Difference between revisions of "Quickstart guide"

{{Quality|Unrated}}

Most basic game-related tasks (saving, keybindings, sound, etc.) are performed through the options menu, which can be reached with {{k|Esc}} from the main screen.

{{tc|#d00|Unless you know what you are doing, do not select either}} {{DFtext|Retire the Fortress (for the time being)}} or {{DFtext|Abandon the Fortress to Ruin}}! These will essentially cause you to lose your save.

 

First, [[World generation|generate a new world]]. ''Dwarf Fortress'' worlds are always procedurally randomly generated - there is no "default" or "standard" world. Luckily, the basic version of this process is simple, and with these suggested settings won't take too long. Wait until the game shows that the world has been generated, since stopping history too soon can limit material availability for embark and trade.

 

* {{DFtext|World size}} is {{DFtext|Medium|3:1}}

* {{DFtext|History length}} is {{DFtext|100 years|3:1}}

* {{DFtext|Number of Civilizations}} is {{DFtext|Medium|3:1}}

* {{DFtext|Number of Sites}} is {{DFtext|Medium|3:1}}

* {{DFtext|Number of Beasts}} is {{DFtext|Low|3:1}}

* {{DFtext|Natural Savagery}} is {{DFtext|Very Low|3:1}}

* {{DFtext|Mineral Occurrence}} is {{DFtext|Everywhere|3:1}}

 

After generating a world, select {{DFtext|Play now}} then choose fortress mode. The game will load and update the world, then show the world map.

 

Mouse over the map to inspect it. Left-click to zoom in, where you can then click the {{DFtext|Embark}} button to choose an embark site.

 

Choosing a good embark site is crucial for beginners. Highly skilled players can run a fortress on an evil glacier, but for now, stick to friendly environments. Look for features in an embark site that will make your first fort easier to manage.  

|text=The world tooltip will only show features from the moused-over tile, but since the embark area covers multiple tiles it can contain '''multiple biomes'''. It is '''very important''' to inspect all tiles in your site. Each may have significantly different features such as an aquifer or evil biome '''not initially shown''' in the info due to not being under the cursor.

{{TipBox2|titlebg=#00a|Starting Site|  

[[File:Quickstart-good-location.png|thumb|300px|right|An example of a good starting site.]]

The following are also good to have, but focus on getting a decent site, not a perfect one.  

*'''[[Climate|Temperature]]:''' Warm

*'''Clay or Soil''' makes farming easier when starting out

*'''Flux stone layer''' For your steel industry

*Also avoid sites containing '''towers''', '''goblins''', or other groups at war with you.

[[File:Quickstart-finder.png|thumb|right|Initial finder criteria]]

While finding a site is not as simple as world generation, the {{DFtext|Find embark location}} button at the bottom of the screen can help.

[[File:Quickstart-finder-partial.png|thumb|right|Finder partial match missing Good surroundings]]

Once the find tool has finished searching with matches found, press {{K|Esc}} to look at the results. Any region in which it found a match will be indicated by a green {{DFtext|X|2:1}} on the map.

Additionally, when placing the embark area you can resize it using the buttons on-screen. A 4x4 embark (the default) is usually reasonable, but you may want to change the size to avoid an undesirable biome or match your finder criteria.

If you are unable to find a site that you are willing to embark on, you could always create a new world. Otherwise, move onto the next step.

 

Selecting {{DFtext|Play Now!}} will start you out with a default set of equipment that is reasonably safe, allowing you to skip having to set up your skills and equipment. If you'd like to get going now, just select that option.

[[File:Quickstart-map-starting.png|thumb|right|Starting out. In this example, the dwarves will be digging out an entrance tunnel in the sandy cliff on the right. (You can use {{K|Tab}} to show or hide the overview map.)]]

