I want to know how you people manage your dorf's needs, ranging from extreme solutions, such as intensive micromanagement, to fairly simple fort design choices and clever manipulation of rooms/zones. I'm a dirty cheater so clever hacking suggestions are also welcome, as long as they don't completely overhaul the needs/stress system, but somewhat balance it to be more bearable.
I'll explain what I usually do.
The first two preliminary measures I take are:
* Use Dwarf Therapist for setting specific labors for needy dwarves and for the needs tab so I don't need to spend a whole hour looking at each dwarf's thoughts
* Give every single dorf a human nickname (player human, not in game human), so I can more easily recognize them and if they're male or female, etc. To make it easier to recognize those nicknamed urists in other, in game contexts I repeat their given name. For example,
Lorbam Lūktosid becomes
'Peter Lorbam' Lūktosid. Having a familiar name on them makes it easier to recognize and remember their other aspects. This is more feasible for small forts, but you can use online random name generators to help with large populations. Plus, it's fun, at least for me.
Now, for the specific needs:
* Socialize
Not much to do here. As long as they have some free time they will interact with other dwarves and satisfy this need. Never had a problem with this one.
* Drink Alcohol
No real trouble here, just don't let your booze run out. However, this need is the bane of necromancers and vampires: they will not naturally seek to drink alcohol due to their need, and unless served by a tavernkeeper will never drink. There should probably be a trigger to drink alcohol due to need rather than thirst only, but that's just my opinion. Also affects goblin citizens, if you happen to get one.
* Pray/Meditate
This is bad. Building/designating temples is perfectly fine, and everything runs smoothly until you run into bug
9324. You have to undesignate the temple that the dwarf is stuck in until it goes to the right one, then reopen it. This process is made easier by assigning temples from tables instead of the zone menu: tables can be quickly made into (r)ooms and (f)reed when necessary, and can also be renamed with ctrl+n so you always remember which temple goes where.
The worst part is that this happens to generic temples as well, but to a lesser extent: polytheists will not automatically switch deities unless they leave the temple, such as to eat/drink/sleep.
To fix this permanently, I use gui/gm-editor and navigate to status>current_soul>personality>needs and remove all but one of the worship needs, normally leaving the higher one.
* Stay Occupied
Only a problem if I leave the dwarves idling for too long, which is unusual. When using the 'Craft Object' method, this gets taken care of as well.
* Be Creative
Troublesome if I have haul slaves and other dwarves doing non creative labors. The method described in 'Craft Object' works for this as well.
* Excitement
This is a hassle: you have to expose your dwarves to danger, or have them mercilessly kill the local wildlife. Usually all my fort members except the woodcutter/miner are part of the militia, and I don't use marksdwarves, so I capture something and lock it behind some fortifications in a secluded room, then, when needed, I order everyone to attack it, and cancel the order shortly afterwards.
[EDIT]: Dancing in the tavern will also excite your dwarves and satisfy this need.
Excitement is usually a level 1 need so I have to do it only twice a year or so, and only if I'm that determined to not get any bad thoughts from it.
* Learn something
This is very circumstantial: dwarves that are actively practicing skills will naturally have this fulfilled, and those that don't do anything that raise a skill will have to find another way, such as reading books. For me, the best way to ensure everyone is learning stuff is to send them all to a screwpump academy every now and then and let them gain a level. This is kind of a hassle and better saved for when half the fort is getting bad thoughts from it.
* Be with family
If the dwarf is married or have siblings this will autofulfill as long as they and their family members have some free time. Some dwarves don't have families and aren't even interested in marriage, which sucks and there's not much that can be done in this case, safe from hacking their orientation_flags (not just the unit's, the histfig's as well). Family succession forts have no problem with this after all the first single dorfs die: afterwards everybody will either be married or have a lot of siblings.
* Be with friends
Really fiddly to set up but can be done with a lot of initial micromanagement: burrow together dwarves that I want to be friends and let them socialize. I have found success with groups of 4 and 5, but sometimes letting the whole population mingle in a single tavern/meeting hall works. Doesn't work for dwarves that have very low love propensity: they won't ever form friendships, even if they have the need to. (fixed in 47.05, now dwarves with low LOVE_PROPENSITY can form friendships)
* Hear eloquence
Satisfied easily at a tavern when someone (even the one with the need) decides to recite poetry. I don't know if a music with singers works as well, but I'm guessing not. Almost no dwarf has this need anyway, so it doesn't usually cause much trouble.
