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[zwei]

Theorycraft:

Is it possible to embark with no items at all and eventually end up with fully functional fort?

I am thinking this strategy:

O: embark

Pick calrm area, bring nothing, assign no skills. Arrive ignorant and emptyhanded.

I: survival

1) Gather Plants to get seeds.
2) Enable farming labor, plant seeds, start aboveground farms.
3) Enable fishing labor (if safe)
4) Enable hunting labor (if safe, if not, draft two dwarves to teach them wresting and then send em hunting)

This should supply dwarves with enough food and even some leftovers.

II: production?

1) Deconstruct wagon, build Kitchen, start cooking your crops.
2) Build butchers shop and butcher your draft animals if they are not breeding pair.
3) Build craftdwarfs shop, make totems, bone crafts (crossbow & bolts if in dangerous area), shell gloves if you fished turtles.

Deconstruct butchers shop and build tanner's shop to tan hides, deconstruct it and built leatherworkers workshop, make bags (for seeds), maybe some clothing or armor for sale and use.

Keep on recycling workshops for logs and building the ones you have raw materials for, you can only have three worskps at any time, so this is going to be lots of micromanaging fun.

You can also make cloth good if you have rope reed, or course. tresher/weaver/clothier workshop chain is going to require micromanagement, but clother are easy way to produce wealth if you have absolutelly nothing else.

This should create some wealth. Hunt, Fish, Farm, Cook, Craft whatever you can. Remeber not to cook fish so that you get bones, wait for caravan.

III: trade!

When caravan appears, deconstruct all workshops and build trade depot: wagons will bypass, but some traders with pack animals will wait at edge.

Trade whatever you can, your goal is to get axe. Axe means wood for beds, workshops that you can keep, protective walls, actuall building with roof, bins and barels, charcoal to start glass industry if you have sand. Wood is important and cool. Wood is fun. Lack of wood is FUN!

Once you have your dwarves sheltered, you can simply carry on producing wealth. and buying equipment you need.

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I think I have something to do till next version

[Lav]

Is it possible to embark with no items at all and eventually end up with fully functional fort?

Perfectly possible.

http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=33393

The strategy is simple and there are many options. Always deconstruct wagon to get 3 wood in the beginning.

1. Gather plants near rivers/brooks/pools to get rope reeds. Process them and get threads and seeds. Weave cloth. Make tons of socks. Build a farm and plant seeds to get a replenishing source.

2. Gather plants anywhere. Cook them.

3. Fish. Cook the fish.

4. Hunt. Butcher the corpses. Process fat. Cook meat and tallow. Make tons of bone crafts and leather socks.

You need many workshops for this and you only have 3 wood, so lots of construction/deconstruction will take place.

When Autumn comes - deconstruct everything, build Depot.

When you learn to avoid some mistakes, it's not difficult to get what you need from the merchants.

I also suggest forbidding all prepared food you make and leaving only a few uncooked plants. This way when your dwarves get hungry they will go for the plants and get you some seeds. Not much but that's an extra. Unfortunately you don't have any other way to get the seeds but to wait for the dwarves to eat the plants (rope reed is the only exception since it can be processed).

[Pie]

I suppose the difficulty lies in how hostile your area is, because you can't really build defences. So if you have to carefully maneuver your workshops and dwarves around the scary zombie lions or whatever, it would be an even more fun challenge.

[Shades]

Is it possible to embark with no items at all and eventually end up with fully functional fort?

It's not only possible but it's fairly easy as long as you pick somewhere with vegetation. This is basically how I play with the orc mod now, until the new version comes out anyway.

As far as I can tell a glacier (and desert?) map would be close to impossible though due to lack of food and drink items meaning not only will your dwarves die but they will have nothing to trade either. If you could survive till the first caravan I guess you could steal what you needed mind you.

It's quite fun to make forts that don't bother with food production at all and just import food and export some kind of craft.

[Drecon]

It's easy, providing you can keep at least 1 dwarf alive until you get a pick and an axe. From there it's just basic fortress running. Anyone can do that.

[Swivelguy2]

I recently embarked on a map that was so steep near its center that I didn't get a wagon. If you want a REAL, FUN challenge, try that out!

[nutzy]

I recently embarked on a map that was so steep near its center that I didn't get a wagon. If you want a REAL, FUN challenge, try that out!

No trading then...

That could still be possible if you can get an axe from a goblin ambush, but would you ever get ambushed if all you can do is gather plants and beat hoary marmots to death?

Also, what chances would a naked dwarf whose only fighting skill comes from hunting against an axe goblin?

This may be impossible without a miracle from Armok himself...

[MoonLightBird]

If a groundhog can kill a sworddwarf with full clownite armor, it can be done!

[Derakon]

The traders should still show up if you don't have a depot, right? They  just hang around waiting for you to build one, if I recall. So you could still steal from them. But that's cheating.

Yeah, axe from an invader seems the best bet. You could even maybe try to lure the invader into a forest fire (triggered by luring a fire imp out of hiding, say) to "actively" kill the enemy. Alternatively, just swarm him with your naked dwarves; enough wrestlers ought to be able to take an armed goblin down. It's a shame fortress dwarves can't use kobold daggers, since kobolds can easily be killed by unskilled wrestlers.

Food while you wait shouldn't be too much of a problem, since you can farm without any supplies at all. Theoretically you should be able to farm enough to lure invaders, but that would be a lot of wealth in just raw plants, which aren't worth much. Alternatively, embark on a mountainside and engrave it.

[forsaken1111]

You'll have a hell of a time getting an anvil or pick without trading... I don't think its possible.

[zwei]

I recently embarked on a map that was so steep near its center that I didn't get a wagon. If you want a REAL, FUN challenge, try that out!

No trading then...

That could still be possible if you can get an axe from a goblin ambush, but would you ever get ambushed if all you can do is gather plants and beat hoary marmots to death?

You can build wealth with farming and fishing. Bones on refuse stockpile would not go away, similary for food.

The traders should still show up if you don't have a depot, right? They  just hang around waiting for you to build one, if I recall. So you could still steal from them. But that's cheating.

...

Alternatively, embark on a mountainside and engrave it.

Dunno, stealing from caravan that does not involve depot deconstruction but instead involves 7 naked dwarves sounds like fun.

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Ah yes, building wealth with engraving. You do not even need mountainside. Even swamp maps have enough boulders/peebles so allow smoothing and engraving quite a lot of surface.

In fact, since morale is largest problem fro this embark, engravings that can be admired sound quite important.

You'll have a hell of a time getting an anvil or pick without trading... I don't think its possible.

You actually can: If you manage to get Axe, you can just cut down some trees and build trade depot.

And you can get an axe fairly easily: Either from ambushers or from migrants, and if very lucky, from dead caravan guard.

In fact, i would prefer axe instead of pick.

[Demonic Spoon]

Ah yes, building wealth with engraving. You do not even need mountainside. Even swamp maps have enough boulders/peebles so allow smoothing and engraving quite a lot of surface.

Umm, you can't smooth/engrave pebbles afaik?

Also, there exists a teeny tiny chance to make a anvil of bone as a artifact if you somehow get a workshop.

[Salamander]

Not much use without a pick to mine with.
Also, theres lots of exposed rock on the ground / side of a mountain you can engrave on, and boulders can be smoothed, don't know about pebbles though.

[100killer9]

What if you do this on a glacier? No food, no trees… That would be close to impossible.

[Derakon]

Food would come from wrestling wildlife. Water is the bigger problem; your dwarves would die of dehydration in short order.