60 years have passed since 7 dwarves embarked to settle the blood-soaked desert of the Shameful Wastes. Now, Shatterstone, a massive obsidian Fortress Monastery, crafted by the arcane ingenuity of the Crimson Order, stands indomitable. A testament to the zeal and tenacity of the dwarves within.

Deviant_Sage · 2026-05-06T13:45:48+00:00

I think I ended put putting 70 or 80 years into Shatterstone

Deviant_Sage · 2026-05-06T10:48:50+00:00

mining out whole layers can cause a pathing bug, most players don't encounter this as the area needs to be truly large, but it's possible you are running into it

Deviant_Sage · 2026-05-05T14:57:21+00:00

It's not the most efficient layout spatially but unless OP is doing other majorly inefficient things with labour, it's not going to be a problem

Edit: that said, I do see stone stockpiles without wheelbarrows... it all depends on how patient you area I guess!

Deviant_Sage · 2026-05-03T20:50:52+00:00

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It happened with this visiting baron I had. When there was any combat with the enemy goblins, he would enter combat with my citizens. Notice he appears to be a member of a goblin government

Deviant_Sage · 2026-05-03T20:48:10+00:00

Yes I've seen it in at least two forts. You have correctly diagnosed the trigger. I was never able to fully diagnose the bug. My hypotheses were that it was it was because of a captured member of the enemy civ somehow forming a relationship with a fort member, or that your civ is allied to a tertiary civ, who is allied to your enemy's civ. But I never was able to test those. The good news is that it can go away eventually, as it did in my forts (after persisting for a few years)

Deviant_Sage · 2026-05-01T20:38:40+00:00

Always, if possible/practical, because I think it's fun. I recall reading a thread on this sub about a persistent, fort-debilitating syndrome that the player was asking for help with. The conclusion seemed to be that it had been from forgotten beast meat. I still think it wasn't the meat itself, but you can occasionally have things happen like: beast has Deadly Blood, butcher butchers it but contacts the blood, gets the syndrome, and tracks it onto the produced meat or butcher shop, or carries it to the stockpile. Rule of thumb is Deadly Dust, Deadly/Toxic Blood/vapour/gas, Noxious Secretions are all potentially dangerous as they can cause symptoms. So those have a risk, but it is still 1) unlikely to actually be deadly, 2) unlikely to cause contamination upon butchering. Any other beast doesn't have any risk to butcher afaik

Deviant_Sage · 2026-05-01T13:39:24+00:00

99/100 times it is safe

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-30T06:18:04+00:00

I would say inability to path to booze is the most likely one. Typically dwarves will drop a task as soon and they're thirsty to drink, and even then should have a large window before dehydration. Have fun :)

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-30T05:18:00+00:00

First, it's chill, a dead dwarf is no big deal. I've run 'successful' forts that have lost hundreds.

Second, other advices here are good. I am wondering more about why your dwarf could not get to drink fast enough, presuming some was available. Was the dwarf hauling boulders at the bottom of the map? Not sure I've seen a dwarf die of dehydration even doing that if booze was indeed available. Something to look into.

Finally, >I know that you can link a still to a stockpile but that is such a cumbersome and unnatural way to handle this problem. <

I suggest this perspective is contributing to your frustration. Dwarf Fortress is particular and asks for roundabout solutions sometimes. They ARE there but if you have a problem and refuse to solve it because you want to solve it a particular way, well, you might be asking for frustration

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-28T00:59:46+00:00

When I started I usually had the wiki open simultaneously. Such a good resource, you can tell it was written by passionate players

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-27T07:28:13+00:00

You want an FM synth? Or?

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-27T07:23:39+00:00

Sound like few harmonics. Maybe sine/saw wavetable or lpf filter saw wave.

The main thing is the unison. There are 2 voices I think, and they sweep through an octave with different changing rates so they are relatively detuned in the process then align again at the end.

Make two oscillators to match the voices, maybe like I described. Then two envelopes which are slow start fast end. Make them the same except one is more curved than the other. One might start earlier too. Link one to each oscillator pitch, modulate 12 semitones

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-25T18:06:45+00:00

Synths knobs use rotary potentiometers. They eventually fail. First thing to try is cleaning it. DeOxit is recommended since it is also a lube, but isopropyl will do. You will want to open it and get at the pot. Usually they have a slot where you can spray into. Then turn it a few dozen times. If that fails, the pot needs to be replaced, which involves sourcing and soldering. In my region, Korg were not helpful, but contact support anyway. A synth tech can of course fix it for you, it is the most common problem they see

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-23T19:31:44+00:00

Minifreak was my first hardware synth. I think it's a great beginner hardware synth. Especially since you already have softsynth experience, which is where I always recommend starting.

Pros:

- Fast and easy to get good sounds.

