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[Col_Jessep]

I'm still playing .15 because I want to learn how to deal with extreme stress levels. One of the kids has been extremely stressed and unhappy for quite a while now. I can't pinpoint a reason for the life of me. There were only positive thoughts except for being ashamed about starting fist fights and whatnot. The kid has destroyed workshops, startet fist fights and now it has bashed the expedition leader's head in. It was inevitable.

I have convicted the little stinker of more than half a dozen crimes but my sheriff won't lift a finger. So I appointed my strongest military dwarf as hammerer and forged an iron war hammer (no silver). As I had already feared, he did nothing.

Now the little shit it attending a meeting with the freshly promoted expedition leader. The red, flashing arrow tells me all I need to know about how that's going to turn out in the long run. There will be more blood.

What's the best way to get rid of this little murderer? He has caused more pain and trouble than most forgotten beasts or invaders.

[Loam]

Give him a room of his own and lock the door when he goes in, maybe? I think kids are immune to ordinary justice.

I also have a child who won't stop being stressed despite having no negative thoughts listed. It's been at least two seasons since his last "sad" thought but he still won't cheer up.

[Col_Jessep]

Aww, and I don't have access to magma yet!
Thanks, I'll have my miners make a "special" room. =D

[Col_Jessep]

So, that's taken care of. Of course now I have 3 more kids with red arrows standing in my meeting hall. They attended the party that was going on while their "friend" murdered the expedition leader.

But there is still room in the mineshafts. I'll order more beds, doors and blocks... *sigh*

[Larix]

So, that's taken care of. Of course now I have 3 more kids with red arrows standing in my meeting hall. They attended the party that was going on while their "friend" murdered the expedition leader.

But there is still room in the mineshafts. I'll order more beds, doors and blocks... *sigh*

There's a reason versions .40.16 to .18 came out so quickly. If you have any influx of unhappiness in 40.15, the fort will enter an eternal slow-burn tantrum spiral after a year or so. Everyone who makes it to the red arrow will keep it for the rest of their life, there's nothing to handle but the constant damage and burials; it will never get better. It probably qualifies as some type of "handling stress", but i consider it dangerously sadomasochistic.

BTW: Re: can't justicemurder a child - yeah, what's going on here? Dwarven civs having basic standards of legality? Heresy!

[Codyo]

I think children are not subject to justice until they're adults.
Gotta give them your own custom juvie system .

In the version you're using, I had to designate a burrow for all children to tantrum and be stressed in. Annoyingly enough, they all stopped attacking dwarves once they were in there. Maybe they only attack adults when mad. Brats.

I had a particular child that pulped the heads of three dwarves and he couldn't be jailed until he came of age. Fortunately, there was a problem with my feeding and watering system when it came to jail and he died of thirst in there.

[Col_Jessep]

standards of legality? Heresy!

The best part is that all crimes were meticulously reported with several witnesses - only the murder wasn't!

I'm specifically playing .15 because I want to learn to deal with a fort that's on the brink of tearing itself apart. It's a test for the justice system and what I can do to avoid stress factors. Once my !!science!! is done I'll tap the brook and flood the place.

[draeath]

I vote you put them in a danger room. With metal weapons.

Either that, or drop them into the cavern lake. If they don't drown, they get to be productive in warning you about FB positions and such.

[Col_Jessep]

No worries, I'm working on it. The solution is very promising so far and requires very few resources! =3

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

All the dwarfs had the line "Doesn't handle stress well" in their description. I think that's probably the reason they simply can't recover. I'll see if I can turn one of them around with an extremely nice bedroom. If not - there is still room in the mine...

[CaptainLambcake]

i wouldn't murder the poor guys, just keep them behind a draw bridge or something, drop food in.

[Col_Jessep]

I'm keeping one of them around, a bone carver. He got a royal bedroom, light duty and I'll try to get him to craft a masterwork. I'll let him chill for half a year and if that doesn't help he goes on the long voyage... ;P

[smeeprocket]

The problem with learning to handle stress and tantrum spirals through 40.15 is that there's no real way to overcome it.

Like, way back when I previously played, I survived a number of tantrum spirals, most involving starvation and dehydration, and that felt like I got a better grasp on those things from that. But you don't get a benefit if you handle it in a way that would normally mitigate the problem. It just stays bad.

[Col_Jessep]

The kid was the only tantrum I had. He has a couple of modifiers in his personality that simply didn't allow him to recover from the stress at all. The other stressed dwarfs were perfectly stable on a day to day basis. I assume that has something to do with the bedroom design I'm using from Quickfort:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

http://i.imgur.com/u64b28O.png

With a nice dining hall and a couple of statues to look at they stay stressed but don't fall into melancholy or go berserk. Only they never get rid of the stress and can't become happy or ecstatic. I always try to have at least 80% of my dwarfs ecstatic in peacetimes. It makes tantrum spirals after accidents or sieges unlikely. But if you ruin my statistic you get a bedroom in the mines behind a wall, legendary bone carver or not!

I wish we could just exile them but I don't want another incident like with my expedition leader/bookkeeper/broker. I certainly don't want a steel-armored legendary axedwarf to go berserk in the great hall!

The needs of the many... 

[Larix]

With the emotions re-write, "happy" and "ecstatic" are no longer a thing.

Once again, in revisions before .40.17, stress will not recede in a notable way. At all. You'd have to keep a dwarf safe from even the slightest unhappy thought like "caught in the rain" for decades to get a measurable stress reduction: stress is not removed by having happy thoughts, it's removed by a long-term lack of further stressors. If you expect a dwarf to become less stressed in half a year, the only way to achieve this is to upgrade to a newer version.

"Stressed" is just the generic unhappiness marker and will _not_ result in serious problems. I've only seen tantrums (or other types of episodic insanity) from dwarfs who were "haggard" or "haunted". The worst thing stressed dwarfs do is occupy your mayor with meetings.

[smeeprocket]

until dfhack and dwarf therapist are available for 40.18, I just set my dwarves to max happy via dfhack whenever I start seeing red arrows. I hate overriding what could be legitimate stress, but once they get they way, there's no fixing it at all.

My fortresses that have lasted a good while like that have been littered with dwarves stumbling in and out of obliviousness and depression and wandering around being utterly useless with nothing to differentiate them on the jobs list. That's if they don't start having tantroms and killing people. It's one thing if they kill the animals, (unless they are exotic, then they pay,) I can replace those and the ones that are pets are a nuisance. But when they start injuring and killing other dwarves... the worst is when they keep fighting while in the infirmary.]

I haven't yet walled any dwarves off to die yet. I hate having dwarves starve or dehydrate. I just went with what the game handed me, but it was getting ridiculous.