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[Girlinhat]

For those unaware, Cataclysm is an open-source zombie survival roguelike in development by the talented and rarely slimy Whales, and has a Bay12 thread as well.  In addition, a non-negligible portion of Cataclysm's user base is B12.  Whales' official stance is that the game is in "pre-alpha state where only developers should be looking at it" but that doesn't stop us from loving it.  It's also native in Linux, and doesn't port entirely cleanly to Windows.  Whales has expressed a desire to change this, but as he's currently focused on the game itself and not the audience, he's continuing in pure Linux.  C++ is rather forgiving though, so anyone with some knowledge could probably port it over.  An unofficial Windows version exists, but is currently slow to update and suffers some Windows-specific bugs.  I've installed Linux Mint and Cataclysm relatively easily and am preparing to get into it a bit deeper.

In Cataclysm, many things are optional.  Only three things must happen, and that's food, water, and sleep.  If you neglect these, you will die or simply pass out.  Things that "must" happen to play also include defense and morale.  Cataclysm works off a unique experience gauge.  When your morale is high, you gain exp over time, stacking into a counter that's tallied up constantly.  When you perform an action, it reduces your exp pot and applies experience in that skill.  If you have no free exp, then you gain no skill.  While this sounds very important, after the first day it's usually very easy to stock up exp and no one really notices it anymore.  A couple shots of tequila and a bag of beef jerky and you're good for the day.  Mp3 player?  You're set for like a week!  Which is overkill.  No one survives more than like 3 days.

Combat is either ranged (throwing or shooting) or close (melee or unarmed).  Much like DF, Cataclysm has suffered a nerfing of unarmed combat, and while still viable it's much harder to become viable.  Strength determines your close range damage, while perception determines much of your ranged damage, especially the change of headshots.  Dexterity helps determine your to-hit chance in ranged and close, and Intelligence isn't used in combat directly.  But skill rust does happen (you can forget what you did that afternoon?) while intelligence helps delay it.  Higher Int allows for higher stable levels, creating a sort of soft cap on skills.  Additionally, with combat, everything is a weapon.  No really.  Every object in the game can be held in your hand, either to transport it or wield it.  If you're short on space, you can carry an extra 2x4 in your hands to save inventory space, but any combat done will use that as a weapon.  This applies to all items, from combat knives to radios to frying pans to gold bars to ID swipe-cards.  Of course many items are terrible as weapons.  Sweaters have a negative bashing rate (soft cotton) and a poor speed.  Katanas have overpowered cutting strength and a bit below-average speed.  Also chainsaws, which actually run on gas, and generate noise.

Now then, with some of those basics out of the way, let's get to the real LP.  Community LP, really.  I'll be taking suggestions from the community on how to handle things and progressing over time, and can post save data in case anyone wants to pick up.  Because the death rate in Cataclysm is so high, I'll be playing extra-cautious and avoiding dangerous areas like wasp nests that would otherwise prove quickly fatal, and be playing rather prudent with less "jump in the fray" combat.  After all, that's very deadly and we want to drag this out as long as possible.  Because our goal here, is to win.  Despite being a sandbox game at heart, it should theoretically have an "end" scenario, aside from death.  But it's extremely difficult, with the very high death rate and intense dangers, stable gameplay is all but impossible and every game is a constant struggle against the hordes.  But, I've heard rumors that there's a spawn cap, and that you can theoretically whittle the zombie population to zero and stop future spawns.  That is the goal here, to cleanse the world of the undead and to live relatively safely.  We're doing this the Dwarven Way.

To this goal, the ultimate ideal is to build and/or steal several automated turrets and set them around a heavily fortified base.  Turrets are loud, and attract zombies, but because of the spawn algorithm zed come in waves if the noise level is very high, so it should eb and flow and allow some time to rest and take stock between waves.  Lots of spiked pits and very hindering terrain will be used to allow the turrets maximum protection when facing the hordes.

Now then, character creation.  Here are screenshots of the stats, traits, skills, and description pages of character creation, as well as the wiki for info on all of that stuff if you care.  Strength and "pain resistant" help melee, perception helps ranged, intelligence helps late-game, and skills at start are a waste of points as you can level them all in-game.  Certain traits are better (or worse) than others and I'll be picking a few, but taking advice on how to handle a new character.  Be aware that skirts are great for melee, and as it's me making it, the character will more than likely be female.

