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Author Topic: What is the best year to embark on?  (Read 1594 times)

Smackinjuice

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What is the best year to embark on?
« on: December 09, 2010, 12:01:30 am »

Dragon's will grow to the size of 10,000,000 when they reach the age of 1000, if you embark for say; 250 years; you will only see a quarter of there full power.  Also later on in years a lot of things change; the weaker die; strong survive; less civs, less megabeast.

So after Dwarven !Science! what has resulted in the best year to embark on?
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squeakyReaper

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #1 on: December 09, 2010, 12:05:01 am »

I say 500.  I want my semi-megabeasts to be around (who aren't invincible in world gen) and the chance of catching a dragon and raising him for 500 years is just amazing.  I doubt I'll get a fort that lasts 500 years but could you just imagine?  Perhaps if I make dragons breed, too...  hrm.
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Internet Kraken

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #2 on: December 09, 2010, 12:06:59 am »

I always embark on 1050. Just feels natural, since that's when world gen stops.
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veok

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #3 on: December 09, 2010, 12:43:00 am »

I like bumping worldgen short at 999. That way, if you've got 1 fort per world, you can easily see how many years your fort has survived, simply by looking at the date.
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rephikul

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #4 on: December 09, 2010, 02:02:38 am »

Year 100. Long enough for my large world to be covered with mountain home, short enough so the farm spiral isnt too bad and nice civs dont get wiped out. Also faster world gen.
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Intensifying Mod v0.23 for 0.31.25. Paper tigers are white.
Prepacked Dwarf Fortress with Intensifying mod v.0.23, Phoebus graphics set, DFhack, Dwarf Therapist, Runesmith and a specialized custom worldgen param.

Xenon, Dwarf of Hoar

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #5 on: December 09, 2010, 02:29:55 am »

The plan:
Mod dragon to high frequency
Build fort capable (as far as dwarfs are capable) sustaining themselves without supervision
Capture dragons
Dedicate CPU core.
Keep running in background for hundreds of dwarf years.
Do dragons breed?
/!Science!

Cull the weaker ones for food = happy dwarfs
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rephikul

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #6 on: December 09, 2010, 02:44:57 am »

Do dragons breed?
You can find that out quickly by dedicating CPU to notepads and explorer.
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Smackinjuice

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #7 on: December 09, 2010, 02:48:36 am »

world gen stops at 1050? what ya mean?
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AngleWyrm

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #8 on: December 09, 2010, 04:07:15 am »

Dragon's will grow to the size of 10,000,000 when they reach the age of 1000, if you embark for say; 250 years; you will only see a quarter of there full power.  Also later on in years a lot of things change; the weaker die; strong survive; less civs, less megabeast.

Flawed argument. I've embarked on year 1 and all my dwarves were much older than 1. So it stands to reason that there's no arbitrary start of age at year 1. A dragon might already have lived half it's life or more.

Also: megabeasts die out, but the strong survive? Strong what, exactly? No, I think it's the lucky that survive. Lucky to be in the right place at the right time.
« Last Edit: December 09, 2010, 04:09:53 am by AngleWyrm »
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Nerserus

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #9 on: December 09, 2010, 06:31:09 am »

Dragon's will grow to the size of 10,000,000 when they reach the age of 1000, if you embark for say; 250 years; you will only see a quarter of there full power.  Also later on in years a lot of things change; the weaker die; strong survive; less civs, less megabeast.

Flawed argument. I've embarked on year 1 and all my dwarves were much older than 1. So it stands to reason that there's no arbitrary start of age at year 1. A dragon might already have lived half it's life or more.

Also: megabeasts die out, but the strong survive? Strong what, exactly? No, I think it's the lucky that survive. Lucky to be in the right place at the right time.

World Gen is very Bipolar, I've had one weak demon that I could kill with one punch, it had 200 kills to its name...

And a Dragon who could kick my ass barely had any.

So I've come to the conclusion it has little to do with fighting capabilty, also, while Dwarves start off old I've seen Human civs in older versions who were all children in year 3 of world gen.

Prehaps you should research before you act like a douchebag.
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Di

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #10 on: December 09, 2010, 06:53:11 am »

Shorter worldgen = more enemies for you to kill (at least no one gets extinct before you could assist  ;))
Also that means that there will be less events for your dwarves to engrave instead of events happened in your glorious fortress.
And if you embark somewhere around 120-150 you'll have higher chance to witness rare phenomenon: dwarf dying of old age (maybe not so joyful but still beautiful in it's uniqueness)
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AngleWyrm

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #11 on: December 09, 2010, 06:59:23 am »

Prehaps you should research before you act like a douchebag.
Aww did I step on someone's toeseys?

I embark at 500 for two reasons: The first is that civilization radius seems to cap around 100, and this gives a little time to do multiple expansions from home base. The second is that waiting too long just creates a larger industrialization and consolidation, which I don't prefer. I'de rather have multiple smaller civilizations, rather than a giant plowed field.
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squeakyReaper

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #12 on: December 09, 2010, 07:54:17 am »

World Gen is very Bipolar, I've had one weak demon that I could kill with one punch, it had 200 kills to its name...

And a Dragon who could kick my ass barely had any.

So I've come to the conclusion it has little to do with fighting capabilty, also, while Dwarves start off old I've seen Human civs in older versions who were all children in year 3 of world gen.

Prehaps you should research before you act like a douchebag.

Quick check to the legends mode usually shows that all races, for the first 100 years or so, have mysteriously well aged people.  Often, an 80 year old team of dwarves will found the first dwarven civ on the first year, just as elves and humans and goblins will do.  Beasts themselves, however, need to grow.  I believe that only Dragons need to reach adulthood, but they start at age one if I'm correct.  Of course, Megabeasts don't have their ages listed in Legends, so that's very speculative.  MBs are immortal in worldgen anyways.  You have more to worry about if you, say, gen only one year and then play for a while.  The no-longer-invincible infant dragon has a good chance of dieing.
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Internet Kraken

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #13 on: December 09, 2010, 09:35:30 am »

Dragon's will grow to the size of 10,000,000 when they reach the age of 1000, if you embark for say; 250 years; you will only see a quarter of there full power.  Also later on in years a lot of things change; the weaker die; strong survive; less civs, less megabeast.

Flawed argument. I've embarked on year 1 and all my dwarves were much older than 1. So it stands to reason that there's no arbitrary start of age at year 1. A dragon might already have lived half it's life or more.

Also: megabeasts die out, but the strong survive? Strong what, exactly? No, I think it's the lucky that survive. Lucky to be in the right place at the right time.

Not flawed at all. World gen generates sapient species of certain ages because the game refuses to start with civs ruled by children. Howerer this never occurs with megabeasts, as there would be no reason for it to do so. Dragons always start at age 1.
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celem

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Re: What is the best year to embark on?
« Reply #14 on: December 09, 2010, 11:04:11 am »

I have a tendancy to come in just over 300.  For the reasons mentioned above:

Long enough for civs to spread out a bit
Short enough that pansy civs dont get curbstomped
Long enough for some story to build up and give early engravers something to work with other than founding/noble appointments
Short enough that my MBs dont get significantly messed up.

However I keep my worlds and run many forts per world, so im often coming in closer to 400 after a handful of fortresses live and die.
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