcutter, Adequate Axedwarf, Adequate Shield User, Adequate Armor User, and Adequate Dodger. In the past, I've had a dedicated dwarf for the military on every embark, but decided that combining my woodcutter and military dwarf could be good, as he could use their axe for cutting down both trees and goblins. Also, as the woodcutter would likely be further out than the rest of the dwarves while he was cutting wood, he/she would likely be the first dwarf that any hostile creature would encounter, so the ability to defend himself would be good.

One carpenter/craftsdwarf, with Adequate Carpenter, Adequate Wood Crafter, and Adequate Building Designer and possibly a couple other skills thrown in.

One stonemason/craftsdwarf, with Adequate Mason, and Adequate Stone Crafter. Adequate isn't that high, but he'll get plenty of experience smoothing the walls of the fortress.

One doctor, as I've heard these can be quite hard to come by as migrants.

One weaponsmith/cook, with any important skill the previous six dwarves hadn't covered.

If there's any leftover points, I'll either spend them on raising skills or getting various crap to bring with the dwarves.

[Duuvian]

Smoothing and engraving are both Engraver jobs.

[EvilBob22]

There is nothing wrong with that team.

Two miners, each with Adequate Miner. Adequate's kind of low, but they should be getting plenty of experience early on.

Heh, mining skill is easy enough to get that I usually start with 0 mining skill

One woodcutter/warrior, with Adequate Woodcutter, Adequate Axedwarf, Adequate Shield User, Adequate Armor User, and Adequate Dodger. In the past, I've had a dedicated dwarf for the military on every embark, but decided that combining my woodcutter and military dwarf could be good, as he could use their axe for cutting down both trees and goblins. Also, as the woodcutter would likely be further out than the rest of the dwarves while he was cutting wood, he/she would likely be the first dwarf that any hostile creature would encounter, so the ability to defend himself would be good.

The only catch here is that the woodcutter "uniform" is different to the military uniform.  So if Urist McAxe is out cutting wood, and then he goes to military training, he will go to the weapon stockpile to trade in his tree chopping axe for an axedwarf axe (and vice versa).  Even still, as long as you have an extra or two, I have found it to work pretty well for me.

One stonemason/craftsdwarf, with Adequate Mason, and Adequate Stone Crafter. Adequate isn't that high, but he'll get plenty of experience smoothing the walls of the fortress.

As mentioned earlier, smoothing is an engraver job, not a stone crafter job.  I usually split these two apart (really I make everyone a mason but keep the crafter busy).

One doctor, as I've heard these can be quite hard to come by as migrants.

I get doctor migrants all the time, although I can get 0 for two or three migration waves in a row (and then 4 in the next wave).  So, unless there is an emergency and I need one RIGHT NOW, there will usually already be plenty hanging around.  Also, inexperienced doctors are quite effective in a pinch...

One weaponsmith/cook, with any important skill the previous six dwarves hadn't covered.

This seems an odd combination, but if you want to do it that way, go for it.


So, to sum up: it is a reasonable team, try it out!  You'll probably tweak it after a couple tries anyway.

[Dampe]

One weaponsmith/cook, with any important skill the previous six dwarves hadn't covered.

This seems an odd combination, but if you want to do it that way, go for it.

I just couldn't squeeze in a weaponsmith and a cook without getting rid of a miner, so I was just like, "fuck it," and combined the two. Also, I know engraving isn't used by the stone crafter skill, but stone crafting seemed like something a mason would be good at.

[doublestrafe]

Never embark with doctors, that's my advice. Doctor skills don't improve results, just operation time, and the time that it takes to perform a doctor function is exponentially shorter than the time it takes to convince some dwarf to get off his fat ass and actually do something to a patient. The time savings you can expect by having doctor skills are so pathetic compared to the waits between job pickups that it's never worth training them at all.

[Dampe]

Alright, I'll get rid of the doctor.
Besides, it'll give me some room for a cook/brewer.
Thanks.

[than402]

Also note that as far as i know,brewing skill doesn't affect the happy thoughts a dwarf will get.only booze value and personal preferences do.

[sal880612m]

I am not so sure that is true. I have seen differing thoughts on drinks available range from had a good drink lately to had a truly decadent drink lately and even the wiki seems uncertain as to whether there is a hidden quality level to booze. The other thing is brewing skill does affect brewing speed, so if your brewer is going to do anything else it might be worth putting points into it just in case.