'''Do not unpause the game just yet.''' Take a look around with {{k|w}}{{k|a}}{{k|s}}{{k|d}}. Look up and down a few [[z-level]]s with the scroll wheel. Place the cursor on various tiles to familiarize yourself with what the symbols mean.  If you get lost, you can press {{K|F1}} (or {{k-|Fn|F1}} on some systems) to return to the wagon.  (You can define more [[hotkeys]] later, to jump quickly to other sites of interest.) Notice the terrain features, the vegetation, and any minerals visible. If you chose a site with flowing water, where is it? What about pools of water? The more carefully you examine your site before breaking ground, the better off you will be.

'''Labors''' are how you control what types of tasks a dwarf is allowed do. When dwarves are idle, it could be because you haven't given them anything to do, or it could be because none of the idle dwarves have been told that they're allowed to do the types of tasks you've designated. For example, if you designate an area to mine, but none of the dwarves have the mining labor enabled, they will all just sit around ignoring your mining designation, thinking that it isn't their job.

Also, the default embark comes with two pickaxes: so for efficiency, make sure two dwarves have the Miners detail enabled.

*[[Activity_zone#Meeting_area|Meeting Area]] You can designate a Meeting Area zone inside the new rooms. Press {{k|z}} and click "Meeting Area". Draw a rectangle to create a meeting area, then click "Accept". ''See also the [[zone]] page for more information.''

The digging orders menu allows you to select areas to dig. Click the pick axe at the bottom or press {{K|m}}. There are multiple methods of digging:

#Hit {{K|m}} to bring up the [[Digging orders Menu]].

 

[[File:Digging Channeling tiles.PNG|200px|thumb|right|Demonstrating the difference between mining and channeling. Mining creates empty space on the same level where it is designated. Channeling creates empty space in the level below, clearing the floor. The levels are connected by up/down ramps. ]]

This diagram shows the cross-section (side view) of 1x1 pits channeled 1 z-level deep, 2 z-levels deep and the correct way to do a 2 z-level deep ramp. The appearance of "downward ramps" can be confusing as there is no such thing - the down arrow indicates a ramp on the level below. Dwarves in the first pit can walk up the ramp to ground level and escape, while dwarves in the second pit cannot use the ramp at all. The third pit lets dwarves walk back to the surface again since the two ramps are offset to produce a continued slope. In short, channels (particularly channels multiple z-levels deep) can be dangerous. Digging an entryway from the surface level is one of the few times you'll ever need to channel.

If your wagon is near a [[cliff]] or hill (generally speaking, any difference in levels, usually shown by the existence of natural ramps), you can just designate a tunnel to mine ({{K|m}}) into the cliff to create an entryway. If the wagon is surrounded by flat terrain, [[channel]] out a 3x3 rectangle on the surface with {{K|m}}-{{K|u}} to create a sort of pit with ramps on the edges, then go down one z-level with {{K|c}} (or use the mouse scroll wheel) and tunnel into one wall of the pit (with {{K|m}}) to create your entry.

* Press {{K|y}} to open the labor menu, and select "Miners" on the left side.

Near the middle of the entry tunnel, build a 5x5 room, and link it to the entrance tunnel with a 3-tile-wide passageway. Expand the main entry tunnel to ''three'' tiles wide from the entrance of the new room to the outside entry. At the end of the entry tunnel, dig a small room, which will later become your main stairwell. Two tiles past that, dig a larger room, which will later become your general stockpile, and connect it to the stairwell with a narrow passageway.

[[File:Quickstart lodgings 1.png|thumb|right|An example layout, as described in this section. Note the 3-tile wide passage - this allows merchants to access your depot, which will go in the 5x5 room. Note that the turn also needs to be 3 tiles wide; otherwise, wagons won't be able to access the room.]]

