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| − | {{Colored_Notice_Box|#a00|'''If you attempt to kill the target(s) of your first quest with | + | {{Colored_Notice_Box|#a00|'''If you attempt to kill the target(s) of your first quest with neither companions nor armor then you are very likely to die.''' Therefore, before proceeding make sure you have friends with you. If you do, you shouldn't need armor if you let them do most of the fighting.}} |
Revision as of 20:11, 8 April 2011
| This article is about an older version of DF. |
This guide provides step-by-step instruction for those who have never played Dwarf Fortress in Adventure Mode before. It assumes that you have already installed the game and can navigate the menus on your own, but no significant knowledge of how to play Fortress Mode is required.
Read the full adventure mode documentation for additional detail.
Even experienced players might want to check out the tips section at the end.
World Generation
Some custom worlds which are interesting for fortress mode may be annoying for adventure mode for various reasons such as few civilizations, low population, certain races not existing, lack of access to metals, or history being so far advanced that many fortresses and towns have been abandoned.
For your first game it's best to start with a generic world to avoid potential problems. You can come back to an existing world once you have the hang of things.
For your first game, generate a world using Create New World! with:
|
Character Creation
Race and Civilization
The first step in starting an adventure mode game is to choose the race (and civilization) of your adventurer.
All three races can complete the same quests. Elves are arguably the most challenging since they start with very weak wooden weapons. Starting equipment for dwarves is generally better (the only race which can start with steel weapons), though for now much of the armor and clothing you will find is too large for dwarves as shops only sell human-sized clothing.
Humans are all around the best choice, as they begin with bronze or iron weapons and can use any of the items sold by shopkeepers (who, for the time being, are only found in human towns). "Human outsiders", however, start with almost no equipment and most civilizations are unfriendly to them, so it's suggested that you not pick that "civilization" option until you really get the hang of things and want a challenge.
| For your first game, select Human of some civilization (not outsider). |
Status
You can then choose to start as either a Peasant, Hero or Demigod. Each offers progressively more points to spend on attributes and skills. These three options essentially amount to how difficult it is to get started, so to make things easier for your first game you may want to just pick "demigod".
| For your first game, select Demigod as your status. |
Starting Attributes
These are the attributes you start with. They will go up as your skills increase which means that many of them can be raised in game, sometimes rather easily. Agility, Toughness, and Strength are probably the most important, in that order. Endurance keeps a character from getting exhausted too quickly in battle, and Social Awareness increases the number of followers you can have at one time.
Other attributes to keep in mind in the future: Focus helps with Archer, Observer, and Ambusher. Willpower helps characters resist exertion/pain effects. Spatial Sense helps combat skills. Kinesthetic Sense helps with most skills involving any movement at all. These are less important to start out with, though, because they can be raised by doing various things in game, some of which are explained in the tips section.
Some attributes like Musicality are currently completely useless.
For your first game, select the following attributes:
The others are either less important, easier to raise by doing things in game, or totally useless. Note that you won't have enough attribute points to increase all of these unless you set status to Demigod. Later you may find that you want to start with different attributes, but these are a good safe starting point. For example, you may find that later you don't care about the extra follower from Social Awareness and want to increase Spatial Sense or something instead, but for purposes of getting through this tutorial alive the extra follower will help. |
Read up on Template:L for more information.
Starting Skills
These are what you start out with for skills, though you can increase them and develop others by doing things in game. The most important in the beginning are a specific melee weapon skill (such as Swordsman), and defensive skills like Shield User, Armor User, and Dodger.
Defensive skills are absolutely critical if you don't want to die instantly. (See Template:L for more info.) Observer is important for avoiding ambushes, which often mean instant death if sleeping, and Swimmer helps to avoid drowning. Others such as Fighter are useful but increase rather easily on their own in game.
