User:GarrieIrons/log

Beginnings

Well this game is intriguing. Far from the roguelike I was expecting having played Angband since Frog Knows... in 199?

My first fortress was more of a mud hut and I had dwarves dropping from the mangy cougar which wandered around picking them off at will.

Farming

This time at least I have some real mountains around me. But I still cannot work out how to get my farming dwarves to get out of the pit and out there picking plants or growing plants where they are able to, so that they can in turn brew something for my alcohol-deprived dwarves to drink.

Need more detail. What pit? Have you figured out how to build a farm plot yet?

Could be that you haven't designated plants to harvest? Or perhaps the dwarves in question have too much else to do, and need other labor preferences turned off? (Notably stone hauling) --Edward 23:18, 3 January 2008 (EST)

Most of my D's have all but a couple of jobs turned off ... then even though they should have work to do they end up idle...? GarrieIrons 06:58, 4 January 2008 (EST)

To get any job done, you'll need to a) build a workshop; b) turn on the appropriate labors on one or more dwarves (if they built the workshop, they'll usually have the right labors turned on); c) add whatever tasks you want done at the workshop via q-a. Set it to repeat if you want it done continuously. If you don't have the right raw materials for the job (or you run out of them), you'll get an announcement to that effect (unless you turned announcements off via orders).--Maximus 13:27, 4 January 2008 (EST)

Pit comes from my Angband background... the Fortress / hole in the ground. Once I dug the first bit I had 6 dwarves inside and one outside, fishing, but letting all the fish he caught rot on the riverbank even though I had designated a space for a fishery to be built (and nobody would build it). 06:58, 4 January 2008 (EST)

Add fish cleaning to one or more dwarves. Once the fishery is built, add "process a raw fish" on repeat until all your fish is cleaned. Fish can be eaten once it's cleaned; it doesn't have to be cooked.

If they're just letting the fish rot by the riverbank, you need to create a food stockpile. Any dwarves with "food hauling" on will move the raw and/or processed fish to the stockpile so that it won't rot. If you have empty barrels available, they'll put the barrels on the stockpile and put the food in those.--Maximus 13:27, 4 January 2008 (EST)

And I am still yet to work out how long a season takes, or how long between sleep intervals, in a world where there is no such thing as night and day.

Talk:Economics#Dwarven_consumption

Well, I have now worked out - and maybe it's obvious ;) - that I can farm indefinately indoors on a patch of Silt cavern floor. For my new problem see below! GarrieIrons 09:49, 5 January 2008 (EST)

Training animals

Can I ever learn how to train a dog? GarrieIrons 08:50, 3 January 2008 (EST)

Add the animal trainer labor to one of your dwarves, build a kennel, add a "train animal" task to the kennel. The trainer will seek out a stray dog, if you have one (it cannot be owned by another dwarf), and train it into a war dog (don't bother with hunting dogs).--Maximus 15:43, 3 January 2008 (EST)

Trying this method.GarrieIrons 10:09, 4 January 2008 (EST)

Well, Day 2 of Real Life gets me....

the Dwarven Caravan.... they don't sell me any food, and I've run out!
I find some ore... but everyone is busy trying to stave off starvation
I think I have tried to build too many workshops. What ones do I need to become self-sufficient (ie stay alive) vs the ones I need to earn money?

GarrieIrons 10:09, 4 January 2008 (EST)

You actually don't need to earn money at all. In my current fort I've been experimenting with computing and haven't bothered to do a single thing beyond making enough food & booze to keep my dwarves alive. I haven't traded, I haven't made any industry (aside from kitchens, carpenter shops for barrels, stills, and whatever mechanisms/doors the computer requires), haven't made a military (I chose an island; the only dangerous thing around is unicorns), haven't dug any living space, and haven't made any furniture.

In fact, I haven't even bothered with farming; too much maintenance on my part. I just periodically designate the entire map for plant gathering and make sure any idling dwarves have the Plant Gatherer labor turned on. I brew all the plants into alcohol and cook the alcohol into food (1 plant turns into 5 alcohol which can be cooked to produce 5 "prepared meals"). Lately, due to surpluses, I've been cooking the seeds instead. I finally set up a butcher shop to get rid of the strays running around; I'll render the fat & cook the resulting tallow eventually to get rid of it. (To butcher livestock, z-enter to go into the Animals screen; toggle "butcher" on any that aren't owned by a dwarf.)

