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[EmperorJon]

Ok... I want to play DF, but I don't want to play 31_25 because we seem to be close (ish) to an update, and I get annoyed that Toady has a game with stuff in it that I don't... So I decided I'll go back and play 23a and see if I can get the economy working etc.

Any tips?

[jaxy15]

Watch out for Elephants.

[Quietust]

1. If you mine out really big rooms, be sure to build supports (or leave some stone tiles behind) or you will get cave-ins.
2. Build lots of bridges over the cave river to make sure the seasonal floods don't sweep your dwarves away
3. Be careful with the chasm - either redline it with magma, or keep it well trapped.
4. Start farming as soon as you possibly can - you're likely to get a big migrant wave near the end of Autumn, and you cannot do any farming during Winter.
5. Keep your bag stockpiles far away from your plant processing workshops and dining rooms - dwarves will always choose the nearest bag for storing seeds, even if there are a dozen other bags that contain a single seed each.
6. If you decorate barrels or bags, you won't be able to use them for making dwarven syrup, extracting quarry bush leaves, or milling (and possibly even brewing). They'll still be usable for food storage and gathering sand, though.
7. Keep a set of craftsdwarf's workshops somewhere and surround them with stone stockpiles that only accept a single type of stone. With the number of nobles you'll get (and the mandates they'll make), you'll be needing to make lots of items out of specific types of stone.
8. Grab a copy of Dwarf Manipulator here - it's not quite as versatile as Dwarf Therapist (and the text interface is a bit clunky) and it isn't quite as robust (always make sure the game is paused, or you might get crashes), but it's invaluable for managing labor assignments. As an added bonus, you can even use it to make your soldiers use bows, daggers, and whips/scourges.
9. If you're bothered by the inability to forbid items or the inability to melt/chasm stuff without going into the Stocks screen, get a copy of 2d forbidder. As with Manipulator,
10. I recommend autoforbid as well, just to make sieges slightly easier to deal with.
11. Make frequent backups of your saved games, since they can easily get corrupted during crashes. This is especially important if you're using any of the above 3 utilities, since they themselves can cause crashes.

[tolkafox]

Watch out for butterflies, the butterfly effect can be tremendous.

[Naryar]

Watch out for butterflies, the butterfly effect can be tremendous.

Especially monarch ones. When they lock your doors with their tiny remains...

[RiderofDark]

Watch out for butterflies, the butterfly effect can be tremendous.

Especially monarch ones. When they lock your doors with their tiny remains...

Immediately after reading this:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[darkflagrance]

The cave-in threshold for rooms is 7x7 tiles, I believe.

[Larry421]

The cave-in threshold for rooms is 7x7 tiles, I believe.

Yeah, anything greater than 6x6. If you dig out a room of 7x7 and leave 1 corner undug, you'll be safe.

Also, have some Fun with channels. Channel and floodgate the river outside, and you can flood the entire world. Do it wrong (right?) and you'll end up with a constant wave running up and down your site.

[o_O[WTFace]]

Bring two proficient miners.  You have to bore all the way to the cave river in a reasonable amount of time, there is no soil to practice on, and its not unlikely for one of them to drown when they hit the river (it happened to me at least).

Overall 23a feels more balanced.  Without z levels everything takes up more space and so production is slower, plus there are more nobles to feed and house.