Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Sparks]

Whats the largest area you've ever started with? I know most people like to go with as small as possible for FPS reasons, but I'm on a reasonably decent computer, so I haven't encountered any problems.

Once just for the heck of it, I designated the whole local screen and embarked, was the first time I'd ever seen any appreciable lag, and that was just with seven dwarves standing round the wagon

[Derakon]

I tried embarking onto a region that was over 50 z-levels tall once. Let's just say that that place got abandoned pretty quickly.

[Asehujiko]

I found a 16x16 area with about 130 acessible z levels counting air. With 2 fps peak.

My cpu still hates me for that.

[puke]

yeah, when the 3d version first came out, i was all over the "maximum sized" areas.  I would even try to find ones with cliffs and deep river valleys.

once that initial infatuation with masochism wore off, i keep it down to 2x2 or 3x3 or 2x5 kinds of areas, depending on what kind of terrain i want to build on.  really, a fort that fills more than 2x2 is wasting a lot of space on hauling distance.

the only reason to go for larger areas, i think, is to have better luck with mineral prospecting.  but the more z-area you excevate, the more you compound your lag issues.  my computer is pretty butch, but when the dwarfs get numerous and the clutter piles up, that frame rate starts to drag.  might as well keep it as efficient as possible.

[Joseph Miles]

Mine is 9x9 I only started that big because I wanted the magma, chasm, river, hidden stuff, the other chasm, and other river,, more magma, more chasms, and so forth. I used prospector for it.

[Andir]

Can you see the height before embarking?  I honestly never looked :p

[Lord Dullard]

Can you see the height before embarking?  I honestly never looked :p

You can't see a Z-level representation of height, or anything that specific. But you can press 'tab' to see different views of the embark area. One shows cliff height levels, and another is relative elevation, so you can generally get a pretty good idea from there.

[Andir]

Can you see the height before embarking?  I honestly never looked :p

You can't see a Z-level representation of height, or anything that specific. But you can press 'tab' to see different views of the embark area. One shows cliff height levels, and another is relative elevation, so you can generally get a pretty good idea from there.

I knew about the difference map as that's how I find cliff areas, but I didn't look to see if there was a number of levels field somewhere.

[Doppel]

Never larger then 5x5, wich is way to large for my computer anyways, but i suspect the "biggest map" (counting vertically) was when i embarking on a mountain top (the actual mountain top itself), can't remember how high it was, but it wouldn't surprise me if it was 70 z levels or above. (think it was 3x2)
I so need a new computer. (cause i would love to built myself such a tall fortress)

[Kagus]

I tried a 16x16 area once, as a mod test (I was looking for animals).  The lag actually wasn't that bad, and there was a river going through the whole thing.

It was actually quite fun while it lasted.  I never made a fort there, since I found what I was looking for and had no more reason to stick around.

[RPharazon]

Never bigger than 3x3 or 2x4.
I usually keep it at 2x2 though.

[Zerox]

My computer barely lags at all! I went to a 6x5 area, had 90 dwarves, and still ran fine! And My friend runs at freaking ninja speed, so fast the dwarves all seem perfectly agile!

(I'll give a really big area a shot next, just to see.)

[Frobozz]

I generally play with 4x4 or 5x5 areas, but I also prefer flat areas over mountainous regions. If and when I get a decent processor I might try for a mountain area.

[Dareon Clearwater]

I generally play on 5x5 or smaller, but one time early on I tried a 16x4 in an attempt to bridge/tunnel under a section of ocean (To reach an offshore island.  Lucky generation.).  I didn't know how to deal with aquifers yet, and was a bit put off when eight separate test delves hit water.