The Complete and Utter Newby Tutorials

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The Complete and Utter Newby Tutorial for Dwarf

Fortress

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Part 1: “WTF?”

February 9, 2009 at 6:54 am | InFantasy,Tutorial|68 Comments Tags:Dwarf Fortress

Dwarf Fortress is an extremely interesting and complex game, but one which peoplefind exceptionally difficult to get into. Although it isn’t hard to find tutorials, manyassume some basic knowledge of the interface and what the player is looking at.They also don’t take into account different tilesets and versions and the difficultynew users have in finding a good site for that first fortress.But all that is in the past as AfterActionReporter.com is pleased to present

TheComplete and Utter Newby Tutorial for Dwarf Fortress

! It comes with a pre-made world and save and fullgame download for you to play along with. And a ton of screenshots. Yes, many, many screenshots.So grab a drink, get your thinking cap on and be prepared for some dwarfy fun! And carp. Never forget thecarp…

Set Up

First things first. You need to grab a copy of the client. Lucky for you we’ve made that easy and the copy you’llneed for this tutorial is availablehere(mirrored atFileDropper,FileFactoryandSaveFile). Even if you’ve already got DF installed you should grab this version as it has the world and save file we’ll be working from forthis tutorial. In case you’re wondering, this version is a copy of MayDay’s Green tilesetand it’s worth grabbingnew versions as the game is updated.Next you need to unzip the folder on to your had drive. Then create a shortcut on your desktop (if you wish)leading to dwarfort.exe. While you’re at it, go into the DwarfManager folder and create a shortcut toDwarfManager.exe, we’ll need that later.

Run the Game

Now we’re ready to get going! Run the dwarfort.exe shortcut and you should get the screen below. Bear inmind, this game version is optimised to run in 1280 x 800 resolution, if your game doesn’t look like thescreenshot, you might have to fiddle with the .ini file found in \data\init\init.txt. You can read the DFWiki entryongrid sizefor a bit of help.

By TinyPirate

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So, you’ve got the game running and enjoyed the exciting ASCII intro movie. Well done! I can tell you’ll go far!Next step is to hit “enter” on “Continue Playing”, which should be highlighted. You’ll then be presented withthis screen.This is the save game list, which gets cluttered very quickly as seasonal saves build up. But for now all you haveto do is use the down-arrow key (not the number pad arrow key) to select the

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save. Hit enterand the game will load.

First Look

Once the game loads you will be presented with this screen. Although it’s confusing on first glance, don’t panic!It will all be made clear shortly. First thing though, hit “space” to pause the game. Space pauses DF and alsobacks out of any menu you’re currently in.Lets talk about what you can see. First up, the screen is divided into three sections: The left shows the localview. The center shows the action menu, the right shows the area map. To make things a lot neater hit “tab”.“Tab” cycles through various menu arrangements. Stop when your view matches the one below.

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Now we’re really cooking with gas! Soon you’ll be melting foes with magma-falls, and drowning goblins inartfully engineered traps! But before then, lets look around. Use the arrow keys to navigate around the localarea. You’ll notice the we’ve got a decent amount of space to work with.While you examine your surroundings you should be able to spot trees and the grassy areas easy enough, samewith ponds and rivers and bushes. Other tiles won’t make much sense, these tend to be the slightly-arcanezones like open air spaces (pale blue tiles, or tiles with dots) and the earth (brown tiles) and slope tiles (up anddown triangles). The screenshot below should help point those features out.Key to understanding DF’s local view is getting your head around the fact that DF is a 3D game displayed on a 2Dmap. To display a variety of heights the world is sliced into dozens of Z-levels. Each Z-level is numbered.