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[xZippy]

I had more than enough separate bedrooms, but I didn't assign all of them. Does having a bunch of "free beds" make that big of a negative difference.

[Large Wereroach]

A very newbie question but... Is there ways to help prevent tantrums? I've given dwarves everything they could ever want and there's enough alcohol in my fort to sustain 4 more fortresses. Does the game just decide, "It's time to make everyone insane, R.I.P. the player's fortress. sux d00d!!" or am I doing things wrong?

Also, has the idea of "a dwarf can be a psychologist to help prevent tantrums" been suggested before?

You can check their needs in the "view" / "status" screen? Do you use an external management helper tool like dfhack or dwarf therapist? If not, you may (v)iew the dwarf, hit (z) for its status and (enter) for "thoughts and preferences". There's quite a lot of text, but you can check in the first paragraph for recent bad and good thoughts (and memories). The second to last paragraph starts with "overall, urist is...". There you can see which needs are fulfilled and which ones are bothering your dwarf.
Maybe read into the needs system a bit.
It seems to me, and I've read it more than once here, that the needs system is kind of broken. All my dwarves have superb bedrooms, can pray to everyone they like and have spare time etc. They haven't seen neither a body or dead dworf nor the sun or rain in years.  Yet some of them want exotic food or booze or "acquire" some trinket and stuff and go crazy about it.
In my case, as soon as someone starts to "attend meetings", usually at around 20.000 stress level, he'll walk straight into the atom smasher, no exceptions. Which is about one dwarf every second season or so.

[Large Wereroach]

Hi there. I just had a dialogue that I mistook for the yearly elven tree-chopping limit dialogue. So I pressed "a" without reading the dialogue. In the last moment before the screen flashed away I saw the last line of the dialogue was "[...] become legendary", so it wasn't the elven diplomat, but something else.
As far as i can google, this was a nobles' request to retrieve an artifact, but I can't find any mission on my civ screen or a demand on the nobles screen.
Can anyone off the top of their head hint to what that dialogue was and where I can find the details to what I have probably agreed? 

So, I've found out what that was. This year's human caravan, more precisely their diplomat, made a request that *I* should hand over some artifact with that dialogue. Seems like I handed some over with the last dialogue. Bit of a thorn in my proud fortress but I guess I'll get over it.

[Ulfarr]

You don't have to manualy assign each dwarf their rooms. Just define a room from the bed (q-r-enter, it will report something like "current owner:nobody") and a dwarf who doesn't have one will eventualy claim it.

Having their own rooms is realy usuefull, for starters it prevents bad thoughts from "sleeping on the ground" or "sleeping without a proper room" and it gives the happy thought of "slept in an [insert quality] bedroom". In addition to these they will also get a happy thought from seeing any extra furniture that you have put in their room.

The closest to a dwarf psychologists that we have right now is the mayor who is supposed to meet with unhappy citizens to get yelled at (gives a happy thought to said citizen) but it requires that the mayor isn't doing anything else.

From my experience once a dwarf starts getting too stressed out (red arrows and such) I consider them a lost cause. You could try to disable most of their labors so they can have plenty of time to rest,pray, socialize or whatever stress reducing activity they want to do, but it'll take a very long time for any meaningfull improvement.

Corpse duty is a major source of stress (at least in my forts), my best bet is to only use highly disciplined soldiers for it and even they can become too stressed from it.

[TomiTapio]

A very newbie question but... Is there ways to help prevent tantrums?

Using Dwarf Therapist to rename the most stressed citizens, and giving luxury rooms
to the stressed-haggard. Also remove all hauling and herb collecting and web collecting jobs
from the stressed, so they won't walk past corpses.

Putting the stressed soon-tantruming citizens into separate burrow so they won't bother the main meeting areas?

[catacombs]

.

[xZippy]

I know that dwarves get happy thoughts when they eat/sleep/something in a room that's nicely decorated, but do they get happy from just general good decorations around them? Like... a hallway they always walk through that's smoothed out, engraved with platinum furniture everywhere?

[Large Wereroach]

As far as I can see, general opinion in other threads and also my personal experience is to focus on avoiding negative thoughts. My impression is that no statue or golden mug can balance a day of hauling comrades' corpses through a snowstorm.

[catacombs]

.

[TomiTapio]

Using Dwarf Therapist to rename the most stressed citizens

What do you mean by this? Just simply renaming John Doe as STRESSED DOE No. 1 or something, so he is easier to identify?

Niblar Bimbudar renamed to "Carp[enter] hero stres[sed]" or "dig doc depress" or "stres mug mil[itia]" so know to remove them from admin tasks and militia squads.
Also this way easier to give Deluxe Rooms to the HERO-type soldiers (main skills 4 or higher)

I also rename the worst criminals; sometimes they get their own Prestige Quest Squad and they go deep into the Fuzzy Rabbit Caves....
"Heyyy why is 'Stevo Cripple' hauling stuff that far?"

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[anewaname]

@xZippy
Sometimes you have plans for your fort, and are not willing to let tantrums become the center of your attention...
- you can expel the dwarf
- you can dfhack the stress away
So far, I had three dwarfs hit critical stress; one died, two were expelled. It was better to lose the legendary armorer than to let him kill another.

[xZippy]

If a dwarf goes on a tantrum and attacks people randomly, will his assigned war dog help him out with his crazed attacks?▼

[Fleeting Frames]

Friends have joined in combat against even reasonable actions before, so maybe when he's attacked back (and maybe also has good relationship with the dog)? Test it and find out, I'd say.


The happy thought they get when they sleep in their own room is dependent on room value.

That's not a simple topic, but unless they're nobles, it maxes out before it hits royal. Accessing through stairs with a hatch is little better for value than using a door in wall, though.

Smoothing/engraving is never admired. Functionally, the point of smoothing and engraving is largely to give happy thoughts to you (the player).


Buildings are admired when standing next to them, but it's not likely you're having problems with easily cheered up dwarves. Some very closed-off dwarves practically require admiring their own buildings; sticking those same buildings in hallway isn't as effective for saving them in particular.


It may be that your dwarves fight each other in taverns or the like, and thus corpses of your friends hitting the dancefloor right in front of you puts the damper on any party. Sticking them in their own room, smoothing and engraving things, has been noted as one way some people have improved their mood while keeping them away from other dwarves.

[xZippy]

Is there - aside from the Object Testing Arena - a "creative mode/mod" for this game where I can build and spawn anything at a whim? Not exactly for fun, but to better understand the game's mechanics?

[Naturegirl1999]

Is there - aside from the Object Testing Arena - a "creative mode/mod" for this game where I can build and spawn anything at a whim? Not exactly for fun, but to better understand the game's mechanics?

That is what the Object Arena is for