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[Calhoun]

I didn't watch any tutorials to learn...  Actually, I kind of hate tutorials.

Basically, I just looked up the suggested starting builds page... then linked to something from there, then something from there, etc.  I wound up wiki-crawling for about three days until I'd read pretty much every article.

I did the same basic thing, because i also don't like tutorials, but i followed the basic instructions for setting up workshops, and how build materials work. It was confusing at first, and i'd never played a game like DF before, i came into it with an RTS mindset, so it was weird.

But some people need a bit more to get started, and DF is a game with a learning cliff, not a curve. Plus the video tutorials actually show you some fortress design and are, Visual. Which is easier for some people.

Plus, just wiki-crawlin' doesn't impart some of the nice tips that the video tutorial series does, the kind of things you learn after playing and trying things, Forum-lurking does though, and I've also been doing that.

[NW_Kohaku]

Actually, wiki crawling showed me things like space conservation ratios for making fractal apartment patterns, and where dwarves stand when you are building wall sections, which I consider fairly useful information.

But then, I don't really do much with RTS games, and I play games like Pharoh and Sierra's other "City Builder" games, so working with building pathing efficiency was something I was used to.

(I also play Romance of the Three Kingdoms quite often, and that has some fair amount of similarities, now that I think about it, with the way that you train very large numbers of officers...)

[wagawaga]

Having few dwarves will slow down big things, like megaprojects or stone dumping, but if you pc has a weak CPU, like mine, you would get slower by having many dwarves.

[BigD145]

I've had a couple small forts with ~60 dwarves, 20 of them being children. It really drags after 10 years, although I do have a few major legendary (dfcompanion says level 100+) wrestlers that casually rip legs and arms off, toss them aside, and then proceed to rip a torso in half before moving on. I wish I could pit them against a siege, but it would take another 10-20 years to hit the 100 mark. Projects take forever. Small obsidian farms take forever. Don't even try to get a mega tower cap forest going.

Then I noticed the base d16 install set the pop/migrant limit at 40. /facepalm

[dennislp3]

I have always tried to have a low pop and get the rest by birth....if it takes to long or something try changing the aging from 12 years to 6....then the children grow up twice as fast....that way you can have the controlled population without the annoyance of waiting 12 years every time you need a new dwarf =P could go lower to...its up to you....

[BigD145]

Would 1 year give you a Dwarfsplosion? It sounds useful for megaprojects.

[NW_Kohaku]

Would 1 year give you a Dwarfsplosion? It sounds useful for megaprojects.

You would need to get them married fairly quickly.  The thing about catsplosions is the geometric growth rate.

[SenorOcho]

(I also play Romance of the Three Kingdoms quite often, and that has some fair amount of similarities, now that I think about it, with the way that you train very large numbers of officers...)

And especially the dangers of too many officers early on when your income is low and you have no way to pay them all (or nearly a large enough army to require so many mans to lead them).  They've done a good job of making food a scarcer resource in the later games- especially in Nobunaga's Ambition: Iron Triangle, my current game of choice.  So if you draft too many guys quickly and go on the march you'll just end up starving to death.

[RantingRodent]

My embark ended up being a bit dwarfier than I planned, heh. Was looking for a magma pipe and underground river, ended up with a site that is part Joyous Wilds, part Untamed Wilds. The magma pipe is about one embark tile away from my wagon, and there's the end of a chasm in between the pipe and my wagon. There's a giant cave swallow hanging around outdoors.

I had to quickly pack my original 7 inside and lock the doors. There are now Antmen and naked mole dogs running all around my entrance, and I didn't start with any military dwarves. A season into the game, a Giant Eagle showed up as well.

Managed to receive my first immigration wave safely, though. Up to 15 dwarves now.

[Danjen]

I usually run the game at 200 FPS and as soon as I hit about 60 moving things on the map, it drops to about 50, never to recover. So, I usually play with no immigration, and have a massive inbreeding loop in any given fortress.

I usually play with invaders disabled, too, since I find it hard to get a military going with such a low population (though, I'll be getting a new computer soon, which should fix that...).

Regarding job distribution, rather than do a 5/5 split for stuff, I like to do a 4/3/3 split and give a dwarf an "industry". So, someone will have farming, threshing, and milling, another will butcher, brew, and cook, etc.

[hatcher]

I think its easier at low cap like 15 as you can see and plan ahead where to put your dwarves. I ussualy set child 2:1 or what ever so a dwarf has 1 year till child from baby and 3 years to adult from baby. Also i use multiple litter to common so triplets and twins are common, 5 breeding couples can easily have 12+babies a year.

[Tally]

The problem I always have with immigration is that you never really need to do anything more than the necessities. So by the time you get 60 ~ 70 dwarves, you just glance over at the idle counter, and see "Idlers: 27"

And I stress enough to even THINK of what to do with dwarves at the second immigration mark. First immigration I can do handily, but not second.

Though it never hurts to have more woodcutters and miners.

I'm thinking of sacrificing my peasants to the carp, though...

[darkrider2]

Easier definitely. Less nobles and your FPS stays higher.

I've got a seaside fortress and I'm considering dropping it below 100 because the waves are dropping my FPS (the wave effect is so awesome!). You don't even need that many to run a good fort.

[atomfullerene]

I find my optimum efficiency is in the 20-50 range.  The speed boosts you get from having more skilled dwarves and higher fps makes up for the smaller number of workers available.  Plus you can get to know your dwarves to a greater extent.  There's just no way to keep up with 100 of them.  Losing any given dwarf does hurt though.

And as a piece of advice, set your population limit about 10 lower than the number you are aiming for, because it only sets the maximum population you can have before immigrant waves stop coming, not the number of immigrants in that last wave.

[RantingRodent]

Part of my problem is that I am really not okay with idlers. Everyone should be busy.

I was sitting around 35 dwarves, but the military didn't quite get geared up in time. Had to fend off quite a number of goblins without any armour to speak of. Just managed to track down a Magnetite vein though, and Lignite is everywhere, so I can throw some low quality iron gear on them just to have something there.