One bug I'm noticing is that when idle the gnomes cause a huge amount of lag... keeping the little fuckers busy helps.
Some tips, find some flat land, dig down to level -7 that's usually the first full rock bed and hold coal and copper, good place to start.
Plant all three types of trees and take cuttings of everything you can
Wall yourself in before the end of summer year 1, open the wall to collect bodies and allow gnomads in.
Make torches fast, if you have to build a smelter and assign a gnome as a blacksmith.
Don't worry about deaths, you'll loose a lot when you start but it gets easier and they tend to get replaced.
Ohai Cardboard
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I take it all back. FFFFFFUUUUUU cardboard!!!!!