Hello Dwarf Fortress my old friend

[Noonling]

I've grown bored of RimWorld and I realised yesterday I haven't played Dwarf Fortress in over three years (maybe six?), so I've picked it up again. Still trying to remember the little details, but I'm over a year in now with about 40 useless dwarves and 10 decent ones. Still can't quite get the hang of the military and I've only even had one attack so not much of a chance to see where I'm no doubt going wrong. Also seen zilch I can smelt into iron, so that's a shame.

I'm not sure I've ever actually lost a game of dwarf fortress. I get preoccupied with having the best possible start, then lose a few dwarves and just want to start over again. I try to be SUPER EFFICIENT (although I'm not experienced enough) and I'm not very good at actually chilling in the game, or appreciating the detail. I end up reading the wiki more than playing the actual game.

Maybe I should mix it up by playing a game in an evil, savage biome? Or a place with next to no wood?

Please teach me how to have fun.

[bgmnts]

Rimworld isn't NSFW for work is it?

[Noonling]

Rimworld isn't NSFW for work is it?

Despite its name its SFW. Although does usually involve cannibalism and organ harvesting. The final release of it is out soon - its similar to Dwarf Fortress but easier to grasp and slightly better graphics.

[Noonling]

I thought I'd create a pocket world with a very short history, so that each event feels more significant. It does have its downsides - namely with little history necromancers are rarer (if they exist at all) and I think megabeasts are more frequent as no one has killed them. With a tiny world the chance of a civilisation getting entirely wiped out is much higher. If dwarves get wiped out then you get no migrants, no king, no dwarven traders...

I figured if I alternated between adventurer mode and fortress it might keep me interested - hopefully I could see engraving of my adventurers deeds in fortress mode, or else discover my ruined fortress in adventure mode. Either way, I could try to advance the ways of the dwarven master race. I'm using the AdventureCraft mod to make adventuring a bit more detailed.

So first up, an adventurer. I figure I'll end up dying a lot so I decided to name them alphabetically. Anya:


She was a citizen of The Respectful Paint, the only dwarven nation on the map - and came from the only dwarven site... It's very much a world with people battling for control. I wouldn't be surprised if the humans die out fast - the elves at least have some space between them and everyone else.



I found myself in a confusing dwarven fortress, stole a few bits of armor and got two companions: Jlugukukleekus (a cave fish woman) and Pludukufringis (a bat woman). I figured they were inevitably going to die and I didn't want to risk dwarven lives.

I was apparently a guard, so the military leader gave me a task: Kill the mi-go Gashcoz Glossscarred (an enemy from the mod?). Well, I knew I was too weak for that, but I figured I'd walk in that general direction, kill a few boring animals, see what happens.

The first enemy I killed was actually a rhesus macaque. Then two more rhesus macaques. They were peaceful, but for some reason my companion Jluguk decided to bite one of them, so I figured I might as well hack their limbs. Which I did without a scratch, unsurprisingly since they are just weak defenceless animals. Still, I was feeling good about my success - I made a bone flute from their remains and played a little ditty. I also made parchment from their skin, hoping I could write a story about how great I am at some point.



I bumbled on, then thought maybe I should actually use the overland map - but no. I was in a special territory already, so couldn't. I meant to just continue on until I was somewhere safe, but I got distracted by some animal tracks heading west, and followed them.

Aaaaand then I bumped into the mi-go. I had made a bow and arrow and shot at it, as well as just throwing snow at it out of curiousity (the snowballs did not seem to do any damage...). It killed one companion, but was bleeding profusely so I thought I'd stick around, how hard could it be?

It killed the other companion. It took many swipes at me and missed. Then...It suffocated me and I died.



Well that was quick. I did not do well furthering the dwarven master race. My total kills were three rhesus macaques and a bunny rabbit. Still, I poked into legends viewer and found something interesting:

Both my companions were scouts from other nations! That isn't that surprising, they were weird intelligent creatures in a fortress full of dwarves, but still - that's two non-dwarves (and probably anti-dwarves) dead. It looks like currently scouts will just gather information about artefacts (there's currently only one in the world, and the dwarves don't have it), I'm not sure if that means they would prompt their civilisation to attack a site if they found one. The next content update has a lot about villains, so we shall see if scouts and false identities become more important.



Too short a life. I think I'll make one more adventurer and play it super safe, then I'll make a fortress afterwards.