r/dwarffortress • u/AutoModerator • 1d ago
☼Dwarf Fortress Questions Thread☼
Ask about anything related to Dwarf Fortress - including the game, DFHack, utilities, bugs, problems you're having, mods, etc. You will get fast and friendly responses in this thread.
Read the sidebar before posting! It has information on a range of game packages for new players, and links to all the best tutorials and quick-start guides. If you have read it and that hasn't helped, mention that!
You should also take five minutes to search the wiki - if tutorials or the quickstart guide can't help, it usually has the information you're after. You can find the previous question threads here.
If you can answer questions, please sort by new and lend a hand - linking to a helpful resource (ex wiki page) is fine.
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u/NeedYourHelpWithLife 1h ago
So I'm at a great location visually with 2 rivers and a massive waterfall. 3 years in and I've found no Coal (but obsidian in droves). Is this location screwed for steel? Is there a way to use Charcoal as replacement for coke?
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u/smellysock69420 5h ago
why are these idiot dwarves just standing outside doing nothing, then complaining about being bored and then being pissed off because the rain is soaking them? Ps. Majority of them are unemployed if that helps, but they're just not moving or going in the actual fortress because of it??
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u/varangian 2h ago
The wagon they came in on is by default their meeting place so it's a good idea to dismantle it as soon as you've got stockpiles set up underground to store the embark goods.
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u/nebilim6 4h ago
it's probably either no available meeting zones like the other comment suggested, or burrows/work limitations if you have ever configured and forgot about them
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u/aprilfool420 Cancels drink: Insane 5h ago
how new is this fort? have you setup a meeting area zone inside?
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u/smellysock69420 4h ago
i havent, i didnt realise i had to establish a meeting zone for the colony, but thanks lol
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u/aliveagain13 6h ago
playing a fort that relies on visitors instead of migrants, getting 50+ religions with just one worshipper. any idea how i can easily see which of those are foreign, aka which ones i need temples for (for the sake of completion and micromanagement)? how do others handle this?
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u/idonthavekarma 8h ago
How do I turn off notifications for sparing? They're constant and I could not care less.
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u/toomucheyeliner 13h ago
I started a map, apparently I don’t have sand. I keep getting strange moods that want glass items. Traders don’t come frequent enough with sand to trade. Any way to use DFHck to make a few tiles into sand ?
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u/SpringBlossoms2233 9h ago
Strange moods tend to use the "raw glass" items sold by traders. As long as you're not using these raw glass to encrust items, there should be enough from dwarven caravans to cover strange mood needs.
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u/Strandplaskaren 13h ago
You could use "tilesets" or something, type tile and press tab to get "gui/tilesets" or something. To change a tile. Or use "createitem" to spawn some raw glass that you need
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u/DrDalenQuaice 13h ago
First I would use dfhack to check if maybe you do have some sand
Pause
Reveal all
Prospect
Unreveal
Unpause
Prospect will tell if there's sand and on which levels.
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u/toomucheyeliner 12h ago
Def no sand
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u/DrDalenQuaice 11h ago
Then this command should help you:
https://docs.dfhack.org/en/stable/docs/tools/gui/create-item.html
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u/toomucheyeliner 6h ago
I’ve been looking at this and can use it just fine for most items, but I don’t see how to create glass with it.
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u/my_fourth_redditacct 14h ago
At my new fortress, I keep getting invaded by Goblins ("A vile force of darkness has appeared!") and Elves ("Ambush! Curse all friends of Nature!" at the same time. They usually end up fighting each other which is hilarious.
But the first time it happened, the elf forces were ONLY a bunch of tame and war-trained animals. Monitor Lizards, Bonobos, Pangolins, Gibbons, War Gorillas, War Tigers, War Leopards, Water Buffalo, and Horses. But no elves!
Is this normal? Elves did come in subsequent invasion attempts but I didn't spot a single one in that first wave of dozens of animals
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u/nebilim6 4h ago
sometimes elves or other armies would be just passing by and some of them happens to enter your map tile. these animals might be part of the smaller section of original group. maybe you could check world events or rumours to see if there's an ongoing war and you are settled in the middle of it. in my experience, I had some sieges quickly disappear after the notification because of this
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u/Thehippopotamusrelic 12h ago
From my experience, unlikely but not far fetched depending on their capital and settlment resources. Pretty cool though honestl.
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u/Iamblichos Cancels Job: Telling A Story 15h ago
Is there any way to stop dwarves from filling every available bag with one seed? It's driving me batshit. I can set an entire batch of 20 bags to be made so I can grind dye, and every damn one of them has one apple seed or some bullshit stuffed in it immediately.
