That’s my problem. I just can’t ‘see’ ascii anymore.
People have tried, and have done a very impressive job (ie., Stonesense) considering that the game is closed-source. Closed-source isn’t a big deal, but the fact that Toady doesn’t provide an API kills any other serious attempts at going further. Stonesense and others work entirely by reading and manipulating memory directly I believe - very technically impressive, but alas forever limited in how far they can go.
That said, you should really check out a tile mod such as Ironhand or Phoebus. While it doesn’t make the game a 3D voxel or retro 8-bit paradise, it does fix some of the ASCII-blindness.
Have you tried some of the tilesets in the lazy newb pack?
The only problem with DF is about how the UI is organized. Visually it’s as clear as reading a book. The amount of stuff it shows on screen goes basically against the use of proper sprites (since even a 16x16 sprite is very small).
That, and the fact that it’s still extremely buggy. What many people see as “emergent gameplay” is just about bugs. It’s like reading comics and coming up with fancy theories when you find a bunch of plot holes. For some people this is fun, for me it’s extremely irritating.
Finally, DF has a layer of depth that is just not there. Like having a number of different materials that are actually identical gameplay-wise. I’m of the design philosophy that you should only see what is necessary, while DF has lots of fluff that SEEMS to have impact on gameplay but that actually has none. And so there’s a lot of “noise” that could be removed with no loss.
But given what DF is there is simply no alternative to how it is built. Those other games you listed aren’t at the level of what DF offers, and THEY NEVER WILL.
What is the best, most accessible, useable one-stop source for learning Dwarf Fortress right now?
several people have similar complaints and have made mods to adjust it. I currently use a mod that drastically reduces superfluous name tags. Leather is just leather not stray pigmy or wild hog leather. All sand is just sand etc.
Removing all that detail sort of destroys what makes DF so great, though. You shouldn’t be looking at that info as annoying and superfluous, you should look at it as more fuel for your imagination machine. The story I’m telling in the back of my mind as I play the game is always the best part :)
Once you know the very basic handling then you probably simply need the wiki: Dwarf Fortress Wiki
Whenever you want something you look it up. Say you need to make a sword, you look up what resources you need, the workshops and everything.
Then you also need Dwarf Therapist: Google Code Archive - Long-term storage for Google Code Project Hosting.
And finally I’d suggest editing the /data/init/d_init.txt
[POPULATION_CAP:15]
So that once you hit a cap you don’t get more immigrants. Which means that you won’t suddenly have to micromanage hundreds of dwarfs and can go on with a smaller community as long as you want. Whenever you feel like growing the population, you raise the cap (but consider that dwarfs will still have babies, and those aren’t counted in the cap, so the population goes slowly up anyway).
I’m actually against guides. The fun I have with the game is, once you know the basics, just do stuff and look up in the wiki whatever comes up.
No. It’s 2013, there’s no excuse for a game that plays like vi and looks like a core dump. I really did try to deal with Dwarf Fortress, but it’s just too ugly and obtuse. The issues raised above about Gnomoria sound a bit worrisome, but it sounds like it’s sufficiently functional to be a good deal at 8 bucks. I think I’m going to try it.
Well, DF is a free game. You don’t have to pay to play it, and many of the tile sets make the ascii graphics fairly unnoticeable. I like Phoebus myself. Plus, half of the fun about dwarf fortress is generating your own stories. It’s neat because you can kind of inject your own view of what is happening when a capital C is fighting a bunch of little faces.
Also, it is kinda of understandable that it doesn’t have the best graphics. It seems like Toady doesn’t have any graphics knowledge, and only works on coding. Sure he could probably hire some people to help but I doubt he’s rolling in money. I think it has enough character to not particularly need any better graphics. More features > better UI at this point.
However, Folk Tale looks really awesome. I signed up for the beta. One of the descriptions really caught my eye: http://blog.gamesfoundry.com/ The bit about the Theives guild trying to equalize the wealth seemed really neat. I hope the game is full of little quirks like that, just like dwarf fortress.
OT but check out stuff like Virtual Applications | Virtual Apps | ThinApp | VMware if you haven’t already.
On Topic:
I’ve been playing Gnomoria a lot and it has a lot of potential but it’s filled with highly annoying bugs and tons of things you have no control over. Suicidal gnomes being the most infuriating.
OT: Ha, yeah, I’m not having anything to do with vmware after the fiasco that is vsphere 5.1. Besides, what’s the point? So I can play newer java games? Not compelling but thanks for trying.
On topic: Suicidal gnomes? I’m only at the 12th day of summer year 1 so far…
Re: Suicidal gnomes: I assume that Phero is talking about the fact that all gnomes will automatically attack any goblins (or other enemies) they encounter, which means that your farmer gnome can be out picking strawberries and–when a goblin with a claymore wanders into view–the gnome’s immediate response is to charge into battle and attempt to kill the goblin with a fist full of strawberries.
This can lead to some hilarious combat logs (e.g., I was quite worried when one of my gnome’s was caught alone collecting lumber, and then I was shocked to see the goblin dead almost instantly. I checked the log, and basically the goblin punched my gnome and then my gnome swung a log at the goblin’s head, smashing the skull and crushing the brain. Normally the fights drag on and on until someone bleeds to death or suffocates, so that was a surprising one-hit finish from an unskilled gnome.)
