Bay 12 Games Forum

You're sleeping. As you wake up, you can sense you're in some kind of forest and your head is pounding. It's night and very dark and there are other people around you, also sleeping. But you don't remember sleeping in a forest and you don't know for how long. You don't even remember your name nor are you sure what you are. You sense a bag next to you. Your belongings, perhaps? The other people also have bags next to them. They too are waking up!

>What do you do?

So there I was yesterday, playing Dwarf Fortress, struggling to make my fort Towerrocks survive after another bloody siege. It was getting late in the evening and my eyes were quite tired. So I saved quickly, shut the computer down and did my daily evening routine. While lying bed, listening to some sweet metal, I got the idea of taking a brake with Towerrocks and do something meaningful for once in my life since school was pretty much over. I know: "Let's do a megaproject for once that won't fail on me!"

All kinds of malicious and delicious plans were running through my head until I settled on someting that the game otherwised lacked. I quickly scribbled down the basic necessities needed: "Let's see here... A volcano for one, probably going to need some iron for it, water optional but could be useful, aquifer only if it can't be avoided. Flux not necessarily needed other than for defense. Magma-safe stone is a plus. Wood... Well wood's for elves, and for this... You know what, wood is needed. For science. Finally, one cave only for framerate reasons."

Crew was up next: "We're definitely going to need a lot of miners. Not because we're going to do much digging... Well we are, but they're most likely going to die. A lot. Three miners for starters should do it. Mechanic's are needed, but not so much in the beginning. One of them. A stonecrafter to get the economy going, a farmer so we don't starve in the first year or go postal when the booze is on fire. Lastly, an architect. For myself."

Fast-forward to today, I start up Dwarf Fortress and gen a world. 400 years should be long enough. Computer comes to a crawling 3 FPS as the world is generated. Half an hour later, the world is finished. First one is a failure since none of the volcanos are satisfying me. The second world I generate looks promising. A quick look around for volcanos also seems promising. And this one caught my eye:


Looks okay to me, decent elevation and cliffs, clay and flux stone is a plus. There's an aquifer to the north but it shouldn't be a problem. Untamed wilds biome for added difficulty. Best of all, it has lots of trees and there's an elven forest retreat nearby. Thus starts the story of "The Bane of Trees" founded by "Treekillers" in 401. Mwhahaha.


And the start of the fort... could have been a little more smoother.


At first I think: "Did the game break my wagon? Where's the - Oh wait, there it is." Not sure why DF decided to place it there. Anyhow, the volcano looks good. It goes upwards in the traditional spiral way it does in so many forts. There's some hematite around here as well. And it looks like I screwed up my initial band of dwarves. So much for my memory. Framerate seems to be down for the moment, too. It might just be because of background progams, though. Might.


"No matter, we shall prevail over our failures! Let's start looking for a suitable entra-"
Okay, so we have a cave. I do remember editing the cave settings a little bit. I just hope this isn't the cavern layer. But an entrance with bridges across that water up north sure does look awesome for a James Bond villain's entrance to his Doomfortress.
"Miners get digging! Um, miners? Miners?!" They are refusing orders!
"Oi! Get digging or get hammered!" I try designating other places for them to mine. Nothing. I put out a weapons stockpile. Sure, they're hauling the tools. How about mining with them?
"What are you? Elves? Are you scared of going underground?!" Come on! Nothing? Well fuck.

Mission Failed. Abandon the fort!

"Let's look for another volcano, then. There should be one, shouldn't there? Surely, there is. Oh, look at this beauty."


There's one little volcano sitting right here just waiting to be turned into a murderous monstrosity. Less metals, flora and no clay. Shouldn't be a problem, I hope. Mirhtful? I suppose unicorns could be a danger for those less unfortunate. It has some funky elevation and cliffs, but I dig it. It gives it a personality.



I'll go with the same setup because at this point, I just want a good site.
First impressions: "What the hell?"

Oh, so now the volcano going to get obsidianized? It's low height also screws up my project. There's no visible iron either. And not only that, the game scares me to death by placing us that close to the edge. The framerate is going to be abysmal. We also somehow manage to spot some adamantine and a section of a cavern collapses.

I'm guessing it's the now obsidianized magma collapsing or something, I'm not going to bother with it. Instead I'll go looking for that adamantine and I find a cavern.

I guess I can play around with that cavern, if the framerate monster stops eating my FPS. And it gets worse. It seems like all hell is going to break loose. Literally
Slade?! It seems that hell is being flooded with the magma from the volcano! The adamantine is out of view, in the upper left hand corner. My poor, precious FPS is going to get slaughtered, roasted over magma, and eaten by freaking clowns. But wait, it gets even worse. Going further down, there's a lot of reddish open space. Just looking over it makes DF slow down.

Even better, the miners refuse to dig. AGAIN! So now I have two defunct saves in the Plane of Hatred, mining is impossible in both of them for reasons unknown to me and they both have framerate issues. Two volcanos, both of which have denied my megaproject to be built. Armok, either give me suitable site or save me from this hell...