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Author Topic: Mountains, and a lack of life above and below. (Question)  (Read 633 times)

Insomniac

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Mountains, and a lack of life above and below. (Question)
« on: December 17, 2011, 06:12:38 pm »

Is it normal for a mountain embark to have no vegetation (trees, herbs ect) above ground, and no underground plants in the caverns? My cavern is basically a gigantic mud pit with an occasional monster running around and webs.

P.S. HI, this is my first post and I love Dwarf Fortress!
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Ieb

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Re: Mountains, and a lack of life above and below. (Question)
« Reply #1 on: December 17, 2011, 06:37:36 pm »

If you embarked on a spot that is high enough in altitude, then yeah, it can be devoid of any plantlife. As for the underground thing, yeah, it's possible to embark on areas where the caverns have only mud or only fungi trees.
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Teneb

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Re: Mountains, and a lack of life above and below. (Question)
« Reply #2 on: December 17, 2011, 06:42:15 pm »

Mountain biomes tend not to have plants.

You barren caverns however, is because there is no water in that part of the caverns. Other layers may still have water. The bottom-most layer can still have blood-thorns even if there's no water in it.
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Dwarfus

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Re: Mountains, and a lack of life above and below. (Question)
« Reply #3 on: December 17, 2011, 06:43:05 pm »

That is odd but sounds possible. If you keep burrowing down you might hit more caverns. Once you hit one with plantlife it will spread throughout your higher cavern levels and muddy subterranian levels.
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Insomniac

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Re: Mountains, and a lack of life above and below. (Question)
« Reply #4 on: December 17, 2011, 06:56:05 pm »

If you embarked on a spot that is high enough in altitude, then yeah, it can be devoid of any plantlife. As for the underground thing, yeah, it's possible to embark on areas where the caverns have only mud or only fungi trees.

What's interesting is that there can be trees on one part of the map on the same Z-level, but the other side which is registering as being the mountain biome will not have trees, but does have soil. Everything simply refuses to grow.

Also, it is mud, no trees or anything underground. I'll keep digging, but I saw this before on another embark. Just seems odd.
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Sutremaine

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Re: Mountains, and a lack of life above and below. (Question)
« Reply #5 on: December 17, 2011, 07:47:25 pm »

Mountain biomes never have trees or shrubs, and the grass doesn't grow back once eaten or trampled. This is normal and happens even on a perfectly flat site.

It's also normal, albeit uncommon, for a cavern to have no water at all. This can be prevented by changing the worldgen settings so that the minimum water level in a cavern is greater than zero. I don't know if any non-zero number will do, so just make it 10 and forget about it.
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