Bay 12 Games Forum

After the trash console port that was Firaxis's XCOM, Xenonauts was a god-send (at least for me).  The sequel is now awaiting you to throw money at the screen; https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/69341191/xenonauts-2-strategic-planetary-defence-simulator/description  As an aside, it was fully funded in less than 8 hours, lol.  We're now trying to reach Stretch Goal #4.

Edit: As this has become a proper discussion, I have compiled all observations and findings below for easy reading.  Any suggestions are welcome.  You can find the original post at the bottom.

*Please note* I am attempting to keep this list as comprehensive as possible.  However, for the sake of not quoting an entire thread, I am limiting this to categories of information and extremely specific findings.  This list will not include every single detail, and it's quite possible that I missed something important.  If you feel there is some information which should be added here, please let me know.

General Information

- Almost everything that counts as a happy thought has a corresponding unhappy thought if not met.
- Captain Of The Guard may be bugged; increasing stress for no reason.
- As of 44.12, stress-reducing effects still seem underpowered compared to stress accumulation, due to the sheer variety of effects.
- 'Caught in the rain' and 'Choked on (disgusted by) miasama' are currently the strongest personality changers, sometimes causing multiple core values to be rewritten.  **Exception** Dwarves with 'Love of nature' are less prone to outdoors stress, possibly even immune (cave adaptation not withstanding).
- Possible that cave adaptation is much stronger now.  Not the specific effects, but rather the Dwarves' reaction to those effects, vis a vie memory.  Same issue with exposure to the elements in general (rain, snow, sun).
- Most Dwarves react to sentient corpses with 'feeling uneasy' (but some are straight up 'horrified').  The relative effect of this feeling is variable.  However, the effect does stack (see next point)
- The amount of time required to clean up a battle is a big contributor to stacking the negative effects of seeing corpses.  For example, a Dwarf picking up 10 different body parts will make 10 trips, 1 per part.  Each time, the Dwarf will potentially get 'feels uneasy/horrified after seeing a corpse.
- 'Took joy in slaughter' is exceedingly rare.
- It is possible to have a Dwarf with 'doesn't really care about anything anymore' without being completely insane, though often stress for that Dwarf is still quite high.
- Many dwarves, both military and civilian, seem to have good thoughts about seeing justice enacted on criminals.  However, the criminal in question will never 'repent', as it were, and simply becomes even more unhappy.
- Alcohol poisoning due to assigning a Tavern Keeper is possibly fixed for large populations
- As a important note, managers & nobles with [MEET_WORKERS] DO work to conduct meetings and de-stress dwarves a bit from red (yelled at) and yellow arrows (crying on) needs but all dwarves without migrated & embark assigned social skills (or newly born children) will not develop enough to replace experts possessing CONSOLER & PACIFIER skills.
- DFHack: The happiness GUI in the bottom right is inaccurate.  For specific stress levels, use Dwarf Therapist
- Children are categorically the loneliest having no recognition of even other children, but Toady can't test this because of how long they take to grow up (given that many of his tests are on the starting 7 with already developed skills), many users I've read about have lonely children because the problems are fortress home-grown.
- Cooking a favorite booze counts towards 'decent meals' thought.
- Possible that a sufficiently large Meeting area with lots of furniture (like a Tavern) will overwhelm any social time.  The Dwarves spend 5x admiring the furniture, then go back to work.
- Regarding 'Focus' and lack thereof (unfocused due to unmet needs);- More personality change causes & effects; - If an injured Dwarf is given a high-quality treatment item like a splint, this might count towards 'acquisition' and 'extravagance' needs.
- Some data mining on overall stress increases; - Possible that if a Dwarf does not have any hauling labors, they will never voluntarily equip trinkets (they do still seek out new clothes though)
- Stress accumulation may actually be occurring at a normal rate.  The problem is that stress-reducing activities are significantly less effective
- When a unit socializes with another, either because one/both are idle or are socializing in a tavern zone, the "rank" counter in their relationship increments by one or more. When the counter hits 15, they become friends or grudges. It's possible for a unit to socialize several times per in-game day. Unknown if the number is influenced by the personality of the talker or listener. Range seems to be 1-4 per in-game day.
-  Dwarves will only interact with units on N,S,E,W adjacent tiles. They ignore units in the same and diagonally adjacent tiles.  A "socializing" unit WILL socialize (increase rank) with other busy dwarves if the busy dwarves aren't moving. Tested individuals busy with a pumpstack, a library, and a temple. All of them were repeatedly able to form friendships.
- 'Millbuilding' (dfhack named idle activity) drives dwarves to occupy a area even in the most mundane of circumstances, as they while actually standing up don't do much so long as there's a chair or walkable piece of furniture to seat upon wherein they will prefer to stop.  Without a chair/walkable furniture (like another museum pedestal) dwarves wont hold attention there long enough and instantly shift position after a tick, constantly erratically moving about. This might also attribute to why they don't talk so much.  Possible that this is crossover code from Toady messing with nobles on foreign sites to make them sit at their offices for the player to see in adventure mode, and that it has transferred with the global offsite meeting room behavior than previous 30. versions, Dwarves were never noted to be sitters.

