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Author Topic: How to get to know your dwarves better  (Read 6182 times)

TheEqualsE

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How to get to know your dwarves better
« on: September 12, 2019, 06:49:31 pm »

You can treat them like they are the unfeeling bits of data they are, replaceable and disposable.  But then, what's the point.  Why bother protecting your fort from invaders and were beasts if you don't care about them.

For me, the game is so much more fun if you get attached to the hapless crazy dwarves.  If you get inside their heads a little and know their stories more.  It makes their triumphs mean more, and their downfalls more tragic.  Maybe it makes you try a little harder next time your fort gets wiped out.  Here are some ways to do that.

Name your dwarves.  Give them a custom nickname.  It doesn't have to be all of them.  Might I suggest your starting seven and then after that - militia captains, people in your fort you really like such as a skilled armorer, gem cutter, weapons crafter, scholars and such.  If one of your dwarves does something noteworthy like do well during a battle or punch an enemy to death bare handed, give them a name.

There are a lot of benefits to doing this.  You get to know them better.  It helps you not put your best weaponsmith  or your chief medical dwarf in the military by mistake.  If one of your starting 7 is constantly in danger because they are outside the fort at the start of sieges, you learn that about them in a way you wouldn't if they are just another urist axehammer.

I get a lot of pushback every time I make that suggestion, and it comes in the form of this.  "Oh, that's so much work."  And I get it, when 30 migrants show up at once, it is.  So I have a kind of a formula I use to name them to make it easier.  I name them after combinations of things they like, most often.  This means you get a lot of names like greenaxe, glasteel or pinkjade. Sometimes I name them after what they are like, so you might find a Happy or Grouchy or Scaredy running around my fort.  Some get named for their jobs right away like Armor the armorer or Dr. Cox, the chief medical dwarf.

I'm not suggestion you have to name every last one in your fort, because you're not going to get to know every last one of them any way.  But if you do, when you see keep running into them, you'll know it, and when something good or bad happens to them you'll know more who it is.  Also I like using Dwarf Therapist to make it faster.

Next tip.  See what they are doing.  Click on a dwarf if you have DF Hack or select one using the units list.  They will tell you what they are doing and their skills.  If you hit f for follow on this screen the viewpoint automatically follows them around as they go about their tasks.  Or goof off.  Whatever they are doing.  Just doing this can be extremely informative.

Ask them what they are thinking about.  When you have a dwarf selected hit z to see their status and then enter to see their thoughts.
You can see their current mood or thoughts, and the things that influenced these recently.  You can see their likes and dislikes

Going back to that status screen if you hit r you can see their relationships.  You can tell which dwarves or other people, even animals, they have been spending the most time with because they will be better friends with them.

Get to know the history of your world.

You don't even need to retire you fort to do it if you're using DF Hack.  You can just exportlegends and open up your world in legends viewer.  I'm not going into a whole thing about how to do it, but here's some things you can meaningfully get out of it fairly easily

How is your civilization doing?  Does it have a lot of sites? Very few?  Have they been getting wiped out a lot lately?  Anything interesting happen in the history of your civ?  Did your kings die of natural causes, or get turned into night creatures?  How are the other civlizations around you doing?  Anyone expanding, any goblins winning wars around them?
You can find out the history of people who joined your fort by way of petitions.  A musical troupe will have a history in your world.  For instance, the group the Mysterious Plants applied to be citizens of Swampcavern, and we thought their name was so ridiculous that we had to let them in.

Ngerxung Maliceally is a goblin poet whose goal is to take over the world.  Her best friend in the world is a male human Pibang and equally as much, an unnamed giant cave spider. 
She started life as a farmer and gave that up to become a poet.  She was apprenticed to the elf Mimale Typhoonstoked and became a member of the Mysterious Plants.
Mimale was briefly the mayor in swampcavern and had two apprentices ever, Ngerxung and Nisa Murderfish, which is an amazing name.

I wouldn't know most of this stuff without opening Legends Viewer.
It's also good if you ever want a summary of everything someone did in your fort, every artifact they made, battle they lived through, when they switched occupations, every masterful meal or weapon.

See what kind of books your people are writing.

It's got to give you some kind of insight about what is on their minds.  Sometimes they even write about their own fort.