Let the carnage be planned to commence!

Also here is a picture taken inside of a Walmart Megastore to display the increased spawn rate in them, and their very large size, over 9x bigger than any other structure!  I've changed the display since then, my console no longer appears "foggy" like that.

[RAM]

I don't know anything about the game, and more specifically character creation, so I will just throw out some items in preferential order from most desired(left) to least(right)...
Intelligence, strength, dexterity, perception.
Parkour Expert, Light Eater, Light Step, Night Vision, Packmule.
Near Sighted, Vegetarian, Glass Jaw.

I predict death at 34 minutes!

[Tilla]

Lets start with really terrible negative traits for the first go round, we all know it's not going to last long anyway

[forsaken1111]

Lets start with really terrible negative traits for the first go round, we all know it's not going to last long anyway

This would be interesting.

Heck, make your typical gaming geek. Asthma, bad eyesight, etc.

[Ehndras]

I always play your typical geek, hehe. High Int and Perception, lower str and dex, Asthma, Bad Eyesight, and something else. As for positive perks, I usually take fast reader, and either quick/fast combo for increased survivability or something more realistic like lightstep.

I say we play a badass female computer geek who's DF game was interrupted by the zombie apocalypse. Pissed off, she goes off to create her own impenetrable bunker using her technical knowledge to steal and create viable defenses and build a fort in the middle of the forest.

[Girlinhat]

Actually the plan is to make a fort in the middle of town.  Shovel and a knife, you can dig pits and fill them with spears, causes intense damage and enormous slowdown on any zombie that falls in.  3 rows of spike pits will kill semi-regularly.  7 will be almost impenetrable.  Which is the goal.  After all, we're dwarves.  We don't cower off in the safety of the forest.  We scream at the top of our lungs in the middle of town until we collapse the earth with our noise and the rubble of fallen houses fills the pits with spiked rubble!

Also, that's not all the traits, it scrolls a bit.  I usually go with quick, light eater, fast learner, and something else fun.  Parkour seems useful, but there's not terribly many places to take advantage of it.  Quick gives you a straight increase, very nice, and Fleet Footed is rather nice as well, but also a bit situational.  I usually grab asthmatic, nearsighted, wool allergy, and schizophrenic.  Schizo is VERY entertaining, and relatively easy to deal with (Thorazine isn't uncommon) and would provide a lot of fun for an LP.  Nearsighted is almost free, you start with glasses and you can find them easily.  You can also utilize a monocle if you find one!  Wool allergy is also almost free, as there's no major times where you need wool, cotton suffices most times.  Asthmatic only really interrupts sleep, I've never had an attack while awake, but it does make a full night's rest very difficult.

For ranged combat it's usually 5 str and 6-7 dex and the rest in per and int.  Int of 12 gives some massive benefits, but is expensive.  Int 10 and meth will suffice to read the advanced electronics and computer books, but if you've got int 12 you can read them a lot easier.  For melee it's almost reverse, bottom out per and top up str.  Low str means low carry weight, which can decrease running speed and make it tough to escape a horde, but you can pop an Adderall and get some heavy boosts.  Low per means you'll have trouble spotting traps and land mines, and usually won't disarm them (shotgun traps HURT!) and means that future attempts to use firearms suffer greatly.  There's no way to raise skills (aside from temporary drug buffs) so you're pretty much locked into melee or ranged.  With good ranged you can kill a green with 2-3 nails via nailgun.  With good melee and dodge you can kill greens in 1-3 hits of a combat knife but risk a bit of injury.  On the one hand, you do heal over time though it's easy to get over-injured and die, and on the other hand ammo isn't always easy to find.  You might be able to one-shot greens with a nailgun, but if you run out of nails then you're instantly worthless.  Your combat knife never needs to reload.  Of course, one bionic upgrade is the "finger pointer of death" that installs a small, long ranged laser in your index finger, allowing you to pop heads easily if you've got handgun skill.  It can be an extremely powerful weapon.

