Normally I'd never trouble you with a thread about a game on the CBG, but Dwarf Fortress is the CBG-est computer game that exists. It's also free!
Dwarf Fortress is an amazingly complex simulator of life in a dwarven colony. The program generates an entire world from a random seed, with continents, extensive terrain and vegetation, thousands of historical figures, stories, caves, ruins, monsters - it can take half an hour to generate a large world map.
But it's worth it, because once you make your world you can live it. In Dwarf Fortress mode, you start off with 7 dwarves and a small amount of resources, with which you must carve your fortress right out of the mountain. The game is extremely open-ended; carve out any cave structure you want through layer after layer of complex geology, and hope your dwarves can survive the first winter and build a lasting society in the years that follow.
Each dwarf has its own personality and preferences; unhappy dwarves will tantrum, destroying furniture and getting into fistfights. They like different foods, make friends, fall in love, have kids, and go into mad trances and create unique artifacts (or go into a murderous rage if their efforts are foiled). You assign them to tasks and they build up experience; they can be carpenters, miners, jewelers, soldiers, masons, engineers, soapmakers, brewers, rangers, or just laughable peasants that haul around garbage (there are many more professions).
Trade with elves, dwarves, and men. Fight off goblin sieges with your Rube Goldberg-like creation of traps stuffed with spikes, enormous corkscrews, and serrated disks, or just fill a moat full of lava, or stuff the fortress entrance with ballistae and champion axedwarves. Mine for gems and precious metals. Build elaborate systems of machinery powered by waterwheels and windmills. Build a citadel with hundreds of dwarves, with nobility ruling over the plebs (and maybe even the Dwarven King himself).
The motto of DF is "losing is fun," and trust me, you will lose. Your dwarves will starve, or go berserk from thirst, or be devoured by zombie elk, or roasted by a dragon, or dig too deep and unleash a horde of Demons, or get slaughtered by a goblin army, or get drowned by a flood of water or lava caused by over-zealous mining. You might lose quite a bit - but it's all in good fun, and eventually you'll build a lasting and secure outpost that will resist all assailants.
DF is not for everyone. It has a steep learning curve, ASCII graphics, and a keyboard-based interface that takes some getting used to. If you can get over these things it's great fun and endlessly replayable.
Links:
here (http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/).*If you want somewhat better graphics, download an alternate version of the game here (http://mayday.w.staszic.waw.pl/df.htm).*Most questions on the game can be answered at this convenient wiki here (http://www.dwarffortresswiki.net/index.php/Main_Page).*Regional prospector (http://www.dwarffortresswiki.net/index.php/Regional_prospector#Regional_Prospector) is a valuable utility that lets you see if there are certain resources (magma, chasms, adamantine, underground rivers) where you settle. Without it, such resources are basically random.[/list]
Enjoy!
well I will give it a try, it does indeed look like fun
I'll give a little advice, because I hate to see people get discouraged and give up on this excellent game.
Always remember to check the wiki. I know many, many things about this game, and whenever I play it, I still always play in windowed mode with the wiki open in another window. It will cure much of your frustration.
Know your various ways to look at things. You can [v]iew the attributes and skills of creatures, loo[k] at the contents of a square, check the [q]ueue of tasks for a workship or the clu[t]ter that fills it. You can press tab to move the map and menu around the screen, or hide them. The menu isn't necessary, but it's a nice reminder of the keyboard commands.
The landscape is represented as a top-down view of a three-dimensional area, and you view one flat slice of it at a time. You can press < to view the next higher slice of land (or "z-level", as the wiki calls them), or press > to view the lower one, deeper within the earth. Black area is area you haven't mined next to yet (and thus, can't see); blue/teal area is usually sky, and will look different if you go down a few z-levels and see what's at the bottom.
If you're playing on a laptop without a number pad like I am, you'll need to remap the secondary scroll keys (they default to numpad + and -.) I stuck mine on [ and ]. You can use the cryptically-named "export to text" function on the key remapping screen to make these changes permanent.
Don't be sad if your first few fortresses fail hilariously. Mine certainly did.*
*The fates of some of LC's [spoiler=fortresses]
Hammerseasons - everyone starved to death.
