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[Hans Lemurson]

I've been experimenting with One-Tile Meeting Areas, and they are proving to be as effective at promoting happiness as danger rooms are at training your military. The majority of my fortress (80/120 dwarves) have Legendary social skills (3 years after implementation), and I'm averaging about 2 marriages per season.

One annoying thing though is that now most of my population is blinking blue and so i can't tell by looking who my actually useful dwarfs are.

[Dadou]

And suddenly, an FTS (Fun Tantrum Spiral).

[Firehawk]

Sounds like a horrible tantrum spiral waiting to happen.

[Fellhuhn]

And suddenly, an FTS (Fun Tantrum Spiral).

This. Shared fun is exponential fun.

Lost some fortresses to this method. Keep dwarves from each other at all times!

[Psieye]

But see, provided you're doing everything else to keep them happy and reach like 2000~3000 happiness (it takes 250 to reach 'ecstatic') then the death of a close one (friend or spouse) shouldn't knock them to tantrum. Everyone having elite consolation skill ought to provide more buffer too. Now if you lost a significant fraction of your population in one fell swoop, then you're screwed yeah. Ideally then, you have an inner core of civilians who are super happy and all friends with each other and a lonely military who never get a social life.

[Moonshine Fox]

I've noticed the very same. Had a very tight embarkation area and designated a small meeting area that got rather crowded as migrants came in. Legendary dwarves all around.

[Stardrinker]

But see, provided you're doing everything else to keep them happy and reach like 2000~3000 happiness (it takes 250 to reach 'ecstatic') then the death of a close one (friend or spouse) shouldn't knock them to tantrum. Everyone having elite consolation skill ought to provide more buffer too. Now if you lost a significant fraction of your population in one fell swoop, then you're screwed yeah. Ideally then, you have an inner core of civilians who are super happy and all friends with each other and a lonely military who never get a social life.

Doesn't really explain how losing 2 of my guys in an unfortunate bridge accident sent dozens of my 1500+ happiness dwarves into tantrums though. Maybe the happiness generated by the dwarves that are killed gets inverted meaning the closer they are, the more happiness they lose when they die? Or maybe I just encountered a weird bug.

[Psieye]

Hmm, it could be that the loss in happiness is -1000 for the death of close ones. Or there may have been some intermediate steps. I guess you've checked their thoughts and found that to be the only bad thought recently before they started tantruming?

[Hyndis]

One thing I've noticed is that over time, dwarves eventually lose friends. This takes many years, but a social dwarf can become an outcast with no friends after being a loner for decades.

For a long term fortress you can do the 1x1 meeting zone to start with, just so you get lots of marriages going on. Then once all of your dwarves are married make a gigantic meeting zone such that dwarves will never be close to another dwarf for any length of time. Over the decades dwarves will stop talking to each other, stop being friends, and then drop being acquaintances as well.

Yes, friendship decays, just like attributes and skill levels. It just takes a long time.

[Urist Imiknorris]

I thought it only took 150 happiness to reach ecstatic.

[Hans Lemurson]

My entire population now is ecstatic, except for the newborn babies which are merely "content".  All adult dwarves have legendary social skills, and I think they've all married.

My fortress has a population-cap of 100, and is currently at 157 and climbing due to births.  I have 25 babies and 33 children.

To prevent over-population and for the sake of my FPS I think that I may have to eliminate the one-tile meeting zone. 

Perhaps they'll appreciate a waterfall in its place?

[EspritFort]

To prevent over-population and for the sake of my FPS I think that I may have to eliminate the one-tile meeting zone. 

Or you can simply limit the number of pregnancies.

[Hans Lemurson]

How would I manage this dwarven birth-control of which you speak?  Put all my dwarf-women in cages?

[LordSlowpoke]

How would I manage this dwarven birth-control of which you speak?  Put all my dwarf-women in cages?

Well, making a waterfall of babies is a good idea too.

[Tsarwash]

How do you pump them up again ? Can you train beasts to carry them up to the top ?