Apart from wagon access (3 tiles wide), the trade depot (5x5), and other workshops (3x3), there are no fixed dimensions you need to worry about. The lower limiting factor is the traffic your tunnels receive (dwarves may have to start climbing over each other), and the space your rooms need (stockpiles, tables/chairs, livestock). The practical maximum size is limited by how long it takes your miners to dig the rooms out, especially if they're digging in stone instead of soil (digging through soil is much faster). Most sites have at least one level soil layer below ground level, which is where you're digging right now, but as you dig deeper you'll hit stone (if you haven't already), and digging will become slower. In most fortresses, even the main hallways never need to be wider than 3 tiles, and needing more than 3 tiles of stairs per floor is very rare. A 3x3 per floor staircase (9 stairs!) is absolute overkill for anything but 20-year-old 300-resident capitals. For most tunnels in your fortress, 2 tiles wide will be sufficient, and many will be fine at just 1 tile wide. 11x11 is a reasonable size for stockpile rooms. However, something smaller is perfectly fine for rarer stockpiles, offices, and small dining rooms. Commoners’ bedrooms need not be larger than the amount of furniture you want inside.

[[File:Quickstart-custom-stockpile.png|right|thumb|Keep corpses, refuse, stone and wood out of general use stockpiles. You can come back and change the settings on this stockpile using {{K|q}}, selecting the stockpile, then pressing {{K|s}}. Try to remember to come back here to disable/forbid types of things as you create more specific stockpiles for them.]]

#Hit {{K|p}} to open the Stockpiles menu.

Dig a [[Stairs|stairway]] in the room you dug out for the stairwell (''not'' the 5x5 room that you dug out earlier): press {{K-|m|t}}, click on the floor of the room to start the staircase, scroll down one level, and click again to finish designating the staircase. This will create down-stairs on the top level, and up-stairs on the level below. To continue digging downwards later, you can designate another staircase ({{K-|m|t}}) starting on the lowest exposed level and continuing downwards. For now just dig down one level.

[[File:Quickstart lodgings 2.png|thumb|right|An example meeting area. Note that this layer has a different type of soil than the layer above - this can happen often. Also note that the "north" side of this room is directly below the lake in the level above, but no water is present.]]

On the second z-level below ground (the one below the stockpile level, which you just reached with the staircase), dig a short, 3-tile wide passageway (this only needs to be 1-2 tiles long). Past that, dig out a room between 5x5 and 7x7, leaving room to enlarge it in at least one direction in the future. Using the {{k|z}} key, create a meeting area in the room you just created, filling the entire room (be careful not to make this too small lest your [[overcrowding|overcrowded]] animals start fighting). This works much like creating a stockpile except that you define what the area is for before you draw the rectangle. Select "Meeting area", draw the rectangle, filling the entire room, and click "Accept". Your idle dwarves will hang around in this area, hopefully keeping them inside the fort and out of trouble.  

NOTE: Again, make sure your [[DF2014:Activity_zone|activity zone]] is already mined out before attempting to designate the meeting area.

Outside your fort entrance, use {{K|p}} and click the "plus stockpile" icon to create a stock{{K|p}}ile for [[Stockpile#Refuse|refuse]] (trash can icon) ''at least'' 5x5 in size. This should be outside in the open or you will have problems with [[Miasma]]. If you do not disable [[vermin]] (Item Types -> remains), you will probably have to expand it later as it will fill up with vermin remains rather quickly. If you are seeing refuse appear in your general-purpose stockpile instead of the refuse pile, click on the general stockpile and check its custom settings to make sure refuse has been disabled.

For a reliable, long-term food and alcohol supply, you'll need to set up a farm. Dig out a medium-sized room in a [[soil]] layer (including sand, clay, loam, silt, peat, and ooze) accessible from inside your existing fortress. 5x5 is a good size to start with, but you'll want to leave room to expand in at least one direction. You must pick an ''underground'' area with mud or soil*. Placing this near the stockpiles is more efficient, since farmers won't need to travel as far.

[[File:Quickstart layout 3.png|thumb|right|A 5x5 room with a 3x3 farm plot]]

Use {{K-|b|o|f|p}} to build a 3x3 [[Farming|farm plot]] in the room you just created. Position the farm plot ideally near the wall to leave space for more plots later on.

