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[warhammer651]

so i'm pretty new to dwarf fortress and something.... odd happened. as the migrants were passing a pool of water, about half of them were "struck down". Intrigued, i used k to look around, but the only thing in the pool was carp.

What killed most of the migrants?

[Sphalerite]

Carp.  Carp are dwarf-murdering monsters from hell.  Avoid them.

[warhammer651]

so.... no fishing on this map?

[moki]

Quote from the wiki:

If you are new to DF, then there is only one thing to do if you come across a river full of carp and you don't want your dwarves to die... Run. Run and never look back.

The word "carp" is an acceptable substitute for "crap" on these forums

No, no fishing before you get rid of the carp. Just try to avoid the river, disable fishing for everyone and be sure to always have enough booze, so nobody tries to drink from the river.
If your fort should survive a few more years, try training some crossbowdwarves. They can engage the carp with relatively little danger of falling into the river.
When all the carp are dead, you can fish as much as you want. They won't ever come back. Search the wiki for "fishing".

[Quietust]

Rivers full of carp are dangerous, but ponds full of carp are downright deadly. Carp don't like fighting, so they prefer to swim away - in a river, this is certainly possible (unless you catch them at the wrong angle, of course), but in a pond they have nowhere to go. Everyone knows that a cornered animal is dangerous, and, in Dwarf Fortress, carp are a perfect example of this.

[evanvolker]

Make sure your markdwarfs are not set to chase enemies.

[darkflagrance]

Once I lost my seven dwarves to a river full of carp and immediately reclaimed. The game gave me 70 dwarves. It turned out that even they weren't enough.

Do not underestimate these foul riparian beasts!

[Deon]

There won't be enough even 1000 dwarves if they can't swim and dodge in the water .

[Fredd]

Before the carp problem is alleviated, also make sure that you Activate any hunters or rangers that migrate to the area. They have a tendency to try to beat carps with their crossbows.
 Wall around a few safe pools, for your fisher dwarfs, for times when you are not expecting liasons, or caravans. The pools filled them nasty boogers, can be utilized later for dwarf fish traps. Dig out a large area near the pools, with a floodgate to control water entry from the pool.Connect the floodgate area above ground with channeling, then once the floodgate is connected to a lever, pull it to drain the carp pool. Adding a tunnel from the drained pool, to the river,with another floodgate, can add fresh meat,bones, and leather to your inventory. Then send out the marksdwarves to finish off the rest of the finny monsters

[monk12]

I lost my first fortress to carp.

They killed a hunter who was walking around. Then they killed the peasant who came to claim his garb. Then they gravely wounded the next peasant. At this point I'd finally figured out what was happening, so I made their items forbidden and cut my losses.

Except that I hadn't dug a well yet. Dorfs kept coming to the river for water to treat the injured peasant and ended up dying or getting seriously hurt, which in turn caused more dorfs to get more water and... you see where this is going. I didn't figure out zones until far too late, and the resultant tantrum spiral caused my dorfs do descend to a level of barbarism that played out much like Bioshock under the Mountain.

So I guess the lessons to pull away from there are build wells and flee the terrifying carp.

[Randomonioum]

I remember this one carp, that had killed over 100 dwarves, by sitting in a pond and eating them while they passed to get their +pig tail sock+. It got to the point where I was sending out my whole army, only to have them pulled in and drowned. In retrospect, my mistake was not using crossbow dwarves, but still. In the end, I decided to boot up the companion, overpower a dwarf, give him 100 swimming, strip him, throw him in, and let them do battle. THAT is the only way to injure a carp.

[silhouette]

But what about blocking them in obsidian?

[warhammer651]

man, this place is going to be absolute torture for anyone to get to.


let me paint a picture for you:

The area is pretty flat, with a mountain in the northern part. to the south is a massive swampy area covering the entire southern half. there is a river to the east, and more fricking swamps to the west. most of the pools of water aren't too big, but the space between them is about two squares wide. every pool has carp.

3 migrant waves so far. I WOULD be at over 100 dwarves by now if the RNG didn't pick off every other one.

oh, and the name of the fortress: Tatlosgeshak (fish bait)

[Quantum Toast]

man, this place is going to be absolute torture for anyone to get to.


let me paint a picture for you:

The area is pretty flat, with a mountain in the northern part. to the south is a massive swampy area covering the entire southern half. there is a river to the east, and more fricking swamps to the west. most of the pools of water aren't too big, but the space between them is about two squares wide. every pool has carp.

3 migrant waves so far. I WOULD be at over 100 dwarves by now if the RNG didn't pick off every other one.

oh, and the name of the fortress: Tatlosgeshak (fish bait)

Sometimes I wonder if the random name generator is sentient.

[Firnagzen]

Strictly speaking, it isn't. It merely acts as a front end buffer/display for the Random Number God*, who does all this stuff.

*a.k.a. The Lady.