Dwarf Fortress Succession Fort - no experience needed! [gauging interest]

[Maulrus]

Hey GitP! I can see that there is a fairly ample DF-playing population on this board, and I've been itching to get into a succession game, maybe with a community fort aspect as well. Anybody interested? If so, post ideas for embark locations etc. We'd be playing .25, which is currently the most recent version.

Of course, no previous experience with DF is needed! This game is all about Fun, and what's more Fun than a newbie faced with a dozen unmarked levers, half of which flood the fort? Nothing.

EDIT: We have decided on a non-evil volcanic embark with no restrictions. Turns will be a week long. Here's the updated playerlist:

1. Maulrus
2. billtodamax
3. Gnoman
4. Incomp
5. RPharazon
6. Shpadoinkle
7. iyaerP
8. Celesyne
9. Level8Mudcrab
10. Grif

[Shpadoinkle]

I'd be up for it. I haven't played DF in a while, and I'm sure both my lack of experience with the newer versions and all the stuff I'm rusty on will lead to plenty of Fun.

[Maulrus]

Excellent! Experience is irrelevant, as with any good DF bloodline. Anybody else? Two players a succession fort doesn't make.

[Celesyne]

Well, work is a bit crazy atm, but, if you can get a few more peopl in and drop me on the bottom of the list, I'm sure a week or 2 down the road I'd be perfectly up to it. Rejoice, I was bad at 40D and have little 31.x experience, so much !!FUN!! will be had.

[Lord Herman]

We've had a few succession forts in the past, but they died after about ten turns when people who'd been in the waiting list since the beginning got the save and had lost interest by then, and when people got the save and kept putting off actually playing it until they forgot they had it.

I'd advise keeping the waiting list short (no more than 3 people), and having a strict rule of one week per turn - if the player doesn't hand in the fort by then, continue on the previous save.

That said, a community fort is a lot of fun, and you can learn a lot from how others manage the fort. And get confused by the incredible mess the fort becomes after a few turns. :smallsmile:

Anyway, I won't sign up right now - not really in a DF'ing mood - but I'll certainly join in when I start playing DF again.

[Maulrus]

We've had a few succession forts in the past, but they died after about ten turns when people who'd been in the waiting list since the beginning got the save and had lost interest by then, and when people got the save and kept putting off actually playing it until they forgot they had it.

I'd advise keeping the waiting list short (no more than 3 people), and having a strict rule of one week per turn - if the player doesn't hand in the fort by then, continue on the previous save.

That said, a community fort is a lot of fun, and you can learn a lot from how others manage the fort. And get confused by the incredible mess the fort becomes after a few turns. :smallsmile:

Anyway, I won't sign up right now - not really in a DF'ing mood - but I'll certainly join in when I start playing DF again.

Yeah, I was wondering about the copious lack of bloodlines on here. I'll try to keep from losing interest, but I fear a short waiting list might result in us grobbling to find more players (my last succession fort ended up being handed back and forth between me and another guy; fun, but not what I had in mind). I'll see how many people are interested by tomorrow and then maybe start planning the rules.

[Shpadoinkle]

I was about to ask about rules. Any thoughts on restrictions/obligations (aside from the obvious "don't intentionally leave the fort unplayable for the next person")? Like "don't touch the blue stuff," or "can't/must kill the elf caravan?"

[Maulrus]

I was about to ask about rules. Any thoughts on restrictions/obligations (aside from the obvious "don't intentionally leave the fort unplayable for the next person")? Like "don't touch the blue stuff," or "can't/must kill the elf caravan?"

No restrictions whatsoever! While maybe in the best interests of the fort, they're often not in the best interests of Fun, and I think it's better for a game like this if everyone chooses their own attitude. However, I'd be willing to go back on that if anybody had compelling ideas.

[Level8Mudcrab]

I'm always up for a little Fun. Count me in.

Any special ideas for world gen, or will you just go with a default random world?

[Maulrus]

I'm always up for a little Fun. Count me in.

Any special ideas for world gen, or will you just go with a default random world?

To be honest in all my DF-playing time, I've never really tweaked world gen settings. I'd be willing to if such is the general will, but I was just planning on genning a normal world and looking for a relatively nasty place to embark. Maybe no Nist Akath-style haunted glacier, but something hopefully challenging.

[Triaxx]

I don't know that I could do the year in a week thing, but I'd be willing to play.

And the only setting I'd tweak would be to up the number of volcano's so we could embark with one.

[Maulrus]

So we've got a couple people now. Anybody have any specific ideas they want to suggest?

[ZombyWoof]

I'm down to be in a succession game. I'd like to try a farming community XD Flatland in a highly wooded area, all the buildings are made of wood.

Though I may just do that in my own game so i can learn the damn textile industry.

[Gnoman]

I suggest you try the Sparkgear style system (was popular on the DF forum). Under this system, each fort runs for one month, and each turn lasts for 24 hours. (Real time.) This moves things faster, plays much more urgently, and generally keeps the fort from dying of boredom. I'm interesteed in perticipating in either system.

[Triaxx]

I hate Sparkgear. I really do. Such that if we go that route, I'm going to be unable to play.

I say a dwarf made mountain fortress. Dig down to magma and then bring it up and cast a massive Obsidian mountain to create into our new mountainhome.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

I've been a bit busy but put me down.

[Level8Mudcrab]

Another point to consider is to use a tileset or not. I like the ASCII but I'm up for a tileset if that's what people want.

[Grif]

My last !!fun!! was way back with .12, so I'm mildly interested in the game. Just put me way down on the list so that I can get up to speed with the textile(!) industry and new changes to the system.

(Oh and I can't play in ASCII, its just too durn confusing and retro for me).

[Shpadoinkle]

I suggest you try the Sparkgear style system (was popular on the DF forum). Under this system, each fort runs for one month, and each turn lasts for 24 hours. (Real time.) This moves things faster, plays much more urgently, and generally keeps the fort from dying of boredom. I'm interesteed in perticipating in either system.

Are you sure it was a month? I thought it was a year, or at least a season. One month of in-game time isn't long enough to get much of anything accomplished... I can't say I really see the point, unless you just REALLY want to drive a fort into the ground and get to the Fun right away.

[Incomp]

I'd like to try my hand at a bloodline game.

My opinions on some questions:

Tileset: ASCII, dammit.

