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DF2010:Farming General farming flowchart. Farming is the act of growing crops for food, alcohol production and cloth manufacturing. While small forts can easily be sustained by plant gathering, hunting and trading, farming is vital to large settlements. Farming is done at a farm plot building (b-p, resize with umkh). Building uses no resources, and can only be done on soil or muddied rock. Mud-free stone will not allow the building of a farm plot on top. Depending on where the farm plot is constructed, different crops may be planted. Note that although you can construct a farm plot anywhere there is either a soil floor or a mud covering, this does not always mean seeds can be planted there. The yellow warning message, No mud/soil for farm, Mud is left by water, is displayed on all above-ground tiles, regardless of whether the farm will function.v0.34.11 This warning may be ignored. See the article on crops for details on the conditions needed to grow the available plants.
DF2010:Building The Build Menu The Building menu can be accessed from the main menu by pressing the b key. This allows your dwarves to build anything listed within the menu, provided you have access to the proper materials. Any item within this list, once built, can then be interacted with using the q:Set Building Tasks/Prefs key. The exception to this rule are items located under the C:Walls/Stairs/Floors sub-menu. [Leave feedback] [edit] Notes When a building gets designated for construction, the items designated to be used in the construction will be reserved for that building, meaning that other dwarves will not use that item for something else, even if there is plenty of that item available. [Leave feedback] [edit] List of buildings
Tutorials Of course, instead of trial and error you could also just read the wiki... Dwarf Fortress started as a pretty complex game back in the days when it was 2D and barely had a quarter of the features it has now. It's easy to get overwhelmed when you first fire it up. Don't worry though, following a tutorial is a very easy way to learn the basics of the game in an afternoon. Don't worry if you don't understand why you do things on your first run, even after reading the tutorial's explanation. [Leave feedback] [edit] Installing and Running the Game If you have not installed the game yet see Installation. [Leave feedback] [edit] Learning Fortress Mode Most of the tutorials were written for the older (40d) version of Dwarf Fortress. The following tutorials will walk you through world generation, embarking with your 7 dwarves, game basics, and building a full-fledged fortress. [Leave feedback] [edit] Recommended tutorials and wiki articles For v0.34: (the current version) See:
Building A building is a structure that can be placed from the build menu and then interacted with by the Set Building Tasks/Prefs command ( q ), and the View Items in Buildings command ( t ). Included in this are workshops, doors, trade depots, furniture, bridges, traps -- most of the interesting stuff your dwarves will build! Most buildings are made from raw materials or blocks, although some workshops require some additional finished items as well. Some buildings are placed furniture; a cage or throne sitting in a stockpile is just furniture and can be moved by haulers, washed away by flooding, etc., but when built they become a building that can be interacted with. Buildings should be considered distinct from constructions. [Leave feedback] [edit] Overlap of Buildings and Constructions Most tiles have one of these simple states: wall, empty space, or floor. Nothing can be built or constructed where a wall tile exists. When it comes to stairs and ramps, the behavior is not very intuitive.
Fortification If looking for a guide on general fortifications as defense, see the Defense guide and/or Defense design. Fortifications on top of a round tower. Fortifications are arrow slits used in the defense of your fortress, (and which are more technically known as "crenellations"). They are probably most commonly used along the outside walls of your fortress and on the upper levels of constructed watchtowers so that marksdwarves and siege engines can fire at enemies from within your walls. Much like real world embrasures on battlements, their utility is limited if the enemy is close and at the same height; their true power lies in shooting from above and at distance, as it is possible to shoot at targets on other z-levels. Fortifications allow ranged attacks (including siege weapons), fireballs/breath, water, magma, steam, etc. to pass through. [Leave feedback] [edit] Building fortifications Fortifications can be carved from stone walls, or built like any other construction.
