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[The Architect]

Edit 1: This is a project to provide a unified guide to all of the practical knowledge a player needs to play DF. It is motivated by the constantly repeated forum questions and the trouble many of us have personally had at various times playing the game. Version 2 of the outline is up. *End Edit 1, part one

We have the wiki, monster that it is. A repository of generally accurate information, filled in with the apocryphal and fictious in places.

I'm not here to complain about the wiki. It's a wonderful tool. My objection is to the difficulties presented to a new player attempting to learn the information necessary to play! I had to read the wiki for hours on end to learn what I needed, and only an insatiable curiosity and the captivating complex nature of the game itself kept me going. I want to create a new wiki page, linked to the relevant pages, which will guide a new player starting with the basics through a complete and thorough knowledge of everything needed to play the game.

I hope experienced players and newbies like myself alike will read the following outline and give me their opinions along with suggestions for improving it. Keep in mind that it is just an outline, and things such as "ways to designate a meeting area" will describe things like making rooms from statue gardens, dining halls, and the area Designation type.

All suggestions from the general to the specific will be appreciated. I'll begin writing once I feel we have reached a concensus of what is needed, and hopefully it will be a collective project.

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AfoBcbukFaehZGdrNzlqcnNfMGNkMzViemR3&hl=en

Edit 1, Version 2 is up and everything new is highlighted for convenience:

http://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AfoBcbukFaehZGdrNzlqcnNfMWR2d2czd2dk&hl=en

[NecroRebel]

How to build buildings and dig diggings should probably be among the basics; people who are just beginning might not know those things, and might not be able to figure it out. Ramps are especially troublesome for any number of new players, and staircases aren't as intuitive as those of us who have been playing a while might believe. I see that you placed these things under the "unsorted experienced player" area, but they should probably be right near the start.

I would also suggest including "How to manipulate where dwarves build/dig from" as either a seperate section under "beyond the basics" or as a major part of the megaproject section.

Hmm... A quick rundown of the meat industry should probably be someplace, too. Probably just a description of how to butcher tame animals in the basics section, with discussions of animal control and containment being in the advanced section.

Water use... I realize you might be grouping that under the section on dwarven beverages, but water is such an extensive and at times dangerous subject that it might well deserve a section of its own as far as pumps, flows, and reservoirs go. A simple "Fluid dynamics" section somewhere would probably be beneficial to include.

Other than those omissions, it looks like a list of things that would be useful for a newbie to know.

[Beanchubbs]

Suggestion:
In my experience, figuring out what do do with things wasn't really a problem. It was figuring out how to do those things. As most people on these forums know, the interface is a very tricky and maze-like system. I suggest one of the first things on the guide be a description and map of the interface. Maybe in the first tier you have on your guide, place things like how to use the designation, stockpile, build, zones, viewing (q menu, v menu, k menu, etc.) and announcement windows. In tier two, the units, orders, military, and status screens. In tier three the civ, orders, and zones. And in tiers 4 and 5 put the other menus that aren't used too too often.
Also, maybe just have a seperate section for an entire map of the interface, so people who want to can see the entire thing in one place.
Other than that, good job.

Edit: ninja'd

[A Dwarven Smokeologist]

IMO the video tuts by Captnduck and Jay0123~ are extremely helpful. Somethings are pretty easy to grasp with words or pictures, but for me at least, a lot of the harder techniques or more abstract methods didn't make sense till I saw them in a video form step by step.

[The Architect]

All very helpful, thank you. I will follow all of those suggestions to the letter (especially about being very technical with descriptions of how to use things, and including a description of the interface right at the beginning). I'll also be sure that appropriate links are included to video tutorials and other helpful pages. Let's get specific with the links later when things flesh out.

I'm going to let comments build overnight before making alterations, in case anyone catches something I miss. I will probably follow this procedure of letting suggestions sit on the board for a few hours before implementing throughout the process, in order to assure that when something is done it's done right the first time. I'm liable to miss obvious objections or technicalities if I immediately implement things I think are good ideas.

[lem]

IMO the video tuts by Captnduck and Jay0123~ are extremely helpful. Somethings are pretty easy to grasp with words or pictures, but for me at least, a lot of the harder techniques or more abstract methods didn't make sense till I saw them in a video form step by step.

I found the video rather terrifying, myself. When I was learning things from the start, I wanted a written resource I could sit up on the side of the game window, so I could progress at my own speed. The video is rather pell-mell (because the guys making them are already good at the game, they go at speed) and a bit difficult to follow if you want to take things very slowly. Each to his own, I guess.

