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[Fleeting Frames]

it's doable, but bizarre, like, if you make a 1x1 tunnel can that keep giants out?

That sounds like an intended consequence, though, right? If you duck into a little hole, a huge monster shouldn't be able to follow you...
I think you'd need to introduce this alongside destructable terrain, though. If you ducked into a little hole, a huge monster would probably try to make it bigger.

And I suppose the flip side would have to be that digging 1x1 tunnels would also prevent the passage of certain things you want into your fortress. Kinda like wagons, but more generalized. Not sure what those would be though.

Depends on the monster, I guess. If a mouse ducks into hole, I'm more likely to seal the hole up rather than demolish a wall; however a hunting dog would dig in and outside I might attempt to induce a cave-in.

Knowing the players, dragons for instance. I don't remember seeing any players wanting to kill them in fort mode, with the death of a single dragon being greater tragedy than 100 dwarves.

[Fogsight]

I've started several fortresses in the past with aquifers, purposefully, trying to tame them conventionally, and found it nearly impossible to do so when faced with multilevel ones. Amount of cancelled jobs even when kept trivial water levels by a dozen of pumps was tiresome, deadly work accidents, etc.

Are there any plans to revamp handling of aquifers?

Also possibility to make some man dwarf made floors collect water same way how "murky pool" works. (when you don't want to use aquifers and have no rivers nor natural pools around)

And is there any mod that makes that last thing possible, meanwhile?

Thank you.

[Rockphed]

I've started several fortresses in the past with aquifers, purposefully, trying to tame them conventionally, and found it nearly impossible to do so when faced with multilevel ones. Amount of cancelled jobs even when kept trivial water levels by a dozen of pumps was tiresome, deadly work accidents, etc.

Are there any plans to revamp handling of aquifers?

Also possibility to make some man dwarf made floors collect water same way how "murky pool" works. (when you don't want to use aquifers and have no rivers nor natural pools around)

And is there any mod that makes that last thing possible, meanwhile?

Thank you.

In general, answers to "any plans for X" questions will be answered with either a "no" or a "sounds good, but no timeline".  If you have an idea for what you want, like your second question, then a suggestion thread over in the suggestion forum is much more likely to get proper attention than this thread.  Toady tries to at least skim every suggestion thread (because you never know where a gem will pop up), but he frequently misses questions in these threads.

If you don't have any natural pools or rivers, your best bet is to dig down to the caverns.  You can usually find water on one of them.  Usually.

If you are just looking to add some water to an otherwise barren map, your best bet might be some dwarfhack program.  The last one I used was 5 years ago, but it let me add either magma or water to a tile.  I imagine that more recent forays can still do that.

[FantasticDorf]

If you are just looking to add some water to an otherwise barren map, your best bet might be some dwarfhack program.  The last one I used was 5 years ago, but it let me add either magma or water to a tile.  I imagine that more recent forays can still do that.

To shill it a little bit. By the current development of the game now in modding, there are already functional endless 'wells' of water and lava (naturally expensive to create within that mod) that drop their contents below them or in a trap above them via dfhack generation.

[PatrikLundell]

@Fogsight: There are a number of reliable aquifer piercing methods available. Off the top of my head:
- The double-slit (documented on the wiki)
- Portable Drain based piercing
- Cave-in based piercing
- Freezing biome piercing (turning the water into ice that can be mined through).

The first two suffer from tiresome job cancellations, but I've never had any accidents when performed properly. Even if the pumping dorf in a double slit stops pumping the builder below has always gotten out.
The third one requires you to know/guess the aquifer depth. It also requires enough head room above the aquifer to allow you to dig out the rings properly, and if you want to be protected from menaces on the surface you need an additional level.
The fourth one requires a freezing biome and exposure to the sky, which might not be ideal with undead fliers around...

[Fogsight]

@Rockphed. Thanks, I'll try to come up with a reasonable aquifers solution for the suggestion thread.

@PatrikLundell. Yea, that's why I said "conventional", those methods are quite specific, with many limitations. And one mistake can ruin the whole thing.

Having a sustainable fortress is much more fun, and also being able to re-engineer/rebuild anything without fear of loosing object's pristine state irreversibly.

[therahedwig]

I think there has been acknowledgement that current aquifers are awkward and that it is actually pretty impressive players can pierce them to begin with.

Here, I made an aquifer suggestion thread for your aquifer suggesting needs.

[FantasticDorf]

A handful of questions about armies in relation to settlements toady. I apologise if I've jumped ahead with the assumption players could in future arcs lead armies but this is pretty bread and butter questions in general.

Question 1 - If you are personally in charge of a army in adventure mode (or some kind of abstract fortress mode) will the player have any say in how a battle's victorious result is handled or will it be pre-determined? Such as determining a slaughter of the inhabitants in order to move in your own entity (typically building on top) or integrating them with a forced administrator (alternatively just pillaging/razing the place and running back home) with some small details of additional policy.

