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[Duntada Man]

Building simulationist.
I want the game to be a simulation of trying to manage a drunken, bipolar mass of untrained, idiotic, violent, accident prone fools. So I get that.

Plus, I want there to be realistic physics involved when I pull the lever bringing my 10 story tall silver hammer pointed right over my trade depot to happen.

When playing adventurer I want to starve to death slowly dragging my broken stumps across the desert on my one good arm. The grittier and more realistic the better.

[miauw62]

Simulationist.
For sure.
Playing provides many challenges, for me df is like the ultimate civilization game.
Everything will happen, even when and what you dont expect.
If you encounter a problem you have to deal whit it, like in a real life, we also have to manage holes in the ground that are filled whit drunk idiots and that are constantly under siege by other drunk idiots.

[Shinotsa]

Sure I build a fortress in this game, hell, sometimes I even start a pseudo-megaproject. I think I've even finished one or two. But for me this game is meant to be the epitome of fantasy realism. This game will be, sometime in the next half century, a complete fantasy world generator that picks you up and plops you in the shoes of a person or group or persons in that world. Your needs will have to be met or you will face an untimely end. Precautions must be taken to avoid death and dismemberment. Even when precautious are taken you might die simply due to circumstance. The game would be no fun if illness randomly overtook you or a runaway carriage ran you over, but putting yourself in a situation with illness (fighting rabid animals) or any other potential dangers should have you face them both in fortress and adventure mode. At least in my ideal game.

So I play this for the Simulationist aspect. Dwarf Fortress is a game that suprises the programmer on a fairly regular basis. It can bring ruin to even the most experienced players and success to those who barely know the ropes but happened to luck in. One can play it for years without finding an ending, there are always goals to strive for, and even when you lose you can look up a little bit later and know that you're happy to have played. In a game that similar to real life, I can't play to build or to win. I play just because there's always something new around the corner and my human nature assumes it's something positive, though in reality it probably has many tentacles, a mandible that can split steel bars, and blood that rots your nervous system.

[peterix]

I play just because there's always something new around the corner and my human nature assumes it's something positive, though in reality it probably has many tentacles, a mandible that can split steel bars, and blood that rots your nervous system.

Not to mention that it's in a real bad mood, hungry and possibly permanently on fire

[Karakzon]

Dwarf fortress is essentialy what you find when you look for fine art in a brawl, and theirs many ways of fighting.

[shadus]

I'm between sim and gamist, although at this point I rarely play adventure mode because it feels to... incomplete in the "fun aspects" to me compared to other roguelikes.  Biggest thing I would like to see is the ability to freely play other races in fortress mode... human civs, kobold camps ^_^, etc.

[Flying Dice]

Primarily simulationist, though I tend to dip into both of the other groups on a regular basis. The core draw of the game (like a number of others) for me has always been the storytelling potential, which IMO fits better into this category than either of the others (perhaps it should be a seperate, fourth group?). Nothing is more interesting or more fun for me than some touching, badass, or absolutely insane story coming about through the game mechanics. As a side note, the other thing that really interests me is the mix of "make it work" ideals that fit both constructionist and gamist mindsets in certain ways; in short, making a fortress or adventurer capable of surviving pretty much anything thrown at them in some form or another, not for the sake of the accomplishment, but for the RP and storytelling potential created by such a situation. So yes, I enjoy setting up highly efficient and destructive trap networks, building massive castles, high-output power plants, etc., but not just for the satisfaction of looking at a thing of beauty that I built, but also because of the greater horizons they open for me.

[deMangler]

Simulationist. Me.
I Play DF for simulationist reasons. I have been playing since 2D days and it is the only game that I have enjoyed more and more the more I play it.
Other games I get bored with eventually because even if they are sims, the simulation aspect is weak. Possible exceptions to this would be Aurora 4X, the Tropico games, and AI War, Fleet Command. But DF definitely rules for my game enjoyment.
I think DF may be the only really truly simulationist sim game in existence. Both in intent and execution.
In fact, thinking about it, DF differs from other sims in that it is truly a sim in and of itself, rather than a sim of something else in particular, so has no need to compromise the simmyness (in execution) in order to appear to be simulating anything else.  It is it's own simulation and what emerges from that is faithful to itself.
A purist simulationists dream.