Trap For traps used to catch vermin, see animal trap. Traps are a reliable and cost-effective method for defending any fortress. Unlike soldiers, they're always on duty, and don't need to be carefully managed. On the other hand, they are immobile and can only lie in wait for foes to walk over them. To build a trap, go to the build->Traps/Levers menu. You'll generally need one mechanism, a dwarf with the mechanic labor designated (ranks in this skill reduce the time to place a trap), and at least one other component depending on the type of trap - a stone, a cage, or one or more weapons. Stone-fall, weapon and cage traps will be triggered by (most) any hostile entity entering their tile, with the exception of kobold thieves. Note that, in combat situations, Mechanics (and others) have a nasty habit of wanting to reload (or clean) traps when they are triggered, regardless of who or what might be out there as well. [Leave feedback] [edit] Stone-fall Trap [Leave feedback] [edit] Weapon Trap
Quickstart guide This guide is intended to be used in conjunction with a save file downloadable here (5 meg download). By downloading it and unzipping it to your Dwarf Fortress directory you will be able to jump straight into a game where the first few hurdles have been overcome - a world has been generated, a location for the fort been selected, the starting skills and items have been bought, and the basic components of the fort completed. This guide aims to explain what the graphics represent, how the menu and interface system works, and guide you through ordering your dwarves to perform a few simple tasks. This guide and associated save file was created using version v0.28.181.40d. Thus, it will not work with version v0.31.01 or later. [Leave feedback] [edit] What you will see when you load the game The game will begin paused (don't unpause yet), centered on the meeting hall where all 7 of your starting dwarves are currently relaxing. You can rearrange this screen by pressing Tab. Sue is a miner.
Food guide This guide is aimed at completeness, overview, evaluation, and comparison. It is aimed at new players. Most of the information available on this page is already stated on more specific pages. There are seven possible ways to get food: farming, trading, fishing, hunting, plant gathering, breeding tame livestock and trapping. [Leave feedback] [edit] Gathering This is the quickest way to resolve a food shortage. [Leave feedback] [edit] Materials None. [Leave feedback] [edit] Skills Minimal Activate the plant gathering labor on one or more dwarves, designate an area to be gathered in a similar way to how you designate trees for felling, and you're good to go. [Leave feedback] [edit] Acreage You need a food stockpile, but you will have one anyway. [Leave feedback] [edit] Fishing Fishing will give a steady food supply, but the return on time spent is low. The catch with fishing though is that the catch (ahaha - horrible pun) is not immediately edible. [Leave feedback] [edit] Tips High Lots Few; Cheap
How do I increase the value of a room [Leave feedback] [edit] Material Digging a room within a layer consisting of obsidian or flux will inherently give it a higher value than a room built inside a mundane stone such as granite or gabbro. Additionally, veins or clusters of precious minerals (whether ores or gems) which pass through the room can provide a dramatic boost in value. [Leave feedback] [edit] Engraving Room quality can be increased by smoothing and engraving the walls and the floor. [Leave feedback] [edit] Construction Constructing floors in a room using high-value building components (such as aluminum or platinum bars, or perhaps soap made from megabeast fat) can dramatically increase the value of a room if its location is important but valuable stones do not occur in the region. [Leave feedback] [edit] Furniture Any Furniture (such as statues, chests, cabinets or anything listed below) will increase room value. [Leave feedback] [edit] Lever [Leave feedback] [edit] Trap [Leave feedback] [edit] Cages
Starting build Your First Fortress? If you are a new player looking for a solid basis to survive the first couple of months or years, check out the aptly named guide on your first fortress. It includes a basic starting build aimed at being fail-safe. If you're trying to plan the future, try what should I build first? If you're looking for specific, personalized examples of starting builds, see starting build design A starting build is a personal strategy for choosing the initial supplies, equipment, and skills of your initial seven dwarves when starting a new game in fortress mode. This page attempts to give advice on some of the many gameplay elements which influence the flow of your game based on your goals. But one thing should be made clear - there is no "best" build, no "perfect" or "clearly superior" final mix of skills and items. [Leave feedback] [edit] Components of a Starting Build [Leave feedback] [edit] Skills (* Note that an unskilled dwarf starts with all Skills at Level 0. Dwarves: Items: 1.