For your first game, select the following starting skills:
The rest of the skills are relatively easy to raise in game or aren't that important at the beginning. Note that you won't have enough skill points to select all of these unless you previously selected Demigod as your status. As with attributes, you may later find that you want to experiment with different skill point allocations, but these are some good safe starting choices for purposes of getting through the tutorial. |
Read up on Template:L for more information.
Other
Your name and gender don't impact your character's ability, so feel free to do whatever you want with those.
Gameplay
Once you have finished character creation, hit the Esc key at any time and select Save Game to save your game. You can then come back to it later by using the Continue Playing option in the main menu.
| Most of the key commands you will need are noted in the text, but refer to the Template:L guide if you need to look up the key for a particular action. |
Setting Off
You will usually start your adventure near a peasant hut. You can ask nearby commoners, using the k key, if you may be of any Service. They will then inform you of any problems their locality is suffering from, giving you a quest. In the beginning this usually means killing a nearby bandit.
| Walk into a hut, talk to a commoner, and get a quest. Feel free to ask some commoners to Join you if you want though most of them will refuse. |
Fast Travel
So far you've been traveling around at normal scale, but this can be very slow for traveling between geographical regions.
Using T will open the fast-travel screen and enable you to roam the land very quickly. Notice the uppermost bar indicating the position of the sun.
Use m to open a zoomed-out overview map to further help you navigate.
| Avoid traveling in the wilderness at night, particularly when you are alone. |
Finding Some Muscle
Much of the time, especially at the beginning, you need some companions to watch your back. The best place to find some is at a fortress. When in the fast-travel screen, press m to bring up the region map. Fortresses on the region map appear as small circles (marked as O on the map) and look like large buildings on the fast travel map.
Move next to the entrance of a fortress and hit > to exit fast travel. Now move toward the fortress and you'll soon encounter the wall. You may need to walk around a bit to find the entrance. Once inside, if the fortress is not abandoned, you will find soldiers milling around. Use k to talk to them and ask them to Join you. At first you will only be able to get three followers but this is enough for now.
| For now, always recruit the maximum number of companions. Later you may find that you don't need as many, though you'll usually need at least a few. |
If the fortress is abandoned, leave and try another one.
Walk some distance away from the fort and go back to the fast travel screen with T.
| When fast-traveling, make sure that all of your companions are near you or some may be left behind. |
Getting Some Rest
At this point you may have traveled enough that your character is tired. When your adventurer becomes tired, as indicated by the Drowsy attribute, it's time for some sleep. Move to a settlement of some sort, go into a building, and use the Z key to bring up the sleep menu.
If you are in a private house, you must first ask the owner for permission before you can sleep. If a commoner is blocking you from entering his home, use the s key to crawl under his legs, and then the same key to stand back up.
| Beware of sleeping in the wilderness at night! If you have to sleep outside, only do so if you have companions. Even if you do have companions, it will usually be better to travel drowsy until you reach a fort or town where it's safe to sleep. |
Finding Your Target
Use Q to bring up the quest screen. Using the + and - keys, you can scroll through the quests displayed on the right. Pressing z will zoom in on the current quest target, showing you the quickest path to reach it. The quest menu can also be used to pinpoint the location of many other useful sites and entities.
Fast travel toward the location where your target is. When you get close, go back to the quest screen, hit z and you should get a more detailed map of exactly where to go. Once you are in the right spot, hit > to exit fast travel mode.
Note that the target of your first quest may be in a camp (looks like ☼) surrounded by henchmen. Make sure to approach carefully and when you see one of them, let them come to you and let your companions attack first. |
In the upper-left corner of the screen you will now see a box with a list of icons and an abbreviation for a direction such as NNE (north northeast). One of these will be marked with TSK and that is your target. Continue to move in the indicated direction until you find the target that you're supposed to kill.
| If you're finding your first quest too difficult, and you manage to escape with your life, you can ignore the quest for a while, replace any dead followers, go ask NPCs about Surroundings, and try to find an easier camp or lair to attack. When you kill whatever "boss" is there, even if it not part of a quest, you can still go brag about it, raise your fame, get more followers, and then go back to the original quest. |
Fighting
| If you attempt to kill the target(s) of your first quest with neither companions nor armor then you are very likely to die. Therefore, before proceeding make sure you have friends with you. If you do, you shouldn't need armor if you let them do most of the fighting. |
To fight, simply use the directional key to move your character as if to collide with your target. You can also press A when directly adjacent to a target in order to target specific body parts, or attack non-hostile targets.
