Bay 12 Games Forum

A newb problem again. I need advice on how to properly start, architecture-wise. What I'm trying to do is rush across the cave river, have it flood the 2 space-wide corridor that leads to it, so that I can farm it for starters, and then build the temporary quarters behind the river. Afterwards I would build proper farms east of the river.

Now, I've retried this so many times that it hurts, and each time something goes wrong: either one of my miners drowns, or I forget to lock the doors or I reach the river unexpectedly soon - flooding my warehouses.

What I wanted to ask is:
1) is there a way to save and reuse the "prepare for journey" settings, so that I don't have to do it all over again - it's really demoralizing.
2) how wide do you guys dig the entrance hallway? I went with 1-space-wide for the first few games, but that means I have to dig out rooms for warehouses and stuff, and it's generally a very newb thing to do, I reckon.
2-wide seems ok, but I've seen screenies of people having much much wider hallways. How do you secure them? I've tried placing multiple doors next to each other, and it didn't work. Do you leave rock in between them or what?

I'm really trying to progress my game, and make a decent effort. Any help would be welcome. Cheers!