40d:Starting builds

Fortress Site

Each fortress site offers particular challenges and opportunities; the starting builds below should be adjusted depending on what sort of fortress you envision ... and what it will take to stay alive where you're going!

Mountains

Most dwarven fortresses are founded along the edges of mountain ranges on sites that combine abundant ore and access to the outside world. Magma and rare metals lure settlers here, but goblins, chasm dwellers, and even giant eagles are potent threats.

Trees and plants do not grow at high elevations, so you'll want to include non-mountainous areas to obtain lumber and food - or, failing this, to pack a lot of extra food and logs.

Other consideration is elevation range. The game allows access up to 15 levels above the highest peak and 15 levels below the deepest valley, so steeper slopes means much more diggable area. The downside is lag; more levels also means more CPU burden (this can cripple a fortress - be careful).

Be sure to include a stream on the map; running water is (almost) essential for any fortress. In Cold and Freezing climates streams and lakes will often be frozen year-round and your dwarves may quickly die of exposure. Choose Temperate or tropical zones for an easier game.

Wooded Plains (with trees and plants)

Flatlands with at least some trees and gatherable plants can also make for highly successful fortresses.

Advantages over mountain zones include abundant trees and plants, guaranteed agriculture both on the surface and underground, fewer hostile fortresses and caves, and (unless frozen) more abundant water. There are even (rare) magma vents.

The greatest disadvantage is lack of rock to mine. Fewer elevations means fewer exploitable z-levels. The first few levels below the surface are almost always soil, peat, loam, clay, or sand, none of which offers much (or any) gems, ore, or building material. An aquifer, if present, may bar all access to stone until you freeze, pump out, or find a way through the water.

Desert, Glaciers, and Barren (few or no trees and plants)

Treeless (or near-treeless) biomes are challenging sites for a fortress: you get most of the disadvantages of a flatland site without having access to nearly as many trees and plants. However, near-lifeless zones such as glaciers are wonderful for those with slower machines, as there's little to burden the CPU but your dwarves and livestock. Deserts and barren areas often have sand; with a sufficient source of energy (preferably magma), you can build almost anything out of unlimited glass.

Ocean Side

An interesting combination of a few of the above locations, beaches are often a mix of ease intermingled with bouts of extreme difficulty. Minerals and trees are often abundant, as well as farmland and sand, but there is often no drinking water unless the biome has a river. There is also a likelihood that the settlement will fall between two biomes, potentially hazardous if the player expects a peaceful oceanside meadow, without realizing the ocean is full of amphibious zombie whales.

Starting Builds

Many of the quantities suggested end in a "1" or a "6"; this is to maximize the number of barrels you start with, since most foodstuffs fit five to a barrel. More barrels will let you build a larger stockpile for your first winter and conserves the wood you harvest in the early game for beds and other necessities.

Basic

The first order of business is simply to survive. Here is a simple, somewhat paranoid, way to do this.

Dwarves & skills

On most (but not all) sites, you'll want to get food, brew drink, mine, make wood and stone items, and trade. Whatever additional skills you purchase, be sure to cover these. If you need more points to buy skills (and it's a good idea to buy lots of skills), remove a battle axe.

• 2 miners
• 1 mason/mechanic
• 1 carpenter/woodcutter
• 1 grower/brewer/cook. He's responsible for making prepared meals and drinks.
• either a herbalist/grower, or a fisherdwarf, or a hunter. The first gets you lots of brewable plants on maps with plants, the second gets you food and bones on maps with water (in maps with dangerous fish such as carp fishing is suicidal so be carefull), and the third gets you meat and bones on maps with animals. Herbalism is usually the safest of the three.
• 1 spare dwarf. You might make him the leader and broker; if so, give him at least novice appraiser skill so you know what stuff is worth. You might make him responsible for making trade goods, or turn him into your first soldier, or you might just give him some skills you want to experiment with.

Items

You want picks, food, and drink. Everything else is optional. The suggestions below assume you spent the maximum possible on skills. We'll pack lots just to be safe.

• 2 picks - 1 per miner
• 1 battle axe - so you can chop wood
• 1 Anvil - so you can make weapons, trade crafts, and such
• 20 units of drink: dwarven ale, dwarven beer, and dwarven rum are all good. dwarven wine you'll get through brewing.
• 30 plump helmets - They're good to eat and produce 5 units of booze for each one brewed at a still.
• 5 turtles - they get you bones and shells
• 20 plump helmet spawn - for planting.
• 2 dogs - to guard against thieves and help kill intruders.
• (optional) other kinds of seeds and rock nuts
• (optional) 1 of many different kinds of meats for extra barrels
• (optional) some cheap (5 point) leather to make quivers and bags and such

If the map is treeless, remove the battle axe and spend the freed points on more plump helmets and logs (you're going to run out however many you bring...).

