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[The Dog Delusion]

so once again, in my most recent fort, I've been tasked with digging out more and more rooms as the migrants arrive. I don't mind the migrants per se, but digging out rooms is really a royal pain in the ass. I've been toying with the idea of simply making one or two "dorm rooms," furnishing them nicely, and then just letting the dwarves handle it from then on. I like the idea of having individual rooms and all, but it's seriously a hassle to dig them out and furnish them all, especially in this fort, where the cavern above is flooded, meaning that every few seconds I get that "damp stone" pause and zoom. So here's what I've worked out:

Room advantages:
happy thought from own room, especially if it's nice
dwarves will keep their junk in their own containers
in general, I prefer this method

Room disadvantages:
Pain to dig out everything (in some cases), especially when migrants keep showing up before rooms are ready
Takes up a lot of space, and layout can become an issue with larger numbers
LOTS of doors, beds, chests, etc. required


Dorm advantages:
single room to dig out and decorate
No complaints from nobles about regular dwarves' extravagant quarters
more room for digging other stuff

Dorm disadvantages:
Dwarves don't get the "own room" thought
Dwarves don't have containers to stash their rotting clothes in



Am I missing any alternatives here? Are their other advantages/disadvantages to either of these that I've missed? What's your method for housing your dwarves?

[shlorf]

Every dwarf even the most useless one gets a 3x3 room, complete with cabinet and if i have time a chest. Doctors get a room next to the hospital. Married couples get a second bed. For 150 dwarfs that was still only 2 z-levels of screen filling living space in an inefficient design. Once you know you get 20ish migrants waves multiple times a year it's just a matter of trading all wood from the caravans and making 30 bed orders. With my current pop cap of 150 the madness was over after a few years anyway.

[Namfuak]

You don't need to give them 3x3 rooms.  3x1 with a hole in the wall for a door is very nice.  Also, if you do a sandwich design (where there are up/down staircases that lead to rooms) you don't need doors while you do the designating.

Also, for the poster above me, I can confirm that even with two beds, a married couple will sleep in the same bed at the same time, so you are just wasting beds.

EDIT:  As for dorms versus individual rooms, it really is personal preference.  I feel like a better fortress-maker by using individual rooms, but if you are OK with a dorm it is easy enough to keep everyone happy with superior meals and a legendary dining room, plus whatever other meeting areas you want to make (statue gardens, zoos, golden wells, etc).

[Jacob/Lee]

I usually do a First Come First Serve deal where I dig ~100 3x3 rooms and the people late to the fortress get to sleep in the dormitory.

[Kc_spot]

I usually do a First Come First Serve deal where I dig ~100 3x3 rooms and the people late to the fortress get to sleep in the dormitory.

Including kings?

[Jacob/Lee]

I usually do a First Come First Serve deal where I dig ~100 3x3 rooms and the people late to the fortress get to sleep in the dormitory.

Including kings?

I've never gotten a king before except 40d when finding adamantine made the king arrive. It depends on what noble it is, the rather bitchy nobles (duke, baron, mayor etc...) get a nice 5x5 room with all the garbage they please inside.

[CapnUrist]

I prefer to have individual bedrooms, unless what I'm doing doesn't really permit it, such as embarking on a glacier (no wood for that many beds) or my current project (glass tower to the sky, with a fortress hanging off the top like the branches of a willow) wherein digging out individual rooms wouldn't be worth the time.

When I do make individual rooms, I carve out a big bedroom section and stuff it with beds, chests, and cabinets, make rooms of them, and let the dwarves figure out where they wanna sleep. The mayor is annoying with this approach, as every time a new one is elected I have to assign him the mayoral suite, then find his bedroom and free it up for someone else (no one gets two bedrooms. That's just unfair).

[ext0l]

I usually do a First Come First Serve deal where I dig ~100 3x3 rooms and the people late to the fortress get to sleep in the dormitory.

I do this except with 2 floors of 44 2x2 rooms. and the rest of the dwarfs can sleep in the beds in the caverns.

[Brandstone]

A big dorm for the first year makes things a lot simpler, but I'd feel bad leaving my dwarves without a room to call their own. I'm trying something a little different currently, just digging open spaces then using statues as walls. It can be a bit time consuming, but Quickfort helps out. I'm also using my Hippo Pack mod to make stone beds, and saving my woodcutting for angering the elves and preventing caravans from bringing mostly wood.

[Savolainen5]

One of the first things I do is dig out my fractal bedrooms.  Just dig a quarter of the rooms at a time, and it's done in a flash.  (I embark with four miners, though).  For the first season, I just put a few beds in some random corridor until the proper rooms are dug.

[Starmantle]

I'm big on individualized rooms, but I'm also big on capping the population of my fort at about 50 (mostly for FPS).

I make pretty lavish rooms for my founders and anyone else important that immigrates.

Everyone else gets at least a 3x4 room, though.

I usually make a big, nice dorm for the inevitable delay in getting rooms ready, though.

[Kc_spot]

Oh I just do 3x2's for everyone. nobles get 5x5's. and everyone gets engravings.

[darkflagrance]

I prefer my dwarves to live for the most part in small, identical rooms (probably 1x3, with a bed, door, and maybe a chest) whose uniformity emphasizes the revolving door nature of residence at my fortresses. Dwarves choose an unoccupied room from the plenitude available, return to this room only to crash or during rare moments of unemployment, and eventually die. Then their remains are swept from the fortress, leaving behind their room, even now still indistinguishable from any other, except perhaps for any stains left behind if the owner of the room died in there messily, or perhaps a few discarded articles of clothing if the other dwarves, out of respect for their former neighbor, respect the memory of his ownership and leave them lying where they fell.

[Lagslayer]

I've given up on individual rooms, except for nobles. The happy thoughts are nice, but I don't seem to have a problem with that anyways. And there is way too much micromanaging involved. Armok help you if a dwarf dies and you have to track down his room again. Besides, with dormitories, you have to spend less wood on beds. Making individual rooms for 80+ dwarves is not fun. Then again, I'm not modding raws, and I like getting more dwarves, even if it slows my FPS.

[Brandedahall]

generally i do this for my dwarfs:
 - -  - - -
-|-|-|-|-|
 - -  - - -
- = beds
-| = hallway