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Author Topic: Newish player finds less is more...  (Read 12809 times)

Red Cossack

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Newish player finds less is more...
« on: February 24, 2011, 03:30:54 pm »

So after my first try, I decided to make it easier on myself in 3.18 and increase my embark points.  I set it at 6k and bought damn near everything I wanted.

Result:  Did not like.  It was actually harder and more agravating in many ways, because of all that stuff packed in the wagon.  People were hauling long past the first couple migrant waves, I had to setup all sorts of piles, and in general, it caused headaches.

So in 3.19, I went with the default, and then a smidge less and it has been a lot more fun.  When you have to sacrifice a lot of things like rope, buckets, ect to afford the steel anvil (no iron anvils in my last few tries), you learn what is and isn't essential for startup, and what is a luxury for later.  I would have liked 2 more picks to keep everyone busy at the start, but since I can put a plot on soil without flooding now, I find my farmer/brewer isn't a miner for the first few seasons. 
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Qinetix

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #1 on: February 24, 2011, 03:32:37 pm »

Always start with the harder things , but always feed your dwarves... its the main thing (hunger energy and thirst)
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Desu

Cotes

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #2 on: February 24, 2011, 03:43:25 pm »

Eh, just make one big stockpile in the beginning with pretty much everything enabled and worry about moving everything into their own stockpiles when you actually get to setting up specific industries.

I rarely have more than a food, furniture and a general stockpile for the first year - no point in giving yourself a headache by perfectly organizing industries/products that won't be relevant in your fortress for a long time.
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Well if you remove the [MULTIPLE_LITTER_RARE] tag from dwarves I think they have like 2-4 children each time they give birth. And if you get enough mothers up on the pillars you can probably get a good waterfall going.
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EmperorNuthulu

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #3 on: February 24, 2011, 03:48:43 pm »

The thing is with embarking is a lot of stuff you don't really need or can get later on. For example, you don't need three buckets, all those quivers, the splints and crutches and all those ropes if you've embarked in the right place. Why you don't even need half the seeds unless you plan to make flour or dye things. (You do need cats though, lots of cats).
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Blargh.

Greep

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #4 on: February 24, 2011, 04:12:37 pm »

my typical embark is usually

2 picks
1 axe
anvil
2 normal stones
7 wine
10 logs/9 coal and a log
20 ph spawn
10 ph's for brewing
40 fish
10 turtles

the last few hundred points go into whatever I'm trying to do.  Generally craploads of iron ore/lots of coal/wood and food, 20 of each seed, etc.
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Girlinhat

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #5 on: February 24, 2011, 04:20:29 pm »

I always get skills on my dwarves, then a single pick and single axe, some booze, and not much food at all.  At the start, immediately set my farmer to plant gathering, go collect food, while my woodcutter cuts down some trees and then makes a few barrels, which get boozed from harvested plants.  After that, I have a few seeds, so I make an above-ground farm for strawberries, prickle berries, and another one for rope-reed.  I've usually got a few strawberry seeds in the ground before the first migrants arrive.  Everyone gets a dormitory pass until my miner has found some empty space.

Those other embark points?  In .18 I bring ores for copper and tin, not bars, and quickly smelt them into bronze bars and then some armor that my first migrant cheese maker will use, with extra bronze becoming something else and then being sold to the caravans to buy precious metals.  In .19 I try and bring iron ore and flux, and try and get my men into steel armor instead.  If my civ has no iron, then I go with a few steel bars, which get made into serrated disks, which I use to buy steel from caravan next year.

vogonpoet

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #6 on: February 24, 2011, 04:21:04 pm »

Note that if you do up your embark parts massively, and subsequently struggle to haul all your crap underground, with a few mechanisms and a support you can collapse the ground your wagon is standing on into a deep pit (as deep as you like, actually, deeper) with a stockpile for everything designated on the bottom floor. Pave over the skylight, and voila, thieves can't nick your beer.
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L3TUC3

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #7 on: February 24, 2011, 05:19:58 pm »

Note that if you do up your embark parts massively, and subsequently struggle to haul all your crap underground, with magma and a wooden support you can collapse the ground your wagon is standing on into a deep pit (as deep as you like, actually, deeper) with a stockpile for everything designated on the bottom floor. Pave over the skylight, and voila, thieves can't nick your beer.

Fixed.
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Nekudotayim

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #8 on: February 24, 2011, 05:22:26 pm »

200% authentic true original real dwarvish dwarfes embark with one grain of sand.
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Aramco

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #9 on: February 24, 2011, 05:29:20 pm »

200% authentic true original real dwarvish dwarfes embark with one grain of sand.

Actually, you can't bring less than one bag of sand.
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Girlinhat

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #10 on: February 24, 2011, 05:30:32 pm »

Harvest plants to eat, start farming, drink water, trade for barrels, make booze, trade plants for a bit of wood to make a training axe for woodcutting, then trade for a pick, and off you go!  Difficult and slow, but not impossible.  Mostly just annoyingly slow and pointless.

Red Cossack

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #11 on: February 24, 2011, 05:41:39 pm »

My choke point early on seems to be barrels.  Cranking them out fast enough to keep up with the brewer has been difficult.  I am hoping once all the kinks in ceramics get worked out that I can churn out a non wood replacement. 
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Urist Imiknorris

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #12 on: February 24, 2011, 05:46:49 pm »

200% authentic true original real dwarvish dwarfes embark with one grain of sand.
My choke point early on seems to be barrels.  Cranking them out fast enough to keep up with the brewer has been difficult.  I am hoping once all the kinks in ceramics get worked out that I can churn out a non wood replacement. 

I started a fort in 40d with seven milkers and ~9500☼ worth of lye once. I made it all into potash and stopped having barrel issues.

Harvest plants to eat, start farming, drink water, trade for barrels, make booze, trade plants for a bit of wood to make a training axe for woodcutting, then trade for a pick, and off you go!  Difficult and slow, but not impossible.  Mostly just annoyingly slow and pointless.
Your wagon makes enough wood for your training axes.
« Last Edit: February 24, 2011, 05:48:57 pm by Urist Imiknorris »
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Red Cossack

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #13 on: February 24, 2011, 11:19:18 pm »

Can you explain how potash cured barrel issues?
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Pukako

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Re: Newish player finds less is more...
« Reply #14 on: February 25, 2011, 12:50:30 am »

One 'unit' = one barrel. So 10 lye = 10 barrels 'liberated' when you use the lye.

Same idea is taking one of each meat type, as you get a free barrel.  Or a cheap barrel and free prepared fly brains....
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