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[Mushroo]

Potash has that use? And are smaller farms really that much better then max size farms that i've been using? Wow, I must be a noobcake at DF  Oh well, at least you guys are helping me out, I'm learning more now that I found this out  And what kind of plants are reccomended to be used, because all I've been doing was plump helmets and thats it, rest of the food was fish and assorted animal bits and stuff left over from something stupid wandering past the cage traps into the serraded discs

Plump helmets are the best beginner crop, and meat is a very Dwarfy source of food too. Nothing wrong with your current methods. I recommend growing at least one other crop for brewing booze (dwarfs get unhappy thoughts from drinking the same old booze) although you can also achieve variety from trading or gathering surface plants.

For intermediate projects, personally I like growing pig tails, then Processing them into thread, is a lot of fun. If you have a skilled Weaver then cloth will be more valuable than the cheap stuff the caravans bring, therefore the clothes you make out of that cloth will be proportionately more valuable. For extra value you can sew cloth images.

One thing you can make out of pig tail fiber cloth is bags. Once you have a lot of empty bags then you can mill flours and dyes at a quern/millstone and process quarry bush leaves at a farmers workshop. Bagged food is highly valuable. If you have a skilled farmer and use potash then you can get fat stacks like quarry bush leaves [45] which can be cooked into lavish meals that are worth as much as a gold statue or serrated steel disk.

Starving to death in Dwarf Fortress is actually very difficult once you understand a few basics. However I enjoy the additional challenge of cooking the most expensive and rare foods (like elephants or forgotten beasts). It is an excessive obsession of mine.

I don't know the answer to your medical question, sorry.

[highmax28]

Does your CMD have any diagnosing skill?

Lets just say my CMD has all skills needed to do this past novice... Is it something I did wrong with hospital? I set it up using zone, piut things in it and then dwarves did rest, and still this bugger won't even budge to even say hi to them, he'll just putz around probably singing, drunk as hell and not caring that while half of the population is in coffins, the other is badly hurt to the point they can't move! Theres a mixture of either broken legs or arms, goblins took a big toll on this fortress, and not only was it just an ambush, they got bored shooting at dwarves and killed EVERY animal in the area, and walked off! They just left the dwarves with bolts probably still sticking in their limbs or the freaking mace wielding goblin that came in and would just smash things until something dropped, and i swear, this was RIGHT AFTER I found magma/adamantine, nothing was touched minus making some magma forges/smelters, and on top of that, it was the first time i pissed off the elves too early in the game (I'd usually wait like 5 years then do so, but they had so much stuff and I was getting desperate and I never liked the pointy eared bastards, even in Norse legends and etc. outside of DF)

[FuzzyZergling]

Hmm, not sure what could be going wrong there.

In an injured dwarf's medical screen, does it show any injuries or treatment?

Are the dwarves in a bed within the hospital zone?

Is the CMD on break?

[NecroRebel]

What personality traits does your doctor have? At least some of them matter. In particular, you want dwarves who like helping others, are easily moved to pity, aren't given to procrastination, and who are impulsive, as having these traits makes them much more likely to take medical jobs and take jobs in general more readily. A dwarf who views helping others as an imposition on their time, would never let an objective judgment be tempered by mercy or pity, rarely completes tasks and is often overcome by distractions, and thinks through every alternative and its consequences before acting will take a long, long time to do medical care, even if they've got no other labors. Like, months-long time. On the other hand, somebody who is truly fulfilled by helping those in need, incredibly compassionate and feels the pain of others, who will persist in the face of any difficulty until a task is complete, and always acts without considering alternatives or thinking through possibilities will usually start medical care within a week or less.

[knutor]

I've been taking a female giant hunting bat, almost all the time.  I can't see wasting points on skills, I can develop on my own.  The bat won't produce offspring in captivity however.  Once the game gets going and snatchers show up, I stick her in an underground pen with nest boxes, and she never lays eggs or has offspring.  I dunno what I'm doing wrong.  I cannot get any giant pets for that matter.  Have you had any luck with them?

Sincerely
Knutor

[NecroRebel]

Well, I wouldn't expect a bat to lay eggs, given that they're mammals and very, very few mammals lay eggs... And nest boxes are only useful for egg-layers, so those are basically useless for the bat.

Anyway, you typically need a male on the map in order to get females pregnant, and unlike many common domestic animals no caravan will bring any. I'm unsure, but I suspect that having a male in the caverns when you haven't revealed those might not be sufficient, either. Next time, though, you might want to embark with both a male and female. I'm assuming you switched off the exotic part of [PET_EXOTIC], else they'll not give birth until the Dungeon Master comes, which he won't.

[Qwernt]

My buildout really depends on my goal for the Fort.  Generally I just embark and deal with it.  However, usually I am thinking of a specific fort idea and that is when I look at the build out.  In general I have roles:

FOOD
   Herbalist (unless unsafe) / Grower.  Always train grower to max, maybe .
   Don't train any other food related skill, quality usually doesn't matter.  The one exception is Cook, I will often have a Cook/Manager dedicated dwarf.

Management
   1 dwarf with 1 point in appraisal and 1 point in some personal skill (so they get voted expedition leader).  Usually I make this person my cook & bookkeeper.

Miner
   1-2 dwarfs.  More if I plan an army.  Fewer if I don't plan on building big.

Woodsman
   1 point wood cutter, 5 points axe, rest dodge.  This is impromptu army #1.  Yeah, a bit of a headache with the axe, I just want him to be less surprised by nasties.  Usually becomes my army captain.  I will often make the woodsman my herbalist as well, but if I do, I bring LOTS of wood at start.

