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#notes label(help) run me for the dreamfort walkthrough
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Welcome to Dreamfort! These blueprints will help you build a functional, secure, fully self-sustaining fortress that you can use as-is or extend to build the fortress of your dreams!
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It can be difficult to apply a set of blueprints that you did not write yourself. This walkthrough will guide you through the high-level steps of building Dreamfort. Run "quickfort run library/dreamfort.csv -n /checklist" (or, if you're looking at the online version, switch to the "checklist" sheet) for a compact list of the commands you'll be running. Each level also has its own mini-walkthrough with more details.
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The final fort will have a walled-in area on the surface for livestock, trading, aboveground farming, and military training. One z-level down is the farming level, with related workshops and vents up to the surface for miasma prevention. The farming level also has a miniature dining hall and dormitory for use until you get the services and housing levels set up.
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Beyond those two, the other layers can be built in any order, at any z-level, according to your preference and the layout peculiarities of your embark site:
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- The industry level has a compact, but complete set of workshops and stockpiles (minus what is already provided on the farming level).
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- The services level has dining, hospital, marksman barracks, and justice services, plus a well system. It is 4 z-levels deep.
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- The guildhall level has large, empty rooms for building libraries, temples, and guildhalls.
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- The suites level has fancy rooms for your nobles.
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- The apartments levels have small but well-furnished bedrooms for your other dwarves.
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Run each level's "help" blueprint (e.g. "quickfort run library/dreamfort.csv -n /surface_help") for more details.
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Dreamfort has a central stairs-based design. For all Dreamfort levels, place the cursor on the center (undug) tile of the 3x3 stairs area when you apply the blueprints for that level. The first surface blueprint will designate a column of stairs that you can use as a guide. If you need to extend the stairs down further to lower levels, run "quickfort run library/dreamfort.csv -n /central_stairs --repeat down,10" with the cursor on the z-level below the lowest current stairs.
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Dreamfort blueprints take care of everything to get the fort up and running. You don't need to clear any extra trees or create any extra buildings or stockpiles (though of course you are free to do so). Blueprints that do require manual steps, like 'assign minecart to hauling route', will leave a message telling you so when you run them. Note that blueprints will designate buildings to build even if you don't have the materials needed to build them. You can use "quickfort orders" to automatically create the manager orders for all the needed items. Make sure your manager is available to validate all the incoming work orders!
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There are some tasks common to all forts that Dreamfort doesn't specifically handle for you. For example, Dreamfort sets up a barracks, but managing squads is up to you. Here are some other common tasks that may need to be done manually (or with some other tool):
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- Exploratory mining for specific resources like iron
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- Filling the well system with water
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- Bringing magma up to the industry level to power magma forges/furnaces
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- Manufacturing trade goods
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- Assigning skilled labors to migrants (although the example professions included with DFHack will help with this)
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- Custom stockpile setups to assist with, for example, encrusting only high-quality items
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Dreamfort works best at an embark site that is flat and has at least one soil layer. New players should avoid embarks with aquifers if they are not prepared to deal with them. Bring picks for mining, an axe for woodcutting, and an anvil for a forge. Bring a few blocks to speed up initial workshop construction as well. That's all you really need, but see the example embark profile in the online spreadsheets for a more complete setup.
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Other DFHack commands also work very well with Dreamfort, such as autofarm, autonestbox, prioritize, seedwatch, tailor, and, of course, buildingplan. An init file that gets everything configured for you is distributed with DFHack as hack/examples/init/onMapLoad_dreamfort.init.
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Put that file in your dfhack-config/init/ directory -- the same directory that has dfhack.init.
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Also check out https://docs.dfhack.org/en/stable/docs/Plugins.html#professions for more information on the default labor professions that are distributed with DFHack, including suggestions on how many dwarves of each profession you are likely to need at each stage of fort maturity.
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Once you have your starting surface workshops up and running, you might want to configure buildingplan (in its global settings, accessible from any building placement screen, e.g.: b-a-G) to only use blocks for constructions so it won't use your precious wood, boulders, and bars to build floors and walls. If you bring at least 7 blocks with you on embark, you can even set this in your dfhack-config/init/onMapLoad.init file like this:
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on-new-fortress buildingplan set boulders false; buildingplan set logs false
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Directly after embark, run "quickfort run library/dreamfort.csv -n /setup" with your cursor on your wagon to set settings, and get started building your fort with "quickfort run library/dreamfort.csv -n /surface1" on the surface (see /surface_help for how to select a good spot). Read the walkthroughs for each level to understand what's going on and follow the checklist to keep track of where you are in the building process. Good luck, and have fun building an awesome Dreamfort-based fort!
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The dreamfort.csv file distributed with DFHack is generated from online spreadsheet files. If you want to look at how these blueprints are put together, it is easier to look at the online spreadsheets than the giant .csv. You can view them at: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1iS90EEVqUkxTeZiiukVj1pLloZqabKuP
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You are welcome to copy the Dreamfort spreadsheets and make your own modifications!
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If you like, you can download a fully built Dreamfort-based fort from https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=15434 and explore it
interactively.
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# The dreamfort.csv distributed with DFHack is generated with the following command:
for fname in dreamfort*.xlsx; do xlsx2csv -a -p '' "$fname"; done | sed 's/,*$//'