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[Gus Smedstad]

My last game, I had the unkillable crystal scorpion.  This game, I accidentally released a Bronze Colossus into the heart of my fort - I was pitting a bunch of stuff, and selected the wrong thing.  (An aside, I really hate the unbelievably clumsy pitting interface, memorizing names that look like random scrambled letters is obnoxious).

The thing is, some titans / forgotten beasts cannot be killed by anything short of magma, and some are immune to cage traps.  The bronze colossus obviously wasn't, but re-caging it was no longer possible once it escaped.  With enough preparation, you can lure them into a roach motel or a magma trap, but let's assume it's too late, and it's somewhere in the heart of your fortress, scaring every civilian in the entire fort, since they're pretty much in a central location.

Is there any graceful solution to this problem?  Both times I've used force-quit, so I could reload from my latest save game.  If I thought there were any real solution, I'd use that instead, but I don't see one.  The fear radius is so large walling off the combat area is impossible, particularly since my entire fort is inside that radius.  The only thing I can think of is trying to use Burrows to force all the civilians somewhere else, and then starting the fort over from scratch.  Only with no supplies, since the storage areas are all well within the fear radius.  It's easier just to Abandon and start a new fort.

 - Gus

[Collic]

The invulnerable forgotten beasts are a problem at the moment, but the games development is ongoing so it will be addressed. If it's impacting your fun all I can suggest is using the previous 40d version, or just trying to be patient while the combat system and beast generation stuff has the kinks worked out.

The main ways I've heard of people dealing with unkillable beasts and titans are using cave-ins, or magma, though that's not always an option.

As far as jumbled letters goes, if you're using a tileset, and seeing symbols instead of letters removing the accented characters will mitigate most of those issues. Have a search on the wiki, there are a few tools.

You likely know all of this, but there isnt anything else I can think of suggesting.

[Cheddarius]

Recruit your entire fortress, except for a few dwarves. Send half to flee. Send half to attack the colossus. No, they won't have a chance, they're there to slow it down.

Collapse the fortress on the colossus.

Start again.

[Gus Smedstad]

As far as jumbled letters goes, if you're using a tileset, and seeing symbols instead of letters removing the accented characters will mitigate most of those issues.

By "jumbled," I don't mean unreadable, I just mean the usual nonsense names the game generates for goblins, titans and beasts.  I find them very difficult to remember for more than a few seconds because they're in a made-up language, so they might as well be a random stream of vowels and consonants.  It wouldn't matter if you didn't have to match the names when assigning them to a pit.  I thought I was moving a Goblin Thief, not the Colossus.

 - Gus

[Urist Imiknorris]

Nothing survives:

Obsidian casting
Cave-ins
Being encased in ice

CHOOSE YOUR WEAPON. I'd recommend digging out the floor above the colossus, then triggering a cave-in over it so the (whatever you drop: wall, floor, etc.) collapses through the floor and onto the colossus' head. DO NOT channel out the floor - that just causes pathing spam because interrupted by bronze colossus.

When dealing with unkillable forgotten beasts and the like, people tend to forget that cave-ins punch through floors and keep going. It's arguably the best solution.

[Gus Smedstad]

I don't see how the cave-in solution can work.  The miners can't get close enough because they're, as you said, interrupted by bronze colossus.  I've done many cave-ins now to seal up aquifers, but I just can't see how this can work for titans / beasts, since you can't get close enough to dig.

 - Gus

[twwolfe]

I don't see how the cave-in solution can work.  The miners can't get close enough because they're, as you said, interrupted by bronze colossus.  I've done many cave-ins now to seal up aquifers, but I just can't see how this can work for titans / beasts, since you can't get close enough to dig.