Question 2 - Will in the future more flexibility be given to adventure (in leading/being part of army) or fortress mode players in wiping out non major settlements off the map entirely (such as goblins destroying hillocks/hamlets to burnt smears and smashed houses the player can embark on freely with the space unoccupied but leaving the market bearing fortresses in reclaimable ruins) such is the case you might want to force the goblins to retreat to their towers to cut down their max population and huddle them all up for a final killing blow to take the citadel.

Question 3 - Are there any plans for adventurers to commit to their own hearth loyalties (ground up little kingdom respected as a minor independent model of the parent civilisation for simplicity) or have any function to forcibly (or be coerced into it) join opposing/alternative hearths (such as a knowledgable flip from dwarf civ to goblin civ in line with betraying your race etc) even if its functioning as a sell-sword for getting caught up in foreign conflicts rather than a blood-pact or anything requiring solid commitment.

Final question - Will goblins (and anyone else) ever be able to realise and fulfill their dreams on ruling the world.

[Fogsight]

Here's one vision of the Future of the Fortress - combining two modes:

"Possessing" any character in the world, roaming the world. Controlling from single entity, to warbands, to cities/forts, to civilizations. Settling in any spot you like, capturing anything you like or imposing your rule by making them puppet states.

There was a talk about possible dwarf AI automation and self-reliance - this would be just the next step.

[DG]

Lime green is usually reserved for questions. But yeah, that would be cool.

[Afghani84]

Thanks for all the great work, Tarn!

I'm curious to know whether there are any plans to create a "race survival" option in fortress mode. What I mean by that: right now you can only select fortress mode if a dwarven civ is still around. It would be great to have the option to play as the last hope of dwarven kind after all other dwarves were wiped out by world generation. I think it would make for great stories!

In a similar vein, it would be great to (at some point in the future) be able to choose the number of starting dwarves. Any plans for that?

[Random_Dragon]

Thanks for all the great work, Tarn!

I'm curious to know whether there are any plans to create a "race survival" option in fortress mode. What I mean by that: right now you can only select fortress mode if a dwarven civ is still around. It would be great to have the option to play as the last hope of dwarven kind after all other dwarves were wiped out by world generation. I think it would make for great stories!

In a similar vein, it would be great to (at some point in the future) be able to choose the number of starting dwarves. Any plans for that?

Right now this is largely hindered by the other civilizations all missing SOMETHING they'd need to be playable, which is the subject of several mods. For one, all of them are lacking basic positions you'd be able to assign in fortress mode. Other than that, humans are playable as-is, goblins lack any of their normal animals besides trolls, elves are royally FUBAR (modding in grown wood is not yet doable), and kobolds are fucked over by not having CAN_SPEAK (this makes them count as pets, not citizens).

[burned]

I'm curious to know whether there are any plans to create a "race survival" option in fortress mode. What I mean by that: right now you can only select fortress mode if a dwarven civ is still around. It would be great to have the option to play as the last hope of dwarven kind after all other dwarves were wiped out by world generation. I think it would make for great stories!

You can already do what you just described.

Pictured below is the message you get when you select Fortress Mode with all dwarven civs dead.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Note: This world has zero dwarves left in the world.

In a similar vein, it would be great to (at some point in the future) be able to choose the number of starting dwarves. Any plans for that?

Yes, check out the "Fortress Starting Scenarios" notes on the dev page.


Ignore Random_Dragon. He normally takes five seconds to read the question(s), but he keeps spending that five seconds on adding giant desert scorpions. ;]

[Random_Dragon]

EDIT: Okay yeah, turns out you said nothing about playing on-dwarves. Doh.

[PatrikLundell]

@Afghani84: You can already play a dead civ. It's fairly difficult to achieve, at least consistently, as in most cases you get a struggling civ instead. I believe vjek has some dead civs up the sleeve in the world gen cookbook thread (and I'm playing one right now).
A dead civ has the following characteristics:
- You get your 7 starting dwarves, plus two waves of migrants. That's it (not counting recruited visitors and gremlins).
- Your civ won't send caravans or a liaison.
- You won't get a monarch, nor any civ appointed nobles, but you will get a mayor when the pop has increased enough.
- You won't get insulted by the pointy ears demanding you to stop removing the unsightly starvation inducing trees (the noble they need to meet is never appointed). However, human and elven caravans behave normally otherwise.
- There can occasionally exist other dwarves in the world, but normally they're hostile necromancers. I haven't encountered a case where any dwarves were members of other civs, but it might be possible.

The only know sure sign of a civ being truly dead is to embark, look at the 'c'iv screen and find it completely empty (normally you start with the dwarven civ there). No dwarf in existence for 1000 years is NOT a sufficient criterion.

Unfortunately, burned is misinformed. The message is the same both for a truly dead civ and for a "struggling" one. A struggling civ provides a caravan and a liaison, and you're likely to be saddled with an emergency monarch selection early on. You'll also get an unlimited number of migrant waves.