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[Kay12]

Yeah, most of the designs are very similar and some look quite boring. However, having fortresses that are both aesthetic, unique AND functional is next to impossible. That's why I seldom alter my industrial/residential designs, but I create fancy lobbies, statue gardens, noble palaces, gaols, contraptions - they don't need to be minmaxed to the top. Aesthetic areas to balance out the plain industrial tenements - just like in real life.

I am, however, planning to do something a bit more interesting, if it works that is. A glass dome research facility fortress under the sea (Fun With Water Guaranteed). Sadly, I don't think there's a viable way to build under the sea, so the ocean may have to be artificial as well.

[RCIX]

Mainly i do a small base-level (where you start) with a farm, trade depot, maybe some traps, then a single shaft which i build off of on various levels to do stuff. My most proud achievement so far is my in-progress dwarf Condo-plex.



I wanted something that could hold a lot of dwarves but still look reasonably good doing so, and i think that works. Note that i'm considering making a cool fortress. You might see it later. I might even do a succession game

[darkrider2]

My first successful* fort was a walled in raving with a moat and a ceiling. Because of an aquifer almost everything was on the top two floors and I used an unhealthy amount of trees. Most of the workshops and things were in a semi-circle pattern around the ravine and there were several doors all over the place, and plenty of hatches to the larger forest level. Also included a catwalk several z's up for archery and ballistae.

Coolest thing was when I used a large puddle near the ravine and used it to make a deathtrap. Should the enemy ever get across the moat and drawbridge, a lever would be pulled. water would be siphoned up from the aquifer, and dumped into the ravine. The walls, doors and drawbridge would now be sealed and they would be sealed inside. Then I would siphon it back into the puddle and we could use the main area again.

*fell to a goblin siege, bonzai rushing dwarves at bowgoblins doesn't work too well.

[Tehran]

All this modular design is efficient and all, and no offense to those who use it because it's a good tactic and I completely understand why, but frankly I find it really damned boring.

You know what's even more boring? My usual fortress design. It follows the well-known "Big Room" principle.

The rest of the fortress is done differently, but everything industry-related goes into The Big Room.

I used to take forever trying to divide everything into neat, separate little rooms on different floors, but my dwarves always looked so inconvenienced by having to walk through and around all of those rooms whenever they wanted to go anywhere. So I just got rid of all the walls completely.

BIG ROOM.

[ECrownofFire]

Big rooms are efficient, but they look bad.

Personally I prefer to keep my industries bleak and hopeless, while having everything else decorated and whatnot. I want to make a fortress that is completely divided (using burrows) by industry, with the food industry up top, with hatches or something to drop food down. Would make for an interesting design.

[nbonaparte]

Big rooms are efficient, but they look bad.

Personally I prefer to keep my industries bleak and hopeless, while having everything else decorated and whatnot. I want to make a fortress that is completely divided (using burrows) by industry, with the food industry up top, with hatches or something to drop food down. Would make for an interesting design.

That could just be done using castes, Metropolis style.

[Cotes]

Cross shaped hallway with staircase in the middle and with three 7x7 rooms in each corner.

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[Itnetlolor]

Thanks to watching some Fallout Chronicles (DF Modded LP), I'm adapting my remodel of (New) Wavehandle as a more aesthetically pleasing vault architecture; combined with some inspiration from my Bloodfist project. As the initial POI will show.

As seen here: http://mkv25.net/dfma/map-9045-return-to-wavehandle

[Pistolero]

Big rooms are efficient, but they look bad.

Personally I prefer to keep my industries bleak and hopeless, while having everything else decorated and whatnot. I want to make a fortress that is completely divided (using burrows) by industry, with the food industry up top, with hatches or something to drop food down. Would make for an interesting design.

I do the big room because I like how it looks

I just imagine this huge dwarven hall where a blast of heat hits you in the face as your ears fill with the sound of ringing hammers while dwarves haul massive bins full of steel battleaxes off to the stockpiles. Where they are graded and anything not considered a masterwork is sent back to the hall for melting down

Tiny elephants , barely visible way down the far end of the great hall, being led around by handlers as they are trained for war. Ramps leading down to the warehouse pits, bins full of raw ore being carted up, bins full of shining steel being carted down, dwarves yelling, dwarves working, dwarves rushing through.

Of course, if you picked up the save and looked at it you'd probably see a big ugly room in all different colours with rough walls and a ton of wasted space on the zlevels above it.

Great game.

[Noble Digger]

I like non-square big rooms and thick hallways. The FPS damage caused by tight, complex pathing is immeasurable.

[Genkora]

I once built my entire fortress in a tower which was sort of round, as round as you can get I guess, which, if I remember correctly, was 13 tiles wide.  In the center was a 3x3 stairwell.  It was actually incredibly efficient.  Also it was made out of obsidian, but not cast unfortunately.

[ECrownofFire]

Someday, I will cast an entire fortress out of obsidian. For now I just use a tower type thing most of the time. 3x3 staircase in middle. It works well, but I want to go for a different design.

[Retro]

90% of this thread is rephrasing "I like to have a square/circular design with a central staircase/rampway that everything else branches off of." This is something that's always kind of annoyed me when I skim the DFMA - regardless of the specifics, the general designs are always the same. People also seem to repeat the same kind of designs across their own forts as well. I don't really come across really interesting, unique designs very often any more, probably about once a month. I'd like to see more gentle curves and sprawling organic waterways, that sort of thing. All this modular design is efficient and all, and no offense to those who use it because it's a good tactic and I completely understand why, but frankly I find it really damned boring.

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Personally, I favor the vertical shaft design.  Everything in the fortress grows out of this central shaft

In a nutshell, a horizontal hall leading to a Shaft of All Things.

A vertical shaft with all common areas around it a few Z levels deep.

I tend to use a Greek cross layout.  It's laughably easy to designate, too: a 3x3 staircase array in the center

Between each 19x19 block there is 3-wide up/down stair, which goes from top of cube to the very bottom.

I go with a highly modular design. Every room, including apartment complexes, are eight-by eight and laid upon a grid, with stairways in the middle and two by two doorways leading between rooms

I usually make one massive center hallway with rooms off of that, one of those being the central staircase shaft.

a single shaft which i build off of on various levels to do stuff.

Cross shaped hallway with staircase in the middle and with three 7x7 rooms in each corner.

In the center was a 3x3 stairwell.

For now I just use a tower type thing most of the time. 3x3 staircase in middle.

If you see yourself in that wall of quotes, you have just been challenged!

Your task: Create an organic fortress. You do not have to throw efficiency to the wind, either! However, you are prohibited from: Using up/down staircases (just up or just down are acceptable) and creating square or rectangular based rooms. For respectable bonus points, use nothing but ramps to travel between z-levels, and designate your rooms with your mouse.

To those who attempt this: honour!
To those who do not: ...well, nothing, but you have to deal with the shame of a random guy on the internet thinking you're boring.

[ECrownofFire]

I occasionally try an organic fortress. How are we supposed to create "just down" and "just up" staircases? I suppose a hatch can make a just down "staircase," but otherwise I don't see how that could work I did have an idea for a dwarven elevator once. I shall have to test one eventually.
Ramps are actually pretty efficient. Only takes one move to go two spaces. Essentially just moving diagonally vertically.

[darkrider2]

and designate your rooms with your mouse.

My mouse doesn't work in the new version. Although I am trying to make my fortress more random and less vertical shaft of simplicity. (turned into a horizontal hallway of everything... dangit!)