Gearcloisters - a bowmaker went insane when his masterpiece crossbow was stolen by kobolds, and in his madness he slaughtered all my other dwarves, then threw himself into the river.
Helmedgleam - tragic mining accident killed a few of my dwarves, and sealed the rest in a part of the fortress that happened to have no mining picks, food, or (most importantly) booze.
Blazespears - I built a perpetual-motion-machine and accidentally used it to flood the entire world.
Swordbodice - overrun by goblins.
Tinshears - surprisingly successful, until a king moved in and started making demands I couldn't manage to meet, and having craftsdwarves punished by beatings with a hammer. Ouch.[/spoiler].
I saw the best dwarves of my generation destroyed by madness, starving, hysterical....
[blockquote=LC]I saw the best dwarves of my generation destroyed by madness, starving, hysterical....
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------[/blockquote]
This may be the best advertisement to play a game ever...any game that can have insane dwarven craftsmen is OK in my book.
As long as they don't bite people in the butt...
Quote from: NomadicAs long as they don't bite people in the butt...
They do that too.
I've run a few fortresses, and most were mildly unsuccessful. My first fort crashed my computer during a save, cause it was using too much system resources.
My second fort couldn't make iron weapons cause I flooded the magnetite stock pile with magma. Then a goblin siege started and my wooden X-bow bolts weren't killing them fast enough.
I'm not sure what happened to my third fort.
In my forth fort, I had caught five imps. My fort was annihilated when I tried to move the imps from their five tin/nickel/copper cages into one masterwork glass cage. The animal stockpile was in the same room as the well room, and the imps were loosed during a party. I wish I had caught that on film or something...
My most recent failure is chronicled here (http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=20177.0). Rather embarrassing.
I have a poll (http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=20273.0) going to decide for me which fort chalenge I should try next. It looks like I'll be taking a coastal fort and create a glass palace beneath the waves, unless some more votes for the canyon of doom come in.
-------
As fun as this game is, don't doubt that I'll be any less productive. PkMn Same, Botsa SD, and 54 Swords are still very high priorities.
Quote from: Luminous CrayonI saw the best dwarves of my generation destroyed by madness, starving, hysterical....
...naked. Don't forget naked!
Let's see, special ways in which my fortresses have been destroyed...
- All dwarves killed by goblins save one miner, who subsequently threw himself into a bottomless chasm out of despair
- All dwarves killed by a single zombie tuna (!)
- Accidentally broke into aquifer, flooding bedrooms, all dwarves sealed by water in their bedrooms until they starved
edit:
QuoteBlazespears - I built a perpetual-motion-machine and accidentally used it to flood the entire world.
Yeah, "accidental." Sure. ;)
That is brilliant, I am going to start a game just so I can try to flood the world with my mechanisms
Quote from: NomadicThat is brilliant, I am going to start a game just so I can try to flood the world with my mechanisms
It's harder to do than in previous versions but is possible as long as you have sourced water (a brook, river, or underground river). An aquifer would probably work too. Alternately you can flood the world with lava if you have a source, though that will take a lot longer.
It's a lot easier to flood your fortress. That has happened to me many, many times. Lava is best for that because it leaves rock in its wake, entombing your hapless dwarves in obsidian forever.
I blame this thread for a day of staring at ascii and a mind-numbing headache.
Gosh darn it. I had everything unpacked and started digging my fortress out... and then I realized it was completely loam and sand. Good for farming, however I didn't find a single stone the whole time.
Quote from: RaelifinI blame this thread for a day of staring at ascii and a mind-numbing headache.
If you can't stand the ASCII, I highly recommend the alternate download I posted in the OP. The graphics, while not astounding,
seem astounding if you're used to the ASCII version.
Quote from: NomadicGosh darn it. I had everything unpacked and started digging my fortress out... and then I realized it was completely loam and sand. Good for farming, however I didn't find a single stone the whole time.
Who needs stone, make everything out of glass!
You can make stone mechanisms and doors out of glass?! o_o
Quote from: NomadicYou can make stone mechanisms and doors out of glass?! o_o
Well, not mechanisms, but you can make glass doors (they're called portals). You can make glass versions of almost every placeable item except for beds (must be wood) and mechanisms (must be stone). If you have access to magma and build a magma glass furnace, you can make green glass just from a bag of sand (no fuel required) and glass becomes essentially a limitless and renewable resource. Don't make clear glass unless you have a ton of wood and spare dwarves to turn it into pearlash.