Are you sure you can disable darkness spawning? I would love it if that were true, but AFAIK, you can only disable certain monster types, not the darkness spawning mechanic itself.
So I could potentially disable golems and beetles and spiders and zombies and everything that comes from underground, but then there’d be nothing in the caves either I think.
Agreed. I actually think that Gnomoria needs more of this, so I’m surprised to hear anyone complain about it. I get the idea of a streamlined design for some games, but in a sandbox game like this where there are no clear goals except those that you make, variety for its own sake is a big part of what fleshes out the game world and allows people to roleplay/immerse themselves in the story of their fort. I love the preposterous idea of having Dwarves (or, hopefully one day Gnomes) equipped with leather helmets made from hundreds of little rabbit or bat skins sewn together. I also love all of the variety in stones and gems and foods (and it helps that the dwarves in DF have preferences for such things, so you can provide each dwarf a stone cabinet made out of their favorite obscure material if you want to truly cater to their wishes).
I have played DF and I really admire it and can’t imagine any game doing what it does equally well. I can mostly get over the cruddy UI and I’ve adapted to the graphics (none of the other tilesets are perfect, but some are good).
I would rather play Gnomoria.
I think one thing about DF that keeps me from sinking my time into it is that there’s too much to learn and there is no accommodations made by the game to help you learn it. So you have to keep up with the development, follow the community, sift for tips to this or that system. That’s awesome for those who feed off a community like that. I think it’s one reason DF has been so successful and I wouldn’t ask Toady to change his approach. But it excludes me as a player.
I really appreciate a lot of the decisions Gnomoria has made to make DF more streamlined while maintaining essentially the same high-level feature-set. (I actually wish it would approach the military stuff in a less DF-inspired way, something more streamlined). I agree with those who say it doesn’t have the story-building potential of DF. I’m hopeful that more of that stuff will get added to the game as development continues.
Suffice it to say, for anyone put off by DF but in love with the concept, the first game I would point you to is Gnomoria. I haven’t played T&S yet, but it does sound promising, so I’m looking forward to giving it a try.
Well, you are the one that brought up Java version as the reason you could not play newer Java games. Besides that, sure, playing games is hardly a compelling reason to upgrade your Java environment. But perhaps the security vulnerabilities of a 9 year old platform are.
Well you can disable specific monsters since version 8.24
[I][INDENT]Based on feedback from the poll about switching from Peaceful to Normal, this patch adds some options to adjust difficulty. There are some presets and also an advanced options window to adjust each option individually.
There are two options for adjusting how ore veins are generated.
Metal Depth - Picking “Shallow” will generate higher tiers of metal at depths closer to the surface, while “Deep” means you will have to dig deeper before finding the next tier of metal.
Metal Amount - “Scarce” generates less total ore veins, while “Abundant” generates more.
The next three options adjust how enemies spawn.
Enemy Strength - This scales the calculated strength which is based off Kingdom Worth or depth. A strength higher than 1 means, stronger enemies will spawn for the same Kingdom Worth or depth than normal and a number less than 1 means weaker enemies will spawn.
Attack Rate - This scales how often enemies spawn. A higher number will spawn enemies sooner while a lower number gives more time between attacks.
Attack Size - This scales the number of enemies that spawn.
The next option additionally increases enemy strength over time. This combines with the strength calculated from Kingdom Worth or depth.
The next few options for difficulty allow turning different enemy types on or off. You can turn off all underground enemies, or just mants or whatever here.
This patch also adds some sliders for adjusting terrain generation. For the next few examples, every world was generated on a Standard size Kingdom with a seed of 0. The pictures are also zoomed out further than normal with all hidden cells visible to give a better idea of the changes.[/INDENT][/I]
Looking at the Options, right now, there are wild animals, goblins, mants, golems, zombies, skeletons, beetles, spiders… and you can easily select which you want to deal with and which you don’t. Top side only would be Wild animals and goblins… and mants. Anyway, the advances options are really nice and were not present for anyone who tried it early on but not since a lot of updates.
Suicidal gnomes
Well, you can give civilians basic survival instinct by assigning them to military squads and ordering them to “Avoid enemies” (Positions perk “Militia”, Uniform none/nothing). It doesn’t stop them from pathing into dangerous situations, but it makes them more gnome and less rabid lemming farmer/engineer/tailor.
Yes, I gave in and switched to an ‘all gnomes in squads’ approach. I was resistant to the idea because I didn’t want every gnome in the militia, but it does make them more likely to flee and it makes it easy to position them away from a fight with a ‘guard’ designation that is some distance away from the invading goblin.
I’ve also taken to walling in my fort. I didn’t want to wall-in at the edge (because that’s a bit too cheezy/gamey for my tastes), but the lack of any damn drawbridges or other secure entrances has convinced me to use walls as portcullis/gates. I built little gatehouses around them and I just mine out some soil to open it up and rebuild the soil wall when we’re closed. I understand that one can use trap doors or piston floors as unbreakable doors, but that’s too advanced for my early fort.
I hate the squad approach too. There should be a civilians flee from monsters option and equip this kind of armor. Also… they path themselves into the most bizarre corner when running.