Dwarves be Angry

[AurelianDio]

It's a hard thing to fix apparently, I'm just looking for tips to keep the dwarves happy, cause twice I've reached around 200 pop and twice it eventually fell down to around 50, my dwarves just get very angry and kill each other, I've reached an all time low of 39 pop and migrants aren't being attracted in like 3 years, I tink this fortress is doomed to a slow death =(

I have plenty of drink and food, we got lots of artifacts on display safely tucked behind windows, smooth stones, engravings, big rooms, small rooms, plenty of temples for the more major sects, I'm running our of ideas on what to do now, specially since now with such a small population, anything takes a long time to do, cause they're always busy with small stuff.

[Testikles]

What do the personal tabs of your unhappy Dwarfs say? Maybe this gives a clue as to why they are unhappy?

[Vivisectus]

Stuff you can try:

- food variety: get lots of different meats and plants to eat.
- Booze variety: same
- Build a nice waterfall in your tavern / temples! Dorfs love a bit of a misting.
- For a small population, turn off some of the temples and keep a smallish tavern. Dorfs like to hang around other Dorfs and sometimes they get a bit too spread out
- Keep them busy but not too busy. I always build a bunch of craftsdwarf workshops and make them make crafts so everyone gets to craft something every now and again. But make sure they get some time to socialize every now and again
- Some unhappy dorfs like military training, so put those in a squad and let them train every now and then.

But honestly, there is no pleasing some dorfs. :P

[Johan 2.0]

Do you have clothiers and leatherworkers set up to supply fresh clothing so they can replace their old worn clothing? This also helps with keeping them happy as dwarves with those professions enjoy performing tasks they excel at.

[Sayla Massochist]

When in doubt check your Dwarves thoughts for ideas on how to improve your Fort. Besides what else has been suggested also make some jewelry or other nice stuff as well. They'll take a ring or necklace sometimes to put in a box in their room. Sometimes they just want to own a nice thing.

[AurelianDio]

Thanks, I'm going to try some of those suggestions, specially the clothing stuff, I never payed much mind to that =X didn't know clothes wore out.

As to the dwarves thoughts, most of what I see if being with family and the like, I mean, I have the inn, I don't know maybe if I idle them for a while?

[Johan 2.0]

Soon you'll be looking for ways to offload all your worn clothing. Set up dedicated cloth, silk and yarn clothing stockpiles and dwarves tend to lump worn clothes into the same place since they are very keen on wearing fresh clothing.

[AurelianDio]

Yeah I was working on a room that can be filled and emptied of magma with a lever to get rid of such things before the last time they went ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ and killed each other for the second time xD took a while to finish it after that but I just got it done. Also can't believe clothes might've been the biggest contributor for the downward spiral both times ... oh well, live and learn =P hope I can get some migrants soon as well, they haven't been coming for a while now which kind of sucks =( maybe after I make a huge pile of clothes x)

[Johan 2.0]

I remember one of my first tantrum cullings. It went in four waves until I gave in. Its very rough getting out of it as you spend phenomenal amounts of time forced towards burying all your dead or the other issues will all crop up and make it even worse. You might suffer a third anger wave before they settle down. The good thing is that less dwarves means less clothing usage.

[Sudo Modding]

I asked the same thing, here's what came out of it:

If you want answers this link is excellent: https://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Stress

The main idea is that some rare dwarfs will indeed be a pain to keep happy no matter what (those are the dwarfs you'll dispose of)
Some will handle stress very well, compensating your bad decisions.
And most of them just need some "basics", which are:
- generic temple (minimum) + temples for each deity (better?)
- engraved bedrooms with high quality furniture
- luxurious dining hall
- a library
- at least one mist generator somewhere
- a tavern to socialise
- high quality food
- high quality clothes
- acquiring objects (they take them randomly when the haul them)
- variety in food/drink
- training in the military 1/2 months a year
- doing a work that raises a skill
- some down time to make friends/family (this was my main problem)
- dwarfs that don't go outside for a long time may get traumatised when going outside
- dwarfs vulnerable to stress needs to avoid jobs like nobles/military

Not so basic in the end but this covers 95% of the dwarfs.

