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[Diamond]

Five years later, it's that time again. It did not go well the previous time.
It did not go well this time too, but at least now I know embarking in hell is still possible in 0.42.05.

So, before committing to finally completing the "dig-outta-hell" challenge and while waiting for DFHack for 0.42.06, I need to ask a few questions/suggestions:

1. What's the MAXIMUM number of dwarves you can bring at embark (before game starts crashing)? I think it was 225 or 255 or something similar. I will need everyone I can get.

2. I expect to be attacked soon and attacked in mass. What's the best weapons to fight off / hold off the clown wave till I finish the Project Trump wall to keep the clowns out, considering my combat dorfs will be low skilled? Hundreds of crossbows? Mass axes and shields? Mix these?

3. Even if my squads can live through initial attack, constant harassing will mean that I would need to wall myself off. Since the slade floor is all I expect to have to work with to sustain myself long enough to make it out, farming is out of question, no water either. Any way to get a renewable food&drink source at embark, that does not need soil or grass?

4. Is digging up into slade still possible? I doubt that I will have an easy access to tubes (unless I get really lucky), so I guess I will have to try to tunnel up through slade (that is normally un-minable). Anyone can explain how to do that properly? Wiki is really obscure on topic.

5. What else should I bring along that might be useful in circus? I assume medical supplies might save a few lives, as well as spare cloth for clothing, should I be forced to stay in hell for a long time. Magma-safe stone might come in handy later, I guess. Any more suggestions?

[Bwint]

This is quite the challenge! I salute you.

2. You'll probably want a mix of damage types. Crossbows will be important for flying and ranged clowns, and hammers for armored foes. Axes and spears are good all around.

3. Renewable food: Poultry and nest boxes. Drink: Maybe there are milking animals that aren't grazers? I can't think of any such animals, nor can I think of other drink sources. Can dwarves milk venomous animals and drink the venom?

4. You might have to do science.

5. Lots of animals to draw fire. Menacing spikes, and mechanisms. Consider surrounding bait kittens/dogs/etc. with spikes attached to a lever set to repeat. Might help with some of the clowns.
Instead of using cloth clothing, set a civilian uniform that includes armor. The armor won't degrade over time, and it'll help protect your dwarves. Would you consider hundreds of candy armor sets cheating? If not, definitely do that.

[darkflagrance]

There is supposedly a way to dig through the semi-molten rock, if you search that up on the wiki.

[Dozebôm Lolumzalìs]

Mod milk to be turned into drinkable stuff. There's a mod for it somewhere. Dwarves will NOT drink milk. Pigs will be your food, most likely. Bring many, as quite a few will die to the demons.

[Melting Sky]

Don't forget tons of steel pick axes. They are pretty much the most versatile and nasty weapon dwarves can make natively. They also use mining level in the place weapon mastery level so it gives your miners an interesting retirement to look forward to. Personally I would avoid hammers since it is clowns you will be dealing with rather than goblins. Battle axes are solid. Spears are good for poking the internal organs of large organic creatures which will fit the description of some demons but against inorganics they will be weaker than the picks and axes, so use them more sparingly. As others have said crossbows with tons of ammo will be important for dealing with the fliers.

The materials to start all your workshops will be important plus as others have mentioned trap components and loads of animals. I highly recommend turkeys and maybe a load of war dogs. Tons of booze since a lack of ways to make this will become a big problem if you actually manage to get a foothold. Bring a load of raw magma safe stone to build with rapidly.

[Diamond]

Thanks for feedback and ideas. But I don't want to change the raws if not entirely necessary, considering the fact I am already messing with occult to embark straight to hell. So far some answers have been found, I guess I will be ready to start soon.
1. Startdwarf seems to allow 500 dwarves at embark, according to example in it's description. I wonder how much FPS will I get, but on the other hand everything being slower at start would be beneficial.
2. Quick price checks showed that 10k points would not be enough to deck out adequately. I'd be either forced to increase points with DFHack or everyone gets a spear and a wooden shield, lowering their life expectancy severely, as well as ability to deal with fliers.
3. Food seems to be covered by eggs since poultry does not graze, for drinks I can bring a ton of plump helmets and lock them away so nobody eats them.
4. Apparently, it's SMR that I'll try to dig through, not slade. And wiki says "You can also dig up into semi-molten rock just fine (by designating an up/down staircase accessible from below). This also works only if the tile is still unrevealed." I guess that would be manageable.
5. I guess cheap animals to act as distraction will be useful (thanks for that idea). Armor will be too expensive as a clothes replacement and I guess I'll be dealing with a lot of psychological issues either way for clothing to actually matter.

[Spriggans]

Don't forget to bring thousands of wood. And to assign every dwarf to build a wooden perimeter very early. Once sealed (roof included !), you can work on expanding up.
With turkeys / plump helmet, you have your food/drink problem sorted out.

Maybe use half or more of your lifestock, dwarves included, to distract the deamons while the others seal themselves ? Kinda cowardy, but you know, as long as you stay alive...

GLHF, and keep us up to date ! =D

[khearn]

Pigs can also be pastured on bare rock. They can also be milked (but as has been mentioned, that doesn't provide anything to drink). SO between pigs and turkeys, food shouldn't be a problem.

Something to drink is going to be your main problem (well, avoiding getting killed, too).

[Sutremaine]

Why not bring barrels of drink?

