Dwarf fortress mode

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v53.16 · v0.47.05 This article is about the current version of DF. Note that some content may still need to be updated. More Info · V

This is a detailed reference guide. For a beginner tutorial, see Quickstart guide, see further tutorials.

Modding is not covered on this page.

Fortress mode is the most popular of the three modes in Dwarf Fortress, with the other two being Adventurer mode and Legends mode, and is often the mode implied when one talks about Dwarf Fortress. Fortress mode is a construction and management simulation of a colony of dwarves. In fortress mode an embark location is chosen, and then seven initial dwarves are assigned some starting skills, equipment, provisions, and perhaps, animals to bring along (possibly including extinct ones). After preparations are complete and these hardy explorers embark, they will be faced with the fortress site chosen, down to every little detail; from geologically appropriate stone types, to roaring waterfalls, to, for example, ornery hippopotami. Rather than controlling individual dwarves, designs are planned, and these dwarves will go about implementing them autonomously.

Goals

Fortress mode is considered a construction and management simulation game, with few explicit goals imposed upon the player by the game.

The most apparent goal is survival, as your endeavors at the chosen site will, in this instance, end if the last dwarf dies. With this comes the need to keep your dwarves happy, as unhappy dwarves will cultivate some very unhealthy (yet surprisingly Fun) habits like murdering their colleagues.

Another goal of sorts, programmed into the game, is creating a fortress that attracts the king/queen of your civilization. Therefore, players typically, but by no means necessarily, choose to expand into a thriving community with skilled workers, battle-ready warriors and nobles, creating ridiculous amounts of wealth like fine crafts, excellent armor, valuable furniture, decorated with precious gems, all the while protecting them from foes with deadly traps and a trained military. Avoiding imminent death also requires providing the dwarves with plenty of food and alcohol, by way of farms above and below ground, while clothing from leather or cloth will keep them happy.

Of course, every dwarf loves precious metals, but the only way to find them is to dig. Make sure you don't delve too greedily and too deep, for many creatures dwell in the caverns below...

The world

To play Dwarf Fortress in fortress mode, a world must be generated that includes a dwarven civilization – see World generation for detailed instructions. After at least one world has been generated, a game can be started. Only one game may be going on in a world at the same time, unless a game is saved to another timeline, then only one game in each timeline.

Geographic features / Inhabitants / History

The main features of a world are biomes on the surface and stone layers underground, some of which may contain aquifers. Other surface features that are significant, but which aren't biomes, strictly speaking, are hills and plains, rivers, volcanoes, and caves. There are also caverns and magma seas everywhere underground which will most likely be encountered when expanding a fortress, though these can't be seen on the world map, or on the local map, for that matter, until they have been excavated. There may also be other Fun things that can be discovered underground, after embarkation.

Every playable world will be inhabited by various creatures, civilizations, night creatures, and megabeasts (including titans and forgotten beasts) in addition to any local dwarf citizens. All of these types of inhabitants may be encountered at some point in the form of wildlife, invaders, or rampaging forces of nature.

Given that the world includes creatures and civilizations capable of independent action, it also has a history that is viewable in legends mode. Historical events can be chronicled and discovered in many forms of artwork such as engravings, texts, and even on coins – created locally or by citizens of any other sites and civilizations. Historical dates are expressed in terms of the dwarven calendar.

Historical events can occur during a fortress mode (or adventure mode) playthrough, and these events will be recorded for all time in the annals of the world, regardless of how embarrassing or unfortunate they might be. These events may later become the subject of various engravings and decorations created locally, or by those in a later fortress.

Embarking

See also: Reclaim fortress mode

From Caravan to Happy Dwarves – a flowchart showing approximately what sequence of actions most people will take after embarking.

Before starting to build a fortress, you must choose the embark location in the world, then assign skills and supplies to the seven dwarves on the expedition team you will embark with into that environment. This is the embarking process, and is a major subject on its own - see the Embark guide for all the details. Also see Starting build for more information on outfitting your expedition. After you embark, the real game begins.

Gameplay user interface

Your main view of the in-game world is a top-down view of a multi-layered environment. You can move your view in the four main cardinal directions as well as up and down Z-levels (elevation) to see different layers. There is also a command menu that lets you issue commands that your dutiful dwarves will attempt to follow.

This section covers most of the screens and user interface elements used after embarking, at least in brief. It does not necessarily tell you how to accomplish every task you might need to, but instead just describes what you see on the screen and what various keystrokes do.