 - Gus

since cave-ins punch through floors, simply dig so there is a natural floor above the beast you need to kill, then make the cave in 1 level above that. the miners can safely dig without interruption now, and the cave-in goes right through

[Gus Smedstad]

OK, I follow now.  Though in the cases I've experienced, the Titans were not in a place where I could do this, since there simply wasn't a full level of stone anywhere above them.  It was all floor-only, with the occasional internal wall.  Obviously this requires luring the titan into a trap area.   I'm not too clear on how you'd do that - Civilians tend to run in every direction, and military squads will fight anything nearby if you give the Move To Station orders.

 - Gus

[Urist Imiknorris]

Constructed walls/floors are just as deadly during cave-ins as natural walls. They do deconstruct, but they kill first.

I did completely forget about one thing though - Stairs block cave-ins. I suggest flooding the beast out of your stairwell, then dropping large objects (like walls) on it.

[Gus Smedstad]

I suggest flooding the beast out of your stairwell, then dropping large objects (like walls) on it.

Yeah, I can't see how flooding would work.  Since I'd breached cavern 1 and sealed off a section with walls, and all of that was below the central stairway, I'd have to flood the cavern and the 10 fort levels above it before it would threaten the colossus.

I must say, I was being totally clumsy this game with beasts / titans.  First I let a beast into the fort accidentally with a corner breach into the cavern I didn't see, then I let another one in with a roof breach I forgot to seal.  Both died rather easily to my steel-equipped military, but the Colossus mashed them up thoroughly when it escaped.  It was breaking bones right through the steel mail, and the steel battleaxes didn't do much more than fracture bits.  The only reason it was missing its arms and legs was it walked through a couple of steel-disc traps, and those did shear things off.

 - Gus

[Collic]

As far as jumbled letters goes, if you're using a tileset, and seeing symbols instead of letters removing the accented characters will mitigate most of those issues.

By "jumbled," I don't mean unreadable, I just mean the usual nonsense names the game generates for goblins, titans and beasts.  I find them very difficult to remember for more than a few seconds because they're in a made-up language, so they might as well be a random stream of vowels and consonants.  It wouldn't matter if you didn't have to match the names when assigning them to a pit.  I thought I was moving a Goblin Thief, not the Colossus.

 - Gus

Ah okay, I see what you mean. I've done similar things myself. I once accidentally released a dragon from it's spot in storage when I meant to pit a goblin... Still, there isnt a thing we can do about things like this. Hopefully it'll be helped when the game gets a decent interface, but we all know that won't be for a long time.

It's dwarf fortress; you have to take the rough with the smooth.

[Gus Smedstad]

It's dwarf fortress; you have to take the rough with the smooth.

More like "you have to take the jagged, spiky things with the rough."  As weird and hostile as most of the interface is, you can learn it eventually  - the pitting thing is just unusually bad.  It's unfortunate that it uses the Cage / Restraint interface, instead of just being a flag like Dump.

 - Gus

[Collic]

It's dwarf fortress; you have to take the rough with the smooth.

More like "you have to take the jagged, spiky things with the rough."  As weird and hostile as most of the interface is, you can learn it eventually  - the pitting thing is just unusually bad.  It's unfortunate that it uses the Cage / Restraint interface, instead of just being a flag like Dump.

 - Gus

Haha yes, this true. The fact so many of us still play it speaks volume for how fun it is despite the complete lack of polish and user friendliness.

[Urist Imiknorris]

I suggest flooding the beast out of your stairwell, then dropping large objects (like walls) on it.

Yeah, I can't see how flooding would work.  Since I'd breached cavern 1 and sealed off a section with walls, and all of that was below the central stairway, I'd have to flood the cavern and the 10 fort levels above it before it would threaten the colossus.

Flowing water pushes things around.

[numerobis]

If you can get your miner away from the carnage, you might be able to go hermit-fort with the miner for a bit, and then emerge back at the surface to greet the next wave of immigrants.  Then you can wall off the old fortress and dig a brand new shaft down, taking care to wall off anything of the old fortress that you breach.

tl;dr: yeah, just save-scum.  That's what I do.