Timing: I would have turns go be a year of ingame time and a week of real time as standard. If we get much less real time, I probably can't play, as I don't have too much spare time right now.

Setting: Nothing too inhospitable, as I'd like the fort to survive long enough for everyone to play.

[RPharazon]

I'd like to try a Bloodline game that doesn't die immediately after I join.
ASCII please, and terrifying, terrible places to set up the fort. Losing, or barely Losing, is Fun.

[Gnoman]

Are you sure it was a month? I thought it was a year, or at least a season. One month of in-game time isn't long enough to get much of anything accomplished... I can't say I really see the point, unless you just REALLY want to drive a fort into the ground and get to the Fun right away.

One month REAL TIME, not in game. Many players turns lasted multiple years in-game, depending on how much time they had in their 24 hours.

[kpenguin]

well, ASCII and terrifying terrifying embark might be a bit offputting for "no experience needed".

I'm in, though.

[billtodamax]

I'd be interested, although I'd have to download the new version, and I'd prefer ascii or mayday.

The download can only happen after the month ends though - and then I'll be restarting school and such, so I'd need a weekend.

Still, interested.

[Psionic Dog]

Tentative interested, even though I'd have to update.

TileSet: Not sure why we can't each use our own char-set, unless we want to take identical screen-shots.

Location: I'd suggest avoiding Funny locations. We're going to have enough chaos Fun trying to adapt to what everyone before us has done, and us inexperienced/casual DF players don't need terrorizing terrific locations for our intro to succession gaming.

Timing: A month real time is much too long for succession, and 24 hours is much to short. I'd suggest allowing 2-3 days to play 1 DFseason. A week to play a DF year would also work.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

I would prefer ASCII over graphics. Graphic packs give all kinds of display bugs like when numbers are in brackets [] or with punctuations.

[Level8Mudcrab]

Currently the votes are,

ASCII: 5
Graphics: 1
Either: 1

I'm up for any embark location, preferbly not one with undead though.

Should we have a general theme for the fortress to be based on? Not a set of rules for everyone to abide by but a theme to build the fortress on, something like above-ground city, build in the caverns or city suspended above magma in a volcano.

[Celesyne]

I believe the graphics should be decided on a personal level. I can't read the ASCII to save my butt, so I will personally be using Maydays or Pheobus' pack so I can understand whats going on. As far as theme, I'm up for anything.

[Triaxx]

We should totally build Sauron's Tower, with an eye made of Magma.

[Triaxx]

We should totally build Sauron's Tower, with an eye made of Magma.

[Incomp]

A city suspended over the mouth of a volcano would be awesome.

[potatocubed]

Sign me up! I prefer the year/week timing, and have no opinion on anything else.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

Some sort of fun with a volcano sounds good. We could maybe work in some fun magmaworks. Maybe a Project **** The World 2.0 in our little fort.

I do ask one thing. Label your levers. Nobody wants to let in some water for a well and accidently trigger your danger room (http://df.magmawiki.com/index.php/DF2010:Danger_room) while some naked peasants are cleaning it.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

Also if we aren't in an evil biome, we could try a 0 point embark. If you have surface clay, they are pretty trivial. Otherwise, training axes made from your wagon's wood can give you more than enough building material until you can get a pick (or material to make one). Lots of cooking can give you more than enough prepared meals to trade with that caravan.

[Maulrus]

Wow, I can't believe the turnout for this thing. In a little while I'll compile the names of those who want to participate and send out some PMs, but for now I want to discuss other things.

As far as a theme goes, the idea of a city built over a volcano sounds fun. Let's take a vote on themes. I'll start it with a couple that have been proposed already but you're more than free to add your own:

Volcanic Embark: 0
Terrifying Embark: 0

I'm gonna hold off on voting myself until I see what ideas are on the table.

And as far as ASCII/tileset goes, I might have to put my foot down here. One requirement for this bloodline that should go without saying is that every turn needs to be accompanied by a writeup with screenshots. Also, I'll expect an upload of the map to DFMA after every turn. I personally find tilesets nearly impossible to read, so I may demand that you use ASCII. It looks like most people use ASCII already, so it shouldn't be a huge deal, but if anyone has any serious objections I can reconsider.

[Celesyne]

If it is ASCII only, I'll have to bow out. It would take me forever to get anything accomplished, much less a year of in game time.

[Maulrus]

If it is ASCII only, I'll have to bow out. It would take me forever to get anything accomplished, much less a year of in game time.

Well, it's not decided yet. I'd rather not fully lose people, so what about this: you can do the screenshots in a tileset, but upload the maps in ASCII? That would only require one quick change at the end of your turn to do, and you wouldn't have to play with it.

[Celesyne]

Believe I can do that easily with the LazyNewb Pack. So, works for me. Vote is for non-evil, cause skeleton creatures = !!FUN!! Otherwise Volcano would be awesome, still trying to figure out how to get them to show on my embark site map again.

[Maulrus]

Believe I can do that easily with the LazyNewb Pack. So, works for me. Vote is for non-evil, cause skeleton creatures = !!FUN!! Otherwise Volcano would be awesome, still trying to figure out how to get them to show on my embark site map again.

I might be misreading your post but I thought evil = skeletons?

[Celesyne]

Yes, and I'm not quite into dealing with said !!FUN!! yet. I'd like to not have to worry about them, thus the non-evil, as before though, I'm happy with whatever we decide.

[Maulrus]

Alright, fair enough.

Volcanic Embark (non-evil): 1
Terrifying Embark: 0

Anybody else?

[Shpadoinkle]

I'd prefer the volcanic non-evil embark, myself. I'm not much good at dealing with random undead... but then again, undead make the game more Fun. BUT, succession forts are generally Fun enough without the extra encouragement (hell, look at Boatmurdered; they had more Fun than they could handle and they weren't even in an evil biome), so I'm kinda conflicted. I'm not casting my vote just yet.

On the other hand, we could look for a terrifying volcano! Lots of !!Fun!! as zombies knock dwarves into magma!

[Grif]

I'd prefer the volcanic non-evil embark, myself. I'm not much good at dealing with random undead... but then again, undead make the game more Fun. BUT, succession forts are generally Fun enough without the extra encouragement (hell, look at Boatmurdered; they had more Fun than they could handle and they weren't even in an evil biome), so I'm kinda conflicted. I'm not casting my vote just yet.