Other 3
   All depends on what the fort is.  Am I going for a large stone structure?  Then 3 masons.  A glass monolith - then glassmakers and masons.  A GIANT farm - more herbalist/growers.  etc etc etc.

As far as gear.  I eliminate all "premade" items except pick and axe (only 1 axe) used to go real bare bones, but decided it is more time consuming than I care to deal with.  But remove the quivers/crutches, etc.  I usually get 5 of each thread type and cloth (and promptly forbid them) to deal with moods.  I also tend to grab 20-30 wood (so that woodsman doesn't really HAVE to do anything right away).  I tend to ignore the "get extra barrels by" stuff, especially because rock pots are easy now. 
I also like to take turkeys, a male cat, and a few dogs (never pre-trained) for early security.

[highmax28]

My CMD isn't on break and I'll have to take a look again at waht his traits are, and I've honestly watched him sit on his ass with "No Job" for a good month before I said "F*** it, he isn't moving anytime soon so... Come back to this fortress when I get more of an idea of how to run this", and I remember I even set the others without damaged limbs TO ALL medical stuff, and they did f*** all too, but I thought of THAT just being they don't have the proper skills... And I've actually had one guy sit on his rear in one game in a brook drinking water and catching fish and sat there with a broken arm from a previous ambush that ended in goblin heads flying. All I know is I had the same issues there as I do now, except I had a FULL hospital, with EVERYTHING in it, even though this was before they fixed baron issue

[FuzzyZergling]

A CMD should ideally have only diagnosing on, not the other medical skills, so that they diagnose every dwarf before doing anything else.
That probably won't help you, but I thought I should point it out.

[chris_strain]

My standard lately has been:
miner5/mason5
miner5/stone craft5
carpenter3/woodcutter1/wood crafter3/bone carver3
planter5/miller1/plant gather1/cook3
planter5/thresher1/plant gather1/brewer3
weaponsmith5/armoursmith5
teacher3/axe3(sometimes sword instead)/armour use2/shield2

2 cheap picks
1 axe (I 'cheat' and use a training axe to save points)
16 each booze
16 plump helmets
12 assorted meats (1 x 12 different  cheap ones for extra free barrels)
a few turtles (if avialable) for shells for the odd mood.
11 of each sead
2 pig tail cloth
2 of each thread
1 m and 1f dog
1m and 1f cat
2-3 bags of plaster for early injuries

If I have the points 1 ewe and 1 ram for wool/milk/cheese, otherwise 1m and 3f egg laying birds for meat/egg

Any remaining ponts go into sand, both because I love glass, and sand is 1 point and nets you a free bag, saving you 9 points each.

[Mushroo]

One embark strategy tip is to make a list of "moodable" (can be improved to Legendary by Strange Mood) vs. "non-moodable" skills. Ideally each dwarf has one (and only one) moodable skill, because each dwarf can only experience one strange mood in his lifetime. If a dwarf has no moodable skill then he will not get a strange mood; if he has two or more then he will potentially become legendary in one and lag behind in the other.

[knutor]

each dwarf can only experience one strange mood in his lifetime.

Thats interesting to know, never knew they just got one.  Moods are what ruin my embark strategy.  Since I don't have an anvil.  I lose a lot of metalworkers early on to moods.

Although I wouldn't add social skills without first examing the attributes of ea of the seven dwarfs, because many are impossible to advance without a matching attribute, or more precisely a beneficial attribute, low honesty for lying, high organize for appraisal and low urge for brewing.

Sincerely,
Knutor

[Mushroo]

Why you not bring an anvil? It is the one item in the game that dwarfs cannot manufacture themselves!
(and legendary armor/weapon/metal smiths are arguable the most valuable dwarfs you can have)

[Delta Foxtrot]

Moods are what ruin my embark strategy.  Since I don't have an anvil.  I lose a lot of metalworkers early on to moods.

Get an anvil on embark (100 points for iron is pretty cheap) or don't embark with smiths. Maybe I'm just lucky/unlucky, but I rarely get a dwarven caravan that doesn't have an anvil, and I usually get my first smiths far later, so I don't have any smith related problems early on.

Skip the splints and crutches (awfully expensive and practically useless early on), if you must, just have your carpenter make a few of them early on. You should also see to how many dogs & cats you bring along (unless you want to go nuts with them straight away, a breeding pair should be enough. This is assuming you really want to avoid moody smith related incidents early on.

[Sutremaine]

Splints and crutches are pretty common with the first caravan, and even if you're unlucky and get a bunch of diamond-encrusted ones (once I saw a crutch or splint that was worth something like 1200db) the elves and humans consistently arrive with them. If you're not in a dangerous area or using something like the Fortress Defence mod and pumping out wealth immediately, you're almost guaranteed an invader-free first year.
 

If a dwarf has no moodable skill then he will not get a strange mood

They will; it'll be a crafter mood and use bone, wood, or stone. Usually you get a useless trinket, but sometimes you can get something buildable.

if he has two or more then he will potentially become legendary in one and lag behind in the other.

It doesn't really matter. You still have the XP and created goods from the non-mooded skill, after all.

Although I wouldn't add social skills without first examing the attributes of ea of the seven dwarfs, because many are impossible to advance without a matching attribute, or more precisely a beneficial attribute, low honesty for lying, high organize for appraisal and low urge for brewing.

Brewing and Appraisal skill can be gained by any dwarf. The ones that may or may not be advanced by a particular trait are Comedian, Conversationalist, Persuader, Flatterer, Consoler, Liar, Intimidator, and Pacifier. Some of these skills are useful for trading and Consoler / Pacifier are useful for dwarves in whichever position is currently dealing with unhappy dwarves, but mostly you don't need to pay attention to them.