how to make dwarfs to construct (walls etc)

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at one point my fortress became probably too big, and everyone are doing already so much so it is hard to make them to do something new i planned. for example when someone breaks the workshop, it takes now ages to wait until they come and fix it. i somewhat had a solution using burrows, however these do not help all the time. for example, i did managed to make dwarfs dig or fix workshops using burrows. but these do not help with constructing walls! so i planned some new walls, made a burrow and send there some dwarfs who's labor is "masonry" and nothing else, expected they will make the walls from stones. however they just stood there, being sad and miserable. where is my mistake? maybe i should've picked some other custom labor? i thought masonry covers everything building-wise

[Fel]

For building walls, just make sure you have plenty of people doing non-work stuff (socializing and such), they count as "idle" and will take any job they are allowed to do.

It is also very helpful to make stone blocks (stone cutting labour at a stone workshop, you can pick the material before the task is started too) since you get 4 from each boulder and they weight way less than a boulder, meaning that the builder will walk much faster with it in his hands.

You can always temporarily set a bunch of labours to "nobody does this" to free up dwarves if they are all too busy.

Burrows are tricky to work with, they are great when you need to get everyone to safety but it is all too easy to mess up when using them for specific things like what you tried.
Make sure you enable the setting that allows workers to get materials from outside of the burrow if you are not specifically making sure that the materials are sent in it.


For digging you also have several priorities you can use, 4 is the default, lower numbers are prioritized.


I think the main thing you might want to work on is to not overwork your population, they tend to get stressed that way anyway.

[DoubleG]

Construction dwarfs are importaqnt when your fort gets to a certain size. Set up a specific labour just for construction. Remember that if you want them to build a workshop they need to have the workshops labour enabled as well. Generally its better to have building available to everyone to do but have some special builders restricted to JUST building.

[Miclee]

Masonry skill has nothing to do with constructing walls(walls are not counted as an "architectural" item).

Read the wiki: https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Mason
https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Building_designer

[johntarmac]

Sounds like they need some time to do dwarfy stuff like pray, socialise and stand by a waterfall and have happy thoughts.
Try giving them a rest from work.

[/ /\ (ರರ⌓ರರ) /\]

thanx everyone!

Originally posted by Miclee:

Masonry skill has nothing to do with constructing walls(walls are not counted as an "architectural" item).

Read the wiki: https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Mason
https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Building_designer

that page says:
The building designer skill was a skill that was previously required in order to build certain buildings, and affected their value. It no longer exists; instead, buildings which previously required this labor are now constructed using masonry for stone, carpentry for wood, and any of blacksmithing, weaponsmithing, armoring, or metalcrafting for metal.


i think my problem could be that everyone is overworked+some burrows may not have access to the materials