On the other hand, we could look for a terrifying volcano! Lots of !!Fun!! as zombies knock dwarves into magma!

To be honest, most of the !!FUN!! they had was when elephants are roaming devils of the land. :smallbiggrin:

That said, I'm afraid I spoilt myself by using tilesets to start my DF career. Can't read ASCII art now to save my own skin.

EDIT: Annnnndddddd i forgot on how to vote. Voting for non-evil as well.

[Level8Mudcrab]

A volcanic embark sounds good to me.

[Incomp]

Volcano non-evil sounds great. I personally hate evil locations, because you can't tame undead and turn them into war undead. Sadly.

I think evil embarks would be awesome if they had some more creative creatures.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

I vote volcanic as well. I have a world gen that would fit the bill very well. It has sand, flux, clay, and a stream that freezes as well as a pretty good surface ores. The west biome has the clay and volcano. East has some sand, flux, and a bit of coal.

[WORLD_GEN]
[TITLE:VOLCANO]
[SEED:205087125]
[HISTORY_SEED:2179929159]
[NAME_SEED:1618688678]
[CREATURE_SEED:3707293620]
[DIM:257:257]
[EMBARK_POINTS:1274]
[END_YEAR:1050]
[BEAST_END_YEAR:300:80]
[REVEAL_ALL_HISTORY:1]
[CULL_HISTORICAL_FIGURES:1]
[ELEVATION:280:320:555:550]
[RAINFALL:0:100:400:400]
[TEMPERATURE:25:75:400:400]
[DRAINAGE:0:100:400:400]
[VOLCANISM:20:100:3000:3000]
[SAVAGERY:0:100:400:400]
[ELEVATION_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[RAIN_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[DRAINAGE_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[TEMPERATURE_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[SAVAGERY_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[VOLCANISM_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[MINERAL_SCARCITY:400]
[MEGABEAST_CAP:75]
[SEMIMEGABEAST_CAP:150]
[TITAN_NUMBER:33]
[TITAN_ATTACK_TRIGGER:80:0:200000]
[DEMON_NUMBER:10]
[NIGHT_CREATURE_NUMBER:10]
[GOOD_SQ_COUNTS:100:1000:2000]
[EVIL_SQ_COUNTS:100:1000:2000]
[PEAK_NUMBER_MIN:0]
[PARTIAL_OCEAN_EDGE_MIN:0]
[COMPLETE_OCEAN_EDGE_MIN:0]
[VOLCANO_MIN:200]
[REGION_COUNTS:SWAMP:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:DESERT:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:FOREST:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:MOUNTAINS:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:OCEAN:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:GLACIER:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:TUNDRA:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:GRASSLAND:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:HILLS:0:0:0]
[EROSION_CYCLE_COUNT:250]
[RIVER_MINS:400:400]
[PERIODICALLY_ERODE_EXTREMES:1]
[OROGRAPHIC_PRECIPITATION:1]
[SUBREGION_MAX:5000]
[CAVERN_LAYER_COUNT:3]
[CAVERN_LAYER_OPENNESS_MIN:30]
[CAVERN_LAYER_OPENNESS_MAX:100]
[CAVERN_LAYER_PASSAGE_DENSITY_MIN:0]
[CAVERN_LAYER_PASSAGE_DENSITY_MAX:100]
[CAVERN_LAYER_WATER_MIN:0]
[CAVERN_LAYER_WATER_MAX:100]
[HAVE_BOTTOM_LAYER_1:1]
[HAVE_BOTTOM_LAYER_2:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_GROUND:15]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_1:5]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_2:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_3:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_4:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_5:2]
[LEVELS_AT_BOTTOM:1]
[CAVE_MIN_SIZE:5]
[CAVE_MAX_SIZE:25]
[MOUNTAIN_CAVE_MIN:50]
[NON_MOUNTAIN_CAVE_MIN:200]
[ALL_CAVES_VISIBLE:1]
[SHOW_EMBARK_TUNNEL:2]
[TOTAL_CIV_NUMBER:40]
[TOTAL_CIV_POPULATION:15000]
[SITE_CAP:1500]
[PLAYABLE_CIVILIZATION_REQUIRED:1]
[ELEVATION_RANGES:0:0:0]
[RAIN_RANGES:0:0:0]
[DRAINAGE_RANGES:0:0:0]
[SAVAGERY_RANGES:0:0:0]
[VOLCANISM_RANGES:0:0:0]
http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i76/ObadiahtheSlim/greatembark.gif

[Shpadoinkle]

That brings up another thing- are we going to be using any mods or anything, or is it going to be a totally vanilla game?

[ObadiahtheSlim]

If we want to keep this friendly for the newbies then lets keep it vanilla. Maybe some minor mods to the raws like adding beards to dwarven women and taking beards off elves.

[kpenguin]

I vote volcanic as well. I have a world gen that would fit the bill very well. It has sand, flux, clay, and a stream that freezes as well as a pretty good surface ores. The west biome has the clay and volcano. East has some sand, flux, and a bit of coal.

I second this embark.

[SYPIAC]

Howdy, guys!

I don't really know what this forum is about(and don't much care), but I love Dwarf Fortress! If this is not only community-wide game, sign me in!
I vote for any zone(including evil without trees) as long as it contains clay and soil on the surface, I built whole cities out of clay in the rocky wastelands!
http://i065.radikal.ru/1104/a5/c97196e3be1dt.jpg (http://radikal.ru/F/i065.radikal.ru/1104/a5/c97196e3be1d.png.html)
So, in our case this is volcano, right? I vote for it.


Also, some offtop: While I were registrating I found out that you have 3 layers of anti-spam-robot-defense. What, robots are overwhelming, huh?

[kpenguin]

Robots are a dire threat. Robot elves doubly so.

[Incomp]

I vote volcanic as well. I have a world gen that would fit the bill very well. It has sand, flux, clay, and a stream that freezes as well as a pretty good surface ores. The west biome has the clay and volcano. East has some sand, flux, and a bit of coal.

