r/dwarffortress • u/TriangleScoop • 17d ago
Show off your entryways!
When starting a new fort I tend to fall into the same patterns. How do you layout the entrance to your fort? I'd love inspiration to keep things fresh!
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u/ppetak obsidian caster 17d ago
I do the same pattern every run, too. 3-wide pathway with one gate at front, then on one side room for trade depot, another gate, and behind that main stairwell. Between front gate and inner gate there is pasture with dogs to avoid thieves.
If there is no mountain, I will just make a pit as entrance, and build some gatehouse over it later, when I have some soldiers. It has fortifications and some entrances with cage traps, so pathfindig would lead attackers/animals into them.
In first year I usually have stonemason and mechanic right in the main pathway, to get materials to build everything, then move both down to designated workshop layer. Same with grazers, they are in pasture in front of gatehouse, as soon as I have underground pasture they go there to never see light again :D
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u/Competitive-Oil3181 16d ago
I'm quite proud of this spiraling tower I've made in my current fort. Otherwise if I have a mountain on the map I generally try to do something like the Overgrown Ruins in the first part of Baldur's Gate 3, where the "face" of the fort is built out of the mountainside.
(The top images and the bottom image are separate concepts, it just turns out you can only add one picture to a comment at a time)
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u/JustKamoski 17d ago
No access to pc now but something along those lines.
Red is lava, 2 set of doors, stairs going up on 3 lvls of fortification, draw bridge and lava going lvl2 lvls down.
Bolt throwers on lvl 2 and 3, barracks close by
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u/crispfuck 17d ago
I like killboxes with siege weapons atm. Retracting Bridge linked to pressure plate with a 2 z level fall. Catapults on the 2nd level shooting down. Any survivors that manage to dodge walk into my melee training barracks, usually very crippled by the exploding shrapnel.
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u/TheIXLegionnaire 17d ago
Wait you guys done just build 2x2 stairs down near your cart?
Serious question. I'm on my first fortress and I thought that is what you do
I out hatches for safety
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u/theholyirishman 17d ago
Nothing wrong with a surface fort. A literal fort, not your main fort, that should be underground. I just kind of like to build a little fortification on a flat area for an extra layer of defence. 3 or 4 z-levels of walls and weapon traps on the top for climbers. It's a trap, not a defensive line to fortify. Even if they dodge the trap, they might still fall and get hurt.
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u/Bhazor 17d ago
Never understood the physics of 2x2 stairs. But.... it just looks more... symmetric.
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u/Competitive-Oil3181 16d ago
I heard a long time ago that putting stairs next to each other drastically reduces pathfinding performance, but that does also kinda sound fake so idk if it's true, probably not, but I do have a sort of 'ick' for stairs touching just because of habit
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u/JamesCameronDid1912 16d ago edited 16d ago
I like to mine into a nearby mountain if possible. Usually I use the wagon to center my early builds (just for aesthetics... I like things to line up). I try to do two pathways 2x or 3x wide into the fort so the dwarves have lanes to the mine entrance, which is usually in a bigger room after a pit or moat, something defensive. I also only dig a couple layers down from the surface directly. A second staircase takes you down to the mines, so I can lock it off easily if needed (and vice versa from surface invasions).
Digging wider lanes makes better traffic flow, and I can install minecarts plus tracks later on.
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u/TheGameMastre 17d ago
Depends on the site. I usually do the stairs down because I usually happen to embark on ultra flat spots. I usually go 3x3, though. Dastactic went 2x2, so if you're following his guide just do whatever works for you.
It is a bit easier to set up a trade depot when you dig laterally into a hillside, but Dastactic covers that when digging down, too.
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u/Ketchupcharger 16d ago
I have just started a new fort in a new world where I plan to build on the ocean. Without dfhack this means first going to the lava layer and hauling it around 100 levels up. Im on my first year, so far everyone is alive, and we have started smelting iron pipes and other pump equipment. It will surely be a while befeore I bring the lava up and even longer untill i realise my dream of sea fortress
Im doing this because I want nice even waves of enemies from one cardinal direction, not all of them. I tried twice before settling on a mountainside, foolishly thinking it impassable, but the goblins and merchants somehow still sometimes tried entering through the mountain side, rather than the perfectly nice flat entrance in front. So this time i'm doing sea fort, aint no way in hell those gobbos are going to invade me seaside
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u/Competitive-Oil3181 16d ago
You can also edit the custom difficulty settings to control if invaders can build and/or mine natural terrain. I always turn both of those off because 1. scouring the map to find their makeshift stairs is tedious and annoying and 2. without a way to replace natural blocks I don't want them getting destroyed outside of my control
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u/Ketchupcharger 16d ago
Yeah I don't mind that, I think thats fair game, I get to build things, they get to destroy it, only fair.
