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[Uristocrat]

You should probably not be too worried about making interesting things until you get all the game elements down and know what you'll be working with.  My first few forts (and probably many others') were blocky, boring, and highly inefficient.  Then you start having those realizations like, "Oh, Z-levels!" and "I probably don't need space for 4 Jeweler's Workshops," which allow you to design better and incorporate the game elements into something aesthetically pleasing and useful.

True, but once you get a magma glass furnace running "create raw green glass", you might actually want "cut green glass gems" and "encrust furniture with green glass gems" on repeat, so four (or more) Jeweler's Workshops can actually be useful....

That said, yeah, just worry about learning how everything works at first, then start casting 300x300x100 obsidian blocks:  one to carve your fortress from, the other to trigger a cave-in that destroys HFS and FPS....

Oh, and screw labeling your levers with (N)otes.  I suggest laying down floors made out of obsidian & cinnabar blocks that spell DOOM! in the room with the lever.  Between that and the piles of loose skull totems, it's a lot harder to pull it by accident.

[Mantonio]

If you've got the time, make a fort where all the hallways (and perhaps the main dining hall) are multiple z levels high.

Or a zoo. A zoo for cavernous races. Include two of every underground animal you can.

Edit: Or do what I'm planning, to rebuild the fortress entirely.

Build your fortress as normal. Then when you have the time, rebuild it entirely out of stone blocks. Use Marble, Obsidian, Microcline, whatever you're comfortable with (although Marble does double a rooms value, and Obsidian triples it. Plus Obsidian can be made artificially.). Make all the stone furniture likewise.

Then make all the wooden furniture out of underground trees. Whichever you think would look best.

[sadron]

One option would be to dig out some huge area (over at least 5, better 25, z levels) and build something (completely unnecessary) there. Some obsidian underground castle (including moats, towers, gates, ...), or the hanging gardens of Babylon. Or build some vault to store all your precious artifacts in it; and by vault I mean that type behind traps, labyrinths, riddles, dangerous animals (dragons are the perfect choice if available) and combinations of those; some emergency lever which dumps everything (at least the treasure) into magma is a bonus.

For all of these, try adding as much useless features as possible!

This all sounds awesome, but I feel like, I have a lack of creativity. Like, I want to be more creative, but my mind doesn't necessarily spring the ideas to mind. I don't really know how to build proper traps and get animals to defend a place for me. Are there some helpful articles on the wiki that I could use to maybe break the dam that is blocking most of my creativity? Because my creative ideas (not even necessarily for DF itself, but in other things) at most seem to come at a trickle.

You should probably not be too worried about making interesting things until you get all the game elements down and know what you'll be working with.  My first few forts (and probably many others') were blocky, boring, and highly inefficient.  Then you start having those realizations like, "Oh, Z-levels!" and "I probably don't need space for 4 Jeweler's Workshops," which allow you to design better and incorporate the game elements into something aesthetically pleasing and useful.

Oh no, I've played for a bit now. I've had occasional spurts of creativity but I've more often than not just started making a new fort XD

[Girlinhat]

I find the best way to go for megaprojects in DF is to forgo economics.  Is it economic to build a 5 Z tall waterfall, which cascades onto an iron floor with lava underneath, to generate a steam mist that your military trains in as they become tougher and resistant?  Is it economic to purchase hundreds of millions of dwarf-bucks worth of rose gold just to make a shiny purple spire?  Is it economic to rebuild your entire fort 10 levels above ground, relocated one brick at a time?

No.

Is it dwarfy?

Hells. Yes.

History looks upon the humans and says "they survived the onslaughts and prospered by their strength."  History looks at the elves and say "they survived in harsh reality and maintained their morals."  Upon the goblins it says "despite the odds, the defenses against them, and the overwhelming death that lay ahead, they still pushed on for personal gain."

History looks upon the dwarves and says "Holy carp, someone did that?!"

[ral]

Some fun things to build that might help you learn how to build other stuff:

Drowning chamber with a bait animal: Dig a tunnel into a hill right next to a river. Have the tunnel dead end at a door with a kitten chained behind the door. Set up a draw bridge at the entrance so anything wandering in can be trapped inside. Now carve out space for a pump, water wheel, and a couple of gears (and axels if needed). Use one gear to hold up the water wheel and use the other to turn the pump off and on.  Dig out a tunnel to somewhere that you want to drain the water and put a floodgate on it, or forgo this and just drain out the front door. Link the door, floodgate, and control gear to levers.  Goblins and such will be lured in by the kitten at which point you close off the entrance and turn on the pump. The door in front if the kitten will keep it from drowning. Add some cage traps if you like those and want to help protect kitty in case the pump doesn't get turned on fast enough. Also put pits in front of the pump, drain, and entrance drawbridge to keep trolls and other building destroyers from destroying stuff.

