This game is pretty fun. ^^ Still having trouble with a few simple things, though...
1. I built a 3X4 block of cage traps across my entrance, and a goblin ambush walked right through. I guess they're immune to those?
2. I made an animal pile and all the caged animals got put there. How do I get them back out of those cages? I can only seem to select the pile. (I want my war bear!)
3. Speaking of war animals, I can't seem to train many in the kennel. I should have a /lot/ of dogs by now, but so far I've successfully made about three war dogs so far. Will all my dogs automatically attack any threat?
4. What kind of trap do you need to use the "capture wild animal" option in the kennel? Does that make someone just run off and get something, or do you need to have it caught already?
5. Say, for example, I might not have any decent weapons yet (or maybe no anvils), and therefore no military. Should I get surprise-attacked or something, what is the best way to, um, not lose my whole fortress? Should I send in unarmed dwarfs? Be content with copper or even stone weapons? Wall myself off until I get an army up and running?
6. Speaking of, craftdwarves can make stone swords. Aside from obsidian, are any stone swords useful?
7. I believe some traders have tried to sell me barrels of blood. Is blood used for anything? Should I be saving it?
8. Why can't I make stone hammers, aluminum swords, and other such things? Is there an easy way to enable those?
1.Cage traps have a chance of working, and thieves won't be affected by traps.
2.The way I extract animals from cages is by building a rope and assigning the animal to the rope, then removing the rope, or building the cage, attach a lever to it, and then pull the lever.
3. Currently, the only animal that can be trained normally are dogs. It takes a while, so a experienced animal trainer helps. Once you get a dungeon master, you can train your precious 'war bears', as dungeon masters are the only people (and noble) that does something helpful, train animals other than dogs. Also, war dogs will attack threats nearby if assigned to a owner, or if a hostile creature misshapen steps into your meeting hall full of wardogs. Please note that currently, because of the material rewrite, war dogs aren't actually that effective because anything stronger than iron renders teeth useless.
4.You need a animal trap, made in a carpenter's workshop. Then when this is activated, a hunter will take the animal trap, and hunt vermin to capture and eat/enslave.
5.The best and 100% foolproof way is to wall in your fortress incase of a siege or attack. Nothing can break through walls (even if they're made of soap.) If you are reluctant about walling yourself from civilization, another tactic is to have drawbridges, and lots and lots of traps. Traps are very easy to manage and use, and requires absolutely no training or surgeon. But take note that traps only work for a while, before they get jammed, and sometimes the thing attacking you has trap avoid, which then, you should probably have a wall by then.
6. Stone swords (40d, I haven't tried the new version with stone swords, but they're probably the same) are vicious. They are made from obsidian, and pretty much cuts through things like nothing. It works as a great way to bolster your military earlygame, when you don't have access to metals but you have access to a volcano/obsidian.
7.Blood is useful for worshipping Armok, the blood god. Try dumping barrels into a cistern with a statue of Armok in the middle.
8.Currently, you can't make any weapons out of stone except for obsidian swords, it's hardcoded. And aluminum won't work as weapons unless coded into the raws. (Why would you want such a soft, lightweight, rare, and expensive metal as a bashing tool, anyways?) I can modify raws to make most metals usable as weapons and armors, if you want.