[Panando]

If you're going to embark with one military dwarf, you should embark with two, and make them career military. Otherwise embark with none. I'm sorry but that adequate guy wont be worth a crap against threats, he might be lucky and not get too badly injured in an encounter, but until a dwarf either has excellent skills, excellent armour, or preferably both - he's a causality waiting to happen, and if you have him in woodchopping mode when his military services are suddenly needed, forget it (if you're really skilled you can get dwarves to change mode in a pinch, but it's much easier to end up with them running into combat buck naked or something, which is hilarious but not good for the survival of your fortress).
On the other hand, if you have 2 career military and do squad of 2 sparring, your squad would obliterate ambushes, and if you give them decent armour, they'll obliterate sieges too and they're always ready to respond to any threat anywhere in the fortress or outside. It's not perfect, forgotten beasts can ruin your day (if they have nasty syndromes), and your legendary axedwarf can dodge into a pond and forget to get out, so there's still stuff which can go !FUN! but they'll cover your defensive bases much better than any other comparably priced investment could.

[Dampe]

Also, around what time is the new update coming out? If it's anytime soon, I'll probably wait to start this fortress until the update does happen, because I feel like fun things are to come in relation to said fortress, and from what I understand, transferring saves from different versions almost never ends well.

[Skuggen]

It's slated for the beginning of July, but keep in mind that it'll probably be pretty buggy for a while.

I'd suggest playing on the current version, though the new version would probably be suitable for testing out different embark teams.
I tend to give the engraver job to dwarves that I expect to have quite a bit of free time, but have important duties to perform now and again, such as certain nobles and military dwarves (since I rotate them in and out of duty).

A single military dwarf can work for killing pesky animals that are bothering your workers, but otherwise won't be much use until you give them company and decent armor.

I tend to embark with 1 miner, 1 mason, 1 woodworker (though with Masterwork I drop this one, since I only ever use wood for fuel, replaced with stonecrafter), 1 mechanic, 1 cook/brewer/farmer, 1 military/engraver, and the expedition leader that I give a few social skills and otherwise just use for hauling at the start.

[than402]

I am not so sure that is true. I have seen differing thoughts on drinks available range from had a good drink lately to had a truly decadent drink lately and even the wiki seems uncertain as to whether there is a hidden quality level to booze. The other thing is brewing skill does affect brewing speed, so if your brewer is going to do anything else it might be worth putting points into it just in case.

i had several legendary brewers.after a while,the only drinks in the fortress were made from them.if there was a hidden quality,most dwarves would have thoughts about "truly decadent" and "legendary" drinks,like when you have legendary cooks.i might be wrong,but i really believe there is in fact no hidden quality.

that being said,the speed with which they produce the drinks may,indeed,make a few high level brewers worth the effort.

[MrsStick]

My usual embark team only has one skill - one adequate appraiser. I spend the rest of the points on animals, food, and tools. Maybe my next embark (if I can ever get this fort to die) will have other stuff. I need to try less happy embarks anyways...

[Panando]

You don't need appraiser. When a dwarf initiates trades with dwarves, or I believe humans, but *not* elves, he automatically and immediately before the trade window even opens gets a bunch of appraiser experience enough to give him several levels, I noticed my broker became an instant skilled appraiser first caravan latest game, I don't think it's entirely consistent but I haven't paid attention (it might depend on the size of the caravan, hence it might depend on wagons coming to give enough free experience to gain appraiser levels, perhaps that's why it doesn't work with the treehumpers).
Of course, if you think it's a bug (quite possibly it is) then embarking with an appraiser is an honourable thing to do .

[Hellmoob]

Alright, here we go! Obviously all of what I say comes down to personal preference, but I'm quite obsessive about efficiency and efficacy:

Generally speaking, I find you want to pair one skill you'll be using very often (grower, carpenter, mason) with another that you'll use much less frequently (mechanic, building designer, gem setter). This way, dwarves don't have a conflict of interest between their professions; you can plant seeds all season and then occasionally decorate a particularly fine sword. For the same reason, I find that weaponsmith/cook and armoursmith/brewer actually make pretty good combinations: unless your population really gets out of control, you shouldn't need to cook and brew that often.

Woodcutter and miner aren't necessarily worth it as embark skills - they train quickly and the resources for training them are near enough to infinite. The exception is if you're embarking in an area with very little soil (you want to move inside as quickly as possible, so mining skill will be useful).

Doctors are pretty worthless, as noted earlier. By the time you see your first combat, any embark medical skills probably will have rusted, too.

I find that a military dwarf can be a good move at the start, particularly if you're embarking in an area with more aggressive wildlife (nothing worse than embarking on top of a Giant Eagle, who proceeds to rip all your dorfs to pieces). Also, any arriving migrants with military skills can immediately be equipped and set to spar with your existing military dwarf. Option B, as mentioned earlier, is to take two military dorfs and have them start sparring immediately (this is, in my experience, the most efficient set-up that doesn't involve cheating: squads of two dwarves set to train all year round.)

Other than that, I'd avoid woodcrafter since you'll be using that wood for superior enterprises (beds, barrels, bins, burning) and also because you can't trade wood to the elves, and make sure you get a good grower in there: high plant yields + good cook/brewer = lots of lovely dorf-bucks.

Strike the earth (and all that)!