If you suddenly run low on food, butchering an animal is another option. Build a [[butcher]] shop ({{K-|b|o|f|b}}) and mark one of your animals for slaughtering (press {{k|u}}, click on "Pets/Livestock", and click the meat cleaver next to the animal you want to slaughter). A dwarf with the butchering labor enabled will haul the animal off to the butcher's shop, work for a while, and produce neat stacks of meat products.

Initially, [[wood]] is probably a good choice for building material, as it's lightweight and can be easily obtained. You will need plenty of building materials as your fortress grows, but wood will suffice for now. If you are unable to locate enough wood (or if you run out of trees, which is unlikely at this point), extend your staircase down to a stone level ({{k|d}}-{{k|i}}) and mine out a small area (at least 5x5) to obtain stone.

Even if you don't have trees, you can obtain 3 logs from your embark wagon. Press {{K|q}}, place the cursor on your wagon, and hit {{K|x}} to deconstruct it. This will flag the wagon for disassembly. Eventually a carpenter will come along and turn the useless wagon into 3 units of wood. (Removing other buildings is done the same way.)

Assuming your site has [[tree]]s above ground, now is a good time to start obtaining wood. Create a stock{{K|p}}ile for {{K|w}}ood outside your entrance (preferably near to it). As it will only be temporary, don't make it too big (maybe 5x3, or 15 tiles total). Later, you will move this closer to your carpenter's workshop (once you build one), so don't worry about placement too much. Also near the entry, designate a couple of trees to be chopped down with {{K|d}}-{{K|t}}. One tree will produce many logs, so only designate three to five at this point. If you designate too many trees, your woodcutters will spend all of their time chopping them down and hauling the resulting logs, instead of doing other work. As soon as one tree is cut down and its wood stored in a stockpile, you can proceed to the next step (your woodcutter will continue cutting down any remaining designated trees).

Drinks can be more problematic than food, since they require more preparation (except for [[water]], that is). In warmer weather, you can specify a "water source" activity zone ({{k|i}}-{{k|w}}) around a lake or river on the surface to keep your dwarves from dying of thirst, but dwarves deprived of [[alcohol]] slow down and become unhappy. In addition, drinking outside can be dangerous — dwarves running outside constantly risk running into wild animals, or worse. Creating a [[still]] to brew alcohol is the simplest solution to these problems.

You need a [[brewer]] to brew drinks. Unfortunately, your brewer is also your woodcutter (with a default embark), who is busy cutting down trees. You will want to make a different dwarf your brewer instead, since both your brewer and woodcutter will be busy (and one dwarf can't do both jobs at the same time).

# Find your woodcutter in the {{k|u}}nits list, select it, and press {{k|z}} (this selects the dwarf without you having to search your entire map). Use the {{k|p}}-{{k|l}} menu to disable brewing (located under "Farming/related" — you can navigate this menu with the {{k|+}} and {{k|-}} buttons).

# Use the {{k|u}}-{{k|z}}-{{k|p}}-{{k|l}} menu again to enable brewing on the new dwarf.

[[File:Quickstart still 1.png|thumb|right|A completed still]]

# Dig out a 3x3 area connected to the farm plot.

# Use {{k|b}}-{{k|w}}-{{k|l}} to build a still. Position it in the 3x3 area you just created and press {{k|Enter}}.

# Use {{K|Enter}} to select a building material for the still (this is probably one of the logs you just cut down by default).

# Use {{k|Esc}} to exit the menu, and unpause the game.

After a short delay, your new brewer should run off, drag a log over to the workshop site, and build the workshop. (This is also how building other workshops works, but you won't need to do that yet).

To brew drinks, use {{k|q}} to select the still and press {{k|a}}dd task-{{k|b}}rew drink. '''This will not work yet''', since you don't have any empty barrels or rock pots, but you should start brewing in the first six months (see [[Calendar]] and [[Status]]).