[WORLD_GEN]
[TITLE:VOLCANO]
[SEED:205087125]
[HISTORY_SEED:2179929159]
[NAME_SEED:1618688678]
[CREATURE_SEED:3707293620]
[DIM:257:257]
[EMBARK_POINTS:1274]
[END_YEAR:1050]
[BEAST_END_YEAR:300:80]
[REVEAL_ALL_HISTORY:1]
[CULL_HISTORICAL_FIGURES:1]
[ELEVATION:280:320:555:550]
[RAINFALL:0:100:400:400]
[TEMPERATURE:25:75:400:400]
[DRAINAGE:0:100:400:400]
[VOLCANISM:20:100:3000:3000]
[SAVAGERY:0:100:400:400]
[ELEVATION_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[RAIN_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[DRAINAGE_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[TEMPERATURE_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[SAVAGERY_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[VOLCANISM_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[MINERAL_SCARCITY:400]
[MEGABEAST_CAP:75]
[SEMIMEGABEAST_CAP:150]
[TITAN_NUMBER:33]
[TITAN_ATTACK_TRIGGER:80:0:200000]
[DEMON_NUMBER:10]
[NIGHT_CREATURE_NUMBER:10]
[GOOD_SQ_COUNTS:100:1000:2000]
[EVIL_SQ_COUNTS:100:1000:2000]
[PEAK_NUMBER_MIN:0]
[PARTIAL_OCEAN_EDGE_MIN:0]
[COMPLETE_OCEAN_EDGE_MIN:0]
[VOLCANO_MIN:200]
[REGION_COUNTS:SWAMP:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:DESERT:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:FOREST:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:MOUNTAINS:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:OCEAN:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:GLACIER:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:TUNDRA:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:GRASSLAND:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:HILLS:0:0:0]
[EROSION_CYCLE_COUNT:250]
[RIVER_MINS:400:400]
[PERIODICALLY_ERODE_EXTREMES:1]
[OROGRAPHIC_PRECIPITATION:1]
[SUBREGION_MAX:5000]
[CAVERN_LAYER_COUNT:3]
[CAVERN_LAYER_OPENNESS_MIN:30]
[CAVERN_LAYER_OPENNESS_MAX:100]
[CAVERN_LAYER_PASSAGE_DENSITY_MIN:0]
[CAVERN_LAYER_PASSAGE_DENSITY_MAX:100]
[CAVERN_LAYER_WATER_MIN:0]
[CAVERN_LAYER_WATER_MAX:100]
[HAVE_BOTTOM_LAYER_1:1]
[HAVE_BOTTOM_LAYER_2:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_GROUND:15]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_1:5]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_2:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_3:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_4:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_5:2]
[LEVELS_AT_BOTTOM:1]
[CAVE_MIN_SIZE:5]
[CAVE_MAX_SIZE:25]
[MOUNTAIN_CAVE_MIN:50]
[NON_MOUNTAIN_CAVE_MIN:200]
[ALL_CAVES_VISIBLE:1]
[SHOW_EMBARK_TUNNEL:2]
[TOTAL_CIV_NUMBER:40]
[TOTAL_CIV_POPULATION:15000]
[SITE_CAP:1500]
[PLAYABLE_CIVILIZATION_REQUIRED:1]
[ELEVATION_RANGES:0:0:0]
[RAIN_RANGES:0:0:0]
[DRAINAGE_RANGES:0:0:0]
[SAVAGERY_RANGES:0:0:0]
[VOLCANISM_RANGES:0:0:0]
http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i76/ObadiahtheSlim/greatembark.gif


Schveet.I write silly things using white text.

[SYPIAC]

I vote volcanic as well. I have a world gen that would fit the bill very well. It has sand, flux, clay, and a stream that freezes as well as a pretty good surface ores. The west biome has the clay and volcano. East has some sand, flux, and a bit of coal.

[WORLD_GEN]
[TITLE:VOLCANO]
[SEED:205087125]
[HISTORY_SEED:2179929159]
[NAME_SEED:1618688678]
[CREATURE_SEED:3707293620]
[DIM:257:257]
[EMBARK_POINTS:1274]
[END_YEAR:1050]
[BEAST_END_YEAR:300:80]
[REVEAL_ALL_HISTORY:1]
[CULL_HISTORICAL_FIGURES:1]
[ELEVATION:280:320:555:550]
[RAINFALL:0:100:400:400]
[TEMPERATURE:25:75:400:400]
[DRAINAGE:0:100:400:400]
[VOLCANISM:20:100:3000:3000]
[SAVAGERY:0:100:400:400]
[ELEVATION_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[RAIN_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[DRAINAGE_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[TEMPERATURE_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[SAVAGERY_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[VOLCANISM_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[MINERAL_SCARCITY:400]
[MEGABEAST_CAP:75]
[SEMIMEGABEAST_CAP:150]
[TITAN_NUMBER:33]
[TITAN_ATTACK_TRIGGER:80:0:200000]
[DEMON_NUMBER:10]
[NIGHT_CREATURE_NUMBER:10]
[GOOD_SQ_COUNTS:100:1000:2000]
[EVIL_SQ_COUNTS:100:1000:2000]
[PEAK_NUMBER_MIN:0]
[PARTIAL_OCEAN_EDGE_MIN:0]
[COMPLETE_OCEAN_EDGE_MIN:0]
[VOLCANO_MIN:200]
[REGION_COUNTS:SWAMP:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:DESERT:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:FOREST:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:MOUNTAINS:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:OCEAN:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:GLACIER:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:TUNDRA:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:GRASSLAND:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:HILLS:0:0:0]
[EROSION_CYCLE_COUNT:250]
[RIVER_MINS:400:400]
[PERIODICALLY_ERODE_EXTREMES:1]
[OROGRAPHIC_PRECIPITATION:1]
[SUBREGION_MAX:5000]
[CAVERN_LAYER_COUNT:3]
[CAVERN_LAYER_OPENNESS_MIN:30]
[CAVERN_LAYER_OPENNESS_MAX:100]
[CAVERN_LAYER_PASSAGE_DENSITY_MIN:0]
[CAVERN_LAYER_PASSAGE_DENSITY_MAX:100]
[CAVERN_LAYER_WATER_MIN:0]
[CAVERN_LAYER_WATER_MAX:100]
[HAVE_BOTTOM_LAYER_1:1]
[HAVE_BOTTOM_LAYER_2:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_GROUND:15]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_1:5]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_2:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_3:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_4:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_5:2]
[LEVELS_AT_BOTTOM:1]
[CAVE_MIN_SIZE:5]
[CAVE_MAX_SIZE:25]
[MOUNTAIN_CAVE_MIN:50]
[NON_MOUNTAIN_CAVE_MIN:200]
[ALL_CAVES_VISIBLE:1]
[SHOW_EMBARK_TUNNEL:2]
[TOTAL_CIV_NUMBER:40]
[TOTAL_CIV_POPULATION:15000]
[SITE_CAP:1500]
[PLAYABLE_CIVILIZATION_REQUIRED:1]
[ELEVATION_RANGES:0:0:0]
[RAIN_RANGES:0:0:0]
[DRAINAGE_RANGES:0:0:0]
[SAVAGERY_RANGES:0:0:0]
[VOLCANISM_RANGES:0:0:0]
http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i76/ObadiahtheSlim/greatembark.gif


Oh god, you found heaven?
Now show us the heightmap!