I hope this written guide meets with success for exactly those reasons

[Murray]

The Complete and Utter Newby Tutorial for Dwarf Fortress

It is even on the gameplay questions part of the forum http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=31928.0

[The Architect]

The Complete and Utter Newby Tutorial for Dwarf Fortress

It is even on the gameplay questions part of the forum http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=31928.0

That's not bad, but it's not even remotely what I'm looking to do here. To refresh the mission statement: The objective is to create a complete guide to all the knowledge necessary to play DF, starting with the most basic aspects and moving through all of the knowledge you could possibly need to play. This isn't about creating another tutorial for players. I'm well aware of what a waste of time that might be.

[Garth]

Just some suggestions as to what should go in.
Seeing as I haven't even been playing for a month I think I can provide some insight.


-Basic digging layouts
-entrances and defending them
-how to trade properly
-how to manage the jobs of your dwarfs and changing their priorities
-Management of bedrooms(ESPECIALLY HOW SOUND TRAVELS 4 TILES IN ANY DIRECTION)
-How to manage food and water

Just some importants thing that I needed help with when I first started my first fortress a few weeks back.

[Gara-nis]

Part of the wonderment of DF for me was learning how to do a lot of things.

I really loved the tragic surprise of losing a lot at first.

I think a newbie guide shouldn't be a total walkthrough, it should leave quite a bit for the player to discover for themselves.

[Beanchubbs]

I thought of another thing to add in. I don't know if you consider this to be the "Megaprojects" section, but      Mechanics
It should cover everything from making a screw pump, to creating a water based clock. Mechanics is often overlooked in most of the tutorials I've watched/read and is considered something for more players who know all the basics and can execute on those basics. Considering this is a guide for all skill levels, all levels of mechanics should be included.

[A Dwarven Smokeologist]

One of the main killers for me starting out was my dwarfs getting them selves stuck and dying from thirst / hunger.

It took me a while and some reading on the forums to realize that there is a preferred way to dig / channel / build in order to avoid dwarfs getting stuck. Might save some frustration if players realize early on how to avoid getting a dwarf trapped.

[Gara-nis]

One of the main killers for me starting out was my dwarfs getting them selves stuck and dying from thirst / hunger.

It took me a while and some reading on the forums to realize that there is a preferred way to dig / channel / build in order to avoid dwarfs getting stuck. Might save some frustration if players realize early on how to avoid getting a dwarf trapped.

Quirks/bugs like this should definitely be in the guide -- situations that wouldn't happen if the game could simulate the thought process of a dwarf in a similar situation.

Hmm. I'm dismantling the the only path that leads back to booze... I should do this from the other side so I get stuck!

[Retro]

What I find about the wiki is that there's a lot of very frank, unconnected information that's certainly useful in its own right, but generally doesn't address most of the frequent questions such as 'how to drain a magma pipe' (just an example). On the wiki, you'd find articles about screw pumps, power, magma, and magma pipes, but would have to already know and understand how the game works to be able to put them together (plus other things, like how you would usually have to tap into a layer of the pipe that sticks out more than the one above it). Yet so many questions on the gameplay forum keep getting responses like "Try looking at the page on magma pipes. The wiki is a very valuable tool!" As a game that's about the mechanics just as much as it is the ways that these mechanics can be used together to do crazy things (which to me is the entire draw of DF), I rarely see anything about the latter. So I suppose my suggestion would be to add 'Interesting things you can do' that focuses on stuff like this in detail.

Even the stuff on the wiki that is related to using different aspects of the game together could be reworked to make more sense, offer more suggestions, and mention more ways to do things and most importantly why. The page on damming rivers has a bit on using magma, for example, that just says to pump magma into the river. No mention of how to control where it's to be pumped, nor how to get it there in the first place, etc. I try and frequent the gameplay forum as much as I can to help out when I know the answer, but I still end up writing the same responses over and over that could easily be placed on the wiki. The 'state only direct knowledge, not what to do with it' policy that the wiki seems to have is, I think, a big hindrance in new players working their way up the learning cliff.

There's a bunch more topics like this (eg. controlled, shaped cave-ins, how to build underwater structures, detailed obsidian casting (yes, regardless of having a wiki page already)) that I can't think of all at once but have crossed my mind at some point. I might have to come back and make a very rough list later. But I'm sure by now you understand what I'm getting at.

[The Architect]

Yes, I understand where you're all going with the lack of more specific knowledge on the wiki. I think we may find ourselves making many auxillary pages as this moves forward, in order to supplement the existing pages we need to flesh out our guide.

One of my main motivators is how there is no guide to where to go for information on the wiki. We end up constantly answering the same questions in the forums because specific information is hard to find on the wiki, or in many cases just isn't there. This will be a guide to help everyone find what they need. As we find necessary parts are missing, we can add them to the wiki ourselves.

I'll begin updating the outline now, reading through your comments as I go so that I (hopefully) don't miss anything. Will post again when I think it is updated, and you can all tell me what I've missed and where to go next.