Later sections in this document and many other articles on this wiki help you tie all of this together by describing the sequence of actions needed to accomplish various things in the game; see Menu for a more detailed reference for the UI itself.

Common UI concepts

About key symbols

This wiki uses symbols that look like t or t to indicate what keys or interface buttons are used for an operation. Note that keys are case sensitive and to save space, Shift+t is shown as T. So t means "press the 't' key without the shift key" and T means "hold down shift and press the 't' key". Lowercase and uppercase keys will often perform different functions, so it is important to use the correct key. Sequences of keys will be in separate boxes, so abC means "press 'a', then press 'b', then hold shift and press 'c'"; while bT means "press 'b', then hold shift and press 'T'. A plus sign '+' between the boxes means to press them all together, so Shift+Enter means to hold shift and press 'Enter'. Other separators, such as ',' or '-', might be used but mean the same as no separator: to press the keys in sequence.

Keybindings can be seen and changed on the Keybindings tab in the Settings menu.

Menu navigation and selection

Esc or right mouse	Go back to the previous screen/menu
Mouse wheel	Scroll menu one line
Shift+mouse wheel	Scroll menu one page
Left mouse	Select menu option

Esc or right mouse will almost always return to the previous screen until you get to the top level of the UI, at which point Esc will display the options menu.

Pausing and resuming

Space

Pause/Unpause the game

Entering some menus will automatically pause the game, and Space will pause or unpause the game when not in those menus. The pause and play buttons to the left of the mini-map will show the pause state and can be clicked to change it. Certain announcements will also pause the game automatically and you will have to unpause manually to proceed.

Main screen

Ctrl+	Zoom in and out, in classic ASCII mode this changes the size of all UI elements, but only the size of the main map graphics in graphics mode
[ ]
F11	Toggle fullscreen mode

The screen at the top level of the user interface hierarchy consists of the main map, a status bar above, three tool bars below, a mini-map at top-right, a depth bar on the right edge, and most notifications will appear along the left edge.

Options menu

Esc	Enter options menu (if at top level) Move back up one UI level (if not at top level)

Clicking the button with the mouse will always open the option menu, while pressing Esc will close any open menu, and only open the options menu if none are open.

• Save and return to title menu – Saves the game, unloads the fortress, and returns to the main menu screen. See saved game folder.
• Save and continue playing – Saves the game to a new folder, useful for backups.
• Retire the fortress (for the time being) – Saves and ends your control of the fort, giving limited control to the game. Most of the fortress remains as is, with citizens, livestock, and most items continuing to exist. Not always available, such as during sieges. After it saves and returns to the main menu you may start a new game in any mode including to unretire the fortress.
• Abandon the fortress to ruin (or Succumb to Invasion) – This permanently abandons the fortress, saves the map to the world's data files for later use, and returns to the main menu. Once you abandon a fort, all of your dwarves leave the site, all of your livestock dies, and all items including corpses will be scattered around the map before it is saved. This is how you "give up" on a fortress. You might later reclaim the fortress with a new group of dwarves or visit it with an adventurer in Adventurer mode.
• Quit without saving
• Settings – Settings for video, audio, game, keybindings, announcements, and difficulty options.
• Return to game – Exits the options menu. You can also just press Esc or right-click.

Main map

Main view with interface buttons on the game, in the premium version.

w s a d ( + Shift)	Move map view around (20 tiles instead of 10)
MIddle mouse and drag
e c ( + Shift)	Move one Z-level up or down (10 z-levels)
( + Shift)
< >
F1	Zoom to starting location (default hotkey)
f	Show fluid levels
r	Show ramp arrows

The main map window is where you will be looking much of the time. This is where the action happens.

While the play area itself is three-dimensional, the window is not; you can only focus on one Z-level at a time. The 8 Z-levels below current level are also shown if they are visible (adjustable in settings).

The number of tiles moved with the keyboard can be adjusted in the settings.

On the far right side of the screen is the depth bar showing you the approximate depth, below or above ground, of the current Z-level that the map is displaying.

Keyboard cursor

↑ ↓ ← → ( + Shift)	Move cursor 1 tile (20 tiles)
8 2 4 6 7 9 1 3 ( + Shift)
w s a d ( + Shift)	Move cursor 10 tiles (20 tiles)

The keyboard cursor must be enabled in settings, then will only be shown when entering a command that uses it (X), such as mining.

Status bar

Along the upper middle of the screen is the status bar showing:

• The fortress name, in Dwarven and English, and the fortress rank; pointing the mouse at these will show a popup with the fortress wealth.
• The total fortress citizen population and stress levels.
• The stocks button, also openable with k.
• Various food category amounts.
• The current phase of the moon or weather.
• The calendar day, season, and year.

