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[SmileyMan]

Also, lead has a low material value, and is not used for any alloy reactions.

I wish to point out lay pewter.

Yeah, as above, I really should have written "not used for any alloy (you're ever going to want to make unless some idiot noble requests it) reactions"

[Urist Imiknorris]

I use lay pewter (very rarely). Mostly for its color.

[deoxy]

When embarking, get one of every kind of 2 cost meat. Just the meat though. Each gives you a separate barrel. Don't get several of the same animal though, those get tossed into the same barrel. Even the 4 cost and 6 cost meat is worth it for the extra barrel.

6 isn't worth it - you could instead buy another 2 (even if it doesn't come with a barrel) and a log (which you can make into a barrel) for only 5 points.

another embark help, instead of buying picks and 2 axes and selling the anvil, buy 4 copper bars, 1 bar of coke, and 4 bituminous coal and the anvil and make your tools on-the-spot

A log is cheaper than a bar of coke, and ore (even with buying extra bituminous coal to refine it) is cheaper than bars, but otherwise, yeah, that's a good way to go.

The other option is to bring a pick (one is usually enough), no axe, no anvil, and LOTS of wood.  Wood is so cheap, you can still come out easily ahead and just buy the anvil and stuff from the first caravan.

I try to max out the "skill level matters for item quality" skills, especially the metal working ones.  Other stuff will take care of itself.

[SenorPez]

Since you can't farm on dry soil for now (stupid bug!), bring along a rock block and a corkscrew (the pipe will have to be made on site) to muddy whatever dug out area you plan to use for farming. Be careful not to flood it entirely with 2/7 or more of water or you're going to have to bail that area out somehow. Thats if you're planning on embarking along a river or near a lake. Alternatively, if you know there will be murky pools, just empty that out into a space for farming.

I just bring logs for the screw pumps. 10 logs = 1 windmill, 1 carpenter's shop, 1 wooden block, 1 wooden corkscrew, 1 wooden pipe section, and 2 logs for discretionary axles. Once you're in business, deconstruct it, and turn the recovered logs into barrells, bins, or whatever.

[smjjames]

Or you could just have it be dwarf powered because you want to monitor the flooding carefully.

You're also forgetting the fact that the windmill will have to be elevated off the ground (you can't just plug an axle into the side AFAIK) and you will need a mechanism to connect the windmill from below to the axle.

Later on when you have your fort established and your food supply secured, yea that'll work, but this is upon embark.

[style]

Regarding wood, the amount of logs a trade caravan brings in, depends on your log stockpile when the caravan arrives. So don't unnecessarily hoard it if you depend on imports.

[Lawec]

Regarding wood, the amount of logs a trade caravan brings in, depends on your log stockpile when the caravan arrives. So don't unnecessarily hoard it if you depend on imports.

How about forbidding it all before the caravans enter your map?

[Dorf3000]

Or you could just have it be dwarf powered because you want to monitor the flooding carefully.

You're also forgetting the fact that the windmill will have to be elevated off the ground (you can't just plug an axle into the side AFAIK) and you will need a mechanism to connect the windmill from below to the axle.

Later on when you have your fort established and your food supply secured, yea that'll work, but this is upon embark.

You can build windmills resting on a floor above the pump, and power it directly that way, but it's massive overkill if you only want to flood a tiny area to put in some farms.  Murky pools are the best method if you don't mind putting your farm next to one; they contain enough water to flood an area big enough for your first farm(s), and if you wall it back up again (or have weather turned off) you won't have a problem with flooding.

[Funtimes]

Whatever happened to bucket brigades?

[Beeskee]

For shells, make an indoor refuse pile to hold them so they do not rot away. After you have a dozen shells, TURN OFF FISHING or your fisher dwarfs will fish the area dry after a few years. Even a 16x16 embark that borders an ocean and has multiple rivers, brooks, and ponds can be fished clean by a single dwarf.

"R" (uppercase) shows rooms, so if you are looking for a noble level bedroom or something you may find you already have several. Rooms that have gem veins for floors or walls are exceptionally valuable. You can also find wayward zones that way. It's easy to lose garbage zones when they are full of garbage.

Embark points - you can increase these to bring more stuff, make a custom map and adjust the settings before generating it.

Trading - request 1 of every metal bar from your civ, for picky nobles. Start stockpiling them all, and if you get a picky noble that wants a ton of a certain type, increase your order for that. You can request ore instead but ore is heavier, that may impact the amount of other trade goods they bring.

[Psieye]

I see a few tips I'd disagree on, but only because they're not as efficient when applied to veterans. They're all good advice when starting to learn the game.

Don't bother with getting a military up quickly, it's still pretty buggy and filling your entryway with 100 traps, even if they are stonefall traps, will be more effective until you get steel weapons and armor and have your dwarves training for at least a couple seasons.

This is indeed valid. Note that you can get that military set up by the end of the first year with full steel gear and a couple seasons of training (sentient invaders never come in the first year), but it takes experience to do it without crippling your start.


