River-crossing Dwarves

[xocorret]

Hi there,
I notice from time to time that my dwarves seem to end up on the wrong side of a river and I have no idea how they are getting there. (No crossing points on the map) Usually they starve to death before I catch on and build a bridge.

The issue here is: How did they get there in the first place? If they swam, shouldn't they also swim back? Can they just fall into the water when no one is watching?

[McFuzz]

You can build a normal floor across, and don't need a specific 'bridge' building. You should bridge rivers as soon as you're set up on a river map for this very reason.

As for how they're getting there, NFI. They might be migrants that spawned that side lol. Dwarves start with absolute 0 in swimming and will never actively seek it out even if you tell them to cross the river.

[RetroJL]

Dwarves are dumb. For whatever reason they swam across to get something and after being weighed down with it can't make it back across.

It's a safe bet to always include a bridge or two in your first construction jobs.

Plus, pathing calc-wise, a bridge gives you a natural chokepoint to handle traders/migrants/raids.