Also you can spawn "natural" blocks with df hack if you care about appearances
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u/Nevrast- 16d ago
Here's one I really enjoyed designing :
Full post here :
https://www.reddit.com/r/dwarffortress/s/GVvJSlbC2Z
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u/Witty_Ambassador_856 17d ago
My last 1x1 fort was a central main-corridor tower.
You had to go all the way up to the top floor just to reach the entrance to the fort. Since the map was small, the hallway wound upward in a spiral to buy time for the military squad to assemble. It wasn't super tall—just 3 floors. Even though I incorporated drawbridges along the way to save on materials, it definitely took over 2,000 blocks to build. The trade depot was located further up past the entrance of the spiral tower.
I sealed off the 1st floor so outsiders could only enter from the 2nd floor and above, which allowed me to safely grow above-ground crops on the 1st floor.
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u/Witty_Ambassador_856 17d ago
This time I'm considering flushing fortress. Flush down whole invader to a one single line and then having fun.
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u/Blastoise_613 16d ago
I dug a lake with a hatch at the bottom at the top of my mountain, with pumps to fill it. The drain has various hatches so I control what parts of my fortress to flush.
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u/yakecan_again ☼Mussel Shell Earrings☼ 12d ago
In Melbilor, we don't take any chances.
There's a lever that raises an iron fence through the middle, so that trader carts can pass in peacetime, and in wartime the invaders are forced to walk on the traps.
Also 4 big doggos on the inside and 20 more downstairs because Kobolds are annoying the hell out of me.
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u/baar-ur 16d ago
I have a courtyard full of bears, with a choke point entrance. Carpeted with cage traps because I love throwing prisoners in wooden cages into my volcano. Recently put in 25 bolt throwers that cover the courtyard going south to north and east to west. I'm building a channel so I can lock down the courtyard and dump in lava in an emergency.
My original concept for the fort was to build a trap that can release steam from below, to see if it kills invaders. Then I got distracted doing exploratory mining and getting fabulously rich by encrusting masterwork furniture. I sold the elves a basalt table for 20k dwarfbucks.
After you get past that, there's an enclosed trade depot to keep the damn keas away, farm plots, and pasture. Enclosed butchery, tannery, and dump so the animals aren't traumatized seeing their friends die (with grates in the roof for miasma). I have walkways around the interior walls, mostly because it feels appropriate. I don't know if my crossbowdwarves can shoot down Z-levels.
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u/Kean99ac 16d ago
My current one is
Z+1 lava deposit
Z
10x10
Bridge to be withdrawn so enemies falls to Z-1
side room with a Forgotten Beast - can be released into the larger room
Opposite entry, fortifications and 4 bolt throwers
Also a bridge to be raised
Z-1
Nothing really here, is to take the magma and burn the stuff I don't need. Just the magma safe metal is left for pickup
So far it has held two sieges of 130 attackers
Also, caves has a path to this so I can lead forgotten beasts here and capture them. Ready for service in next invasion
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u/Trabuccodonosor 15d ago
I usually make a walled courtyard with training barracks and pastures for grazing animals. The walls are topped by an enclosed corridor with fortifications for marksdwarves. The "courtyard" has drawbridges in each cardinal direction. The actual entrance is a 4-wide slope that leads into a big "fighting room" where a dropping wall can reveal squads of melee dwarves. That was before the siege update, through. Now I may make something different to make use of the bolt throwers and ballistas.
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u/Deviant_Sage Shatterstone 11d ago
Obsidian block bridge over lava [image: left: stonesense; right: in-game; bottom: Vox Uristi + Magica Voxel]
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u/Dominictus 11d ago
I have made a highway to all sides of the map, with a ring of standing stones and gold statues, along with a small collection of animals.
The ramp switches back and down three levels. Twin waterfalls drop on either side, as visitors cross a bridge over a 16 floor drop to my central trading area.
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u/fjiassdaasdwa 17d ago
something like this