Quote from: NomadicGosh darn it. I had everything unpacked and started digging my fortress out... and then I realized it was completely loam and sand. Good for farming, however I didn't find a single stone the whole time.
Dig deeper into the ground. When you have any type of soil or sand, it's usually just one or two layers deep, with stone underneath. Dig under the soil to find the stone below. Lots of people like to put farms and stockpiles in the soil levels (since there isn't any resulting stone from digging to clutter the stockpiles.)
Some biomes have aquifers, which are essentially levels of water between the soil levels and the stone levels. If you have an aquifer, you'll have to find a way to bypass it to get to the stone beneath, so it can be very hard to get any stone on aquifer maps. Aquifers are handy sources of water, but I think they're generally more trouble than they're worth.
This fortunately isn't an aquifer area so I am set. Best part is I started a level up and the level down opens up into several lower areas filled with trees. So I can push vertically out. I am thinking that if I can find a permanent water source nearby I can channel it over for permanent wells as well as water traps and a moat. We shall see, we shall see.
On a side note this game gives me a new fear of polycarp and his minions.
Quote from: NomadicThis fortunately isn't an aquifer area so I am set. Best part is I started a level up and the level down opens up into several lower areas filled with trees. So I can push vertically out. I am thinking that if I can find a permanent water source nearby I can channel it over for permanent wells as well as water traps and a moat.
Keep in mind that the outdoor map will usually have a lot of up-pointing and down-pointing triangles-- these are ramps and natural slopes that dwarves can walk up and down on. So you don't have to build your fortress's entrance on the same z-level where the wagon appears, but can choose your starting location based on whatever factors you like.
For wells, I like to drain an outdoor pond or two into an underground cistern, and build a well over that. Keep in mind that the only times dwarves will drink water are when they're wounded or when they're out of booze (not ideal), so if you keep plenty of alcohol, you really only need a well to keep your wounded dwarves alive. That is to say, you won't need a huge supply of well water; a moderate amount will do okay. If you do have "sourced" water on your map (i.e.; it flows in from offscreen, infinitely), be careful when using it. I recommend setting up some sort of clever system with floodgates and levers, to avoid flooding your fortress.
Water and magma are fun for elaborate traps and moats, but "regular" traps (stone fall, weapon traps, etc.) will suffice against goblins and other small threats in the early stages of a fortress. If you find you keep losing to goblin invasion, try bringing a mechanic with your starting dwarves, or training one up early.
I've tested my new Goblin Liquidator, and posted the results in the poled thread.
Quote from: Luminous CrayonWater and magma are fun for elaborate traps and moats, but "regular" traps (stone fall, weapon traps, etc.) will suffice against goblins and other small threats in the early stages of a fortress. If you find you keep losing to goblin invasion, try bringing a mechanic with your starting dwarves, or training one up early.
You should bring a mechanic even if goblins aren't a problem. Mechanisms sell for a really good price, especially if you have flux to make them out of and a good mechanic who makes quality work.
Anyone picking this game up now might actually want to wait for a day or two, as the developer posted yesterday that a new update will be out "tomorrow or the next day, depending on this and that."
I will keep that in mind. However as I have already gotten going no reason to just sit and wait... might as well play my world :P
on a side note...
CARP! CARP!!! *assumes fetal position and sucks thumb while rocking back and forth* CARP!!!!!!!!!!!
(http://img232.imageshack.us/img232/9248/20080627rc8.jpg) (http://www.striketheearth.com/)
HAHA that is epic. :D
Anyhow I finally got a world going (only took me 8 tries to get the hang of starting a fortress). I think it's coming along nicely, though you all can feel free to give your two cents on it.
Surface:
(http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/1442/dfsurfacerr4.png)
Main Area:
(http://img362.imageshack.us/img362/9730/dfmainef4.png)
Mine:
(http://img137.imageshack.us/img137/8932/dfmineuq4.png)
I love your moat.
What is the bright blue stone you're building lots of stuff out of? Cobaltite? It's pretty.
