40d:Biome

A biome is a biotic area with homogeneous features, characterized by distinctive plants, animal species and climate. Your dwarves will find different resources depending on which biomes they select when starting a fort.

Selecting a biome

Biomes are important when choosing a fortress location in order to understand your surroundings. Individual biomes, which form at least one tile of your plot, can be cycled with the F#-keys; for example, an area with 3 biomes present can be cycled using F1, F2 and F3. The selected biome will be highlighted with flashing Xs on the Local Map, and the biome's information will be displayed on the right side of the screen. (See the illustrated guide for more detail).

Understanding Biomes

Biomes allow you to set the difficulty of your game. To make it easy, and to provide a variety of resources to your fort, you can select a plot that covers a wide area. A wide variety of biomes will give you access to several unique resources provided by each. Generally it is advantageous to plot your embarkation at the convergence of 3 seperate biomes (4 or more if possible - which is made easier if you enlarge your starting plot).

• Note: Making the starting plot wider than necessary will slow your game down considerably ^{vv0.27.169.33a}

By making use of several biomes you can provide more resources for your fort. Making sure one of your plots cover a either a broadleaf or conifer forest will provide you with an ample supply of trees, even if the rest of your plot extends into badlands and desert.

Surroundings are not directly linked to biomes (i.e. Glaciers could be one of haunted, wilderness or serene).

If your plot is completely encompassed by an ocean, lake or mountain biome you will not be able to embark. These areas are desolate, and your dwarves wouldn't last long there anyway.

Available Biomes

Arid

• Arctic Ocean
• Badlands
• Glacier
• Mountain
• Rocky wasteland
• Sand desert
• Tundra

Temperate

• Temperate Broadleaf forest
• Temperate Conifer forest
• Temperate Grassland
• Temperate Freshwater lake
• Temperate Freshwater marsh
• Temperate Freshwater swamp
• Temperate Ocean
• Temperate Saltwater marsh
• Temperate Savanna
• Temperate Shrubland

Tropical

• Tropical Dry broadleaf forest
• Tropical Coniferous forest
• Tropical Freshwater marsh
• Tropical Grassland
• Tropical Ocean
• Tropical Savanna
• Tropical Shrubland

See Also

• Regions for the possible values for Trees, Vegetation and Surroundings.
• Volcanoes which are not a biome in Dwarf Fortress, but may provide important resources