Mini-map

The overview mini-map shows a compact version of the entire available map area at the currently focused Z-level and the elevation of that level below. This can be useful especially if your embark zone is very large. Left-clicking on the mini-map moves the main map view to that location.

A yellow dashed rectangle shows the area currently viewed in the main map, while in classic ASCII mode a X shows the approximate center of the viewed area.

Along the left edge of the mini-map are various buttons; when pointing the mouse at one of these, the mini-map area will instead show a description of the purpose that button, this also happens for some buttons in some menus.

Tool bars

The tool bars along the bottom are the main way of interacting with the game:

• The left set of tools involve the dwarves, animals, visitors, and nobles, their tasks and work orders, and places with in the fortress.
• The middle set involve designating things to be done in the fortress, such as mining and building.
• The right set are for controlling the military and viewing what is happening elsewhere in the world.

Alerts

Also known as announcements or notifications, alerts most appear along the left edge of the screen, and the N button at the top-left corner opens a menu to view (some) past ones. The most important alerts will be use the button.

Your dwarves

Your dwarves are one of the creature types who implement your designs in-between periods of drinking, eating, partying, drinking again, sleeping, and entertaining themselves. While you do not have full control of your dwarves, you have more control over them than any other creatures. Be aware that it is not necessarily always the case that a dwarf is friendly; insane dwarves, weredwarves or vampires are anything but.

For a comprehensive reference, Reddit user DarxusC has done research on the minimum requirements to keep dwarves alive for long periods of time here.

Eating, drinking, and sleeping

Dwarves need food to eat, alcohol to drink (water is a poor substitute), and time to sleep. If only one of these is available, it better be alcohol; while water will keep dwarves alive, they will actually work more slowly and get unhappy thoughts (see below) if they don't get much alcohol to drink.

Dwarves will also get unhappy thoughts if forced to eat a single type of food or drink a single type of alcohol all the time, so variety is also important. Dwarves will also get unhappy thoughts if forced to sleep on the floor.

Happiness

While going about their day, dwarves will get happy and unhappy thoughts, depending on what sorts of things happen to them. This will nudge their happiness levels up or down each time one such event occurs to them. If they become too unhappy, they may throw tantrums, or go completely berserk, killing and destroying things.

Children and immigration

Periodically, new dwarves from the outside world will migrate to your fortress, drawn by tales of, and looking to share in, your wealth and success. Female dwarves will also get pregnant and have children, if they are married to a male dwarf.

Jobs, labors and skills

Any adult dwarf can perform any labor even if they have no skill in that area. Unskilled dwarves will simply be slow and not very good at what they are trying to do, but, with practice, dwarves will acquire skill, and become faster and better at their jobs. Lack of practice for long periods leads to skill "rust".

Nobles

Nobles are dwarves who have special positions within your fort. Some of these are appointed, such as your broker and bookkeeper, but others, such as the mayor, are essentially forced on you by conditions in the game. See the main article on nobles for more information.

Death

Assuming they somehow manage to avoid starving, dehydrating, freezing, drowning, burning, falling, being crushed, or otherwise suffering fatal wounds or infections, your dwarves will inevitably die of old age. Unfortunately, they are a bit picky about how they are buried or otherwise memorialized, and they will cause trouble if they are unsatisfied with their remembrance. Corpses lying around can also pose a hazard if there are necromancers in the area.

A Healthcare industry might help your wounded dwarves postpone death.

Digging

Digging is an essential part of building a fort. There are several reasons you might want to dig, such as searching for various stone types, ores and gems, or simply to create the basic tunnels and rooms in your fort.

All of the digging operations are considered Mining. Even if your goal is simply to dig out a passage and you don't care about extracting ore, your miners will be generating stone as a byproduct unless they are digging through soil. See Stone management for ways to deal with all the unwanted stone.

Stockpiles

Stockpiles are where dwarves will store items of various types. Dwarves with the corresponding "hauling" job on will seek out items that aren't already on a stockpile that accepts them and carry them to the appropriate stockpile. See the main Stockpile article for detailed information on setting up stockpiles.

Rooms, furniture, and portals

To remove one of these, Click on the furniture Item, the press the remove build icon . This will mark the item for removal and a hauling job will be queued. Eventually a dwarf will show up and haul the item off to a stockpile if one exists.