Keep in mind that if you have cave-ins turned on in the init file, it's dangerous to mine out an area that is 7x7 or larger, if it doesn't have a support pillar or an unmined square (a.k.a., "naturally occurring support pillar") somewhere inside it to hold the ceiling up. If you have problems with the cavern collapsing, that's what will be causing it. (Alternately, edit the init file to turn off cave-ins, and you won't have to worry about it.)
What are you going to do for defenses when the goblins start knocking on the door. You got a plan? Is there a way to retract that bridge?
Quote from: Luminous CrayonKeep in mind that if you have cave-ins turned on in the init file, it's dangerous to mine out an area that is 7x7 or larger
No anymore. That's only in ye old 2D versions. With the z-level supporting versions you only need a non-diagonal connection to keep any amount of anything up. One floor panel or support pillar will hold up a 200x200x200 volume of anything. Ye drafkin are dumbeth and ye physics are thwackedth!
-----
I that brook. "I'm going to curve right here and then leave. Yoink!" Note that everything can just walk across the brook without any trouble. That includes goblins, so you might want to dig a mote around the brook to prevent a surprise entry.
Quote from: Luminous CrayonWhat are you going to do for defenses when the goblins start knocking on the door. You got a plan? Is there a way to retract that bridge?
I that brook. "I'm going to curve right here and then leave. Yoink!" Note that everything can just walk across the brook without any trouble. That includes goblins, so you might want to dig a mote around the brook to prevent a surprise entry.
[/quote]
Yea I noticed that with my dwarves. You can't see it since this is an earlier picture but I actually did order my dwarves to carve a channel out and around the brook.
Yeah, cave-ins no longer occur unless a construction/rock face is unconnected to the rest of the world.
Nomadic, that's a fine moat, but remember that goblins and kobolds often pack ranged weapons and will be able to shoot right over it. Flying creatures (giant eagles, maybe dragons too?) will also be able to bypass it. Once you get more stone, you might consider building walls (and maybe fortifications for marksdwarves).
Yes, thats the plan. For now though I just wanted something so I wouldn't get caught with my pants down (if worse comes to worse right now I can pull the bridge up and lock my dwarves inside).
Well, I learned something new and awesome about cave-ins by reading this thread! Old 2D-version habits die hard, I guess, and I keep putting supports in my 7x7 or larger rooms anyway.
QuoteYes if you notice the switch next to it, it retracts (drawbridges are awesome).
You know, you don't need to have levers adjacent to the objects they operate; mechanisms can link them to things from across the map. In this example, you might prefer to operate the bridge with a far-away lever-- say, deep inside the fortress, so that dwarves don't need to walk right out to meet an invading army in order to pull the only lever that will stop the advance of that aforementioned invading army.
If I have to pull it up by the time I see the invading army I am in trouble (since bridges take awhile to go up) hehe. Nah it is staying up 24/7 for now unless its getting near to caravan time or I need to go out for some reason. Later on things will probably change. Thanks for all the responses though (and good advice too), she's coming along nicely.
Quote from: NomadicIf I have to pull it up by the time I see the invading army I am in trouble (since bridges take awhile to go up) hehe.
Judging by this, you haven't had a goblin ambush yet. Have fun with that! :axe:
That doesn't sound good...
well the caravan has come and gone and I have my nice iron anvil plus other goodies. And now migrants :D
To top it all off I just struck gold and microcline (yay). This is proving to be alot of fun. Next up I need to figure out a way to setup a screw pump so I can pump water out of a room with the flip of a switch (going to have the entrance be floodable). Now for some walls though...
darn you carp... darn you and this addicting game.
Quote from: NomadicThat doesn't sound good...
I won't spoil the surprise, but let's just say the goblins will be giving you a little surprise of their own (or two, or ten) if your site has access to them (it probably does).
Check the DF Wiki for proper screw pump operations. It might take a few attempts to work out the system, but once you've got it you can pump anything anywhere with just a bit of power.
Well now that the caravan is through and the migrants have arrived my drawbridge is up for the time being which means that unless there is such thing as an aquatic goblin I am safe (unless I get some irritating kobold archers; hmm that wall would probably be a good idea).
I picked this up yesterday or the day before, but hadn't seen that there was going to be an update. I have already started by following one of the wiki tutorials.
Is anyone else using the "prettied" up version with the better graphics?
