The way I see it, it's like the difference between people who follow a Lego manual (RimWorld), and people who are creative enough to just build awesome things without it (DF). It's 100% what you make of it.
There's an amazing channel on YouTube, called Kruggsmash, that does DF lets plays. In his current series, he initially founded a new settlement based entirely on bee agriculture and trading - no fighters. He kept the population small so they were under the notice of the local goblins, and got set building an awesome looking place with custom bee related statues, engravings and the like. Unfortunately the other dwarf settlements around him (NPC ones) die off because of the local goblin fortress, and refugees start flocking to his settlement. (SPOILERS AHEAD!) He ends up throwing a vampire goblin down the well, and stabs him with spikes which ends up bloodying the water. The dwarves that drink the water then end up turning into vampires themselves, so he now has a fortress of vampire dwarves! He also has a massive prequel to this fortress series where he plays in adventure mode as a boar man and his compatriot goblin buddy (the one now down the well...), going around stealing artefacts and building his own role-play story, with some amazing illustrations to show what's happening in through all the ASCII graphics.
Honestly, he's more than worth a watch. You get very attached to all the characters, especially the dwarves that have been there from the beginning. He's one of the few YouTubers I've ever contributed towards on patreon.
There's an amazing channel on YouTube, called Kruggsmash, that does DF lets plays. In his current series, he initially founded a new settlement based entirely on bee agriculture and trading - no fighters. He kept the population small so they were under the notice of the local goblins, and got set building an awesome looking place with custom bee related statues, engravings and the like. Unfortunately the other dwarf settlements around him (NPC ones) die off because of the local goblin fortress, and refugees start flocking to his settlement. (SPOILERS AHEAD!) He ends up throwing a vampire goblin down the well, and stabs him with spikes which ends up bloodying the water. The dwarves that drink the water then end up turning into vampires themselves, so he now has a fortress of vampire dwarves! He also has a massive prequel to this fortress series where he plays in adventure mode as a boar man and his compatriot goblin buddy (the one now down the well...), going around stealing artefacts and building his own role-play story, with some amazing illustrations to show what's happening in through all the ASCII graphics.
Honestly, he's more than worth a watch. You get very attached to all the characters, especially the dwarves that have been there from the beginning. He's one of the few YouTubers I've ever contributed towards on patreon.