For your first fight, you may want to let your companions take the lead as you won't have any decent armor yet. Press . to skip turns if you want to wait in one spot and let your friends do the fighting or let your target come to you. If one of your companions dies, no big deal. You can just take his stuff by pressing g then get another follower later.
Once your targets are dead, take their stuff using the g key. Immediately use w to wear any armor or clothing you gain. Decapitated heads can be left behind.
When walking around, use the g key to pick up any equipment or item lying on the ground. These will then be added to your inventory i. Items may be sold later on to a shop at a nearby town (not hamlet).
Completing Quests
Once you complete your first quest, you can talk to any hamlet, town or fortress dweller to spread the news of your success. Though your quest log will direct you there, it is not necessary to return to the individual who gave you the quest to report your success.
Each time you report your success, your level of fame will increase. Once your fame has risen, more mighty warriors may want to join you on your way to glory. They can be recruited at fortresses or among the common peasants. Your companions will greatly increase your chances of survival and adventurers who care about such things should drop by the nearest fortress as quickly as possible.
Checking Things Out
At any time, use the z key to display your status. This can be used to look for any scratches, bruises or missing limbs.
To check on the status of your companions, use the c key to get a list of them (specifically, the ones within visual range) and a summary of their conditions, then press the key corresponding to the one you want to view up close. Alternatively, you can use the l key, which can also be used to look at any other item or creature within your range of vision.
You may equip any items that you find or buy using the w key. If you are wearing too many items in an existing location, items must first be removed using the r key. To swap weapons you should drop the equipped weapon first, or put it in your backpack, then get the new equipment from the ground or rremove it from your backpack.
Trading
Next you will probably want to sell of a bunch of junk you don't need and ideally buy some armor. To do this you'll need to find a shop.
You can tell at a glance which towns have shops by looking for ■ (yellow, rather than the white ■ of houses) on the travel map.
To find shops, go stand on a yellow ■ tile on the fast travel screen then press >. Walk around a bit and you should find some huts with signs outside. These are shops. You can walk inside and talk to the residents just like anyone else, except that residents in shops will be willing to Trade with you. Armor shops have a sign that looks like [ armor.
| Read the section on Template:L because how trading works is not entirely obvious, especially the fact that you must manually pick up your change and whatever you buy. |
What Next
The next thing you should do is work on getting a full set of armor unless you have been luckily enough to have already obtained one. You may want to go tromping around in the woods looking for animals to kill. Killing animals can be profitable because you can butcher their corpses with x and sell the products. Butcher and sell all animal corpses until you've managed to obtain a full set of metal armor. Meat is surprisingly valuable.
You may need to visit several armor shops to find all the armor pieces you need.
After you've armored up a bit, it's probably safe to go on the next quest. Get as many companions as you can and set off for your next target. You can also ask commoners about Surroundings which can reveal lairs and other hidden sites on the map, but you should probably avoid any non-quest monster sites in the beginning as lairs and such can have creatures that you won't be able to handle at this point.
After That
Congratulations, you have graduated from adventurer school. You can now keep doing quests, explore random sites, go find and explore an old fort of yours in one of your existing worlds, get lost in the underworld, or whatever you feel like.
You may want to read though the full adventure mode documentation to learn about things that weren't covered here.
Tips
See the Template:L for lots of tips and suggestions on how to avoid death and increase your skills. This is well worth reading!