[Diamond]

Why not bring barrels of drink?

Might as well. Original idea was to bring supplies at 10k tops. But considering that I am bringing over 400 combatants, it's less than 25 points per dwarf - one copper spear per 2 dwarves with no other equipment, #JustRedArmyThings. I guess I will have to get more points, and get drinks to last a while, as there is little that can be done with potential 6500 drinks/year consumption.

[Spriggans]

In elder versions, your dwarves could be "forced to drink vomit lately" to survive
That could allow a 0-points-freezing-area-embark fort to endure, but the feature got removed, in 40d IIRC.

As of now, only drinks and brewable plants can grant you alcohol at embark.
With plants, you must also have some barrels, and craft your ale.
Let's make some math :

• 4pts for the plant
• 3pts for the wood for a barrel. One barrel holds up to 30 units of alcohol.
• The first time, you get 5 units of alcohol for 7points
• The 2,3,4,5 and 6th time, you get 5 units of alcohol for 4points (because no new barrel needed)
• On average 1 unit of alcohol = 0,9 point (instead of 2 if you buy "raw alcohol")

For 6500 units of booze, you need to spend 5850points. For drinks only.... Gonna be fun !

[Spinning Fly]

In elder versions, your dwarves could be "forced to drink vomit lately" to survive
That could allow a 0-points-freezing-area-embark fort to endure, but the feature got removed, in 40d IIRC.

As of now, only drinks and brewable plants can grant you alcohol at embark.
With plants, you must also have some barrels, and craft your ale.
Let's make some math :

• 4pts for the plant
• 3pts for the wood for a barrel. One barrel holds up to 30 units of alcohol.
• The first time, you get 5 units of alcohol for 7points
• The 2,3,4,5 and 6th time, you get 5 units of alcohol for 4points (because no new barrel needed)
• On average 1 unit of alcohol = 0,9 point (instead of 2 if you buy "raw alcohol")

For 6500 units of booze, you need to spend 5850points. For drinks only.... Gonna be fun !

The plants come in stacks of 5 though right?

[Spriggans]

In elder versions, your dwarves could be "forced to drink vomit lately" to survive
That could allow a 0-points-freezing-area-embark fort to endure, but the feature got removed, in 40d IIRC.

As of now, only drinks and brewable plants can grant you alcohol at embark.
With plants, you must also have some barrels, and craft your ale.
Let's make some math :

• 4pts for the plant
• 3pts for the wood for a barrel. One barrel holds up to 30 units of alcohol.
• The first time, you get 5 units of alcohol for 7points
• The 2,3,4,5 and 6th time, you get 5 units of alcohol for 4points (because no new barrel needed)
• On average 1 unit of alcohol = 0,9 point (instead of 2 if you buy "raw alcohol")

For 6500 units of booze, you need to spend 5850points. For drinks only.... Gonna be fun !

The plants come in stacks of 5 though right?

Well, not at embark. Every 4 points, you get one plant. Which can lead to 5 drink units.

[pikachu17]

how does one embark in hell?

[Sanctume]

1 turkey = 6 points.
Butcher turkey = 1 leather, bones, and meat. 
Leather for armor, quiver, backpack, skin, and even shields.
Bones for crossbow and bolts. 

1 Dwarf eats 1-2 per season, and drinks 4-5 drinks per season?
@ 200 dwarf embark, you will need 100-200 food units, and 800-1000 drink units for the first season.
Let's just say 25 units per barrel average.
You will need 25 to 50 barrels/pots for food, and 100 to 125 barrels for drinks.
3 points for wood or stones; so can allocate maybe 300 points towards containers.
75 wood, 75 jet stones; 1 carpenter and 1 stone crafter.

Plump Helmets at 4 points each, will yield 25 units.

Correction:
Plump Helmets at 4 points each, brewing yields 5x drink units, so 1 plump helmet = 5 drink units in a container, costs 4.
Some garden plants / fruits may be available at 2 points each; so 1 blueberry = 5 drink units in a container, costs 2.

Lavish Meals will save you on containers because the stacks are additive.
rat meat[5] + spinach[5] + fish[5] + hen egg[5] = roast rat meat[20] + 3 possible empty barrels.

IIRC, embarking with rat meat[26] results in 1 barrel with 5x rat meat[5], and a 2nd barrel with 1x rat meat[5], right?

1 milk comes comes in 1 barrel to make 1 cheese.  Milk however can be part of a lavish meals as long as there is 1 solid ingriedients.

Tallow from turkey butchering can lower the cost of food too.  Tallow + Milk + 2 more cheap food items to make lavish meals.

You can also brew from fruits if available from the Garden Plants section.  Again, source of container is the limiting factor during embark. 
Blueberries costs 2 + wood/stone costs 3 -> 5 points to make 25 drink units. 

--
1 copper smelted = 8 bars, costs 3 for a malachite ore/native copper?
1 cassiterite + 1 malachite = 8 bronze, costs 9 total.
1 cassiterite + 1 tetrahedrite = 8 bronze bars, with 20% silver bars, costs 15 total.
10 bars to make full armor uniform: mail shirt (2 bars), helm (1), gauntlets (1), high boots (1), greaves (2), breastplate (3), and at least 6 fuel. 
Weapons costs vary, 1 to 3 bars.
Depends on availability of bit-coal or lignite to help with fuel.