Hello to all. I am new on the forums here at Bay12, but I am no stranger to DF.
I must, first and foremost, declare my love of DF, before I then go on to say that, of late, I have been playing the increasingly-popular Gnomoria as an (albeit depressingly, practically story-less simple) alternative to DF for one very simple reason, which forms the main thrust of the question in this post.
I have only the greatest mirth whenever I encounter the vast majority of DF bugs / glitches / unexpected happenings, and no other game boasts the true definition of "fun" that DF has. Without further ado, however, I will explain my absence from playing DF and thereby get down to why I come to these hallowed halls of DF wisdom seeking guidance. Aside from an inability to bake flour into bread, or an intuitive set of keyboard hotkeys, or possibly even a built-in professions manager a la Dwarf Therapist, DF is the undisputed king of complexity, story and immersion, in my opinion. Yet, there is this one small thing which keeps sending me away from my fortresses and is the sole cause of my enjoyment of Gnomoria. However, I was skulking around an IRC chat channel for another game which I enjoy greatly (Minecraft) and, amidst a mutual "DF is great" session within this chat conversation, put forth my one complaint about DF and was told that there were workarounds for it. If this is false hope, I will be devastated, but I could think of no greater place to go than to these very forums for confirmation or denial of what would undoubtedly have me remove every other game from my hard drive and stick to DF for the glory that it is. Herein is the crux of the matter:
In DF, one is utterly unable, it seems, to replace natural stone or soil. This therefore means that the small amount of soil on each map is irreplacable, unrenewable and therefore, in many ways, more valuable than all the gold beneath the earth (which, after all, can be traded for.) Once dug out, only "constructions" can be put there, and soil is never dropped, nor is stone, simply vanishing into the aether... Try as I might, I cannot "generate" earth and so, as battles, redesigns etc. wear on over the years, more and more of the precious surface of the land is churned into useless "constructions" or is outright gone. This applies to natural stone as well. If a single mistake is made when digging out rooms, for example, you are stuck forever with constructed, an thus un-carvable, walls, which look terrible and have lower value. No carvings of plump helmets, no great murals of battles against thieving birds or even of engravers eating cheese - just naff-looking "constructed" walls which, if ever used to fill in a large area, look abysmal, don't behave properly with gravity / cave-ins etc. This means that, over time, a fortress' evolution starts to look utterly awful and many of my fortresses move entirely underground as the eyesore surface world is churned into an unfarmable mass of pits and rises, where projects have been and gone. This is the thing which I was told workarounds existed for. To be able to replace and generate soil, even if expensive or time-consuming, would solve everything. Generating natural stone may be already possible through extremely time-consuming transport of lava and water, perhaps? I was told that a workaround exists to generate the natural layers of stone, though, and I cannot, for the life of me, think how. I even was told that this didn't involve the use of DFHack, which, I was also told, is unable to generate natural stone / soil anyway...
Therefore I come to you, those of greater knowledge than I, to ask how it is that I might do these things. I have played DF on and off for over 6 years and never once have I stumbled across a way to do this. My most beloved fortresses, with long histories and generations of well-loved dwarves, are doomed to look crap as I enlarge, move, change and redesign my fortress. All farming takes place underground from the outset now as it is too depressing to see the amount of above-ground valid terrain dwindle as my experiments in plumbing and trap-making are needlessly permanent.
I thank you in advance for your help. I also apologise if this has been asked before, as I could not find it on the forums or by generic internet search either.
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Topic: Generating soil and stone (Read 10548 times)