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Author Topic: Cavern-hunting?  (Read 382 times)

Lielac

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Cavern-hunting?
« on: October 24, 2010, 04:15:07 am »

I decided to embark on a volcano for the magma. Unfortunately, I happen to be in the middle of a lot of mountains and so I have no trees (suck it up dwarfies, the ground's not that hard) and no water (oh CRAP I can't plant anything!)

Sooo... how do I go about finding a cavern?
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Lielac likes adamantine, magnetite, marble, the color olive green, battle axes, cats for their aloofness, dragons for their terrible majesty, women for their beauty, and the Oxford comma for its disambiguating properties. When possible, she prefers to consume pear cider and nectarines. She absolutely detests kobolds.

EddyP

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Re: Cavern-hunting?
« Reply #1 on: October 24, 2010, 04:33:57 am »

Dig down. I can say with 100% certainty that you'll find one.
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FleshForge

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Re: Cavern-hunting?
« Reply #2 on: October 24, 2010, 04:36:05 am »

Well, there's a small chance that you can dig straight down to semi-molten rock without hitting a cavern, but that's pretty uncommon.  Yes pretty much dig straight down, and if you go maybe 20 or more levels down and haven't hit one, then start thinking about digging sideways.  In general it's a good idea to embark with ~200 drink to get through the period where you don't have any water and can't farm.
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Auto Slaughter

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Re: Cavern-hunting?
« Reply #3 on: October 24, 2010, 04:50:24 am »

Note that with the default world generation settings nothing precludes all of the caverns being dry (still muddy, so you can create farm plots, but no water.)  That has been my luck every time I've been in the situation of desperately needing water.

Another thing - don't forget that if there's any way you can manage to get a farm going with the right crops you'll be able to brew booze, which healthy dwarves can drink (injured dwarves are the ones who absolutely require water.)  Whether or not you'll have the barrels to brew in is another question... but if you've got a metal industry going you can make metal barrels
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Lielac

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Re: Cavern-hunting?
« Reply #4 on: October 24, 2010, 04:54:41 am »

WHOO-HOOOO!

I ran out of booze, and maybe two minutes after that, I hit a cavern. I'm saaaved!
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Lielac likes adamantine, magnetite, marble, the color olive green, battle axes, cats for their aloofness, dragons for their terrible majesty, women for their beauty, and the Oxford comma for its disambiguating properties. When possible, she prefers to consume pear cider and nectarines. She absolutely detests kobolds.