Despite having nothing more to offer than food, booze, and some strange machinery in the basement, the fort is in its 5th year and is at 120 dwarves, and they keep showing up.--Maximus 13:27, 4 January 2008 (EST)

Food, booze, and gadgetry. You have just managed to build a technical college. The geeks are flocking to you. --Ikkonoishi 04:42, 5 January 2008 (EST)

OK, I have managed to train War Dogs. That is one personal mission achieved!GarrieIrons 05:43, 5 January 2008 (EST)

Hunting

OK, so I have a Hunter. He is doing really well at catching prey animals. I also have a Butcher and a Butchers Yard. But no matter what I do: the hunter catches animals, and the Butcher says he hasn't got anything he can work with for either Butcher an animal, Catch an animal, or Extract from an animal. What gives?GarrieIrons 10:09, 4 January 2008 (EST)

Unless you changed your options, the butcher's shop should be set to auto-butcher any available corpses. The corpse has to be dragged back to within 20 tiles or so of the butcher's shop, however. My hunter seems willing to drag his quarry back to a big food stockpile I have. Try creating one near the butcher's.--Maximus 13:27, 4 January 2008 (EST)

OK - so if I am having a butchers shop, fishery and a kitchen - I take it each of them need food stockpiles near them?

Should my kitchen be "down in the mines" near where I want the miner to keep chipping away at it, or near where the food is bought in?GarrieIrons 22:51, 4 January 2008 (EST)

You don't need more than one stockpile. It's usually best to have all food production, processing, and storage in one central location (along with a dining room). Sometimes you might want a secondary dining room (and food storage) in a more distant location where lots of dwarves work (like magma/metalworking operations, or a barracks), to keep them from traveling large distances to and from food/drink, but it can be hard to get them to actually use the nearer dining room. Don't bother moving food near your miners -- you'll probably have them working all over the fortress. I would however put everything indoors, behind defenses. It takes a few goblin raids before you know how to defend the fort properly, but as of the latest versions they don't happen until you have scores of dwarves.--Maximus 23:45, 4 January 2008 (EST)

OK I will create a new open space for a butchery and fishery downstairs near where I have made my kitchen and dining room. I had thought it best to keep those things outside but it seems that isn't essential... 01:57, 5 January 2008 (EST)

The animal corpses themselves need to go to a refuse pile not a food pile. Always have a refuse pile near the butcher's shop. Preferably enclosed by walls and doors. --Ikkonoishi 04:44, 5 January 2008 (EST)

This would explain the miasma I just had hanging around my kitchen/butchery just now... ;) GarrieIrons 05:44, 5 January 2008 (EST)

Well, I think my hunter is working out. But I am not really sure. All I really know is, I now have a refuse room which is filling up with bones quicker than what my craft-dwarf can produce bolts on auto-repeat. GarrieIrons 09:48, 5 January 2008 (EST)

Farming, mark 2

OK, so how do I finish the life cycle from Plump helmet spawn -> Plump helmet (I'm getting this far!) back to Plump helmet spawn? ie how do my dwarves get the spawn back out of the mushrooms?GarrieIrons 09:48, 5 January 2008 (EST)

OM NOM NOM NOM. They eat them. Or you could brew them. With plump helmets you need to make sure you have a large food stockpile so they don't just rot on the field before your dwarves eat their way through the ones you already have.

If you see your stockpile filling up, create a bigger one right beside it. It's a good idea to start a barrel-making industry too, as each barrel can store up to 10 units of food. This won't give you 10x the storage, as only two plant[5]s would be stored in a barrel (vs. 1 stockpile square for each plant[5]), but a 3x capacity increase is reasonable to expect.

More importantly, you must have barrels on hand to make and store booze. In the stockpile menu, give yourself at least 5 "reserved barrels"; these will be kept empty until you fill them at the still.--Maximus 13:58, 5 January 2008 (EST)

My dwarves evendutally started farming on a very ad-hoc basis but then...

Oh, no it's winter...

What's a dwarf to drink when there's no still and the brook is frozen solid? Who'd have thought that I can turn rock into iron and not melt ice?

So thanks to thirst, it's down from seven to one... and now the mine is too big, it's over-run with thieving little bastards and full of dead bloody vermin who are stinking the place up.

At least I got everyone buried in style. Let's see how long the ranger challenge lasts?GarrieIrons 08:45, 10 January 2008 (EST)

Your best emergency response to thirst is to build a still and brew any plants you may have available. If you don't have any plants available, gather some. If all the plants are dead because it's winter, you're probably screwed. It's hard to keep them from dying if you run completely out of food or drink. Oh well, losing is fun.

There's probably a way to melt that ice but then I believe you have to build a well, which is pretty complicated.--Maximus 23:12, 10 January 2008 (EST)