Furniture

b-f-b	place Bed
b-f-r	place Chair or Throne (seat)
b-f-t	place Table
b-f-h	place Chest or Container
b-f-n	place Cabinet
b-f-x	place Burial Receptacle (coffin)
b-f-l	place Memorial Slab
b-f-u	place Statue
b-f-T	place Traction Bench
b-f-o	place Book Case
b-f-y	place Display (Pedestal)
b-f-p	place Offering Place (Altar)
b-f-i	place Instrument

Assuming that dwarves have already made a piece of furniture, they can install it somewhere using one of these commands.

Defining rooms

Areas can be defined as a room using z (zones), some rooms may require specific pieces of furniture to function properly. The zones menu can also be used to undefine rooms, with or without removing the associated furniture.

Doors and hatches

b-p-r	place door
b-p-h	place floor hatch

These commands allow you to place already created doors and hatch covers assuming that you have an adjacent wall.

Constructions

Constructions are features that are built in place, rather than carved out of existing rock. Constructions are how you build above-ground structures or structures in any other place where there's no rock or soil to carve them out of.

Constructions are usually built out of, and thus require, stone or wood, but you can also use a variety of materials (such as metal) to build them. Possible constructions include Floors, Walls, Stairs, Ramps, and Fortifications. Some constructions may also require to be created in a workshop first before being able to place them down, such as Grate.

Walls, floors, and stairs

b-n	build Constructions submenu
b-n-l	build Constructed Wall
b-n-f	build Constructed Floor
b-n-r	build Constructed upward Ramp
b-n-t	build Constructed Stair
b-n-b	build a bridge
b-n-o	build Paved road
b-n-O	build Dirt road
b-n-F	build a Fortification
b-n-G	build a Wall grate
b-n-g	build a Floor grate
b-n-M	build a Vertical bar
b-n-m	build a Floor bar
b-n-y	build a Glass window
b-n-Y	build a Gem window
b-n-p	build a Support
b-n-k	build a Track
b-n-K	build a Track stop

Walls, Floors, and Stairs are removed with the mining menu and selecting x Remove Construction. Bridges and roads are removed by selecting them and clicking the button in the top right corner.

Bridges

A Bridge is not only used to cross rivers or chasms, but can also be used as a large door when built as a drawbridge. Such use requires that a Lever be linked to it in order for dwarves to control its open or closed state.

Roads

Roads are most commonly used to give caravans a reliable path to your fortress from the map's edge, though they don't really require one. A paved road is much like a floor except that it requires fewer raw materials per tile to build. A dirt road requires no materials to build, but deteriorates over time.

Grates and Bars

Grates and bars are used to stop creatures for passing through, while still allowing liquids such as water and magma to. Bars are similar to grates, but they are made of metal instead of rock or wood and don't have to be built in a workshop first.

Trading

When you want to obtain things not available on your map, and you don't want to just kill people to get them, Trading is the way to go about it. See the main article for everything you ever wanted to know about legitimately and non-violently obtaining things from other creatures.

Military and combat

See also: Military interface

The military is one of the most important aspects of a successful fortress. Even with many traps, drawbridges and other defenses, your military will still need to fend off goblin sieges, megabeasts, titans, and fiendish underground beasties. Using a combination of squad orders and scheduling, you can set up an elaborate offensive, defensive, or balanced military structure for your well-equipped soldiers to follow. Turning your dwarves from useless migrants into bloodthirsty killing machines never hurts (unless you're the enemy).

Setting up a military is a huge subject in and of itself, so check out the main article on it and the military interface guide.

Hospitals and healthcare

Normally your dwarves do just fine assuming they get enough food and alcohol, but sometimes they get wounded. When this happens they can benefit from an efficient Healthcare system.

Burrows

Burrows are optional user-defined areas in your fort where selected dwarves live and work. Dwarves will only use workshops, dig walls, use rooms, etc. in burrows they are assigned to, though dwarves not assigned to any burrow will still use workshops etc. even if they are located in a burrow assigned to some other dwarves.

Burrows are by no means required, but are useful when you want to restrict certain dwarves to certain areas of the map.

Macros

Macros allow recording sequences of keystrokes and "playing" them back into the user interface as desired. Since the game often requires using a lot of repetitive keystrokes, this can sometimes make life much easier. See the main article for full information.

Getting Started

About - Installation - Tutorials - FAQ

Fortress Mode Quickstart Guide - Adventure Mode Quickstart Guide

Fortress Mode Reference - Adventurer Mode Reference ^{(Quick Reference)}

How do I get more help?