Learn how to manage your dwarves.

• Assigning jobs
• Designating areas for farming/mining/logging/etc.
• Your dwarves will need food/alcohol or they will get murderous/suicidal
• All dwarves have skills, make sure you assign dwarves that are skilled in the thing you are assigning them to (Dwarf Therapist is great for beginners)
• All dwarves have likes and dislikes. Learn what they mean.
• Dwarves need to be happy/content or they get murderous/suicidal.
• Learn what strange moods are and how to deal with them.

Learn how to manage waste

• Your dwarves will get sick if you let the trash pile up
• Learn how to clean, otherwise you will have blood/water/icky stuff tracked all over your fort.

Learn how to manage dead bodies

• Your dwarves will get sad and potentially murderous/suicidal if you don’t clean up, bury, and honor their friend’s/pet’s carcass

Learn what you need to make things

• Learn what building make what things
• Learn all the sub-menus for buildings
• You can find material requirements on the wiki: www.dwarffortresswiki.org
• Most plants can only be grown during specific seasons
• Most plants can only be grown inside or outside, usually not both
• There’s a variety of meats in the game, learn how to manage them
• Prepared meals are the best way to satisfy hunger

Learn how to arm and train your dwarves

• Make specific dwarves into specific soldiers (sword dwarfs, axe dwarfs, crossbow dwarfs, etc.)
• Make training rooms and assign dwarves to them.
• Also learn how to setup medical rooms and train nurses/doctors.
• Learn how to make traps and siege defenses.

PAY ATTENTION TO THE QUALITY OF ITEMS

• Seriously the quality/price of your items, directly affects a number of things related to your fort: what trade goods are available, how many of them are available, how much you can trade your stuff for, how happy your dwarves are, and how powerful the bad guys are when they attack you.

Learn how to pick the right nobles.

• Every dwarf has a particular set of skills and likes/dislikes.
• Learn what they mean to make sure you assign them to the right noble position.

Elves are prissy removed and won’t trade anything wood/animal skins. Even if it’s stuff they want, if it’s in a wood/leather container they will get super mad if you try to trade it to them. If you want you can just murder them (when you’re good enough) with little consequence other than not being able to trade with them any more (boo-fucking-hoo).

And last but not least… Your forts will ALWAYS fail. Whether it’s from outside influences (vampires, goblins, necromancers, demons, etc.), internal forces (sadness spirals, treachery, running out of food/alcohol, etc.), or FPS death (too many dwarves == bad frame rate == unplayable).

That’s about all I can think of off the top of my head. The game play is MUCH more in depth than that, and there’s a steep learning curve. So don’t get frustrated if you have no idea what you’re doing…. That’s all part of the ¡fun! dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Losing