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[pepsi]

Hello fellow players!
After 7 painful years I switched from laptop to PC. With new computing power I decided to create new fort.
I am doing well so far, with one exception: random dudes die in my tavern with no signs of combat.
I didn't care at the beggining, because only visitors died, but now my dwarfs die too.
My assumpions:
- a vampire
- too dank wine
- assassin visitor (?)
0.47.05, thanks for any help!

[Thisfox]

If the corpses are drained of blood, it's a vampire.

If you have hired a tavern keeper (often referred to as a "poisoner") then they might be dying of alcohol poisoning as he pumps even his passed out customers with mugs of alcohol, doing exactly what an RSA tells you not to do.

If you've had a Forgotten Beast yet, it could be a dust or similar syndrome killing them off.

[pepsi]

Yes, as in fact I do have a tavern keeper. Should I leave this position vaccant?
None of the bodies were drained of blood.
I didn't reach any cavern yet so I don't think it is the megabeast problem.
Fun fact: I had to replace tavern keeper, or rather find a new one, since the first one was found dead.

EDIT: On the side note, could it be possible to put "poisoners" to good use?

Using burrows create tavern with only tavern keepers inside.

When the visitor arrives, tavern keepers start "The happiest hour" event.

Claim the belongings and dump the body.

I don't like the bards anyway.

[Thisfox]

While it is possible the Poisoner is taking his job too seriously, I've not heard of one drinking himself into full on death (although I did have one who kept passing out from booze). Generally I find my tavern works just as effectively without anyone to serve the alcohol, though, so diagnostically, not having a tavern keeper might be useful until you can fin the source of the deaths.

Any blood on the floor, walls or furniture? It could be some sort of not-immediately-obvious tavern brawl. You could check the {r}eports on battles. (edit: You said no combat evidence, so I guess it's not that then... Hmmm...)

Oh yeah, and after a hilarious issue I once had with a wild bull moose, drunk dwarf children and a tame turkey, are there any animals in the tavern? They can be surprisingly effective killers. That said, {r}eports will also help rule out killer moose travelling 20z down from the surface to pick fights with the livestock...

[pepsi]

No reported fights.

No blood, bones or skulls flying inside the tavern.

All the animals are locked away.

There is only vomit on the floor, from time to time.

It seems like it is the good old Party Maker's fault.

Thank you for the help. I thought tavern keeper was essential to run it.

[Mobbstar]

I don't trust tavernkeepers who serve sewer brew and gutter cruor.

Jokes aside, I believe tavernkeepers are essential if you want to benefit from the rumours and world updates that come with visitors. Your own dwarves can serve themselves, given nearby goblets and filled barrels.

[PatrikLundell]

Vomit is the sign of a tavern keeper over serving patrons. In most cases, over serving only leads to unconsciousness, vomit, spilled drinks, hauling to the hospital (if you have one) and lung damage (vomit blocking the airways resulting in lung damage). It can take several attempts to cause enough damage to result in death.

It's not possible to make a visitors only tavern: I've done my best to try, but you just can't keep the dorfs out.

It's been said by people who employ poisoners (which involves any performers assigned to the tavern: they serve as much as dedicated tavern keepers, and dedicated tavern keepers perform as much as dedicated performers, which neither performing noticeably more than regular patrons) that reducing the number of tavern keepers help, employing lazy ones probably help as well, and keeping the booze stockpile far away (increasing the time it takes to fetch booze), and reducing the number of goblets (by whatever name) assigned to the tavern (those goblets are used exclusively to serve booze and can't be used for self serving, while the others in the fortress are unavailable for serving booze and only available for self serving).

[Bumber]

While it is possible the Poisoner is taking his job too seriously, I've not heard of one drinking himself into full on death (although I did have one who kept passing out from booze).

I've had one who did.

[Kat]

could always use dfhack and the "deathcause" to see for sure what killed them.

If it's "suffocation", then it's usually alcohol poisoning.

[pepsi]

Using the dfhack i confirmed, the harmful influence of party makers. All of the victims suffocated.

That is including my first tavern keeper. I only had one tavern keeper at a time.
Talk about dedication to the job!

[Bralbaard]

I never appoint tavern keepers anymore. In most of my fortresses they were easily the leading cause of death.

[FantasticDorf]

Its nowhere as bad as it used to be, and controversially i blame it on the dwarf patrons themselves than anybody else.

Immoderation and exictement seeking both amp the % need to drink alcohol as collateral (immoderation also applies to food, so they're very gutsy and sometimes easy to please with mixing favorite boozes into the food), so when a dwarf goes to get a drink for themselves pleasurably in the tavern and still has the need availble, the tavernkeep will run over to them and serve (its about when it reaches 60% depletion, so if drinking doesnt cave in even 40% of that need, they're going to be targeted). Other than that, i barely have a fatality once every so many odd years by carefully reading dwarf personality sheets with a active tavernkeep and fast retrieval to a hospital for anybody not-fatally winded.

So yeah, dish out ASBO's to dwarves who are likely to drink themselves to death literally, to serve their own in a burrow-bar.

[vjek]

Its nowhere as bad as it used to be, and controversially i blame it on the dwarf patrons themselves than anybody else.

Immoderation and exictement seeking both amp the % need to drink alcohol as collateral (immoderation also applies to food, so they're very gutsy and sometimes easy to please with mixing favorite boozes into the food), so when a dwarf goes to get a drink for themselves pleasurably in the tavern and still has the need availble, the tavernkeep will run over to them and serve (its about when it reaches 60% depletion, so if drinking doesnt cave in even 40% of that need, they're going to be targeted). Other than that, i barely have a fatality once every so many odd years by carefully reading dwarf personality sheets with a active tavernkeep and fast retrieval to a hospital for anybody not-fatally winded.

So yeah, dish out ASBO's to dwarves who are likely to drink themselves to death literally, to serve their own in a burrow-bar.

This is a very interesting (and imo, highly relevant) observation, as in the forts where I set unit.status.current_soul.personality.traits.IMMODERATION to 25 or less, globally via dfhack, for all dwarves, I have never seen overdrinking, with or without a tavern keeper.

[Thisfox]

Interesting.

I don't use hack, never seen the need to install it, but have never seen a dwarf die of alcohol poisoning without a poisoner, and I keep a careful eye on random deaths as visiting werebeast fatalities can be unexpected.

[PatrikLundell]

I've heard of dorfs drinking themselves to death without assistance from a poisoner, but never seen it myself. It should be very rare, and just another case of a dorf unfit for survival (like those nowadays relatively few destined for fatal depression regardless of what you do).