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[janglur]

Basically, it will.

If you have no running water on a 3x3 area and embark with less than 100 FPS, your computer just simply needs an upgrade.  Otherwise, learn to deal with the slowness, or consider using Nanofort or whatever it's called.  It's a mod that lets you use 1x1 embark areas, which are insanely fast even with many dwarves.

Also turn off temperature and weather.

[LoSboccacc]

In my experience using fancy 'ramp' stairway setups is much laggier then just slapping a generic up/down stairway column in the middle of the fort.

I've not done extensive testing, but my fancy stairway forts have always been much laggier then my lazy up/down column forts.

with that you mean a single up/down column? because I was meaning a 3x3 or more up/down column
single 1x1 column is not so critical, but will slow down dwarves.

[thebigJ_A]

Well, buyin a better comp just isn't an option for me. I could learn to live with the slowness, except that, according to the magmawiki, my pc should be getting 100fps at embark, or nearly so.

I used process explorer to set everything to core 0 and DF to core 1, and defragged my hard drive (even though it didn't really need it).

I started yet another embark, which is getting 60fps in the very beginning. It's an improvement, but still not where I'd like it to be. I've reached the limit of my limited computer expertise. If there's nothing else I can do, then so be it, but maybe somebody with better computer know-how has some advice? Something I could do with my graphics card or comp or something?

I'd really hate to turn off weather and temperature, and a 1x1 fort seems so... small.

Thanks for the help, everyone.

[Duuvian]

Try changing the init settings to partial print mode. That always seems to help speed up my games.

[thebigJ_A]

Try changing the init settings to partial print mode. That always seems to help speed up my games.

I tried turning that on before with the DF Init utility, but it makes the screen flicker terribly.

[BurnedToast]

In my experience using fancy 'ramp' stairway setups is much laggier then just slapping a generic up/down stairway column in the middle of the fort.

I've not done extensive testing, but my fancy stairway forts have always been much laggier then my lazy up/down column forts.

with that you mean a single up/down column? because I was meaning a 3x3 or more up/down column
single 1x1 column is not so critical, but will slow down dwarves.

I usually do either 2x2 or 3x3, depending on what fits with the rest of the fort design. Even with 2x2 I never see them crawling over each other so it's just aesthetics if I decide to go with 3x3.

[zilpin]

I typically do a 5x5 column, then put storage around it for common items (booze, furniture, mechanisms, specialty food, booze).
Corridors go at angles away from it.

I used to do all kinds of ramp tricks in my central stair, to quicken diagonal vertical movement, but that hurt FPS.  I'd rather keep decent FPS than save my dorfs 10 steps.

My favorite trick had no stairs, but rather had criss-crossed diagonal ramps connecting diagonal corridors on every level, then putting floor hatches over the ramp so it could be walked across on the same level.  Was awesome for the dorfs, they could get from anywhere in the fort to anywhere else with nearly a direct straight line across z-levels, but the combination of ramps with floorhatches always opening and closing KILLED my fps.


I wish we could give a special "highway" designation, which was always assumed passable and blockages never caused re-pathing.  It would be a simple change in code, and could have enormous benefits when used correctly (and disastrous when incorrectly).
The high-traffic designation does do that, so re-pathing still occurs.

I would absolutely take on writing optimization for pathing, if Toady threw the pathfinding related source code at me.

[veok]

Just  the default 3x3. My fort starts on the surface at 143, and the very bottom of the map is -20something. I haven't dug very deep, apart from a stairwell that goes down to level 73,but that's just 4 tiles of up/down squares.

this. stairs kills fps, for no particular reason. I used to dig a 3x3 staircase to hell a la Led Zeppelin, but that is very very bad on the pathfinder.

now I'm using something like this:


odd level

WWWWWW
W.....W
W.v^v.W
W.^W^.W
W.v^v.W
W.....W
WWWWWWW

even level:

WWWWWW
W.....W
W.^v^.W
W.vWv.W
W.^v^.W
W.....W
WWWWWWW




W wall
. space
v ramp down
^ramp up

Based on my limited understanding of ramps, that seems impossible! Time for !!Science!!

[FleshForge]

Setting DF's processor affinity to force it to run on only one core has no useful impact on my FPS.  I have a busy fort right now that was at 21ish FPS with default processor affinity, and after changing it in Task Manager to only allow one core, it remains at 21ish.  Maybe other hardware/OS performs differently, I don't know.  Setting it back after a while it remains at 21ish.

[Xenos]

you want to kick everything else off the core DF is on, not just tell it to stay to one core.

[FleshForge]

The other three cores are at 0-1%, so I don't think I'm going to bother with that.

[LoSboccacc]

Based on my limited understanding of ramps, that seems impossible! Time for !!Science!!

yes, seemed strange at first even for me. I was prepared to dig a relief tunnel for stranded miners (many were lost while experimenting ramps) but all of them returned to the surface.

[o_O[WTFace]]

Temperature and weather really don't make much difference gameplay wise, but can give a pretty solid FPS boost.  Just turn temp back on if a dragon shows up or someone decides to take a magma bath. 

[thebigJ_A]

Is there a way to set affinity semi-permanently? Switching the affinity for everything ever frickin time I want to play takes like ten minutes. It's a pain.

[Eagle_eye]

just a guess, but the properties tab might have something.