Claire Dawson
Dwarf Fortress is a free text-based strategy RPG where you create an empire starting with only seven dwarves and some supplies. It is one of the most challenging and rewarding PC games in the world. To build a hospital in Dwarf Fortress, you will need to designate a hospital zone, stock up on supplies, and assign doctors to tend to the wounded dwarves. The hospital zone should include beds, tables, traction benches, and chests or cofers. The hospital will also need supplies such as thread, cloth, splints, crutches, plaster powder, buckets, and soap. Doctors in the fortress will operate under the instruction of the chief medical dwarf and will perform medical procedures after a treatment has been prescribed by a diagnostician.
| Characteristics | Values |
|---|---|
| Purpose | To allow wounded dwarves to rest and receive care and treatment |
| Items used | Beds, tables, traction benches, chests/cofers |
| Requisitioned items | Thread, cloth, splints, crutches, plaster powder (for casts), buckets, and soap for medical use |
| Storage | Items are stored within the hospital's containers; quantities can be adjusted |
| Doctors | Dwarves assigned to any of the four doctoring occupations: diagnosis, surgery, setting bones, and doctoring |
| Chief medical dwarf | An appointed noble who oversees all doctors in the fortress |
| Medical procedures | Performed only after treatment is prescribed by a diagnostician |
| Animal healthcare | Not performed by doctors (as of 2022) |
| Water source | Well, cistern, or running water |
| Water usage | Cleaning wounds, bathing patients, and drinking |
| Thread usage | Suturing closed wounds |
| Cloth usage | Cleaning wounds, washing patients, and dressing wounds |
| Crutches | Help crippled dwarves walk |
| Adamantine thread | Prevent usage by storing no thread in hospital settings; use non-metal thread instead |
| Stockpiling | Not necessary; use chests/cofers instead of cabinets |
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What You'll Learn
Assign a chief medical dwarf and doctors
A hospital zone in Dwarf Fortress allows wounded dwarves to rest and receive care and treatment. Doctors in Dwarf Fortress are dwarves assigned to any of the four doctoring occupations: diagnosis, surgery, setting bones, and general doctoring, which includes all of the above. Doctors in the fortress operate under the instruction of the chief medical dwarf, an appointed noble.
To assign a chief medical dwarf, go to the noble menu (n) and select one. The chief medical dwarf is mainly used for diagnosis. Every other dwarf who has medical jobs enabled will perform jobs in the hospital.
Doctors perform their medical procedures on a dwarf only after treatment has been prescribed by a diagnostician. Doctors do not perform any healthcare on animals. It is important not to distract doctors from treating patients. "Recover wounded", "Give food", and "Give water" are low-priority jobs, so patients may starve, dehydrate, or bleed to death if no one is available to bring them food or water, or move them to the hospital. Similarly, it is important not to put your doctors at risk by recovering wounded in the middle of a battle – if they become injured, they cannot treat themselves.
You can create "orderlies" by setting dwarves to only use the "Recover wounded", "Give food", and "Give water" labours. You can select nurses who enjoy helping people to give them good thoughts.
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Use chests/cofers, not cabinets
Chests, also known as cofers, are essential for storing hospital supplies in Dwarf Fortress. While cabinets are commonly used in other areas of your fortress, such as dormitories, they are not suitable for hospitals. Here's why you should use chests/cofers instead of cabinets in your Dwarf Fortress hospital:
Storage Functionality: In Dwarf Fortress, containers like chests and coffers are designed to hold hospital supplies. On the other hand, cabinets are typically used for clothing and personal items in dormitories. In hospitals, cabinets are ignored, and any attempt to use them for storage may lead to issues with your dwarves not utilizing the available storage efficiently.
Inventory Management: Chests and coffers allow for better inventory management of hospital supplies. You can adjust the desired quantities of items stored within the chests, ensuring that your hospital remains well-stocked. This includes essential items such as thread, cloth, splints, crutches, plaster powder for casts, buckets, and soap.
Flexibility and Accessibility: Chests and coffers provide flexibility and accessibility for your dwarves when it comes to storing and retrieving hospital supplies. By placing chests in your hospital, you ensure that your dwarves can easily access the necessary medical items without having to rely on separate stockpiles. This streamlines the caregiving process and improves the efficiency of your hospital.
Avoiding Storage Conflicts: Using chests or coffers in your hospital helps avoid storage conflicts with other areas of your fortress. Cabinets in dormitories, for example, can cause issues with dwarves not wanting to pick up or store items in chests elsewhere in the fortress. By using chests in the hospital and cabinets in specific areas like dormitories, you prevent potential conflicts in your dwarves' storage behavior.