If you're willing to wait a year or two to do any metalworking and you're sure traders will come, remove the anvil and spend the freed points on such things as skills, food and drink, wood, leather, or weapons.

Metalbashing/Glassworking

Heavy metalbashing and glassworking requires a site with 1) abundant fuel and 2) raw materials. Magma is ideal but large coal seams or a forest will also suffice. A site with either limestone or chalk means nearly unlimited steel. Any site with "sand" (not "loamy sand" or the like) will permit glassworking. Failing these, any place with lots of rock, trees, and preferably sand will work fine. Your biggest choice when setting up is whether to optimize for a fast start or long-term success.

Dwarves & skills

Unless you're trying a low-skills challenge, each dwarf should get the maximum possible number (currently 10) of skill boosts; remove a battle axe to free up needed points. Individual preferences can be mighty handy; if you have a dwarf who likes steel, clear glass, crossbows, siege engine parts, or something else equally interesting, he's an ideal candidate for matching skills.

• A carpenter/leader: Points into Carpenter, Wood Cutter, and a bunch of nobles' skills, including at least novice Negotiator and Appraiser. This dwarf should have good inter-personal thoughts/preferences.
• A Mason/Mechanic: Points into Mason, Building Designer, and Mechanic. Adding more points to Mason gets construction materials and furniture faster. More points to Mechanic allows faster trap-setting. Adding Appraiser and/or Negotiator skills gives you a back-up leader or broker. A boost to Wrestling gets you better on-call defense.
• A Farmer/Herbalist (assumes the site has at least some plants): This dwarf will gather the plant material you need to brew drinks. Points into Grower and Herbalist. Leftover skill raises should be invested in a valuable, hard to raise trade skill such as Metalsmith, Metal Crafter, or perhaps Glassworking.
• A Farmer/Brewer/Cook: This dwarf is responsible for keeping your community fed and liquored up. Points into Grower, Brewer, and (optionally) Cook. Leftover skill raises should be invested as for the Farmer/Herbalist.
• A Metalbasher: Points into whatever hard-to-raise skills you most want. Armorsmith, Weaponsmith, Bowyer, Glassworker, and even Siege Engineer can all be good choices depending on your setup. Remember to spend a few points on Furnace Operator and perhaps also Wood Burning.
• 2 Miners/Soldiers: Points into both mining and military skills. The miners first get legendary and then become extremely powerful fighters. Remember that it's much easier to increase Mining skill than most of the military skills (especially Armor User), but also that you'll want capable miners immediately.

With this setup, you have several ways to make the trade goods you'll need to buy what you lack. Metal goblets, stone mugs, handwear, footwear, mechanisms, bone or wood crossbows, prepared meals, or bone and shell crafts are all solid choices.

Items (all starts)

• 2 picks
• 6 or 11 of each of dwarven ale, dwarven beer, and dwarven rum. With abundant brewable plants and lots of wood you don't actually need any starting booze, but it's nice to have a backup.
• at least 11 plump helmets. Bring a lot more if you anticipate problems with gathering brewable plants.
• at least 6 turtles. Not only are they good eating, they ensure you have the shells and bones needed to satisfy strange moods.
• 1 of every kind of meat that costs 2 or 4, as each type of meat will be packed in its own free barrel and cooking the meat will release that barrel for use. If you don't like this feature, bring more turtles or plump helmets instead.
• Unless the map is glacial, or you intend only outdoor agriculture, bring plenty of seeds as well. A minimum of 15 plump helmet seeds are essential for a quick start to underground agriculture; rock nuts, sweet pod seeds, pig tail seeds, and cave wheat seeds will diversify your meals and drinks and let you set up for clothes-making. Seeds are packed in bags.
• (optional) some cheap (5 point) leather to make quivers and bags and such

Items (fast start)

• 1 Anvil
• no battle axe ... as long as you're confident the site has either iron or copper.
• only a few logs (just enough to get started with), unless the map has no trees

Items (moderate start)

• no Anvil
• 1 battle axe (at present, steel is the only option)
• few or no logs, unless the map has no trees
• with the points you save by not bringing an anvil, buy logs and metal cages. Each cage can be melted into one metal bar, which is an easy way to ensure stocks of metals you expect your site to lack. That missing anvil will slow you down until you get one in trade (which normally takes about 6 or 7 seasons) and might even cost you a failed strange mood, but it means 50 extra metal bars or enough logs to make beds and barrels for all.