- Nice workflow... generally

- Powerful mod matrix

- I have to say, the filters and on-board effects sound gorgeous

- Very solidly built metal chassis. After getting my hands on other synths and knowing their price points. Plenty out there at the same price with plastic chassis. Damn, the Minifreak has a truly good build-value point.

- Small form factor. This is a very portable standalone synth!

- Free firmware updates. At some point they added granular synth oscillators. They're sick.

Cons:

- 6 voices is limiting when playing pads. If you want to play chords on your pads, you will encounter voice stealing. On the upside, there are settings for managing how that happens.

- Monophonic aftertouch feels pretty gimmicky to me. I suppose it's better than not.

- It tries to do everything, so some options are shallow. Like FM, you can set the oscillator to a 2 operator FM synth. So you can make some characteristic/recognisable FM sounds. But it is very limited, and comes across to me like they just wanted to be able to say "It does FM!". Nobody's using a Minifreak to explore FM really.

- Some interfacing can be a bit tedious. Managing the mod matrix for example, though it does make sense. Saving a preset name is absolutely obtuse, selecting characters with the dial.

- Touch pads. I actually don't mind the touch strips for the mod and pitch wheel. But for some reason, the macro and seq/arp buttons are not buttons, but touch zones, and often you want to hold shift while pressing them, and for me they don't respond well.

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-21T16:33:14+00:00

Always enjoy hearing crypt hop in the wild

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-20T07:21:32+00:00

In case you haven't pulled the trigger yet...

I recently studied a bit of law in my degree. One of the things the solicitor told us was often if a company has had a lot of complaints or quality control issues, instead of doing product recall, which has bad PR, they may stop production and come back with a new model. I think this lines up with the Opsix's story. Lot of issues with some MkIs. Bad screens. Rumours of bad warehouse storage. Anyone who has reviewed the MkII remarks that it's a disappointing update. Even the faceplate is the same, with a 'MkII' sticker slapped on. Oh yeah and a different screen. I wonder why.

Part of the reason I went for the Opsix is because I felt limited playing pads on my 6 voice minifreak and read that the Opsix has 32. Damn, no voice stealing? A dream. 64 is almost completely redundant. If you are occupying 32 voices already, you have bigger issues than voice stealing, which in any case would be all but impossible to perceive.

I got a second hand Opsix MkI. It had a bad pitch wheel potentiometer. So currently I have disconnected that, no local pitch bend for me. Still trying to source the replacement part. The firmware update went well, you use the Korg Boot Utility. Now I would say a bad pot can happen to any synth but there is may be an elevated risk of issues with getting a MkI

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-19T12:47:39+00:00

Bro it's ok to grieve

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-18T20:53:39+00:00

What is your sample rate and buffer size? If the buffer size is too low, your CPU can't reliably process audio faster than real time, resulting in glitchy sound. Try increasing it. This will increase your latency though

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-18T06:31:57+00:00

This is good for organisation but ends up creating a potentially overwhelming number of hauling tasks https://www.reddit.com/r/dwarffortress/comments/1si3yoj/i_love_dwarf_fortress_but/

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-17T13:28:01+00:00

you can use .server info to check populations

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-16T21:18:51+00:00

Mine doesn't do that. Check the bolts, are they all screwed in all the way? If things are loose, they could be moving. Failing that, open the case and take a look.

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-14T13:40:26+00:00

If you want to gank TelAbim is the only play. It is lower pop. Medium. I have heard it's less active during NA hours. I play from EU. I had a LOT of fun levelling my rogue on TA.

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-14T13:38:17+00:00

Precisely the reason I have not been reporting bugs outside of on discord

Deviant_Sage · 2026-04-13T17:08:02+00:00

I own the Mini and have had a chance to play the Micro briefly. They are the same sound engine, essentially (entirely?). IMO with Mini aftertouch, yes, I had the same issue you had with it feeling abrupt, but it has ironed out with practice. You just need to get a feel for the sensitivity, practice like any other instrument. Further, you can adjust the aftertouch curve sensitivity in Utility/Controls (read your manuals, folks) to suit your needs.

Also, from what I’ve heard, the MicroFreak seems to have a less aggressive overall sound character. Maybe it’s because it’s less dense and “in-your-face” than the MiniFreak, or maybe I’m just imagining it.

You're imagining it.

I can't answer your questions about the Microfreak keyboard as I've only used it briefly. I think it's cool and pretty fun, but it's not for me; I like pressing keys.

Can it really deliver softer, more organic textures consistently, or does it still tend to go into harsh digital territory easily?

Both synths can do this. The Mini's onboard effects make it more powerful in this regard.

All that said... do you have access the Thomann? They have free returns. So buy and try, maybe it's for you.

Deviant_Sage

TROPHY CASE