Above ground fort

[RitualClout]

Anybody have any experience running an above ground fort? I’m running a semi-underground, semi above ground and curious what people think of above ground forts

[Fel]

There are several issues with above-ground forts.

One is that it takes a whole lot of materials and it's often not easy to keep up even when using blocks.
You tend to need large quarries and a good amount of dwarves cutting stone into blocks.
Most stones have a limit in their availability too (often stone layers are 3 to 5 z-levels deep).
If you have clay and magma you can make "infinite" building materials but it still takes time to gather and process enough to build.

The second is that keeping up even with just the bedrooms for everyone takes a huge amount of work force.
When many dwarves are doing construction work, they are not doing anything else so the progress of the fort in other aspects usually takes a big hit.

The third is that dwarves don't like being exposed to rain, meaning that you kind of need to have a roof over everything, not just proper rooms but paths as well.
It kind of contradicts being above the ground if they are permanently "inside" anyway.
If they are not permanently inside then keeping the stress levels from going down takes a lot more work (a mist generator can still do the trick for the most part).

The fourth is that wildlife and invaders include some that climb or fly, making the defenses a lot trickier.

Last but not least the surface is more limited in terms of space, you have significantly less z-levels to work with.


If you keep your population somewhat low and make it into a "village" type settlement it can be fun but 200+ dwarves above the ground can be a pain to deal with.

[Orange sucre]

I ve done some only above ground forts: one castle surrounded by a big moat, a city with multi story buildings, multiple small hamlets on bigger embark zone.
I had the most hardcore fun with the big cities. Dfhack and patience is a must (for less headaches) for above ground cities, dsense for progress capture and perfecting construction queue. With new updates, the fps drop will not be a big issue. Look at old european cities in old town zones, the streets are narrow, the buildings are close, some have even balconies, some buildings are more isolated (monarchy maybe?) and have their own gardens etc. Those allow for fast replication of buildings. Create simple square templates and put them together like legos, dont overdo the room layouts, small buildings produce best visuals (especially in dsense for fast cities) and hardcore FUN and creative stories. Vision is highly reduced, allowing for diversity in interactions. Start with a big street, use dfhack if needed for a good start on that. Dont limit yourself to time, df is built to grind that material (so spawn those materials for big city), or try to go for a realistic stone quarry if possible. For enjoying visuals in dsense, I recomend checking dsense textures and building according to them. Military buildup is a must on above ground forts. Undead can be a real threat to the survival of a city and hoardes of goblins can decimate your population if provoked.
Go for bigger worlds, bigger populations, modify start worldgen options manually AND SAVE AFTER:
End Year: 501, stop the gen when necromancers start appearing on map (imho)
!!! Population cap after civ creation: crank it down/ leave standard
This determines the maximum possible population of civilization member historical figures alive at a given time during worldgen.
!!! Site cap after civ creation: crank it down/ leave standard
This controls the maximum number of towns and similar sites on the entire map. Raising the number will allow for more towns, etc. though the number of sites will ultimately still be limited by things like space, terrain, and population cap.After civilizationS( all of them) reach this cap, they will not spread out any more to place new cities.
Year to begin checking Megabeast percentage: 501
Cull unimportant historical figures: do it
Number of Demon Types: at least 2 for goblin civ spawn
Number of Werebeast Curse Types: lower this, they can slowly decimate the city
Attack Population Requirement: set according to your preferences
Number of Secret Types: 1: the idea is if necromancers are to appear, the chance for them to appear is lower, if lucky, they appear at around 400 years in world gen, else set to zero.
!!! Number of Civilizations: multiples of n, n-> number of civilizationS possible (otherwise goblins)
I recommend using seeds as much as possible and do multiple gens, watch how they behave, take some choices about site cap and pop cap and yeah have fun that s all I got.

Ah yes, after choosing final map, CREATE MULTIPLE CITIES and not only dwarves. Humans are a nice civ too, even elves. Build stories around specific individuals, grow them with care as they grow with the city and allow them to flourish alone while focusing on another story nearby the first story idk, I usually go for human on flat embarks with a river and if possible, warm place where wells wont suddenly get destroyed if winter comes. gg wp open lane report jg next

[malthenielsen]

You can pick a place where it doesn't rain at all, like a desert.

I did have a fort once when It never rained. Some sort of tropical beach.

[Slapshot82]

Originally posted by Orange sucre:

Ah yes, after choosing final map, CREATE MULTIPLE CITIES and not only dwarves. Humans are a nice civ too, even elves.

"...even elves."

I died a little inside when I read this. Haha

[Fel]

Well, elves are often portrayed as friends of nature and all that.
But also as not being too friendly with dwarves due to their very different values.

For above ground forts elves are even more likely to be your foes, since they hate it when you cut too many trees (and "too many" isn't that many to begin with).
Since you need space above the ground, it is likely that trees are going to need to go extinct in at least a portion of your map even without speaking about needing beds and such.