* Uphold tradition
Doesn't usually show up on dwarves, but when it does it requires a tavern and free time. Eventually the dwarf will perform something and the need will be fulfilled.
* Self-Examination
Never had problems with this, but you need a library and books. Whenever they get this need, dwarves will simply read something, even if they had already read it. It also almost never shows up.
* Make merry
Pretty much anything in a tavern, including telling and listening to stories. Just designate some space to be a tavern and let them tell each other about some random elf that tamed unicorns in the Jungles of Pregnancy or whatever.
* Craft object
This takes some planning of the fort. First, I build near the main hall several compact Z levels connected to each other and make a lot of workshops: ONE FOR EACH dwarf that hasn't a crafting related labor. It can be any layout, but I prefer this one due to its efficiency.
The workshops can be for bone carving, masonry, carpentry, whatever. Then I carefully set the workshops' (P)rofiles so every dwarf has one exclusive to them. Depending on the workshop, I set labor restrictions so only the specific craft I want is allowed. Once or twice every season, I just have to use the manager to queue products from this specific workshop, the quantity being the total of workshops.
For example: I have 40 non crafter dwarves and each of them has a specific craftsdwarf workshop for them, set to only accept bone carving orders. Every once in a while I queue 40 bone rings/amulets/totems and let them indulge in their craft. Obviously, I enable bonecarving for all of them first.
Sometimes I do this to the mason, carpenter, metalsmith, clothier, etc. if they aren't working enough, just gotta make sure to keep the count of how many workshops there are for this purpose, to queue the right amount of objects.
A lot of dwarves will have moods relating to the craft you're using for this, so something useful like weaponsmithing may be worthwile. My favorite is using clothesmaking: it's hilarious when they make artifact socks.
* Martial training
Either put your entire fort in the militia and let them train or give up on this.
Some pointers for militia forts, according to my experience and knowledge:
- Don't assign miners, woodcutters or hunters to the militia, as their equipment conflict. If you want to, temporarily add them and disable those labors, but you'll have to remove them from militia once you need their services.
- For strong dwarves: assign them a full set of metal armor (helm, chain mail, chain leggings, gauntlets and high boots) with the Replace Clothing enabled, and they'll never need to replace clothes again. Make sure one part of their armor is above average quality so they get the Be extravagant need as well.
- For weak dwarves: assign them only a single metal helmet as armor, and assign clothing to the rest of their slots, or they'll become very slow. As they train, they'll quickly become stronger and soon will be able to wear full metal armor. (about 1200 strength required for steel armor, 1000 for bronze and most others).
- Remember to cycle through active and inactive schedules. I find this easier to do manually.
- Putting all your nobles in the same squad is useful so you can always know which squad to set to inactive when you need them, and which to not send to fight dangerous foes. At least remember where the manager is, for your convenience.
* Practice skill
Very easy to keep in check, especially while using use the 'Craft Object' method.
* Take it easy
Very micromanagey if your fort is busy. Deactivate all labors and let them chill for a while. Seems to work best if you have a tavern or temple, but I might be wrong.
[EDIT]: Seems like doing anything in a tavern satisfies this.
* Make romance
Another one that massively sucks, but thankfully doesn't usually show up in dwarves. Interacting with a lover or spouse will satisfy this, but if the dwarf doesn't have one, there's nothing you can do other than try to set them up with someone. Sometimes it can be even worse: the dwarf CAN'T have a lover/spouse due to being asexual or not developing positive feelings (love propensity low, same with Being with friends).
* See animal
Even more trivial than Drink alcohol. Until the time of writing this I had completely forgotten about this need. I have cats pastured all over my fort in areas where vermin can eat stuff, so every dwarf sees animals when they go to eat or for a drink.
* See great beast
No idea what this even is. I don't think I ever got a dwarf with this need. It requires holding nature in high regard to show up, in addition to seek excitement, so it's very rare. The wiki suggests it's the same as See animal but for creatures with [LARGE_ROAMING], so capturing some giant trainable beast such as a Draltha and setting this odd dwarf to train it should do the trick.