[Maulrus]

I vote volcanic as well. I have a world gen that would fit the bill very well. It has sand, flux, clay, and a stream that freezes as well as a pretty good surface ores. The west biome has the clay and volcano. East has some sand, flux, and a bit of coal.

[WORLD_GEN]
[TITLE:VOLCANO]
[SEED:205087125]
[HISTORY_SEED:2179929159]
[NAME_SEED:1618688678]
[CREATURE_SEED:3707293620]
[DIM:257:257]
[EMBARK_POINTS:1274]
[END_YEAR:1050]
[BEAST_END_YEAR:300:80]
[REVEAL_ALL_HISTORY:1]
[CULL_HISTORICAL_FIGURES:1]
[ELEVATION:280:320:555:550]
[RAINFALL:0:100:400:400]
[TEMPERATURE:25:75:400:400]
[DRAINAGE:0:100:400:400]
[VOLCANISM:20:100:3000:3000]
[SAVAGERY:0:100:400:400]
[ELEVATION_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[RAIN_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[DRAINAGE_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[TEMPERATURE_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[SAVAGERY_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[VOLCANISM_FREQUENCY:1:1:1:1:1:1]
[MINERAL_SCARCITY:400]
[MEGABEAST_CAP:75]
[SEMIMEGABEAST_CAP:150]
[TITAN_NUMBER:33]
[TITAN_ATTACK_TRIGGER:80:0:200000]
[DEMON_NUMBER:10]
[NIGHT_CREATURE_NUMBER:10]
[GOOD_SQ_COUNTS:100:1000:2000]
[EVIL_SQ_COUNTS:100:1000:2000]
[PEAK_NUMBER_MIN:0]
[PARTIAL_OCEAN_EDGE_MIN:0]
[COMPLETE_OCEAN_EDGE_MIN:0]
[VOLCANO_MIN:200]
[REGION_COUNTS:SWAMP:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:DESERT:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:FOREST:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:MOUNTAINS:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:OCEAN:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:GLACIER:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:TUNDRA:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:GRASSLAND:0:0:0]
[REGION_COUNTS:HILLS:0:0:0]
[EROSION_CYCLE_COUNT:250]
[RIVER_MINS:400:400]
[PERIODICALLY_ERODE_EXTREMES:1]
[OROGRAPHIC_PRECIPITATION:1]
[SUBREGION_MAX:5000]
[CAVERN_LAYER_COUNT:3]
[CAVERN_LAYER_OPENNESS_MIN:30]
[CAVERN_LAYER_OPENNESS_MAX:100]
[CAVERN_LAYER_PASSAGE_DENSITY_MIN:0]
[CAVERN_LAYER_PASSAGE_DENSITY_MAX:100]
[CAVERN_LAYER_WATER_MIN:0]
[CAVERN_LAYER_WATER_MAX:100]
[HAVE_BOTTOM_LAYER_1:1]
[HAVE_BOTTOM_LAYER_2:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_GROUND:15]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_1:5]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_2:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_3:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_4:1]
[LEVELS_ABOVE_LAYER_5:2]
[LEVELS_AT_BOTTOM:1]
[CAVE_MIN_SIZE:5]
[CAVE_MAX_SIZE:25]
[MOUNTAIN_CAVE_MIN:50]
[NON_MOUNTAIN_CAVE_MIN:200]
[ALL_CAVES_VISIBLE:1]
[SHOW_EMBARK_TUNNEL:2]
[TOTAL_CIV_NUMBER:40]
[TOTAL_CIV_POPULATION:15000]
[SITE_CAP:1500]
[PLAYABLE_CIVILIZATION_REQUIRED:1]
[ELEVATION_RANGES:0:0:0]
[RAIN_RANGES:0:0:0]
[DRAINAGE_RANGES:0:0:0]
[SAVAGERY_RANGES:0:0:0]
[VOLCANISM_RANGES:0:0:0]
http://i69.photobucket.com/albums/i76/ObadiahtheSlim/greatembark.gif


Seeing as everybody likes the idea of a volcanic embark, let's go with this!


That brings up another thing- are we going to be using any mods or anything, or is it going to be a totally vanilla game?

No mods for this one. I prefer vanilla personally.

So we have a world: excellent. Now how should we space the turns? I like the Sparkgear model, but I understand that a day is a little restrictive for some people. Still, a week seems like a little much to me.

[Shpadoinkle]

Split the difference: Three and a half days per turn!

[Grif]

Seeing as everybody likes the idea of a volcanic embark, let's go with this!



No mods for this one. I prefer vanilla personally.

So we have a world: excellent. Now how should we space the turns? I like the Sparkgear model, but I understand that a day is a little restrictive for some people. Still, a week seems like a little much to me.

Given that we need to screenshot and.... write some sort of whacky dorfy story for it, yeah I think a week is perfectly fair.

[Maulrus]

Given that we need to screenshot and.... write some sort of whacky dorfy story for it, yeah I think a week is perfectly fair.

Yeah, I guess I can be a bit impatient. A week sound good to everybody?

[Shpadoinkle]

A week is fine with me.

[Incomp]

Works fine for me.

[SYPIAC]

Week!
The message you have entered is too short. Please lengthen your message to at least 10 characters.

[kpenguin]

I can agree to a week.

[Level8Mudcrab]

A week sounds good to me. I guess some people might finish their turns early, so it might even go faster than that.

[Grif]

A week sounds good to me. I guess some people might finish their turns early, so it might even go faster than that.

Yep. The week is just for those who might not have the time to play it in 24 hours like those crazy people in bay12 forums do.

[Gnoman]

We're not all crazy. At least, I don't think so.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

I appreciate your enthusiasm for my site, but it isn't heaven. It's a calm embark so no fun or fun wildlife.