Unhappy Thoughts; Strategies & Observations

- Away from people / Unable to take it easy / Unable to make merry / Being away from friends / No time off <- Dwarves do not socialize at random anymore.  Socializing must be forced with a Burrow.  This is a big one; Dwarves do not develop friendships simply by passing each other during jobs anymore. They will work themselves to the point of 'haggard & drawn', so creating a proper Meeting Hall (ideally on top of your Dining Hall or Tavern) is essential, as is forcing them to stay there for a time.
- Unoccupied. <- dorfs need work.
- Unexciting life / Unable to fight / Unable to practice a martial art. <- Many Dorfs like trouble, get them in the military.  Note; these needs are not exclusive against crafting & acquiring needs.  Therefore, a balanced training schedule is now required.  I recommend 2-3 months training followed by 1 month 'no orders' (but still Active Duty).  Make sure your military has some crafting labors enabled.  Also consider making a cloak or pants part of the uniform to get the acquisition needs, since military don't equip trinkets.
- Lack of trouble-making <- Although military service can fulfill this need, a simple Tavern brawl works as well.
- Unable to aquire something <- a dedicated stockpile for trinkets like crowns & rings will help here.  Note that military Dwarves don't equip trinkets (see above)
- Lack of decent meals <- Related to favorite foods, regardless of meal quality.
- Unable to argue. <- A library might fulfill this need, further testing required.  Otherwise, arguments happen randomly when Dwarves socialize.
- Not learning anything. <- Library is the obvious choice (reading books counts as learning), but a new skill might also work.
- Unable to help anybody. <- Can only be fulfilled by helping injured Dwarves
- Unable to admire art. <- Liberal placement of statues & engraving will take care of this
- Unable to practice a craft / Unable to practice a skill. <- Lots of dorfs need a craft job, over a few years this one gets bad.  Make sure that your military Dwarves having a crafting labor enabled.
- Unable to pray <- Temples, just so important. Not at all optional, it's a big happy thought and they hate not getting it.
- If a chair is adjacent to a occupied museum in a zone, they'll observe the seat, then the objects in a immediate 3x3 around them leading to a big dump of positive thoughts at once, therefore all personal dwarf rooms should have a chair centre & a dining table (to avoid no table bad thoughts when they attempt to eat), but this actually minimizes the maximum amount of space and designs you can make for a dwarf to acknowledge, though 3x3's are quite basic and also spacious for a single dwarf and family when well outfitted. (Chair/Museum Pedestal - Display case = 1 tick)(Chair/Museum Pedestal - Display Case - Museum Display = 2 or more ticks)

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OP: I'm slowly inching my ways towards investing in a proper Fortress.  Before I commit though, I'm insanely curious how the Dorfs are dealing with the occasional tooth or severed limb.  I can normally work around any unexpected !FUN! in new versions, but the perpetual insanity of the last version was a deal breaker for me.  So, any info on the new Dwarven pysche would be appreciated.
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Per title, I'm trying to get a few non-DFHack workshops into 44.11, but I know I'm missing a piece somewhere.  Using the Gem Cutter as an example:

From 'building_dwarf_civ'

'reaction_mw_crafters'

And finally, 'entity_good_dwarf'

The workshop does not appear in my menu, and crashes more often than not.  Any info is appreciated

With the upcoming revamp of emotions & psyche, I started thinking about all the little tricks for morale boosting, which I haven't needed since v34.  Do we know if quality or value have a greater effect on a Dorf's happiness, or are they equal?  For example, would a ☼Granite Cabinet☼ worth 500 Dwarf Bucks give a stronger happy thought than a -Gold Chest- worth 3,000?  Or do crappy-but-valuable items have a greater impact?  I'm also wondering if being near coffins will still generate happy thoughts due to craftdwarfship, or if that will actually be depressing now.

I suspect that we'll need some hardcore !SCIENCE! to unravel the Dwarves' new brains once the update goes live.