* Acquire object
It'll get automatically fulfilled when picking up new clothes or hauling stuff such as bracelets, rings and amulets.
This needs some micromanagement to keep fulfilled all the time. Some solutions:
-While using the 'Craft object' method, produce trinkets such as rings or amulets, then have the only stockpiles that accept the produced goods be a large space with no bins allowed. This should make almost all the dwarves haul their produced goods and eventually pick some up.
-Make three equal stockpiles linked to each other as to form a triangle and set all but one to take from links only, then feed the only that takes from anywhere some acquirable goods of high quality, and let the needy dwarves drag them around until they pick some up. Micromanaging labors may be required. Some jerks will pick up every single thing they touch and leave nothing for the rest, though. Also, for some reason there are dwarves who won't ever pick anything up, even if they have the need to. Maybe it's related to their preferences, but I can't figure it out.
* Eat good meal
Seriously, screw this need. They have to eat food prepared with something they like to consume, and they pick the most absurd things to like. It's easiest to cook alcohol they like by setting up which stockpiles give to the kitchen, and have one of them give a solid food and the rest give different types of alcohol. Seeing who likes what is very micromanagey, and so is preparing all kinds of booze, so I don't even bother. This is one of the things that frustrates me the most in the current version, and I just gave up and set a script that runs on repeat every month fulfilling this specific need. Sometimes I don't want to cheat and just let them bear with the negative thought forever.
This has been fixed in version 47.05: now high quality meals also satisfy this need, thankfully.
* Fight
I either use the militia fort method of the 'Excitement' need or let loose in my fort some weak annoying pests like kea and watch the mayhem happen. Drunken brawls work too, but I don't bother with tavernkeepers to avoid dwarves drinking themselves to death.
* Cause trouble AND Argue
I treat them as the same, because arguments happen all the time when dwarves are idling and fulfill both. Very trivial.
* Be extravagant
One of the easiest. If the dwarf is wearing anything (armor, clothing, trinket) with any quality modifier, this need will be permanently fulfilled.
* Wander
Fairly easy. I make all dwarves with this need be plant gatherers, and tell them to pick some stuff when they get needy. You don't even have to go outside if your embark has plenty of soil: just dig out a REALLY large room on the soil layer after breaching the second caverns. Or just gather stuff in the caverns. Tip: lock the plant gathering area when not in use to optimize pathfinding and save FPS.
* Help somebody
Animals are the easy solution to this. I lock a bunch of grazers in a cage, and set the dwarves with this need to have the animal care labor enabled. When the animals get hungry, the animal caretakers will feed them and fulfill the need, though it may take a while and some micromanagement to make sure everyone gets a turn at feeding the animals. Keep in mind that grazers will need plants or fruits. Or vermin, amazingly. I just recently had some dwarves give all my cave spiders to the animals I had caged.
[EDIT]: if you leave dwarves in sight of an aggressive creature (such as a reacher), a conflict will initiate, and many dwarves who know the one who got in conflict will join the fight to help them, and will fulfill this need. They'll get negative thoughts, though.
* Think abstractly
Having a library with books seems to be enough for this. Scholars always have this fulfilled as they discuss/ponder their topics, so setting everyone to be a scholar for a few days per year can help in extreme cases.
* Admire art
Absurdly easy to have fulfilled. Being near any built piece of furniture with a quality modifier will satisfy this.
Some caveats:
- Scholars must be released from their position to effectively do stuff you tell them to. You can give them a custom profession name to make it easier to reassign their scholarship.
- Even when inactive, military dwarves will perform combat drill over a lot of other stuff. Removing the barrack designation will fix this.
- Some greedy dwarves will 'acquire' so much stuff that it'll slow them down if they are weak. One solution is to set them to a squad with regular clothes as the uniform, with Replace clothing turned on. Do this when they are close to their room, so they don't spend the rest of the month putting their junk away.
- When dwarves gain children or siblings, their love propensity will usually go up, allowing them to form friendships more often, and the children with siblings will more easily form a romantic relationship later in life. This also makes positive thoughts stronger, due to changing some other personality traits. So forts with lots of married couples/families will have an easier time dealing with stress, assuming something catastrophic doesn't happen to the ones they love.
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Topic: Strategies on dealing with NEEDS (Read 5364 times)