[SYPIAC]

I appreciate your enthusiasm for my site, but it isn't heaven. It's a calm embark so no fun or fun wildlife.
Never had problems with surface wildlife even in Terrifying lands.
And Giant Cave Spiders still spawn underground in good lands.
Also there's a volcano, which(if used properly) provides us with 2-5 casualties per year, that's quite fun.
Don't forget how many fortresess died because of freezing river in Temperate biome.

[kpenguin]

I appreciate your enthusiasm for my site, but it isn't heaven. It's a calm embark so no fun or fun wildlife.

This is why we pump our fortress value as quickly as possible to attract megabeasts and sieges.

[Maulrus]

I appreciate your enthusiasm for my site, but it isn't heaven. It's a calm embark so no fun or fun wildlife.

I don't necessarily see that as a bad thing, seeing as we've got quite a few beginners. This way, we can settle in a bit first before the Fun tears us apart!

Okay, so we obviously have quite a few people interested at this point. We have our embark, we have a schedule, all we need is a player list. I'll take the first turn. Which of all of you are most available right now?

[Shpadoinkle]

I'm unemployed and have no obligations, so I can take the second turn.

[Gnoman]

I can run a year in a couple hours, so I can do any turn.

[Incomp]

Doesn't matter too much to me. I'll take fourth.

[RPharazon]

I'll take fifth. Should be a fun little stint while the fort's up and running but still not superawesome.

[billtodamax]

I'd prefer mine sooner rather than later. School's starting soon.

[Maulrus]

I'd prefer mine sooner rather than later. School's starting soon.

Would you mind sixth? If not, would any of the above mind switching out so billtodamax can go sooner?

[iyaerP]

I would like to volunteer for this.

And speaking as someone who has done a succession fort before, trust me when I say that a week per turn is a lot less time than people think. My average stands at something like 2 hours of real time to produce one month of high quality dwarf fortress time, complete with screenshots, editing, story-ing, and posting.

Not gonna say that that will hold true as a rule for everyone, but there are two main things that keep a community fort running: Timely updates, and INTERESTING updates.

The more pictures, details, and description that are added in, the more interesting the updates are. And so long as people actually MAKE their updates, the first point is covered as well.


With all that said, I would like seventh turn.

[Shpadoinkle]

I'll trade places with billtodamax if he'd like to go second.

[Maulrus]

I'll trade places with billtodamax if he'd like to go second.

Awesome, thanks. Here's the list so far:

1. Maulrus
2. billtodamax
3. Gnoman
4. Incomp
5. RPharazon
6. Shpadoinkle
7. iyaerP

I'll start working on it tomorrow and post a new topic once its ready so we can start fresh. In the meantime, keep discussions in here.


And speaking as someone who has done a succession fort before, trust me when I say that a week per turn is a lot less time than people think. My average stands at something like 2 hours of real time to produce one month of high quality dwarf fortress time, complete with screenshots, editing, story-ing, and posting.

Not gonna say that that will hold true as a rule for everyone, but there are two main things that keep a community fort running: Timely updates, and INTERESTING updates.

The more pictures, details, and description that are added in, the more interesting the updates are. And so long as people actually MAKE their updates, the first point is covered as well..

That's a good point. It's been ages since I did a good succession so it's hard for me to remember the pacing, and as I'm heavily emphasizing interesting updates, it's silly to assume less time.

[Celesyne]

Throw me in on the end there. Still getting the hang of the new stuff on my horribly doomed fort.

[billtodamax]

I'll trade places with billtodamax if he'd like to go second.

Thanks. I probably won't have anything to worry about in that week that way. :smallsmile:

[Cogwheel]

I appreciate your enthusiasm for my site, but it isn't heaven. It's a calm embark so no fun or fun wildlife.

I got a similarly excellent embark (your worldgen file gave me a different world), with a minor mountain range that carries the dwarfiest name ever.

The Axe of Beards. Axe of Beards.

[Level8Mudcrab]

Put me on the end of the list.

[Grif]

Put me at the end as well.

[Maulrus]

I got a similarly excellent embark (your worldgen file gave me a different world), with a minor mountain range that carries the dwarfiest name ever.

The Axe of Beards. Axe of Beards.

:OOOOO

1. Maulrus
2. billtodamax
3. Gnoman
4. Incomp
5. RPharazon
6. Shpadoinkle
7. iyaerP
8. Celesyne
9. Level8Mudcrab
10. Grif

[Incomp]

I got a similarly excellent embark (your worldgen file gave me a different world), with a minor mountain range that carries the dwarfiest name ever.

The Axe of Beards. Axe of Beards.

You must carve those mountains into an enormous altar to Armok and coat it with elephant blood.

[Cogwheel]

You must carve those mountains into an enormous altar to Armok and coat it with elephant blood.

It gets better. My fortress name is Ultradiamond.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

Throw me down in that list.

[SYPIAC]

Don't forget to add me!
If someone from the first places wants to go to the last ones, change your positions with me.
In a month we have exams, and I really can't play much in that time. So I'd prefer my turn sooner

Also, playing your first time in 11-12 year of the fortress really sucks, I'm not sure if fortress will survive till that time

[Maulrus]

Don't forget to add me!
If someone from the first places wants to go to the last ones, change your positions with me.
In a month we have exams, and I really can't play much in that time. So I'd prefer my turn sooner

Also, playing your first time in 11-12 year of the fortress really sucks, I'm not sure if fortress will survive till that time

Okay. Anybody willing to switch out?

Also, if the fort doesn't survive, then anybody who hasn't played gets priority on the next fort if we have one.

1. Maulrus
2. billtodamax
3. Gnoman
4. Incomp
5. RPharazon
6. Shpadoinkle
7. iyaerP
8. Celesyne
9. Level8Mudcrab
10. Grif
11. ObadiahtheSlim

[ObadiahtheSlim]

That or the next person does a reclaim.

[kpenguin]

Errr.

Stick me in somewhere in the back then, I guess.

[Maulrus]

1. Maulrus
2. billtodamax
3. Gnoman
4. Incomp
5. RPharazon
6. Shpadoinkle
7. iyaerP
8. Celesyne
9. Level8Mudcrab
10. Grif
11. ObadiahtheSlim
12. SYPIAC (trying to find sooner week)
13. kpenguin

I'm gonna gen the world and start working in just a bit! I can't do too much tonight, but I'm not gonna be doing much this weekend until Sunday so I can probably get it up by then.