Bug Prevention: Some players have reported bugs and issues when using cabinets in hospitals. These bugs can lead to problems with hospital supplies not being stored properly or used efficiently. By opting for chests or coffers instead, you can avoid these potential bugs and ensure that your hospital functions as intended.
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Requisition thread, cloth, splints, crutches, plaster powder, buckets, and soap
To requisition thread, cloth, splints, crutches, plaster powder, buckets, and soap for a hospital in Dwarf Fortress, you will need to follow these steps:
Thread and Cloth
Thread and cloth are essential for treating minor fractures and suturing wounds. To obtain thread, you can gather silk thread and cloth from the cavern layer, or you can keep a small stock of different types of thread, such as plant fiber thread, silk thread, and yarn. Spider silk is also an option, but it may be challenging to obtain.
Splints and Crutches
Splints are used to immobilize limbs with bone fractures, allowing dwarves to resume their duties while their wounds heal. They can be crafted from wood at a carpenter's workshop or metal at a metalsmith's forge. Crutches help crippled dwarves walk again.
Plaster Powder
Plaster powder is used for making casts and can be produced at a kiln or magma kiln from materials such as gypsum, alabaster, selenite, or satinspar. It can also be purchased at embark for 3 points per unit, or from caravans for around 60 dwarf bucks.
Buckets and Soap
A stock of buckets is necessary for various medical procedures. Regarding soap, it is advisable to create a stockpile specifically for lye and buckets, setting the number of allowed barrels/bins to 0 to ensure the lye is stored in buckets. The soap-making process involves butchering an animal, rendering fat to tallow, making ash, and then combining the bucket of lye with tallow at the soap maker.
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Prevent the usage of adamantine thread
To prevent the usage of adamantine thread in Dwarf Fortress, it is recommended to store no thread in hospital settings. Instead, create a stockpile of non-metal thread in the hospital and have a manager order to make one wafer when you acquire one adamantine thread. This is because dwarves will prioritise using the most expensive thread and cloth for medical purposes, which includes adamantine thread.
To avoid this, you can also mass-produce normal threads to ensure your hospital is full of them, designate a pig-tail thread stockpile in the hospital zone, or forbid the use of adamantine strands when a dwarf is in the hospital. Additionally, you can smelt the adamantine strands into wafers as soon as possible, as adamantine cloth is considered to be of little value.
It is worth noting that attempts to restrict a stockpile to store only adamantine thread or cloth, or to store everything except these items, will not work due to a bug in the game.
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Enable medical skills on all dwarves
Enabling medical skills on all dwarves in Dwarf Fortress is a helpful way to ensure that medical jobs are picked up immediately, as long as there is an idle dwarf available. This can be done by creating ""orderlies"" or "nurses" and assigning dwarves to specific labors, such as "Recover wounded", "Give food", and "Give water". These tasks are considered low-priority, so it is important to ensure that patients receive the necessary care and are not left to starve or dehydrate.
It is crucial to have a dedicated group of doctors with diagnosis labor well-covered. Diagnosis is the first step in treating wounded dwarves, and without it, patients cannot be treated. Any dwarf with the diagnosis labor enabled can diagnose, but the Chief Medical Dwarf, an appointed noble, oversees the process. Once a diagnosis is made, doctors can perform medical procedures under their instruction.
To enable medical skills, go to the labor menu and set 'only selected dwarves mine' to 'no dwarves mine', and then reset it. This trick quickly updates the labors for all dwarves, ensuring they can take on medical tasks.
In addition to medical skills, it is important to have a well-stocked hospital with the necessary supplies. Hospitals use beds, tables, traction benches, and containers. The hospital will also need thread, cloth, splints, crutches, plaster powder for casts, buckets, and soap. These supplies are stored in containers, and you can adjust the desired quantities to ensure you have enough.
By enabling medical skills on all dwarves and maintaining a well-equipped hospital, you can provide efficient healthcare to your dwarven civilization in Dwarf Fortress.
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Frequently asked questions
To set up a hospital in Dwarf Fortress, you must first designate a bedroom dormitory area. Next, click on the area and then on the shield+ icon. Assign a healthcare dwarf, create a zone and mark it as a hospital. A hospital zone will need to have some traction benches, beds, tables, and thread within its zone.
Hospitals use any beds, tables, traction benches, and chests that have been built within the zone. The hospital will requisition thread, cloth, splints, crutches, plaster powder (for casts), buckets, and soap for medical use. These will be stored within the hospital's containers; you may adjust the desired quantities. It is important to note that soap is frustrating to make and can be skipped, but this increases the risk of infection.
Doctors will only treat patients after a diagnosis has been made. Ensure someone (not burrowed) has the "recover wounded" setting enabled at all times. It is also important not to put your doctors at risk by recovering wounded in the middle of a battle – if they become injured, they cannot treat themselves.