Otherwise given enough time and patience you can try to breed some stress resistant dwarfs, even doing it partially by filtering stressed dwarfs from your fortress.
I read someone that made a fortress of superdwarfs (stress resistant, high stamina/strength/agility etc.), I don't remember his name.
It's very hard to do though, because many of them are homosexual or just don't want to raise a family, so you're really fighting against the odds.

[Johan 2.0]

I recall reading threads of subjecting dwarves to enough trauma and corpses that they become immune/conditioned to it.

[Sudo Modding]

But my personal tip is, some dwarfs are just pain in the *ss and won't hesitate to kill all of your perfectly sane and preferably most useful dwarfs given the occasion.
So if you see in their personality tab that they have things about anger problems (personal notes below)

General stress resilience
- (m3)"is a nervous wreck"
- (m2)"is always tense and jittery"
- (m1)"is often nervous"
More likely to throw tantrums and go berserk
- (m3)"is in a constant state of internal rage" (**danger for other dwarfs**)
- (m2)"is very quick to anger" (**danger for other dwarfs**)
- (m1)"is quick to anger" (**danger for other dwarfs**)

Then it's a good time to find a way to take care of them.
If they are in a not too bad mood, having them cutting tree non stop until they inevitably get crushed work.

Otherwise trying to take on invaders naked and barefist, effective. I had an axelord that killed 3 goblins like that, I can't imagine the massacre it would have been with his materwork steel axe.

Or just crushed by a bridge, lock them in their bedroom, anything to take care of those trouble makers that are just future serial killers.

[Celgaming]

Originally posted by Johan 2.0:

I recall reading threads of subjecting dwarves to enough trauma and corpses that they become immune/conditioned to it.

This is very true. Also same with pain.

I've heard some people have made 1x1 room with a trap that has tons of spinning wooden training spears. They then put their soldier dwarf, armored, in said rooms full of spinning wooden danger of wooden goodness.

Then they lock the door and put the trap in action.

The dwarf is then subjected to millions of hits all over the body.

This will not kill them, but level them amazingly fast in dodging. It will also cause massive pain and trauma from which they recover they will be amazing warriors. They might even start to love pain as a result as you twist them with endless ""torture"" (it's training).

Don't believe me?

Google "danger room" in dwarf fortress. This method trains super soldiers. Or at least it used to.

[Sudo Modding]

Originally posted by Johan 2.0:

I recall reading threads of subjecting dwarves to enough trauma and corpses that they become immune/conditioned to it.

Yes, in my fortress everyone is immune to that, even the children and the civilians.
A good way to do it is to let a teeth or something that doesn't rot in a meeting hall.
Problem: often people will get a trauma from it the first time.

I currently have a baby that keeps getting traumatised and horrified from seeing goblins die and such, so erh, we'll see what he becomes but I'm a bit worried for him

[Sudo Modding]

I keep reading about those danger rooms, but do they still work?
I thought they were too dangerous/not useful enough anymore.
Maybe if you gave them a ton of armor layers? I would like to try it one day

[dth]

Originally posted by Sudo Modding:

I keep reading about those danger rooms, but do they still work?
I thought they were too dangerous/not useful enough anymore.
Maybe if you gave them a ton of armor layers? I would like to try it one day

I've read that they now damage armor and deal damage to dwarfs themselves, and don't provide exp so it's not worth using them. Also, I've noticed that dwarfs level fairly fast now (couple of years on full time soldiering and they should get legendary levels), so it's not even worth using this as an exploit for leveling skills. It's still good if you want to traumatize your dwarfs or to keep your hospital up and running with high level doctors. But it can probably end up with blinded dwarfs so know your risks : )