One last question: any choices for a theme to guide the writeups? Prison colony, mining expedition, palace, what?

[Incomp]

I personally find amusing the idea that each person brings his own interpretation of what the fort is to the game.

[NotAEvilToaster]

I would, but, Ive never played. I intend on learning the FUN later anyways.

[iyaerP]

I would, but, Ive never played. I intend on learning the FUN later anyways.

Not knowing what to do but being in charge of the fate all our poot doomed dwarves is a form of !!FUN!! in and of itself.



As a note to the author, could we get the names of our overseers to be as the in-game dwarves? It is always a lot of fun to be like: "Oooh look, its ME! And I am going on brave adventures, and protecting the fort from a vile troll, and dodging into a puddle to drown, and getting eaten by zombie mackeral.....

..

..

next migrant wave was when again?"

[Triaxx]

I'll take a turn.

[Shpadoinkle]

As a note to the author, could we get the names of our overseers to be as the in-game dwarves? It is always a lot of fun to be like: "Oooh look, its ME! And I am going on brave adventures, and protecting the fort from a vile troll, and dodging into a puddle to drown, and getting eaten by zombie mackeral...

I second this. The first seven dwarves should be (re)named after the first seven overseers. I'll be glad to take a planter or a brewer.

[Maulrus]

As a note to the author, could we get the names of our overseers to be as the in-game dwarves? It is always a lot of fun to be like: "Oooh look, its ME! And I am going on brave adventures, and protecting the fort from a vile troll, and dodging into a puddle to drown, and getting eaten by zombie mackeral.....

Well of course. Founders get priority, and I was thinking that the excess dwarves could be named after whichever observers that want a named dwarf. Sound good?

[Grif]

Well of course. Founders get priority, and I was thinking that the excess dwarves could be named after whichever observers that want a named dwarf. Sound good?

That would be hilarious.

I want to be the inevitable miner dorf who digs his way to a cave-in right after obtaining that shiny legendary mining skill.

[iyaerP]

I would like to be our fort's architect if we embark with one (I usually do). Cross train me as mechanic or mason, whichever you prefer to spend your embark points on.

Also, since I don't know if you know it or not, I shall assume that you don't, good rules to go by when spending points on embark. Also, this will help enlighten any of the people who are mildly interested, but don't have much experiance with the game.

1: MAX OUT YOUR DWARVES' SKILL POINTS. This saves much wasted time and effort, especially early on when survival might well depend on your mason not taking four millenia making a door.

2: Sell most of the random crap like splints, crutches, axes and whatnot. Given that we are stated to be embarking on an easy biome, we don't need weapons, and most of the random goods cost too much for their value. We want 1 pick, and 1 wooden training axe for lumbering. And don't sell the anvil. that one we keep.

3: Get 1 rooster peafowl and 4-6 hens. Point for point, the blue peafowl are the single best animals on embark in terms of meat and eggs produced in the least time and with the smallest grazing areas. Not good for defence, but tame bears from the elves and dogs from immigrants are almost guarenteed.

4: Boozohol and food are the big worries. At least for your first year, which is what embark is all about preparing for.

[Grif]

4: Boozohol and food are the big worries. At least for your first year, which is what embark is all about preparing for.

Is gathering still as effective as before? I usually have a dorf with Adequate Herbalism which can then gather a whole year worth of food/brewable alcohol in a easy biome. Also good for seeds for aboveground planting. Bloody dorfs only bring underground plants which need mud to actually plant. :smallconfused:

[Incomp]

It's kinda interesting to see how other people play the game, because it's not like how I play.



1: MAX OUT YOUR DWARVES' SKILL POINTS. This saves much wasted time and effort, especially early on when survival might well depend on your mason not taking four millenia making a door.

Hmmm. I don't really max out my dwarves' skills at embark. I find that the miner is going to be legendary soon enough, same with the mugcrafter, and the rest isn't too important. Oh well, I'm four years in anyway.



3: Get 1 rooster peafowl and 4-6 hens. Point for point, the blue peafowl are the single best animals on embark in terms of meat and eggs produced in the least time and with the smallest grazing areas. Not good for defense, but tame bears from the elves and dogs from immigrants are almost guaranteed.


I personally have never had any issue with produced food, so I've never utilized the meat industry except when I wanted some bones. I find that farming and gathering does the job fine.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

I always bring a at least one breeding pair of dogs and generally a few extra female dogs. You can easily train them to war dogs while digging out the initial fort area. Plus war dogs make an exceptional sentry animal to detect kobolds and snatchers.

[Maulrus]

I would like to be our fort's architect if we embark with one (I usually do). Cross train me as mechanic or mason, whichever you prefer to spend your embark points on.

Also, since I don't know if you know it or not, I shall assume that you don't, good rules to go by when spending points on embark. Also, this will help enlighten any of the people who are mildly interested, but don't have much experiance with the game.

1: MAX OUT YOUR DWARVES' SKILL POINTS. This saves much wasted time and effort, especially early on when survival might well depend on your mason not taking four millenia making a door.

2: Sell most of the random crap like splints, crutches, axes and whatnot. Given that we are stated to be embarking on an easy biome, we don't need weapons, and most of the random goods cost too much for their value. We want 1 pick, and 1 wooden training axe for lumbering. And don't sell the anvil. that one we keep.

3: Get 1 rooster peafowl and 4-6 hens. Point for point, the blue peafowl are the single best animals on embark in terms of meat and eggs produced in the least time and with the smallest grazing areas. Not good for defence, but tame bears from the elves and dogs from immigrants are almost guarenteed.

4: Boozohol and food are the big worries. At least for your first year, which is what embark is all about preparing for.

If I bring an architect, I tend to crosstrain him as a mason, so I'll do that. And yeah, I usually abide by those rules, though I don't always max out skill points and I usually bring two pickaxes. I didn't realize you could cut trees with a wooden axe? If that's possible then it'll save a few points.

Also, I haven't ever had problems with food after I get an excessively large farm set up, but I usually don't bring animals so I might as well this time!

[ObadiahtheSlim]

If you really wanna save points. Drop the picks and axes. Then bring some wood (to make charcoal) and iron ore. You can make iron picks for cheaper than the cost of copper picks. If bituminous coal is available on embark then you can get your fuel for even cheaper (although you need 1 wood or coke to start the process).