(Also Carp, I couldn't figure out how to use the Regional Prospector - maybe because I am using the other version?)
Nomadic, using better quality mechanisms for the lever and linkages will make things like bridges operate more quickly.
Quote from: Neubert(Also Carp, I couldn't figure out how to use the Regional Prospector - maybe because I am using the other version?)
Regional Prospector is the only "cheat" I use for this game. It's weird to use, because it has no interface or anything like that. Here's how it works.
Start Dwarf Fortress, and leave the program at the initial "Create New World / Start Game / Continue Playing" menu. Now, run Regional Prospector
only once. It will not appear to do anything right away, and that's normal.
Now, when you start a new fortress, you will see new symbols on the local map screen. Blue tildes are underground water (cave lakes or cave rivers), red tildes are magma, grey octothorpes are chasms, and light blue squiggles are Hidden Fun Stuff. So, you can deliberately site a fortress on ground that you know to include any of these features, and know in what general part of the landscape you should be digging around to find them.
Ah, alright. I thought I should start it after the world had been generated.
I suppose "Hidden Fun Stuff" can be veins and so on? :)
Quote from: NeubertAh, alright. I thought I should start it after the world had been generated.
I suppose "Hidden Fun Stuff" can be veins and so on? :)
You run it when you are at the DF title screen, but it doesn't do anything unless you are starting a new fortress. It only affects the "choose a location for your fortress" screen.
As for the Hidden Fun Stuff... weeeellll, you should probably just dig around in a mountain biome until you find some for yourself. I don't want to spoil it, and you probably wouldn't believe me anyway. :yumm:
Invader path finding is evil. They don't spawn at the edge of the map and try to find a way into your fortress like caravans and immigrants do. Invaders spawn with a path to your fortress. So if you keep the drawbridge up, they will spawn past your moat.
What you want to do is have only a single path to your fortress at all times, and control it with duct tape. I prefer simple reusable death traps like The Goblin Liquidator, or Smashing Surprise. Lets me allocate what would otherwise would be soldiers to more important tasks, like glass making.
Quote from: the_takenInvader path finding is evil. They don't spawn at the edge of the map and try to find a way into your fortress like caravans and immigrants do. Invaders spawn with a path to your fortress. So if you keep the drawbridge up, they will spawn past your moat.
I don't think this is true; I'm fairly sure all goblins and kobolds spawn at the edge of the map, but only in places where they can path to your fortress. Keep in mind that goblin ambushes, snatchers, and kobold thieves are invisible until they are revealed by a dwarf, a pet, or a cage trap. Kobolds can bypass traps too. A group of goblins that appear suddenly near your fortress didn't spawn there, they've been walking there and just got revealed by one of your units.
Spotting one member of a group reveals the whole group, so a single cage trap in a choke point can give you advance warning for ambushes. War dogs on restraints can guard areas too, though the guard dog will probably get killed if it reveals an entire ambush.
Sieges aren't invisible and will march in quite obviously from the sides of the map. If there is no way into your fortress, however, they will lay siege and wait around outside until you surrender, come out and fight, or let them in. It's generally best to keep a way open to your fortress, but to guard it heavily.
Here are some pretty good fortress defenses I made:
(http://i229.photobucket.com/albums/ee254/MithridatesNES/defenses.png)
The second, little picture is the next level up. Notice how the engraved pathway on the left (first floor) handles all traffic until danger is detected; then, I can pull up the drawbridge and force invaders to go through the lava zig-zag. The zig-zag forces invades to walk through multiple traps and run the gauntlet of ballistae and a "reverse battlement," the second-story structure that lets marksdwarves fire into the back of any goblins trying to navigate the lava maze.
Ideally I should have made the maze longer, as currently the ballista crewmen only get about one shot off before they panic from the goblins getting too close. The rest of the defenses, however, work very well. Notice that the engraved hallway is wide enough to allow the caravan in, so I can close the drawbridge behind them and protect my visitors from ambushes while we're trading. Cage traps in the engraved entrance stop any child-snatchers, and a guard dog on a rope in the central hallway sniffs out any kobold thieves who try to make their way into my craft stockpiles.