Mining and Planting certainly do train up fast. The advantage of starting with high mining is that you can reliably mine out ore and gems without destroying them faster - not an issue if you don't care about either at the start. The advantage of starting with high Planting is that you get better returns for your seeds. If you bring a lot of seeds and brew the majority of your plants quickly so you keep getting seeds out, it doesn't really matter.

[jester]

Kill every cat and kitten that you can. They get in the way, cause refuse hauling jobs and eat fps.
  Keep a male and a few females of large animals you want to breed wandering about and cram the rest into a cage.   Keeps things a bit tidier, no need to have 30 puppies wandering about the place getting in the way of construction.  cramming all your puppies and spare war dogs into a cage near your entrance hooked to a lever is good first line of defense too.

  Enemies cant target with ranged weapons across z levels, so a dwarf 1 z level higher or lower is safe to shoot through fortifications.
  Embarking near a volcano is good because you get magma straight away and have a nice steep hill to back your fort into.
  Always put at least 1 fortification between your fort and the caverns in your forges and waterworks,  all sorts of nasty stuff can climb up through your wells if the way is clear.

  Your Trade depot is a good early first line of defense.  Also if they die its free stuff near your front doorstep.

  In most of my forts I give the useless migrants all masonry, stone detailing, butchery, tannery, architecture.  Legendarys become siege operators, most of the rest get pump operator once I have a room full of spare pumps and a pile of idlers (dwarvern gym).  once the forges are up all the legendarys get woodcutting as well so I have alot of hardcore dwarves toting axes about the place.  I have dedicated furnace operators, Mechanics, brewer/cooks and dedicated craftsdwarves early on for trading.   Any dwarf with high level armoring, weapon making, bowyer, mechanics, metalsmithing or metalcrafting doesnt do anything that might get higher than their good skill incase of fey moods.  A legendary armorsmith makes fights sooo much easier.
 
  Any time you see fire frantically drag your cursor over everything to check that all the stuff that is on fire is forbidden.  If fire gets dropped onto your main food stockpile start recording video.

  Cramming a room with 50 random critters you have caught (goblins, deer, whatever) and then dumping a ceiling on it is a good way to kill fell beasts     

[Shrugging Khan]

Some random carp.

Speed Metal/Space: Unless you want to create some architectural marvels, don't waste your time mining out rooms and minerals separately. Just check the rock below your point of embarkation for valuable resources, mine those out, use the mined-out veins as rooms for living and workshops, and get your smelting and metalworking industries up early.

Large scale security: If you want to build big, have a military. During large construction work, it's always possible that you have to temporarily compromise fortress security (or it might happen accidentally). Traps can only be in so many places, and war dogs can't take on some of the more vicious threats. But if you have even just one small squad of metal-weapon armed dwarves, armoured as best as you can afford, and let them train continuously from early on, then they'll be high master weapon users and fighters very soon. Don't underestimate the importance of violent power - being able to drive away your enemies even if they don't run into your traps can be very important.

Early food supply: Also, if you can find the proper seeds around your embarkation site, consider quickly setting up aboveground farms instead of painstakingly organising irrigation for underground ones. You can always wall the aboveground farms off and connect them to the main fortress via underground tunnels, and if there's airborne predators around you might even put a glass roof on the whole affair.

For additional security: Always have your squads train outside, right before the main entrance. They'll be where they'll be most necessary, and the constant exposure to the outside will prevent them from accumulating cave adaptation.

Trap tactics: Seen from the outside of the fortress, always have your cage traps before your more lethal traps. That way, you might just end up catching a few animals you can then proceed to domesticate or butcher. If you put your violent traps first, you will certainly have fewer, if any, live animals.

Animal FPS: Always cage all animals except for guard animals (dogs, usually) and maybe one or two cats, to hunt vermin. This will give you a solid FPS boost.

Z-Status Menu: Once in a while, press z to check your status menu. See how your food, seed and drink supplies are doing, and check up on your fuels and other critical resources.

Thieves & Snatchers: To prevent goblins, kobolds and mandrills from stealing your valuables (or your children), always have your entranceway guarded by a few animals. A three-tile-wide corridor can be completely covered by two dogs restrained at its sides, and nothing can get through without being spotted.

Ammunition: If you have marksdwarves, or active hunters, check the ammunition section of your military screen. Try to make it so that the hunter uses either bone or wooden bolts, whereas your military dwarves use bone and wood bolts for training, but metal ones in combat. That way you can have them train to top proficiencies by constant exercise, and yet save a lot of resources in the long run.

[caknuck]

Just a few minor points to add...

-If you wind up with excess galena, lead bars are useful workshop construction.
-Learn which materials are magma-safe
-Before you set you gem setters/bonecrafters/metalcrafters loose decorating stuff, pay attention to what stockpiles are nearby. If you don't, you may wind up encrusting your fungiwood bucket with blue diamonds.
-Decorating imported goods removes the import status

[Ricky]

add [SPEED:0] to dwarves in the creature_standard raw makes everything soooooooooo much faster 1 hours worth of diging in 1-2 minutes ect ect....

-is about to cry-

i knew that it would speed up dwarves, but i did not know what notepad to put it in, thank your soul, my dwarves are moving like i actually have good fps -cries-