I can say without exaggeration, it is the single greatest RTS ever made.  Seriously, it puts Starcraft to shame.  If anyone would like to join a team for some practice sessions (and eventually having fun in pubs), just drop me a line.

Edit: Supreme Commander: Forged Alliance, using the FAF client.

My Fortress is currently on lockdown due to siege (no burrow, just bridges/doors).  I thought I would take this time to clean up the stray boulders in a few rooms, most notably my temples and refuse pile.  In the early days, Dorfs would QSP the boulders in a matter of days.  Now, it feels like any and all Dumping jobs are just completely ignored.  I know that all items marked for Dumping count as refuse.  With that in mind, here is my Orders menu;


As you can see, Dwarves should ignore food, ores, and wood; leaving them free to pick up garbage.  This is all indoors, there are no corpses (that I'm aware of, maybe the occasional cavern critter), and all of my animals are safe in their pens.  I've tried adding a couple new 1-tile Dump Zones, but to no avail.  Would creating a normal Stone Stockpile help at all?  Any advice is appreciated; at the very least it would be nice to have my Temples free of clutter.

Throughout the history of Bay12, a number of powerful tales, shocking accounts, and amazing feats of engineering have appeared on the forums. Of these threads, a chosen few have become ingrained in the collective consciousness of our community; our greatest achievements, our most sorrowful losses, our gripping stories and our unprecedented displays of dwarven ingenuity.
 
This thread is a continued compilation of what are generally considered the best stories in the Bay12 forums, the shared experiences that have defined our community as well as generations of forumites. The first incarnation of this thread was created by Jamini, and after he moved on from the forums, the second installment was maintained by Jackrabbit, with the third lead by the one and only Monk12, and the amazing NAV upholding the fourth iteration.  It is now my task to pick up the torch, to chronicle and archive the history of our community.

It is your task, my fellow Dwarf, to find history in the making.

If you find, in your journeys across the forums, a thread truly deserving of the title Legendary, nominate it here. If it is already nominated, vote for its inclusion. Please use discretion- this is an intelligent, witty community, and the number of tales worth reading is innumerable, and beyond the scope of this thread. The Hall of Legends is for the tales that must be read.

The goal of this thread is not to draw attention to particular tales, but rather to chronicle the best so that anybody, new player or forum veteran alike, can find them with little difficulty.

The Nomination Process

The tales contained here are by their very nature, highly memorable.  In order to avoid a rush of populism for something new & exciting, a candidate must be at least 6 months old, but does not need to be finished.  This rule is to ensure that a nominee actually has staying power in the hearts and minds of the community.  To be eligible for nomination, the nominator (that's you) merely needs to post a link to the nominee, as well as a brief summary. It is considered bad form to nominate your own threads.

Nominees need not be from a specific part of the Bay12 forums, nor is their format or subject matter a consideration- it merely needs to be worthy of preservation. Nominees that are not local to the Bay12 forums should be marked as such. To avoid suspicion of favoritism, I shall neither nominate nor vote for any nominee, no matter how deserving. I reserve the right to trim/alter synopses as I see fit (mostly to maintain a reasonable length).

The Voting Process

Nominees will be added to a list of candidates, which will be maintained a post or two following this one. There, other forumites can view the candidate and determine whether it is worthy of inclusion in the Hall of Legends. Each candidate is ineligible to receive votes for its first month of candidacy- after that, any forumite can vote for it. This rule is to allow time for discussion, and prevent people (however well-intentioned) from jumping on the bandwagon.  Threads will be announced here as they become eligible. **Due to low activity, this rule is suspended until further notice**

Once a nominee receives 10 distinct votes, it is inducted into the Hall proper. If a nominee does not meet the required number of votes within a reasonable amount of time (currently one year) it will be removed from the list of candidates. Former candidates can be renominated at any time.  Once in the Hall, a thread can only be removed by 10 votes, author's request, or through evidence of foul play. I doubt this will come up, but I'd like to have precedent handy.

Forumites can vote for as many nominees as they like, and they may make as many nominations as they like.  Remember that just because you CAN vote for everything doesn't mean you SHOULD.  The Legends are here forever.

Final Notes

If you find such a story that is not on the list, discover one of the links are broken, or otherwise find information to be outdated please either PM me or make mention of it in this thread. I will do my very best to keep this listing up-to-date and accurate. If I disappear for months at a time, feel free to badger me incessantly.

For ease of reading, threads will be organized based on subject matter.

Without further ado, in no particular order- The Hall of Legends