Bay 12 Games Forum

Is there a way to prevent the hospital from using adamantine sutures?

Steel weapons (probably axes, swords, etc.)
helms are good,

I got a lucky weapon mood early on, so I've got pretty good steel coverage on weapons.

and bronze armor should be good. Shields... depends. I usually make them from wood to save resources (they don't break... yet.) but they bash badly.

Does shield material not change protection?

but don't forget the cloth too.

I don't actually get this part, would someone mind explaining?

Edit:  Ah, alphawolf ninja'd me.

Against armor, in my experience:

Maces > Swords > Spears > Axes > Hammers* > Scourges > Whips

Did you mean

Maces < Swords < Spears < Axes < Hammers < Scourges < Whips

Am I supposed to do anything on the "review documents" screens?

Not really.  It tells you what things will cost relative to their normal value during the next trade period, but it isn't really important now.

Is there a way for me to view my stocks when a trade is not in progress?

Hit 'z'.  It will bring up a fortress summary menu.  Use the arrow keys to select different menus in it.  One of these is the stocks menu.  It will always give a rough estimate of what you have, but you'll need a bookeeper to get a totally accurate count.

Can you pre-store stuff in the Depot, long before a trader arrives?

No, but I'd suggest investing in some wood bins (made in the craftdwarf workshop).  The dwarves will carry the whole bin at once instead of the individual items.  Once your fortress gets going, it doesn't take many bins to buy everything you will want from a caravan.

Sorry for the minor thread necromancy, but I just read this after following the link from the farming thread.

I really like some of the ideas here, especially your particular brand of agents as the primary means of outside interaction.  I feel that it fits in really well with the current character, skill, and task based system that makes up a large part of DF.  The vast bulk of the mechanics for this seem like they're already in the game, and it's just a matter of providing things for agents to do, plus an interface to send them out.

Things to do will come naturally from Toady's already stated near future goals for Caravans and Armies.  For example, once food shipments and starvation continue past worldgen, it may be possible to send an agent out to hire bandits to starve out rivals, or perhaps poison their shipments.  This could weaken future invasions, or perhaps leave them in a weaker bargaining position on the diplomatic table (another obvious place agents would be useful for).   And with armies traveling the world map, you would want to have spies tell you where they are, what their composition is, or perhaps raise guerrillas to bloody them up a bit before they reach you.

In short, I really like the idea of agents as the main mediator as you expand past fort level management, and I feel that it's a natural extension of the current game state and it's near term plans.

In my experience, it's pretty awful if you're starting from raw unskilled recruits.  They do some sparring, but mostly it's demonstrations and whatnot with a novice teaching a dabbling and accomplishing little.

If you don't mind a touch of cheese, Danger Rooms are pretty easy to set up and are very effective at training up recruits.

I think the lye might need to be in buckets.  Try making some lye in your fortress and see if that helps.

A recently created statue:

The item is a well-designed image of Sazir Wippedspread the dwarf and sheep in phyllite by Eral Ustuthishen.  Sazir Whippedspread is admiring the sheep.

The introduction of pastures seems to have taken a very, very wrong turn in my fortress.