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[Soluzar]

I'm fairly new to the game, and I've got a question, regarding soft building materials such as sand, chalk and clay. Is it really safe to make walls out of them? Are they more vulnerable to natural disaster or enemy attack than the harder type of stone wall? Is there more chance of a cave-in? Can I reinforce these walls, somehow?

Basically, after using TinyPirate's tutorial, I'm trying to get to grips with choosing an embark site for myself.

[Passive Fist]

Aye, anything you can make out of chalk or sandstone that you can also make with granite or marble or pitchblende is safe. 'Stone' is homogeneous in the sense that it all operates the same. The only time the material in question becomes important is when you're pumping magma around. By the time you get that involved you'll have studied up on the wiki about which materials to use.

This applies to metals as well, as far as construction purposes go. An iron anvil, a steel anvil, and a gold anvil made by a possessed dwarf all work fine in a metalsmith's workshop.

Also I guess some people (me) care about the color of the stone used for some applications.

[Minty]

Natural walls, of any material are completely impervious to, well.. Anything. Same goes for constructed walls. A wall constructed of glass or wooden logs, is exactly as tough as one made of steel or adamantine. Same goes for natural walls too. Got a sand wall? Just as resistant/supportive as one you've carved out of granite.

Of course, the same in reverse is true of doors, bridges, or anything else that's not built using b-C. If a monster had the [BUILDING_DESTROYER] tag, it'll plow through your steel portcullis with exactly the same ease and disdain as if you'd made it out of cork. Very thin cork at that.

(Side note. Apparently the forum's spellchecker doesn't believe "plow" is an actual word. I know a few farmers that would disagree on that score..)

[Soluzar]

(Side note. Apparently the forum's spellchecker doesn't believe "plow" is an actual word. I know a few farmers that would disagree on that score..)

It has no problem with "plough", could it be set to British English?

Thanks for the advice, both of you. It really did a lot to ease my mind about picking out embark locations.

[Lord Shonus]

Natural walls, of any material are completely impervious to, well.. Anything. Same goes for constructed walls.

There's one exception to this rule. If you dig into ice, the natural walls will melt if the temperature is increased, either environmentally or because magma moves nearby.

[Murphy]

All this will change someday. But not today, as it is not a priority.
I believe some people do care and try not to build things out of mudstone or make lead goblets. Just because. See, we can always pretend that chalk ceilings are unsafe, even though they actually aren't.

[Passive Fist]

Yeah I usually try not to make lead barrels, even though I know they're safe. Just for kicks I made a water pump out of pitchblende but it didn't make the water glow or anything.