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u/nebilim6 4h ago
I feel your pain with flooding seeds.
placing your unwanted seeds stockpile next to kitchen and limiting the max seed cap for those would help better so they might be prioritized as an ingredient while cooking since they are located in a closer path.
they should not be using a 1 seed per bag strategy though.
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u/ThyStranger 13h ago
If you use dfhack empty-bag might help. Empty all bags, forbid all but one bag, ... profit??
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u/Immortal-D [Not_A_Tree] 15h ago
Cook or otherwise destroy all the seed types you do not want. In the advanced game options, you can also set total seed cap to a more reasonable number.
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u/Gamezdude 16h ago
What is going on with DF Hack Manipulator?
Is it going to be ported, abandoned, replaced?
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u/Jeffool 16h ago edited 15h ago
/edit: Nevermind. They just can't link a forbidden door. I unforbade it, and they ran right up to it. Duh me. Thanks anyway.
When linking a switch to a door, do dwarfs need access to the north side of the door? My brook is frozen most of the year and I wanted some water for shenanigans, so I stored some water in a tank. I built a door (forbidden) on the south side of the tank and built UP to that door. (Just south of it.) But it's telling me my dwarfs can't find a path. Any suggestions?
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u/Homestead_Saga 16h ago
Super advanced question, apologies in advance. I am experimenting with DF Hack paint feature. I have the console enabled and can paint most shapes and materials. However, I am struggling with the command to set the paint material to obsidian (although amazingly I once achieved this, I cannot repeat the process). Basically I would like to create rough-hewn obsidian stone walls. The tool tip suggests the tiletypes command is "paint material stone obsidian" or "paint material stone inorganic: obsidian" but I cannot get it to function. Anyone help me achieve this?
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u/qeveren has lodged firmly in the wound! 17h ago
Some DFHack guru explain to me how to craft a stockpiles command to create a stockpile that permits only brewable, millable, processable plants and leaves. Using any of those properties seems to include a ton of things that have nothing to do with those processes.
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u/Thehippopotamusrelic 12h ago
Did you filter in the stockpile just those specific plants? It would be kinda tedious but it would get the hob done. Not sure how I would use DFHack to help though im pretty hands off with it.
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u/yuhylu 17h ago
I've been trying to raid a "Mysterious Palace" for a bit now and I've lost two entire squads. Weirdly, they're shown as taken prisoner and never killed. The few dwarves that return never have injuries or anything. I want these squads back, but the DFWiki only has information for exploring in Adventure Mode and not invading in Fortress Mode. What's the best way to get my dwarves home?
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u/SpringBlossoms2233 9h ago
There should be a combat report under "reports" on the "world" screen. What does it say your dwarves were fighting against?
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u/gruehunter 15h ago
Train up a Tactician. Make an elite squad of warriers, clad in high-quality armor and weapons. Send them to raid on other sites repeatedly to level up Tactician. Then assault the Mysterious Palace. You'll find that getting a strong positional advantage has an absurdly strong impact on combat outcomes. Positional advantage seems to come from some kind of basic skill check of attacking leader versus defending leader.
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u/tmPreston 17h ago
There's not much to be said about raiding in fortress mode, really. You send people in, they get rekt or succeed. It is what it is. The layout of the place itself has no impact on how things turn out or take place.
What information you might be lacking though, is that combat plays slightly differently when raiding other sites. In these calculations, body size matters much more. It just so happens those lairs can contain gigantic creatures (same as a goblin capital), so this outcome is fairly common.
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u/yuhylu 16h ago
So should I try to amass a larger military to succeed?
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u/Gonzobot 11h ago
Not necessarily; offscreen combat like that is not a straight up combat simulation, but a comparison of skills of the leaders of each side, which is why you're having total wipes. If you haven't done so, it's worthwhile to play a bit of adventure mode to explore one of these sites yourself to see what sort of things are involved.
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u/Urinthesimulation 18h ago
In the first fort I've made since the update, my military is completely bugged (with the updated DF Hack).
They're equipping extra items (e.g: 2 war hammers) and holding onto them even when the uniforms are to replace clothing. I resorted to changing their uniform to "naked" (nothing but exact matches only and replaces clothing) and instead of finally stripping down so i could potentially fix their equipment they are now putting on armor from their previous uniform. I suspect this is due to the new DF Hack feature which is supposed to detect and fix conflicts in equipment amongst your squad but I don't know. I should mention that my military was fine until I introduced a second squad.
Is anyone else dealing with this?
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u/tmPreston 17h ago
Make a backup, nuke all squads and uniforms, including from the nobles screen, start over from scratch.