If you have any grazing animals with you, such as the draft animals used to pull your wagon, they will die if they are kept away from grass for too long. Use {{K|i}} to create a Pe{{K|n}}/[[Pasture]] zone over a grassy area outside and assign your grazing animals to it using {{K|N}} (while still selecting the zone). This area needs to be about 10x10 or so to ensure they have enough grass and don't trample it all. The amount of grass required varies greatly, depending on the type(s) of animals being pastured.  If you intend to keep grazing animals permanently, you may need vastly larger pastures later.  As an alternative, you might wish to [[Butcher's shop|slaughter]] your largest animals for food and materials.

[[File:Quickstart workshops 1.png|thumb|right|An example workshop layout. The gem stockpile (empty) is north of the Jeweler's workshop (southwest corner), the wood stockpile is east of the Carpenter's workshop (northwest corner), and the stone stockpile occupies the rest of the space. Note the wheelbarrow (Ö/umlaut-O) in the stone stockpile.]]

Most labors of your dwarves need a place where they can process raw materials — [[workshop]]s. Almost all of them occupy a 3x3 square, and most of them require just 1 unit of any building material (wood, stone, metal). Dig your stairwell down one level (with {{K-|d|i}}), if you haven't already. It's fine if this layer is soil — in fact, soil is better, since it's easier to dig through (if you only have one soil layer, you can put these workshops somewhere on your first level). Dig space for your workshops off of the stairwell. It will hold your [[Mechanic's_workshop|mechanic's]], [[Stoneworker's_workshop|stoneworker's]], [[Carpenter's_workshop|carpenter's]], and [[Jeweler's_workshop|jeweler's]] [[workshop]]s. Something to consider is stockpile proximity: the farther away the material is the dwarves use, the more time they waste with walking. So for now, dig out some more space for stockpiles close to where your new workshops will be (wood for your carpenter, stone for your stoneworker and mechanic, and gems for your jeweler).

It doesn't matter if you put everything in one large room or dig out small rooms for each workshop and stockpile. Note however that some tiles of workshops are impassable: they appear as dark green 'X' when you choose a location (the specific wiki pages of the workshops also show you this). So before you build small 3x3 rooms for each workshop, make sure your dwarves will be able to reach them. Once you've dug out your rooms, set your miners to work by adding a z-level or two to the staircase (you can designate multiple z-levels at once using {{k|<}} and {{k|>}}, just like moving up and down). Hopefully you'll obtain some stone by doing this, which will be useful eventually. While your miners are busy, use {{K-|b|w}} to build the workshops, using whatever building material you have. If you are still digging in soil and don't have stone yet, just use wood; the material really doesn't matter in this case. Be sure that your craftsdwarves still have labors corresponding to each workshop enabled (see [[#Stout Labor|Stout Labor]] above) so they will begin construction. (Dwarves already busy mining or hauling may not immediately stop to construct workshops; if you like, you may temporarily disable other labors in order to jumpstart workshop construction.) If the construction of any building gets "suspended" just use {{K|q}} to unsuspend it. (This can happen if another dwarf or object is blocking the way. See [[#"Garbage" Dumping|Garbage Dumping]] below if you find you need to remove an object.)

Go to your stoneworker's shop with {{K|q}} and use {{K|a}} to queue up one [[table|{{k|t}}able]] and one [[throne]]/{{k|c}}hair. You will find out why you need these in a second, but now is a good time to start building them. If you still don't have any stone at this point just use wood at the carpenter's workshop.

At this point, it is a good idea to build a few [[wheelbarrow]]s to make hauling large objects (particularly stone) more efficient. Queue up 2 or 3 at the carpenter's workshop. (Wheelbarrows are located near the bottom of the list, on a separate page. They are not visible initially, so you'll need to scroll with {{k|+}} or {{k|-}} — scrolling up with {{k|-}} is more efficient, as it wraps to the bottom of the list.) While the wheelbarrows are being built, select your stone stockpile with {{k|q}} and use {{k|w}} to increase "Max Wheelbarrow" to 3 (the maximum). Your dwarves will automatically move wheelbarrows to the stockpile once they are built.

* You can View {{K|R}}ooms/Buildings to see a Building List, and also Zoom {{K|t}}o the building/item, or {{K|q}}uery the building tasks.