After downing a bunch of goblins, make engravings in your walls so you can have some nice engravings that relate to the drowning of the goblin Slarg Garglechoke at the Siege of Whatever in the year 238.

Also build an archery tower. That's an easy way to learn to build above ground structures and use fortifications. Build it high enough to get above all of the terrain, but it doesn't even need more than maybe 3x3 of space on each level.

[Traece]

I used to dabble entirely in underground fortresses starting out, but now I'm thinking bigger and more vertically. I've started trying to erect castles and towers and that proves to be much more challenging than just an underground fortress. Some people have even made entire cities, or large statues of dwarves housing their population and its needs.

[Girlinhat]

I'm working above-ground at the moment, it's quite the design challenge!  If you're used to digging out your base, try and build one instead.  The effect is that you end up strip-mining, since you're not using native stone to live in, you'll actually find yourself lacking stone.  It really makes you feel the size of a construction as well.  That grand 20x20 dining hall is weak underground, but when supplying 400+ material for a above-ground dining hall, well...  You'll learn to appreciate a good above-ground megaproject more when you see the pictures of one, once you take the time to build one yourself, one struggling layer at a time.

[Girlinhat]

Also, an easy above-ground project that should give you a taste of surface construction at the smallest scale, is a building destroyer proof, archer proof, pet-manned watchtower.  For this you will need 14 construction material, like 14 stones or 14 logs, 4 windows (4 bags sand, 4 units fuel, or for nice clear glass add an additional 4 units fuel, 4 units ash-potash-pearlash).  Build for legs, with a 9x9 hut on top of it.  The flat walls should be windows, while the corners are additional walls, which support a 9x9 roof.  Chain an animal in the center, and add windows around it.  The tricky part of this, is making sure you get everything build, and then remove the stairs correctly afterward, otherwise a building destroyer will smash the windows.

[Naros]

My suggestion is that you let other people's forts inspire your own prefered layout or style:
http://mkv25.net/dfma/

[Duntada Man]

I hadn't thought of making a statue that could be lived in. I'm going to start work on two right now. One will be stabbed by the other, and I will make nobles live in it when they come back.

[Shoku]

If you don't want to just take other people's ideas (nobody seems to be able to get it in their head that you're interested in coming up with your own here) the best way to boost your creativity is a pencil and paper. I like digital quite a bit but something like a pencil is much more sensitive so you get certain sorts of wobbles a mouse wouldn't or don't get ones you would (basically it has a better sort of friction to it.)

Or at least that's my take on why a pencil is handy. If you've done much art then you've got other kinds of experience with pencils and blah blah blah.

But still, draw whatever you can think of, draw over that, throw in random lines over that until something catches your eye.

Obviously drawing things you think have to do with dwarves is a good start. Do the same kind of floorplans you'd do in game if you don't feel like you're good at drawing. Draw scenes and things for dwarves if you can handle perspective or aren't that afraid of any potentially crappy drawing you might do. Draw fancy crap and post it for the rest of us to see if it's good.

[Anubis039]

Build a labyrinth of empty rooms and galleries then fill them with engravings and statues. use what rooms you can, but don't be unhappy if you cant use them all.

[askovdk]

(Blowing my own trumpet)
The main source for fortress ideas for me is Heroes of Might and Magic.
I promise to soon make an update of my 'Dwarven magna hole in the ground', and I'm building a flying 'Mage silver city' on my laptop.

Old tread with links to videos:
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=61010.msg1383642#msg1383642

[steve296]

I have a similar tendency as sadron's (OP), when it comes to actually designing my fortress, instead of just stashing away my dwarves from the elements, the enemy, and the... what else starts with e... elves!
In my current fort, I'll try to put some creativity in it, like having a homogenious bedroom maze, a great dwarven hall with big spirals, and a shiny treasure room built with gold, filled with artifacts and riches. Defended by some non-mechanic traps.

History looks upon the humans and says "they survived the onslaughts and prospered by their strength."  History looks at the elves and say "they survived in harsh reality and maintained their morals."  Upon the goblins it says "despite the odds, the defenses against them, and the overwhelming death that lay ahead, they still pushed on for personal gain."

History looks upon the dwarves and says "Holy carp, someone did that?!"

Mind if I put that in my signature?

[Girlinhat]

Do feel free.

I get a lot of inspiration for my designs from numbers.  Workshops are 3x3, so every room is 5x5 to allow for walls, and two rooms would be 5x9 because that middle wall is shared.  Walkways are 3 wide as well, so it's like building an empty workshop nook.  A grid of 3x3 holes surrounded by walls and separated by walkways turns into a function, if unimaginative design.

Currently, I'm working on towers, so I'm using 21x21 (when you hit Shift+Direction twice ) and this comes out to even 5x5 of these "workshop blocks" which I find works out very nicely.