Make statues and engravings

If you make a statue of a historical figure, but let the artist choose, they might make a stature of when they were hired as militia captain, or when they were fired, or of them surrounded by some kind of creature they hate.
If you make engravings about your region or your fort the artist might choose any event old or recent.  They might depict events that happened during the life of your fort that you were unaware of, like when one forgotten beast killed another in the caves you could not even see.
This may seem like a stretch when it comes to getting to know your dwarves, but things depicted in engravings can show up, whether it's a lady consort that applies for citizenship, and she's from a civ that you made an engraving of their queen being crowned in the year 73.  Or if there is a hydra or dragon in your region it may well show up at your fort some day.

If you see people telling stories, dancing or reciting poetry you can click on them for more details.  You can even find out what the story is about.

Any more advice?
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Spriggans

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #1 on: September 15, 2019, 03:51:49 pm »

Good tips. I might add this one :




- Using dfhack, you can (and should) rename NPCs.
What I like is renaming diplomats/liaisons/merchants. That way I can tell if the same merchants keep coming or not, and wheb they bring new friends with thèm.
I also rename goblins' squads' leaders during sieges. So I know who kill / get killed by the leaders. Names dont have to be too far fetched. Even 'SpearMaster the gobo' can do.
« Last Edit: September 15, 2019, 03:53:25 pm by Spriggans »
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feelotraveller

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #2 on: September 15, 2019, 06:42:52 pm »

I also like to look at my dwarfs preferences and goals and then make an attempt to satisfy (some of) them.  While satisfying the dream to rule the world has not yet been attempted there has been a fair bit of success with creating great works of art and so forth.  With the preferences I will often try to make personal bedrooms truly personal, at least while it is not too much trouble - for example if I have orthoclase and featherwood available then a dwarf with preferences for them they will get a featherwood bed and an orthoclase cabinet.  If they also have a preference for a certain animal they may get one caged in their room.
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TheEqualsE

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #3 on: September 15, 2019, 09:48:11 pm »

I also like to look at my dwarfs preferences and goals and then make an attempt to satisfy (some of) them.  While satisfying the dream to rule the world has not yet been attempted there has been a fair bit of success with creating great works of art and so forth.  With the preferences I will often try to make personal bedrooms truly personal, at least while it is not too much trouble - for example if I have orthoclase and featherwood available then a dwarf with preferences for them they will get a featherwood bed and an orthoclase cabinet.  If they also have a preference for a certain animal they may get one caged in their room.

Good tips everyone.  I do the same thing with animals, stone preference or metals preference.  Also people who like a weapon type often get assigned one.

Another tip I got was to draw your favorite dwarves even if you're terrible at it it will help you to picture them and remember them.

A tip I thought of since this post is: you can get the mood of your whole fort if you're running DF Hack.  Those seven sets of numbers on the bottom right hand of the screen are the number of dwarves that are each status of happiness.  The number on the far right is those that are ecstatic.  It goes down from there.  If you have a bunch of ones on the left "In the red" they are probably throwing tantrums regularly or so depressed they are going to stop eating soon.  Just a glance at these numbers can tell you if your fort is mostly happy, mostly sad, or all over the place.
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Crabs

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #4 on: September 16, 2019, 04:07:20 am »

And I get it, when 30 migrants show up at once, it is.
That's the dealbreaker for me most of the time. Migrants come too fast for me to care.
The first 1-2 waves fill the niches in the industry the first 7 couldn't effectively fill, the next ~30 go into the military and the ones after that replace losses of the military, make luxury stuff like barkeeping, cheesemaking and beekeeping but mostly get to chill all day if their jobs aren't called often.

I think if I really wanted to try however, I would name them by wave and number them. The first seven get 0A-6A, the next get 0B-nB etc. This way I could at least  tell that this Urist came in the 3rd wave and that Urist is one of the founders. If I knew how I'd try to automate this and then incorporate your suggestion of naming them after things they like so they have a better first name:
peach 3A
bismuth bronze 0C
crundle 8B
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Salmeuk

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #5 on: September 18, 2019, 11:34:44 pm »

I liked your list and these other ideas so much that I re-formatted it for readability. . I plan to use it as a checklist when I play. I will try to update this as the thread continues!

