Bay 12 Games Forum

The game has not become boring, you have become unimmaginative.

Just start out with a simple fortress, no large ambitions.
When it's decision time for just about anything, just pick the absolute last thing you would ever do.
fun will ensue.

I really would like to donate but I was dumb enough to forget my paypal password.

Hate to break it to ya but I cracked this idea a few months ago and I already perfected it.

Level 1 (top)

Level 2 (middle)

Level 3 (bottom)

Floodgates on level 1 allow me to close it off and to turn it into a maze to delay gobbos while I pull the necessary levers.
On level 2 is a bunch o' bauxite grates, the floor tiles are needed as grates cannot be built if surrounded by open space.
Level 3 is the reservoir.

I close the floodgates, trapping the gobbos on the level with the bridges.
Then I pump the magma onto the bridges, killing the gobbos and torching all that useless narrow cloth crap, leaving only the semi-valuable iron items.
I then retract the bridges, letting the magma drain into the grates and back into the reservoir and leaving the iron items there for dwarves to pick up.
Total of 5 levers to pull.

If you're making a Viking village, you MUST have an international house of gruel.

Simply put, make a channel (d-h) and build the well on that tile (b-l).
There needs to be water underneath it. Keep in mind that the water doesn't have to be on the level directly below the well, it reaches down a few levels.

Turn off temperature and weather you silly people!
I'm running a Pentium D 945 (3.4ghz), not exactly low end considering some other comments in this thread but by modern standards it's haggard. With temp and weather off, about 100 doorfs with water and shitz I get a constant 95-100 FPS (with 40d11).
The only time it's dropped below 90 with that config is when I released my 130 or so caged cats onto the goblin invaders.
It was a slideshow of gore and awesomeness.

For a basic help, just dig a hole in the wall, then make a small corridor for defences. Then dig a large (30x30 tiles or larger) room for the meeting hall and place everything around that.

Lock her in a room with plenty of cage traps and collapse a small portion of the ceiling, the crash will knock her out and she'll get caught in a cage trap.
Place the cage by your entrance and have her greet the elves on their next visit.