Join the ranks of the dwarven Kings (or Queens)

[Dragyn]

Sounds good to me.

Does that mean we're each only doing 1 year?

[bloodreaper]

Oh my, no! We'd never get enough players to make that happen. Just make up a new persona each time, so you can re-name another one.

I suppose if your dwarf survives until your next turn (with is technically possible, I guess) he could rule for another year.

Df 31.08 looks pretty stable (and has a LazyNewb version), but my test fort ran into a weird pathing bug that stopped my farms from functioning. Looks like everyone is going to die of starvation. This bug has been around for a while, and there's no fix in sight, but thankfully it only happens in a small fraction of all forts. I'm going to try to buy enough food to last until I can build a new farm, so that the fort lives long enough to test the newly fixed military.

I expect more bugfixes before the end of the month, but this actually looks solid enough to start a game in.

Let's decide on a first round rotation. More people can be added to the end, but I want to get as many people in before anyone takes a second turn, as possible.

If you want to play, but have a slow machine, get in near the top of the list, so you don't have to simulate a large fortress.

If your machine is really slow, but you have an internet connection, we might be able to fangle together something where you can play on our machine via a hamachi network. The bandwidth cost is only like 10-15 kB/s, so even Idaho dail-up users should be able to play with only a little latency. I've never actually tried this myself, so it would take a bit of work to set up. However, really new players could enjoy having some vets log in and shout conflicting and unhelpful advice at them.

I'll go first.

Rotation so far:

1. Felblood
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
...

Who wants to go second? I know DW and maybe G and Darknes are going to be on here somewhere, but it might be better if me and DW weren't right together.

EDIT:

The second farm went up without a hitch, but then the brook froze over, before I had an alternate supply of drinks, and everyone is dying of thirst.

However! Before that happened I confirmed that it is possible to remove militia members from the army, and they will return to civilian duties. The game works, I was just really lazy about setting things up, since this was just a testing game.

Gersolov is definitely out.

[Dragyn]

I don't want to go second. Send it my way in about the 4th or 5th slot.

[bloodreaper]

So:

1.Bloodreaper(aKa Felblood)
2.
3.
4.Dragynwulf
5.
?

We need more people!

Solecs, did you get one of the downloads I linked working? PM me if you have any trouble.

Again, if anyone wants to play, but lacks a powerful computer, I may be able to set up a terminal system, to let you play on our machine, across the internet. It's a bit of a hassle on my end, but I think it would work, and I'm actually kind of enthusiastic about trying it out.

[solecs]

I am downloading as I type so we will see how it goes and if it works well enough put me in slot 2 that will give me some learnin space and safety

[bloodreaper]

Okay, you have my e-mail, if you need any tips.

I'm going to optimize my graphics for speed and screenshots, and then create a world (or several; this demands pickiness.).

1.Bloodreaper
2.Solecs?
3. open
4.Dragyn
5. open
6. open?

Edit: i think I've got a good spot picked out, but I don't want to embark at the wrong site size. I know the default 4x4 is too big, but would a 2x3 or 3x3 be okay. I'm tempted to go for a 2x2 spaace, just to be sure, but that doesn't leave us a lot of forest to cut down.

I'm going to back up the save and try 2X2. If it's clearly too small, I'll go larger.

EDIT2:

Maybe this is not good. This is a searchingly hot, haunted jungle, on the face of an active volcano.

If everyone dies of the heat and/or undead in the first year, I'll gen a new world, and try again. I wouldn't inflict that on you guys.

Edit3: (gettin' crazy)

I've got a much better location picked out. Yes goblins, but no undead, no aquifir and plenty of vegetation.

I'm going to run some experiments, before I get started though.


EDIT4: (whatnow!?)

It looks like just being near a volcano is enough to ensure plenty of magma near the surface, we don't have to include the crater itself.

Does anyone want to see a stream, or should I put us near some ponds, for irrigation water?

There is likely to be a damp cavern several levels down.

[Dragyn]

I've always preferred to have a stream, personally. Unless ponds have been overhauled greatly, they always turned into murky, fetid, lifeless things on me within the first year, and my dwarves wouldn't do anything with them.

But that's just my opinion.

[bloodreaper]

Ponds don't evaporate as quickly in temperate areas, so you don't have to suck all the water out immediately, every time it rains.

You know that putting a lid over the top stops the water from evaporating, right?

Even so, a stream means a constant supply of water to play with, but it also means constantly moving water, whihc will hurt the FPS on slower machines. I don't know what kind of rig solecs has access to,

[Dragyn]

Evaporation wasn't the problem. I always ended up with fisherdwarves falling in and stirring it up, making it all murky. Then all the fish would die/be fished out of existence, and they'd stay murky forever.

[bloodreaper]

The ponds in a swamp start out murky. They are just "murky pools" by default. Making them muddy doesn't make them any more drinkable, but either way you can use them to make muddy tiles for farming, and brew the plants into drinks.

Anyway, I found somebody from outside the forum to play the third slot.

I think I have a decent spot found. It's pretty flat, but there's some good stuff underground, and we can build a structure from the stone we quarry out of the burrows.

Got stuff to do today, but I should have the save and the first log by tomorrow night.

[solecs]

I shouldnt have a problem with the streams but you will probably have to walk me through the process a little its been a while since i played these kind of gamesand when I try to play on my computer offline it just gives me a huge mapto scroll around on i was just trying to familiarize myself with the game but then it wouldnt let me exit

[bloodreaper]

Did you finish generating the world, and then slect "Play Now" -> "Dwarf Fortress"? If so, from the world map, press "e" to selct a location to embark at. Some other useful keys should be listed at the bottom of the screen.

Once you have a site, choose "Prepare for the journey carefully" and review your items and the skills of your dwarves. THe interface takes some time to learn, but the most important thing is using + and - to buy skills for your seven starting dwarves. I typically bring two miners, a bookkeeper/appraiser, a grower/brewer, a mason, a carpenter and a woodcutter.

From there, set up a temporary workshop for the carpenter and the mason, and focus on getting some simple living spaces dug out, and getting some kind of farm up and running. Dig a large cave, then dig a hole that takes up most of the room, designate it as a pool, and order it filled. Once you have a thin layer of water, cancel that and make the muddy hole into a farm plot.

Once you have food and lodging, build the trade depot.

That's how I plant to play this first year out.

EDIT: I made it all the way to mid-fall, when my game crashed in the middle of a fight. I saved the notes I took for when I wrote up my report, but the saves haven't updated since mid-spring.

A giant Toad had just killed one of my soldiers, despite grievous wounds.

I'll try again later, but I'm too frustrated to make another go tonight.

[bloodreaper]

Okay, here's the deal. Combat bugs cause the game to crash any time a serious fight happens. This makes an embark site with potentially hostile wildlife untenable.

A fix for this bug is intended to release later this week.

I'll just wait for that, and then load up the spring save in the patched engine.

[bloodreaper]

Patch is out tonight. I'll try to get playing in the next couple of days.

I hvae a bunch of errands on monday, but I think I'll be able to get started tomorrow night.

[bloodreaper]

I'm playing right now.

I killed a giant Toad (not the same one, this one is smaller) and the game didn't crash. It's mid fall now. So I have the winter to dig some decent quarters for my immigrants, and then it's on to the next guy.