Bay 12 Games Forum

For future reference, check the stockpile menu (p).  There will be options in there to reserve barrels and bins.  A reserved barrel will not be used for anything except workshop jobs that require a barrel.  Which is mostly just brewing.  The barrels can be moved into furniture stockpiles, but they'll still be available for brewing.  They won't be used for food or seeds.

I propose color-coding.

Red HFS, Green HFS, Chartreuse HFS, Heliotrope HFS, Robin Egg Blue HFS, et cetera.  This allows for extra creativity points and retains or even enhances the mysteriousness of HFS.

Doing this constrains each process to only act on information from the start of the turn where they might previously have acted on the results of process that ran before them, but it's only one frame.

Personally, I consider this to be a benefit from a merely theoretical standpoint, even if we ignore the benefits that could be obtained from double-buffering.  For calculations that are done from a top-to-bottom, left-to-right order (or anything essentially the same), it seems odd that the calculation of any given tile uses more up-to-date information from the left and top (because these adjacent tiles had just recently been calculated), while using last frame's data for the right and bottom (since these tiles haven't yet been calculated this frame).

In fact, I suspect that in some cases, where the math just coincidentally works out a certain way, this could even produce some noticeable artifacts that should not arise.  (For example, perhaps heat has a higher tendency to dissipate down and right, rather than up and left.  In the ideal situation, it should obviously dissipate in all directions equally, all else being equal.)  Using last frame's data in all calculations of this sort just seems like the right way to do it.

so i'll continue work on this tommorow I guess. maybe i'll find a locale with no goblin access since all i'm interested in is the devices

Just in case you're not aware, you can turn invaders off in the init.txt file.  No regen or anything needed.

You could possibly achieve some further nice results by adding in merges/branches.

For filling it up away from the loop:
P = pond, or other 1x1 square within which 7/7 water can be placed.
-> = pump
~ = water tile in between pumps
P->~->~->~
      ^  |
      |  V
      ~<-~
For getting rid of the water without letting it scatter around the room:
X = 1x1 or larger area on the same level as the pumps
D> = pump that is only powered when you want to drain the system
(This depends, of course, on what happens when two pumps both try to pull from a single 7/7 tile of water.)
~->~D>X
^  |
|  V
~<-~
In fact, you could probably combine these two, such that the source pit and drain pit are the same, and the non-loop source pump and non-loop drain pump are both powered via lever-controlled gear assembly.  The loop pumps will always be running.  However, normally, neither the source nor drain pumps will be on.  Fill up the source pit with 7/7 water however you wish.  Then turn on the source pump.  Once the water is in the system, turn off the source pump.  When you want to drain the system, turn on the drain pump until all the water is sitting in the 1x1 pit.  Then turn off the drain pump.  Now the source pump is ready to be reactivated whenever you want, since there is 7/7 water sitting in the pit.

-> = always powered pump
D> = drain pump
S> = source pump
P = 1x1 source/drain pit
~->~D>P
^  |  S
|  V  V
~<-~<-~

I think SuperWalrus is referring to the seeds for generating worlds.

It would help if we knew the manner in which they are not working.  We cannot help you much without such information.  (For that matter, we can't even figure out easily what you're talking about when you give us no details to work with.)

I think this is coming in the Next Version™, but I can't be quoted on that.

There are changes that will affect the materials that things are made of (like the wood that trees are made of), but there aren't any changes that I am aware of that will affect the way things like trees and walls are represented within the game.  We already have walls made of rocks that have melting points below the temperature of magma, so adding more details to the rock materials isn't going to change the fact that walls are affected by magma.  I suppose the same is probably true of trees as well.

1.  I usually build my first farm plot near the entrance, either in some soil, or even outside (where I use an herbalist to gather some outdoor plants, and use the resulting seeds on the farm plot).  I eventually end up removing all traces of the first farm plot, once I have a better fortress up and running that can handle the irrigation requirements.  To remove all traces, I often specifically locate it under a small hill of soil that I can remove completely, so that you wouldn't even know there had been a hill there.  Aesthetics are important to me.

2.  This is a personal preference.  Some people prefer to never plan anything, and allow for a very organic, sometimes chaotic fortress.  Others plan the whole thing out in advance.  I try to do a lot of "skeletal" planning at the beginning, in such a way that I know that it will allow for more specific plans in the future.

3.  I usually only have one or two miners at first.  Three within a few years, if I'm really doing a ton of mining.  But I could survive with one legendary miner throughout a fortress's entire lifetime, if I had to.

4.  Yes, it is safe, as long as you aren't getting pumps involved.  (You will have to deal with fire imps and such, though, whether through military, grates, fortifications, or something.)  If you do use pumps, then the magma can always return to one less than the height of the pump that is applying pressure.

5.  I go for the carpenter (for beds), mason (for doors), mechanic (for traps), wood furnace (to get a charcoal), smelter (to smelt all the bituminous coal and copper ore that I embark with), forge (to make my first axe for the woodcutter), still (for alcohol, of course), and eventually trade depot.  I don't build them in any particular location, usually just haphazardly outside.  They can be rebuilt in their proper locations later.