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[slink]

I'm looking for a theme for just my starting seven, not my whole fort. Think of my starting seven as sort of a guild trying to monopolize an industry. So, in short, I'd still make my own steel goods, wouldn't need to buy them.

Your plantation idea (as applied to the pioneers and not the fort at large) is nice, but one detail I don't agree with is your carpeting idea. I don't think I could convince myself that the rope I covered the floors with was a carpet.

Not even if it looked like this?   

http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=45284.0

[Lemunde]

I sometimes try to focus my fort on glass making but not to such an extreme.  I always end up digging up gold or platinum or getting too many bones and shells and I just can't let all that good stuff go to waste.  But if I was to force myself to focus more on glass I would give all my starting dwarves points in glass making(of course) and spread out some sub skills to make sure they don't starve or freeze to death in the process.  I'd need at least a couple points in masonry to build the workshops.  A couple of points in mining for at least some storage space.

I would need to have at least 1 dwarf focused on wood burning and double as a wood cutter.  I'd need a leather worker to make bags for the sand and I could just buy the leather I need.  Clear glass is a pretty complex industry as you need to be able to make ash, potash and pearlash and that uses up a good bit of fuel.  If I stick to green glass I could build an above ground fortress that uses about the same amount of wood as a wood fortress.  It would just take longer.

Some self imposed rules I would use would be to only use underground areas as storage.  The dining room, barracks, quarters, offices and workshops would all have to be above ground.  I might extend the underground to include a cistern, a hangout area and a community tomb, if only to have some places to engrave my dwarves' exploits.  I really wish we could engrave constructed walls.  In the end it's about half above ground, half below.

[assimilateur]

Not even if it looked like this?   

http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=45284.0

No, not even then. I think the following poster hit the nail on the head:

What you see:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

What the dwarves see:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[assimilateur]

I'd need at least a couple points in masonry to build the workshops.  A couple of points in mining for at least some storage space.

I don't think you'd need points in skills to perform tasks that can be by someone who's just dabbling in the field.

EDIT: Excuse the double post, but I can't seem to delete this.

[sproingie]

How do you make those boiling clouds then? I take it pouring water on magma isn't enough?

Let a magma imp into your booze stockpile.  Hilarity ensues.

[bombcar]

I'd need at least a couple points in masonry to build the workshops.  A couple of points in mining for at least some storage space.

I don't think you'd need points in skills to perform tasks that can be by someone who's just dabbling in the field.

EDIT: Excuse the double post, but I can't seem to delete this.

You are correct. You can embark with nothing but peasants and get all sorts of skills as you work. I like bringing no miners (and then turning it on) so that the early rooms are not filled with stone. That can be left for the lower levels.

[assimilateur]

I like bringing no miners (and then turning it on)

That's what I do, but not to reduce the number of useless stone - though I guess that's a good thing as well - but to save those embark points for something else. Mining is one of the easiest and quickest skills to reach legendary status anyway.

[silhouette]

Its called magma steam and its deadly... i think... might have changed...

Just make a magma waterfall and yellow "mist" comes off... station a dwarf in it and test it out...

[freeze]

Interesting idea. Someone suggested a starting seven I liked a while back --your leader is a tour guide (ranger), the other six are tourists with white collar skills, and the group gets lost/stranded in the wilderness-- and I've been stuck in that rut ever since. It's highly entertaining for me due to the variety of starts possible. Do I allow myself a trade depot? If so, when? Starting out with just food and drink can be quite difficult.. but I'll usually wimp out and give myself an axe or pick if the biome is dangerous.

I found this thread while searching for fire strategies. I'm normally quite careful because I just love the magma and have to deal with the associated risks. I got a fire in my current fort from the caravan. They entered near the open-air pipe and killed a couple imps on the way by. Either the imp corpses or one of the guards caught on fire, and as i traded and moved their stuff inside a fire got into my stockpiles. Fun, and basically game over or start from scratch with the survivors.

[Danjen]

I like bringing no miners (and then turning it on)

That's what I do, but not to reduce the number of useless stone - though I guess that's a good thing as well - but to save those embark points for something else. Mining is one of the easiest and quickest skills to reach legendary status anyway.

I bring two miners, as I like to dig quickly through the ground and get an elaborate base started asap.

[Beanchubbs]

I don't have any good ideas for the starting 7, but for the steam death chamber, you could just have a grated floor where the prisoners stay, with a hole in the middle and have a chamber of magma a z-level or 2 below it. Above the hole, have a hole in the ceiling, set it as a garbage dump, and dump bins of alcohol. Profit?

[Blargityblarg]

I'd personally use zinc mugs. Cheaper, and if you hit a vein of sphalerite, you'll be galvanising (Not quite, but kinda) prisoners for ages.

[assimilateur]

your leader is a tour guide (ranger), the other six are tourists with white collar skills, and the group gets lost/stranded in the wilderness

I like that idea, mate. But regarding weapons: why would they, even as tourists, go into the wilderness unarmed? Even if not expecting too much trouble, I think bringing some weapons, as opposed to only victuals, should be a given.

I'd personally use zinc mugs. Cheaper, and if you hit a vein of sphalerite, you'll be galvanising (Not quite, but kinda) prisoners for ages.

I take that as a definite confirmation of at least the "magma steam" version of a gas chamber still working. Would be nice if the smoke one worked too, but I guess you can't have everything (I guess I'll have to test that myself, sooner or later).

[Satarus]

"Boiling X" is the same temperature as X's boiling point. If a dwarf comes in contact with that boiling substance it can burn or freeze him depending on what that boiling temperature is.  I found out the hard way when I FUBARed a rock's boiling point.  My miners froze to death because the boiling point was well below freezing.  It can also do no harm if that boiling point is around room temperature.

[assimilateur]

My miners froze to death because the boiling point was well below freezing.

That's fucking fantastic.