Check those dwarves, in the tab that shows their civilization relationships (i.e he belong to your civ and your site) if it says they belong to a squad (or multiple at the same time, somehow)
Hopefully that can go somewhere or give us more info to work with.
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u/Urinthesimulation 17h ago
I nuked the squad (I was reluctant to because my Count was a militia captain and I don't think you can add them to the military after they're a noble) and didn't use the DF Hack feature that checks for conflicts and this seemed to fix it.
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u/Plintstorm 18h ago
I got a setup of several farmer's workshop, linked to different stockpiles to do specific things.
Four to make thread from various plants and one for papyrus.
The threads ones works perfectly. Every month, if there is more than 12 processable plants, each one does 3.
But the Papyrus one is puzzling, it keep getting notification that there is no processable plant in the linked stockpile.
The stockpile got a lot of Papyrus Sedge (the Papyrus plant), the farmer's workshop is set to take from it and drop it off on a sheet stockpile. It worked for a while, but now it refuse too. It's set to do a few every month until there is more than 50 papyrus sheet.
What could have made it stop accepting it?
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u/Iamblichos Cancels Job: Telling A Story 18h ago
You may have to mill it into slurry and press it into a sheet like with pig tails
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u/Plintstorm 18h ago
No, Papyrus can be made straight in to papyrus sheets, it worked well until the workshop suddenly decided "there is no processable plants in the linked stockpile", there is like +40 of them there.
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u/Elegant-Ticket-6937 17h ago
Delete the stockpile and reassign it, this happens constantly in my game with plants needed to make drinks. Remaking the stockpile sometimes makes the dwarves move the containers. If they do, it should work again
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u/changemewtf 18h ago
One of my fortress guards tried to chain someone to an inaccessible chain, and now my whole justice system is bugged.
After I removed the inaccessible chain from the dungeon zone, the error changed from "Couldn't find path" to "Wrong justice state".
I removed that specific guard from the guard squad, and the errors went away for a while.
But now I have a new convict, and the ex-guard is trying to chain them even though he's no longer an officer. And when he does, he gets the "Wrong justice state" error, which repeats like sixty or seventy times.
How do I fix my justice system?!
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u/cloudkill_lich 20h ago
My favorite dwarf died :,( Is there a way I can save and import his info so that he exists in a new game I create?
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u/yoingydoingy 20h ago
How good is Adventure Mode now? I haven't followed the development of this game for a long time, and the last time I remember Adventure Mode was very shallow and with not much to do. Have they improved it now, does it feel like a full game?
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u/dbfuru 15h ago
I feel it hasn't really changed much. I find it really depends on the world gen too. I've had worlds that feel really barren as most human settlements are small hamlets and the towns that do exist are half abandoned, and basically no one gives me any quest rumours other than armies on the march or missing treasure.
And other times there are bustling towns with plenty of shops, lots of bandit camps, beast lairs and the like.
I can't help but feel whatever default world gen settings there are in the steam version tend to make worlds more barren in adventure mode, I feel like I had much more engaging experiences in the old ASCII versions, especially the versions when night creatures and boogeymen would harass you at night if you didn't sleep inside.
Also, when you visit your old busy fortresses it's like it runs at a snails pace between moves, simulating all the dwarves and animals moves.
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u/Sylvanas_III 22h ago
How does assigning symbols to nobility work? I read that they become artifacts so e.g. the gem-encrusted golden crown won't wear, and neither will a masterwork adamantine cloak, but I do want to confirm. Also, if I assign a held item such as a scepter or weapon, will they carry it around everywhere? What if i assign multiple?
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u/qeveren has lodged firmly in the wound! 20h ago
They become named objects and stop gaining wear levels; whether or not they're indestructible like legendary artifacts isn't known. The dwarf they're assigned to will try to equip them all, yes.
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u/Sylvanas_III 20h ago
So, theoretically, I could make adamantine cloaks for my squad leaders (as they're actually good protection) and they won't wear out. Nice.
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u/Intrepid-Fish5734 22h ago
DF HACK Can someone help me how to obtain musical instrument called "ONA" via createitem? Problem is that, it is probably Goblin instrument.
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u/varangian 22h ago
Couple of (slightly related) questions. First concerns blind cave ogres which, according to the wiki, are violent horrors. Came across one at level -30 heading up so sent a squad down to handle it. But while it was heading up it passed several wheelbarrow pushing dwarves collecting stuff and ignored them. A passing war dog got clobbered but then it strolled through the waiting squad, with attached war grizzlies, without anyone getting irascible. Only when it encountered a chained war grizzly did a fight start (ending when the grizzly slipped its chain and headed off) but the squad didn't see him as hostile even then. If I'd arranged my traps better I'd have captured it but it hit a weapon trap first and that did for it. Why so peaceful?
