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[Inkblot]

So for the longest time, I had a lot of idle dwarves. I was not the most brilliant manager, but I figured that I might as well let them party and drink their lives away. At least they'll make friends, have a good time, and grind social skills.

So all was well and good, random dwarven polls showed that everyone was ecstatic most of the time. Just about everyone was friends with everyone. Then one day, there was a tragic accident which killed 5 dwarves in one fell swoop, I think 2 children and 3 soldiers. It might have killed them while they slept, I'm not sure. Whatever. I also think I lost a couple more shortly afterwards through terrible injuries as a direct result.
So naturally, everyone was depressed. I should think they have every right to be. Tantrums were plentiful, and every so often a dwarf would go crazy or something, but it was a mature fortress and I didn't mind losing a couple of citizens. I thought things would pass.

Things didn't. Slowly, I realized that thanks to the intricate friends network I had unwittingly allowed to form, the suicides as a result of the original accident were causing more tantrums and suicides. At this point, my entire industry had stopped. Very little was being made, and dwarves rioted in the halls freely as the body count slowly but steadily rose. I couldn't even make enough coffins fast enough. My fortress was spiraling out of control. In one afternoon, my population had gone from about 200 to 130. Without some sort of mass sedation, all my dwarves would be victims of their own emotions.
I wasn't willing to let my beloved fortress bleed itself to death, and I figured if I was only going to have a couple odd dwarves in the end I might as well start a new fortress. Truth be told, things hadn't been terribly exciting before this fiasco. I flooded the lower levels with magma and abandoned the unfortunate place.

What could I have done? What do you do when this happens? I will try and keep my dwarves from making too many friends in the future, but surely there is some way to recover the situation. I tried to reopen my statue garden, but the few parties could not distract my poor dwarves from the turmoil for long.

[Hawkfrost]

Welcome to your first tantrum spiral!

Once it stops, you can't stop it, and your screwed unless you have a legendary dining room.

Or just pull the lever.

[Warlord255]

when in doubt, have a series of isolated dwarves with no friends who are delivered food via airlock/drop. Destroy your fortress with The Lever - preferably something you can salvage from, such as a cave-in drop - and start anew at the same site.

[martinuzz]

If there were any sane survivors, I would not have abandoned.
I would make many engravings of dying dwarves.

[Fikes]

I've come close to a trantrum sprial once in my early fortress. A bad raid killed off a handfull of my dwarves and their friends were pretty pissed.

One guy threw a tantrum and destroied the belongings of another. Then that guy got pissed and threw a tantrum.

Fortunitly I had enough jail cells to contain them and the sheriff stepped in pretty quick to elimiate the problem.

That is as bad has it has gotten for me, I think that preventing the tantrum is about the only thing that "justice" is good for.

[Sunday]

Love.  Love will tear us apart.



Apart.

[Vactor]

I personally think the best thing to do in a situation like this is to try to keep the fort alive long enough for migrants, one of my favorite forts was when i had a huge die off the second winter when i ran out of food as the river had frozen right as i was about to irrigate a new farmplot (the old farm was in soil halfway across the map).  I lost almost all of my dwarves to starvation and berserking.  By rationing the food supplies I was able to keep a few select dwarves alive long enough for immigrants to come in the spring.  Now the fort's central spiral staircase is lined with coffins, the dwarves decorate everything with the death of dwarves they never knew, and the new residents live their life blissfully unaffected by the tragedy that happened in their new home. (other than having to clean up all the bodies when they first arrived)

[JoshuaFH]

wow, thats a good story. btw, by "rationing" do you mean "give food to some dwarves, and lock all the rest in a room to die"?

[Foa]

wow, thats a good story. btw, by "rationing" do you mean "give food to some dwarves, and lock all the rest in a room to die"?

Or use the patented "Dwarf DESTROYER Lever"*, it is made with the finest killing mechanisms to ensure a painful death, that destroys all the remains of the dwarf, and sweeps it away in the patented "Hydro-Ejection System" to make sure there is nothing left.

*Needs to have the lever on a level higher than the DOOM LEVEL, so that those pesky Nobles shan't be seen again.**

**We mean use a drop mechanism, they pull it, then they fall, then they die.

[Bromor Neckbeard]

What could I have done?

Well, if you keep a couple of military dwarves stationed off away from everybody else, and provide them separate food stockpiles and dining areas so they don't socialize with the other dwarves, this can keep them from forming attachments as easily.  Other than that, there's not much you can do.

What do you do when this happens?

Curse and kick things across the room, quite frankly.  Oh, you mean in the game?  Well, IF there are any survivors, then they get their pick of the best rooms in the fortress, and get to be the bosses of the new immigrants.  Otherwise I start looking for a new embark area.

[Vactor]

wow, thats a good story. btw, by "rationing" do you mean "give food to some dwarves, and lock all the rest in a room to die"?

pretty much, allowing a handful to eat what little food we had, i didn't lock everyone away to die, since i was trying to get them to all get the old farm restocked and running again, to eek out what little food I could,  (I also had managed to get a couple tiles wet at the new farms, and was trying to farm those too)  I think that ultimately all of them starved though, since it wasn't until after the migrants came that I was able to get the farms up and running.

I guess its the price I pay for not wanting unsightly old unused farms cluttering up my fortress area and only digging into the soil well away from my fort.

[Time Kitten]

I've not gotten a tantrum spiral yet, but just in case I leave a forbidden exceptional meal and good booze in every dwarf's room, hopping that syrup roasts and royal quarters are enough to return my peasants to enough happiness to be let into the multi-legendary dining room.

So I just wait, lock them in, and... LOL, who am I kidding, I'll assign them all masterwork obsidian swords and no armour.

[Walliard]

Otherwise I start looking for a new embark area.

Alternately, try Reclaim Mode.

[Jude]

If I ever do get a tantrum spiral I'm going to let it play out until things stabilize or everyone's dead.

[Shoruke]

I want to see a movie of the most gawdawful tantrum spiral ever. It would please my sadistic side.