Items (slow start)

• no Anvil
• no battle axes
• lots of logs - at least 25 on a heavily forested map. You can survive without them, but it's a lot cheaper to buy logs to make barrels than to bring more drink.

Free Equipment

Dwarves who start with the ambusher skill get some leather armor for free. Dwarves who start with only military skills get a weapon for free; for example, a dwarf with Ambusher, Marksdwarf, Armor Use, Shield Use, and Wrestler as initial skill choices will show up for your fortress wearing leather armor and carrying a crossbow and bolts. Dwarves with a mix of military and civilian skills can get the free armor from ambusher, but not the free weapons ^[Verify].

Challenge builds

If repeatedly defending a besieged fortress isn't difficult enough for you, here are a few challenges you can set for yourself. You might also want to check out the List of goals for other ways to challenge yourself.

Hermit

• No skills
• One pick and no other supplies

A well known and popular challenge. Kill off the 6 starting dwarves and any immigrants as they arrive, and try to make a living for the last dwarf.

Outcast

• No skills
• One pick and no other supplies

Same as the hermit challenge, only with multiple hermits. Turn off immigrants or kill them.

Roughing it

• No picks

Don't dig or build at all. Bring no picks, and don't ask for them in trade. Watch as the more "weather-averse" dwarves slowly go mad.

Gone to the dogs

• One pick
• A ton of animals

Replace the starting equipment with an equal value in dogs or cats.

ASPCA

• No animals

Don't bring any pets. Furthermore, due to the possibility of animals being caught in them, don't build any traps, either. If immigrants bring pets, get rid of them somehow. (If you're a particularly rabid ASPCA member, you could get rid of the pet-bearing immigrants, too, but that's probably excessive.)

Diplomacy

• Six dwarves with only social skills
• One skilled dwarf

Six courtiers of the king's court made some ill-advised remarks within earshot of the king, and as a result have been ordered to go found an outpost. They've hired you to make sure they survive. The six nobles only have social skills and refuse to do any work that is beneath them.

Luddite

• No mechanics or mechanisms
• No machines

Traps and moving bridges are forbidden, farming must be accomplished by hand.

City-States

• No skills
• 7 or multiple of 7 of everything you bring

At the start your dwarves split everything equally and move to 7 different locales that are not interconnected. They have to mine their own rooms, plant their own crops, use their own craft piles. This will probably require a bit of cross-fertilization until you get doors and can lock everyone in, but after that it is every dwarf for him/herself!

Wooden Town

Start on any treeless map and make everything that can out of wood. Stone may only be used for crafts to trade and things which cannot be made from wood e.g. mechanisms. Metal can be smelted into bars but these bars must be traded away with no further refinement. This will mean your only defense will be marksdwarves with wooden bolts or traps Alternatively start on a map with an aquifer and do not tunnel beneath it but build all buildings from stone.

Dwarves on a Diet

Fishing Village

Give your dwarves only the fishing skill and other fishing related skills (like bonecrafting.) Try to survive off a fish only diet. Flood the river and build houses above it so the dwarves can fish through their floors. There will be an extra challenge if the river freezes in the winter.

Carnivore

• No plants or seeds

Only eat strays, pets, and animals you trap and hunt. No farming or plant gathering. Keep all your pets in cages and care for them as little as possible. Eat your dwarves' pets first for an extra challenge. If this upsets your dwarves, ridicule or ignore them. (If you are particularly heartless, you could cage those dwarves as well because anyone that empathizes with animals doesn't deserve any rights either.)

Vegetarian or vegan

• No meat or fish
• Vegans - no cheese, leather, silk, or shell

A fairly easy challenge. Take no meat and buy no meat. Butcher no animals. Gut no fish. To make your dwarves vegan, use no animal products like the elves.

IOGT / AA

• No alcohol

Quite possibly, this is the cruelest challenge that your dwarves can be given. Don't ever brew any alcohol. Build wells instead and watch your now teetotaller dwarves work slower and slower by the season.

Hunting Party

• One marksman/ambusher
• Two camp servants (e.g. one cook/brewer/herbalist, one butcher/tanner/leatherworker/woodcutter)
• Four clients, all dabbling in marksman/ambusher but with primarily civilian skills.

No anvil, lots of hunting dogs ... and a haunted wood. (In a terrifying wood, you may find all the trees & plants are dead, severely reducing long-term prospects.)

Immigration and Customs Enforcement

• One miner/mason/architect
• One woodcutter/carpenter/architect
• Five military dwarves

No anvil, lots of food, in a canyon - spend the first year building fortifications to interdict traffic. Immigrants can build a town around you, but your original dwarves remain dedicated to their mission.

Add your challenges!

Challenges are fun! Add some!