You can treat them like they are the unfeeling bits of data they are, replaceable and disposable.  But then, what's the point.  Why bother protecting your fort from invaders and were beasts if you don't care about them.

For me, the game is so much more fun if you get attached to the hapless crazy dwarves.  If you get inside their heads a little and know their stories more.  It makes their triumphs mean more, and their downfalls more tragic.  Maybe it makes you try a little harder next time your fort gets wiped out.  Here are some ways to do that.

Name your dwarves.

If one of your dwarves does something noteworthy like do well during a battle or punch an enemy to death bare handed, give them a name. Might I suggest your starting seven and then after that - militia captains, people in your fort you really like such as a skilled armorer, gem cutter, weapons crafter, scholars and such.

See what they are doing.


Click on a dwarf if you have DF Hack or select one using the units list.  They will tell you what they are doing and their skills.  If you hit f for follow on this screen the viewpoint automatically follows them around as they go about their tasks. Just doing this can be extremely informative.

Ask them what they are thinking about.

When you have a dwarf selected hit z to see their status and then enter to see their thoughts.
You can see their current mood or thoughts, and the things that influenced these recently.  You can see their likes and dislikes.


See their relationships. 

You can tell which dwarves or other people, even animals, they have been spending the most time with because they will be better friends with them.

Get to know the history of your world.

If you're using DF Hack, you can just exportlegends and open up your world in legends viewer.

How is your civilization doing?  Does it have a lot of sites? Very few?  Have they been getting wiped out a lot lately?  Anything interesting happen in the history of your civ?  Did your kings die of natural causes, or get turned into night creatures?  How are the other civlizations around you doing?  Anyone expanding, any goblins winning wars around them?


See what kind of books your people are writing.

It's got to give you some kind of insight about what is on their minds.  Sometimes they even write about their own fort.

Make Statues


If you make a statue of a historical figure, but let the artist choose, they might make a stature of when they were hired as militia captain, or when they were fired, or of them surrounded by some kind of creature they hate.

Make Engravings
If you make engravings about your region or your fort the artist might choose any event old or recent.  They might depict events that happened during the life of your fort that you were unaware of, like when one forgotten beast killed another in the caves you could not even see.


Read their Stories


If you see people telling stories, dancing or reciting poetry you can click on them for more details.  You can even find out what the story is about.

Using dfhack, you can (and should) rename NPCs.

What I like is renaming diplomats/liaisons/merchants. That way I can tell if the same merchants keep coming or not, and when they bring new friends with them. I also rename goblins' squads' leaders during sieges. So I know who kill / get killed by the leaders.

Satisfy their Goals

I also like to look at my dwarfs preferences and goals and then make an attempt to satisfy (some of) them. For example if I have orthoclase and featherwood available then a dwarf with preferences for them they will get a featherwood bed and an orthoclase cabinet.  If they also have a preference for a certain animal they may get one caged in their room.

Draw your favorite Dwarves

Another tip I got was to draw your favorite dwarves even if you're terrible at it it will help you to picture them and remember them.

Check the Mood

A tip I thought of since this post is: you can get the mood of your whole fort if you're running DF Hack.  Those seven sets of numbers on the bottom right hand of the screen are the number of dwarves that are each status of happiness.  The number on the far right is those that are ecstatic.  It goes down from there.  If you have a bunch of ones on the left "In the red" they are probably throwing tantrums regularly or so depressed they are going to stop eating soon.  Just a glance at these numbers can tell you if your fort is mostly happy, mostly sad, or all over the place.

Contributors are TheEqualsE, Spriggans, feelotraveller
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snow dwarf

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #6 on: September 19, 2019, 04:22:15 am »

Spoiler: *snip* (click to show/hide)
This is really nice, thank you.
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Krakyziabr

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #7 on: September 19, 2019, 07:19:49 am »

eventually you can come as an adventurer to your fortress and hang out with your dwarves! and then die in the rain in front of one of them haha
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Urist McVoyager

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #8 on: September 23, 2019, 10:01:44 am »