Nice, looks very good. I have 3 cage traps lined up along the inside of my drawbridge and am currently working on hooking up mechanisms to flood my entrance if anything gets in. I will probably also push a tower up through the surface above the barracks with fortifications on top so that if anything gets through the bridge I can flood the entrance and then move up and snipe them.
My favorite defense so far was set up on a map with terraced cliffs, so that invaders had to zigzag up a few levels of mountain to get to my true entrance, passing traps and checkpoints along their way. I had a bunch of enclosed mini-fortresses blocking the path up the mountain, and could use levers deep inside my main control room to raise drawbridges to block each one, or divert soldiers through underground tunnels to emerge in the mini-gatehouses, or take up archery positions in impregnable marksdwarf towers. In addition, each mini-fort featured unique traps and other passive defenses.
I had realized that the breeding rate of my dogs was getting out of hand. I had close to a hundred dogs running around at one point, chewing up processing time and making everything run slowly. So I trained them all as war dogs, stuffed them into cages at one of the gatehouses, and linked the dog cages (and two raising bridges) to pressure plates located just inside the far end of the place, where invaders would cross them just before exiting the seemingly-empty building. The pressure plates raised bridges, trapping the goblins inside, and released all those war dogs to tear them to bits.
It was a little impractical, and not as efficient as some of my other defenses, but the dog trap was a lot of fun.
That is incredibly evil. My base is kind of set up as a small thing right now. I think what I may do is push down and out from underground and bring up impregnable archery points and several layers of defenses up to the main drawbridge. As a last resort if I can find some I am going to make an adamantine door that I can swing shut if I get trolls or megabeasts showing up.
I'm not sure whether door materials have any bearing on whether or not they're destructable. I am fairly certain that some creatures can tear apart constructed items like doors, and some creatures cannot, and that materials are... well, immaterial. :yumm:
Interestingly, the new update is now out. I think it was released today. You may want to wait before installing it, since there's a bug that causes sleeping dwarves never to wake up, meaning that all fortresses are doomed. The fix should be coming pretty soon on that, though.
According to the wiki adamantine doors are impervious to trolls and (if I recall correctly) megabeasts.
UPDATE: omg we have WARCARP! forget adamantine doors the dreaded warcarp will make even a dragon run to its mommy.
(http://i27.tinypic.com/s58c1y.jpg)
New version's out (again); the "sleep of death plague" bug has been fixed.
Haha, the new version generated a human civilization called "the Incest of Apes." :huh:
DF has the best names.
Finally got a taste of artifacts and it has been pleasant so far. First one was a masterwork barrel (haha). It was basically wood with wooden bands and rock crystal rings. Worth was 6000 so meh there though was glad I got it made and didn't lose my valuable carpenter dwarf.
Next one was a bit interesting when I noticed that my armorer kept going back for more gold bars. He managed to get everything he needed right away (instead of having to frantically mine out an area looking for gems like I did with the carpenter). Anyhow he finished up and I behold the mighty golden buckler he has made... worth is over 160k. I just got my migrant wave (after the latest merchants returned bearing stories of my wealth) and I have a feeling it's going to be big. I had to save and quit before I could see the full extent.
I was fortunate in that I had finally started carving out individual bedrooms (15 down and about 20-40 to go) I just hope I can house and feed them all. :x
Still haven't had any ambushes, only 2 baby snatchers and a thief. Baby snatcher one ran into my cage traps while baby snatcher two ran into the human caravan I was trading with (and its formidable defenses). The thief got into the fortress, and promptly had a bad day thanks to my floodgate/screw pump patented entrance flooding system.
I do have defenses now. The moat of course is there but now it goes into a small walled off area past the retractable drawbridge and cage traps. The walled off area is my trade point. To even get there one must get past the tower I have punched up through the ground with two fully armed marksdwarves and fortifications. Beyond the trade area is a lockable door and then a chained war dog outside the entrance. Once inside I have a flooding defense plus standard traps which looks something like:
Quote from: floodgate
P = screwpump
S = stairs
R = river
t = stone-fall trap
. = floor
# = wall
F#..........
.######
.........ttttS
##F####
#...........#
#...........#
#.####.#
#P###F#
###RRR
[/quoteAfter that is my barracks hall which generally has some of my war dog assigned dwarves in it. Don't think I could yet take on anything major but I am hoping it's enough that I won't get slaughtered if anything surprises me.