[Girlinhat]

Also (doublepost!) in favor of melee is the Steel Spear made by tying a combat knife to the end of a pole, and the chainsaw, both of which utilize melee skill.  Chainsaw makes a lot of noise, even while idle, but it's a chainsaw and it's powerful.  Comparatively, for ranged you can get a heavy machinegun, the sort that are usually tripod mounted or hanging off the side of a helicopter, sometimes found in military bunkers.  And the Savage 111F is a very powerful long-range rifle with a very small magazine (3 by default, more or less depending on weapon mods) that can pop some nasty headshots.

[RAM]

Do we need to stay in our fort, or can we build one, abandon it, and then build another, until the whole city is nothing but forts?

[Girlinhat]

Whatever is desired, really.  I'll be running this mostly from community suggestions (and personal liberties to avoid getting killed).  But forts are expensive.  With the current cost of construction, even a tiny tiny shack is incredibly expensive in terms of boards and less-so in terms of nails.  Costing 20 boards per wall (or 4 per spiked pit) with doors offering ~10 each, you might salvage 1-3 walls from a building, depending on the drop rate and the number of doors.  With a jackhammer that goes up incredibly as you can harvest walls, but without a jackhammer boards are rather hard to come by.  Spiked pits are by far the cheaper and more efficient defense, as they cost time with a shovel and 4 boards to construct, have a high movement cost, and a high damage, and are reusable and silent.  Zombies shuffling over spiked pits go extremely slow and get hurt as they go, making for some very powerful traps.  Empty pits are also good, but don't damage as much.  Bear traps do similar, but need to be reset on each use, limiting their function.

Because of the high high cost of home ownership, the vast majority of people never even attempt to build a cabin (especially as it can be wrecked by common zombies) so owning multiple bases... would be incredibly dwarfy.

[Bobv2]

With good melee and dodge you can kill greens in 1-3 hits of a combat knife but risk a bit of injury.

Or, you know, you could grab a baseball bat and specialize in bashing weapons and never take ANY damage.

[Girlinhat]

I have yet to handle bashing weapons, but the prospect of the sledgehammer is definitely appealing!  I tried one briefly with some melee skill but no blunt skill, and it didn't work as well as I was hoping.  The combat knife just gets criticals so easy that it strikes down foes fast and clean.  In trying to use sledgehammer or steel spear, I think the slower attack speed translated into fewer criticals, and thus a slower kill rate.  If a dagger can strike faster and get more criticals than a claymore, then you can guess which kills faster.

[Anvilfolk]

Heck, now I wish there was a "dwarven trait"

[Girlinhat]

I haven't looked at traits much, but I think it wouldn't be terribly difficult to mod in, but I'd rather a clean vanilla run to start with

So have we come to a conclusion?  Melee build for dwarfing it up close range?

[GlyphGryph]

I think an Int build is really the best. We could be a melee dwarf, but really - the coolest dwarves are always the mechanics. And skills are more important than stats, almost hands down.

Lets be int/speed based. Rocks and molotovs for weapons of choice, plus friendly robo-turrets and traps, for the win! They can't kill what they can't catch, after all, and rock ammo is in plentiful supply... (and silent!)

Did my musical instruments ever get rolled into the main game, by the way? I know some of my stuff did, but don't know about that. If so, ignore everything I just said and go melee, but bring a guitar everywhere. Kabong!

[Girlinhat]

No instruments, sadly, though I may make that a modding goal of mine.  Music stores!  I might just have to make a FLCL homage and do a guitar build.

While I agree that skills matter more than stats, stats DO still matter.  And while I haven't done much throwing, rocks actually aren't the most plentiful thing.  Boards (from doors) are actually much more common, making throwing spears a bit easier.  We could try for a mainly speed based build, int and quick and fleet footed, to skitter around town on our toes and take pauses to bash a head in with a rock or sledgehammer.  Traps, I'll have to check a bit.  I know that traps are persistent, but I think there was an issue that friendly turrets would disappear when you walked away.  If this is fixed, then things change quite a bit, but if we're losing expensive turrets every time we walk outside, then building manhacks might serve us better.  They are small flying robots with a blade, I imagine baseball sized, hovering with a razor's blade keeping them afloat.  Damned dangerous things, by any account.