5

I am experimenting a lot with the game right now and one thing I have noticed is that child dwarves are extremely useless. They just throw parties and interrupt others.

It's obvious they need to be sent to a better place.

My current solution is to dig a 2x2x8 well with a bridge on top, use a burrow to get the children onto the bridge and then just pull the lever. Most of them immediately die, some of them need a few months to meet their demise.

The problem is cleaning up the bodies and putting them into coffins. This creates a lot of unhappy thoughts but I do it to avoid ghosts being spawned.

So what is the most clean way to get rid of children while creating the fewest unhappy thoughts in my dwarves?

| improve this question | |
  • 4
    ..... only in Dwarf Fortress. – Radhil Jul 30 '15 at 21:46
  • Would a solution on how to edit the configuration files to ensure that you don't get so many children be an acceptable answer? I ask, since this being Dwarf Fortress, the elaborate death trap may be half the point. – LindaJeanne Aug 2 '15 at 13:29
  • @LindaJeanne I think I like the one that is already posted, but I am sure what you say would be useful to a lot of other people who stumble upon this answer (I personally don't have a problem with editing the files since I use the newb pack anyway). – Maurycy Aug 2 '15 at 21:56
5

Your elaborate child death trap should work just fine - you can erect a memorial to put a spirit to rest without needing to retrieve the body.

A few caveats:

  • Children do actually help out on their own accord, including harvesting crops and storing items.
  • As you'd pointed out, being haunted by a child produces unhappy thoughts, however the death of a child will cause this as well. You should be careful with how many children you slaughter as this can spark a tantrum spiral (Dwarfs getting upset causing other dwarfs to get upset, etc.)
  • Your bridge plan will work ok (in a sadistic sense), but if you want to make it humane, you can build a bridge on the ground, lift the bridge, corral the kiddies where the bridge goes down, then smash them into oblivion.
  • If you want to be as inhumane as possible (Praise Armok), I'd suggest this.
| improve this answer | |
  • Children can be useful unless you get 10 kids in a 14 people migration wave. And the next one is almost the same... Atom smasher sounds like a better (and safer) solution. Is it known how long the unhappy thoughts appear after the death and how influential they are? Can I combat them back with some decent furniture here and there? – Maurycy Jul 31 '15 at 8:17
  • looking at this 'Thought' version 0.34 on the wiki (dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/v0.34:Thought) the modifiers are stated, the loss of a loved one can range from -50 to -10, and the scale of a dwarfs mood ranges from 0 to over 150. So unless they stack, you could theorietically 'catch' a dwarf from going all the way to 0 with some waterfalls and nicely made food (also depends how much it changed to .40). – schil227 Jul 31 '15 at 12:17
  • 1
    Fair enough. The best way to get rid of kids is to disable them when playing, learn how to cope with them or cope with atom smashing them! – Maurycy Jul 31 '15 at 19:38

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service, privacy policy and cookie policy

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.