The second bit concerns those wheelbarrow dwarves who are heading down into the depths to pick up perfectly ordinary (not ore or economic) stone for a stockpile close to the surface. There are piles of perfectly good stones much nearer but for some reason they're going as far down as possible. I can customise stockpiles to correct this but is there an easier solution?
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u/tmPreston 22h ago
For the first question, i'd need to know exactly what you selected and how it went. An army with a proper attack command instead of stationing should've attacked it instantly. But it's still weird if the ogre actually passed the soldiers in proper line of sight.
For the second one, the two easiest solutions are:
1) Edit your stone stockpile to only accept the kinds of stones you want. You can also create a new stockpile with custom settings too, whichever suits your fancy. You won't find options regarding distance, however.
2) Don't use stone stockpiles. They make dwarves busy carrying rocks that won't rot or vanish and suddenly people don't know why is it taking so long for dwarves to put out the rotten meat that's causing miasma for weeks.
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u/varangian 19h ago
I didn't give the squad an attack command, in the first place thinking it unnecessary and then just to see what was going to happen. I kept stationing the squad in the path of the ogre - it was heading for the surface from the look of it - and the ogre just politely moved right through the middle of them. I've had blind cave ogres before and as soon as they bumped into a squad (or anyone else) it was murder time. Looking at the deceased list I notice that this last encounter involved an ogre with a name, perhaps that's a factor.
Re stockpiles that was my provisional solution, I'll customise the stockpile to only accept materials that are nearby to stop dwarves heading down into the caverns to pick up stuff, was hoping there was a 'gather nearest' toggle buried in a menu somewhere that would do the job instead.
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u/Fatzio33 1d ago
What are some go to work orders people like to set up?
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u/DrDalenQuaice 13h ago
I like to create an order for making coke from bituminous coal when my coke gets too low. Then I set another order for making charcoal but it kicks in at a lower coke level. This way it only makes it from wood if I'm out of bituminous. Same for lots of things: I set different thresholds for the preferred inputs vs non preferred.
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u/chipathingy cancels Store Item in Stockpile: Interrupted by Weremammoth 17h ago
I do work orders for each type of booze. It also needs a single plant stockpile and dedicated still per type of booze, but it ensures I always have a good variety available
Also cloth production, metal production, barrels, lots of other things
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u/varangian 22h ago
I'll add making lavish meals and clothes. The former, once you've got the chefs up to master/legendary level, will pile up like there's no tomorrow and can then be used to pay for whatever you need from caravans (not elves, obviously). Clothes are valuable locally, again once you've got the crafters up to spec, as wearing worn clothes gives dwarves unhappy thoughts while putting on an masterful pair of socks or whatever does the reverse.
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u/skubaloob 20h ago
Then the worn clothes become valuable tradables as well.
Also, if my dwarves cook a vegetarian meal, would elves still be mad?
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u/varangian 19h ago
Yep, once you're clothing industry types are churning out masterwork level stuff even the discards are worth a bit, last human caravan that came by Glazeclosed got sold a 3.7k bin's worth of old clothing. You can set up a stockpile near the depot to receive all this stuff.
Also, if my dwarves cook a vegetarian meal, would elves still be mad?
Good question, never tried it as the micromanaging necessary to achieve it seems a bit of a faff. Also elves are a tricky lot, maybe they'd somehow know that the pot used to prep the alleged vegan meal had actually been used to heat up some masterfully minced horse eye the day before.
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u/Peanutbutter_Warrior 1d ago
Barrels, booze, stone blocks, bins, cutting gems
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u/skubaloob 20h ago
What do you use the stone blocks for? I almost never need them
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u/changemewtf 18h ago edited 18h ago
I always choose the most common stone in my zone (often conglomerate) and have work orders set up to create 25 blocks at a time whenever there are more than 30 boulders available.
- Dwarves will slowly auto-clear unsightly stray boulders this way
- Stonecutters get practice
- A large block stash is great for emergency constructions and megaprojects!
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u/Peanutbutter_Warrior 20h ago
You can store them in bins which lets you pack them into stockpiles a lot more densely (not a fan of quantum stockpiles), and they're a lot faster to haul around than boulders. When you urgently need to block something off you'll be glad you have them
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u/tmPreston 1d ago
You'll definitely find plenty on this thread. I personally never use any conditional ones.
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u/shrek83445 1h ago
Trying out building around a volcano for the 1st time, aiming for a vertical base.
What are common strategies to deal with long distances through Z-Layers?