I remember running a fortress based on our engravings. They all had something to do with humans getting injured and killed by monsters and wildlife, so I decided it'd be dwarven nazi fort where we'd prepare to conquer the humans. Since we were so obsessed with them getting the shit kicked out of them, you know? So I decided to train my medic by building a drop bridge and sending "volunteers" to get injured to help the medics practice. With the rule that permanent injuries made one a noble. Fun times. That fort ended in fire after a dragon attack. The dragon died fast, to a headshot from a hammerdwarf. Just not before he set a turtle on fire. And the forest.
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Magistrum

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #9 on: September 23, 2019, 06:22:04 pm »

I also would like to add "built them rooms". Since most people make a 3x1 strip with a bed, a cabinet and a door, or just the one big bedroom of the fort, they get very little personal space. Give your dwarves more room. Get them stuff they like in their room. Engrave their latest feat on their bedroom wall. It usually helps me remember them.
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nezclaw

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #10 on: September 24, 2019, 04:07:11 pm »

this is all solid advice. i've noticed that in community/succession forts that when you name them you do tend to get attached. Although, if your fort has a high level of !!FUN!! that can be difficult.
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Bydth

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #11 on: October 02, 2019, 10:46:54 am »

When it comes to naming, the way I do it is to give all my dorfs nicknames representative of their skills/jobs. Come every migration wave I look over the new arrivals (easy to see because of gaps in the unit list) and assign them labors and their own nicknames. So for example, my unit list looks like

“MINER” Urist Mcgobbledygook
“MINER” Urist Mcgobbledygook
“MEDIC” Urist Mcgobbledygook
“FURNACE” Urist Mcgobbledygook
“MECH/ARMOR” Urist Mcgobbledygook
“WEAPON/GLASS” Urist Mcgobbledygook
“HAUL” Urist Mcgobbledygook
         Urist Mcgobbledygook “new arrival”
“CONSCRIPT” Urist Mcgobbledygook
“HAUL” Urist Mcgobbledygook
“FARMER” Urist Mcgobbledygook
“PROCESS/HAUL” Urist Mcgobbledygook

And so on. Military dorfs get “<weapon>TRAIN” until they get to lord status, then “<weapon>LORD”
Ledgendary dorfs get their job/skill nicknamed, and “GOD” as a profession, so I know if the dwarf getting mauled is important or not.

“MASON/ARCHITECT” Urist Mcgobbledygook “GOD”

I do like keeping my dorfs happy and safe. I might regularly check some unhappy dorfs, or one military recruit to see their skills progress.  I randomly check on their activities: what are you hauling? What story are you telling? What are you drinking, out of what mug? How’s your sparring? I also regularly check random thoughts to gage happiness&relationships. But I only really do it as part of fort management: when I’m managing a hundred of the wee chaps, they tend to all blur together.
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Urist McVoyager

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #12 on: October 06, 2019, 10:42:13 pm »

I also would like to add "built them rooms". Since most people make a 3x1 strip with a bed, a cabinet and a door, or just the one big bedroom of the fort, they get very little personal space. Give your dwarves more room. Get them stuff they like in their room. Engrave their latest feat on their bedroom wall. It usually helps me remember them.

Mine get a 3x3 with a bed, chest, and cabinet. Not that much better, but it is their space, and it does have walking room along with extra storage.
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nezclaw

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #13 on: October 07, 2019, 04:45:07 pm »

I also would like to add "built them rooms". Since most people make a 3x1 strip with a bed, a cabinet and a door, or just the one big bedroom of the fort, they get very little personal space. Give your dwarves more room. Get them stuff they like in their room. Engrave their latest feat on their bedroom wall. It usually helps me remember them.

Mine get a 3x3 with a bed, chest, and cabinet. Not that much better, but it is their space, and it does have walking room along with extra storage.
tbh i usually go with 4x3, though that can make spacing a bit tricky
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After the fire had burned down all of the wooden next boxes on the surface, Mottled Petrel was reluctant to replace them with more wooden nest boxes. Instead, he placed the remaining store of wooden nest boxes in the dormitory for any aspiring koopa mothers.

The nest boxes were immediately overrun by helmet snakes.

Magistrum

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Re: How to get to know your dwarves better
« Reply #14 on: October 07, 2019, 05:37:10 pm »

Remember to make bedrooms in multiple z-levels. Took me a while to learn that...
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