*wanders off back to lurker land*

[Malarauko]

A little bit of Simulationist and Constructionist but more Simulationist.
I like making a fort work. The best thing about a fort is that its not a set of mechanics with defined interactions. Its different mechanics interacting with each other in unforseen ways. The real world is like that. Unintended consequences and unseen problems. Organising a coherent society is incredibly hard. It took humans thousands of years to advance enough to create buildings and empires and civil entities. The fun of dwarf fortress is playing through that. Building something coherent out of incoherence. Nothing is guaranteed. Its not like a strategy game where building this building lets you produce this unit. Its building this building and ensuring your miners are finding ore and creating metal bars and creating a barracks in an suitable location and a hundred other little things. The complexity  is what makes it interesting. It requires you to think and marshall together multiple mechanics and dwarfpower. Its not perfect but theres no other game that has its lack of rigidity, dynamics and complexity. Its not perfect but it is perfect both at the same time.

[AfroScotsDwarf]

Pretty sure im abit of all three at the moment. i had a period about a week ago (a period of time... dirty people!) where i was purely playing adventure mode, basically because i was never ready for a goblin attack. latley, ive been a simulator, as ive been managing my dwarves alot more in DF and actually survived my first seige! i suppose ill endup expanding, as i have started doing.

i dont really want to see the game get less complex, i enjoy it this way, learning it all is an increadably stimulating process for me, learning new designs and way to do things in order to make my fort more efficient, or my adventurer a better wanderer.

yeah, 's been dead good

[ObeseHelmet]

I'm honestly more of a noob than I think so I am not sure that I fall under any of the categories. Ideally I would be a mix of all three--trying to make each fort wealthier than the last, building more intricatedestructive constructions every time, and playing out a more interesting story with every fortress. However, all these goals are somewhere in the future. I just need to get the initiative to build a magma pump stack and then I'm off. 

In adventure mode I am more of a simulationist. I enjoy thinking about the background of my adventurers. However I guess there is a bit of Gamism in there too, when I compare my adventurer's kill list to those of the people I am supposed to kill. I have never gotten near any of those vampires.

[Deathworks]

Hello!

I guess my main preference would be qualified as simulationist under these definitions. However, I am kind of a passive simulationist - that is, while I do design things and try different things, the main motivation is to get the game to tell me stories. The easiest to get of these stories are those found in the artwork in the game, so engraving any natural stone wall or floor I will never destroy and - in the case of floors - which is unlikely to get erased by heavy objects, is absolutely mandatory for me. I often dig out things that are several z-layers high (starting with wells but also going for underground cities of free-standing houses), and my main concern is ensuring that each and every wall gets engraved before the access is removed. The harder to get stories are those told by the dwarves living in my fortress - their stories of love and hate (mostly of love at the moment, as love culminates in marriages, while grudges do not cause any actions) as well as the unexpected incidents (like heroic battles with hostile wildlife).

So, for me, the most important thing is that the game gives me output that does not correspond visibly to my input.

Yours,
Deathworks

[pedroislander]

My playstyle gravitates around gamist, simulationist and constructionist styles according into what mood I'm into in that specific gameplay season. That's why DF is so cool, it has so many ways to be played.

[Alidus]

I'm a let the goblins scare away the traders and think they are something while I go about my business until I decide to spew bolts out of the fortification and slaughter them all... ist.

But actually I fit into all the categories somewhat.

[MrButtchicker]

Maybe I could be a gamist. But that is because my only real goal is to not lose. Not an easy goal with me running into HFS to end EVERY SINGLE LONG RUNNING GAME! The only time it hasnt, however, was a year ago and I lost the flash drive the file was on.