A Crash Course on Dwarf Fortress

Dwarf Fortress has been considered one of the nerdiest games in existence, largely because of the steep learning curve and the fact that geeks/nerds tend to be able to pick up on that type of thing more quickly. This learning curve is necessary, though, because there's so much that the game can do - and what it can't do can usually be easily modded in (as simple as editing a text file). In a game with so much content, and with so much content always being added to it, every fortress tends to have a unique story - and this has prompted a large community of people to write fan-made stories about their fortresses.

I've written about Dwarf Fortress before in this blog, but I haven't really expanded on it or said much of anything about it. I'm going to try to do that now - I won't be giving you so much a crash course on playing Dwarf Fortress, however, as a crash course on Dwarf Fortress (DF) itself. This is mainly because I intend to put up some of my more recent stories relating to the game - some of which I'm immensely enjoying writing. Don't worry, though - you're not going to be reading through a full manual. I won't put down anything more than you would need to know.


The full name for the game is "Slaves to Armok, God of War, Chapter II: Dwarf Fortress". Armok is known as the "Blood God", and is basically the DF equivalent of an omnipotent, all-powerful being - though Armok has a taste for blood and a sadistic sense of humor. He doesn't come into play much in the actual game, however - most of what you hear about Armok comes from the players.

When you start a new fortress, you initially have seven dwarves who come from the Mountainhome - the main home of your dwarves. You can tell them what to do - farm, mine, dig rooms, engrave pictures on walls (always graphic, often humorous), practice fighting, brew booze and more - but the dwarves only do it if they feel like it. While they usually do, sometimes they'll be lazy and you won't get any work out of them. As the game progresses, you'll receive migrants (dwarves migrating from the mountainhome to your fortress) based on how well your fortress is doing. The better off you are, the more migrants you'll receive. Large numbers of civilian casualties generally means other dwarves will stay away.

On the topic of booze: Dwarven babies drink booze as soon as they're old enough to walk. In fact, all dwarves would much rather drink alcohol than water, consuming the latter only when they're sick. If they can't get enough booze, they slow down and don't work as hard.

There are five different main races: dwarves, goblins, elves, kobolds and humans.
 - Kobolds are tiny and largely unintelligent - they tend to be nothing more than a nuisance at best, stealing generally worthless items from the fortress from time to time and running away if they're seen.
 - Goblins are the main enemies throughout the game, though you can make war with the elves or humans if you so desire. They're roughly human-sized and generally have decent battle tactics. In addition to this, they kidnap young children and raise them as goblins.
 - Humans in DF are about what you'd expect humans to be like. They're excellent traders and very handy with a weapon, though their armor is too big for a dwarf to wear.
 - Elves in DF are unlike anything in any other game, and especially not like Tolkien's elves. To sum it up: elves in DF are hypocritical tree-hugging cannibals. They get very angry at anyone who chops down trees, yet all they bring in trade are items made from wood. They also have a tradition of eating their dead enemies - and sometimes allies. As a rule, DF players hate the elves in the game, but it's more of a running joke than a pure hatred. The dwarves ingame are imagined to actually hate them, though - and instances have been recorded where dwarves went and stole everything from elven caravans, completely on their own accord.

On caravans: You get three caravans a year (if there aren't any sieges). In the spring, the elven caravan arrives. In the summer, the humans come with their wagonloads of goods. In the fall, the dwarven caravan from the Mountainhome shows up invariably, along with a liason who your mayor can barter with to arrange what the caravan will bring the year after.



Finally, something not ingame. DF completely lacks any sort of multiplayer mode, and at some point someone came up with the idea for what has come to be known as a "succession game" (Boatmurdered is an excellent example of this). Basically, one person starts out with a new fortress and plays through one ingame year. After this is done, they save it, package it up and send it to the next player (also known as an "overseer"), who then plays through an ingame year before sending it on to overseer number three. Succession games tend to be a lot more chaotic than single-player games because everyone tries to do things differently. Later players may consider the work of previous overseers ridiculous and tear it down, while some wind up building monuments to themselves.

This is the type of game I'm writing a story on at the moment - a succession game of a fortress called "Spearbreakers". The thread is over 1,000 posts long, and I wouldn't expect you to read all of it, so before I launch into my story, I'll outline the basics of what's gone on over the fortress's seven-year history, just so you have a vague idea of what's happening.

This is all that comes to mind at the moment, though I'm sure there's more I'm forgetting...


Are you bored yet?



EDIT: Some things later deemed necessary:

Adamantine: A rare metal that makes sharper swords than can be found in the real world. It is also incredibly light and makes for practically impenetrable armor.
Artifact: The product of a "strange mood". From time to time, dwarves either get possessed by a spirit of their ancestors, come up with a great idea, or feel they need to create something in commemoration of an event. If the strange mood is successful, they create an "artifact" - an item of incomparable quality. If it fails... they go insane.