[SYPIAC]

Let's get started soon!
Name me after any dwarf that works outside. Fisherman/Farmer(Above ground, sure!)/Wooddwarf/Any other that I haven't added to this list will do.


One last question: any choices for a theme to guide the writeups? Prison colony, mining expedition, palace, what?
What do you think about... Dwarf Fortress? Never seen themed Bloodline sucession games

[Incomp]

If I bring an architect, I tend to crosstrain him as a mason, so I'll do that. And yeah, I usually abide by those rules, though I don't always max out skill points and I usually bring two pickaxes. I didn't realize you could cut trees with a wooden axe? If that's possible then it'll save a few points.

Also, I haven't ever had problems with food after I get an excessively large farm set up, but I usually don't bring animals so I might as well this time!

Yeah, wood axes slay forests just as good as iron or steel. Sad you can't take wooden picks.

[Shpadoinkle]

One last question: any choices for a theme to guide the writeups? Prison colony, mining expedition, palace, what?

How about a mandate from the king? Nobles have mandated stupider things.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

I say some outcasts seeking to prove themselves and/or start anew.

[SYPIAC]

I say some outcasts seeking to prove themselves and/or start anew.
What does this mean?

[Grif]

Outcasts from the Dwarven kingdom of GitP, these sturdy dwarves have journeyed far in order to found a new home for themselves. They call themselves.... The Axe of Beards.

STRIKE THE EARTH!

[Incomp]

I like the noble mandate. Heh. Heheheheh.

[TheLaughingMan]

If you could, name the town drunkard/crazy after me.

Thank you. :smallbiggrin:

Not that they won't all be crazy by the end of this.

[Cogwheel]

Outcasts from the Dwarven kingdom of GitP, these sturdy dwarves have journeyed far in order to found a new home for themselves. They call themselves.... The Axe of Beards.

STRIKE THE EARTH!

Technically, that was the mountain.


The fortress, which is now dealing with alcohol shortage (for no reason other than brewer laziness) is named Ultradiamond.

Also, I'll be watching this fort.

[iyaerP]

It's kinda interesting to see how other people play the game, because it's not like how I play.


Hmmm. I don't really max out my dwarves' skills at embark. I find that the miner is going to be legendary soon enough, same with the mugcrafter, and the rest isn't too important. Oh well, I'm four years in anyway.


I personally have never had any issue with produced food, so I've never utilized the meat industry except when I wanted some bones. I find that farming and gathering does the job fine.

Maxxing out skills as much as you can on embark is important because unless there is an absolute glut of resources, you want your crafters to be making decent quality tradegoods from the start, rather than training up with crappy goods. Also, it speeds up production of all things a great deal, and having higher quality stuff from the start will make all dwarves happier. Which greatly reducing the chances of a tantrum spiral if someone channels themselves into a cave-in or something equally retarded.

Although given what the general consensus for starting conditions is, I don't think that lack of resources is going to be a problem at all, but you never know.


Having a giant surplus of food and booze is important because it is entirey possible to get a migrant wave of 20 dorfs in the first year. And if that happens without a big food stockpile, we end up hunting vermin, and everyone descends into tantrum spiral.



Is gathering still as effective as before? I usually have a dorf with Adequate Herbalism which can then gather a whole year worth of food/brewable alcohol in a easy biome. Also good for seeds for aboveground planting. Bloody dorfs only bring underground plants which need mud to actually plant.

Actually, in the newest versions, you don't even need muddy ground anymore. Any and all underground plants can grow in soil layers. Which is AWESOME.

[Incomp]

Actually, I rather dislike the lack of a mud requirement. I think needing mud was an interesting little engineering challenge for an early fort, even if it got routine. Oh well.

[Grif]

Actually, in the newest versions, you don't even need muddy ground anymore. Any and all underground plants can grow in soil layers. Which is AWESOME.


.. Really? OFF TO THE DORF MACHINE!

Seriously, the mud requirement felt tacked on, if anything. I really really dislike having to gather above ground seeds just to start some farming. Woe be to those who started in a desert clime with no open water source for mud.

[kpenguin]

Errr... as far as I know, mud is still required for underground farming. Its just that even unmuddied tiles can have moss and random underground plants growing on them.

EDIT: Looking it up now...

HOT DIGGITY. UNDERGROUND SOIL TILES CAN BE FARMED UNMUDDIED. THE WHOLE PURPOSE BEHIND MY IRRIGATION SCHEME IS RUINED, RUINED I SAY.

err, I mean

You guys are right. However, rock tiles still need to be muddied.

[Triaxx]

I usually end up with a resevoir anyway, for emergencies and the hospital.

[billtodamax]

I personally have never had any issue with produced food, so I've never utilized the meat industry except when I wanted some bones. I find that farming and gathering does the job fine.

The meat industry can be fun (not to be confused with Fun) sometimes. I brought a bunch of dogs. Every time they have puppies I wait for them to grow up and then cull all males but one so I get exponentially more meat. The bones and leather are nice.


If you could, name the town drunkard/crazy after me.

Thank you. :smallbiggrin:

Not that they won't all be crazy by the end of this.

What's a drunkard? *googles*

Okay, now that just doesn't make sense.

"A chronic drinker"

How can a dwarf drink so much alcohol that it becomes a problem?

[TheLaughingMan]

What's a drunkard? *googles*

Okay, now that just doesn't make sense.

"A chronic drinker"

How can a dwarf drink so much alcohol that it becomes a problem?

It becomes an issue when they do nothing else. :smalltongue:

Or I'm an idiot. Forego what I said and just name a noble or something after me. I always wanted to be the villain. :smalltongue:

[Grif]

The meat industry can be fun (not to be confused with Fun) sometimes. I brought a bunch of dogs. Every time they have puppies I wait for them to grow up and then cull all males but one so I get exponentially more meat. The bones and leather are nice.



What's a drunkard? *googles*

Okay, now that just doesn't make sense.

"A chronic drinker"

How can a dwarf drink so much alcohol that it becomes a problem?

Technically since all dorfs fall under that category, he can literally choose to be anyone. :smallbiggrin: Brilliant.

[Shpadoinkle]

Could someone upload the map to the DFFD every year? I'd like to see how the fort grows (and maybe see if I can get a general feel for the layout so I don't have to spend ten minutes looking around every time I want to find something when my turn comes up.)

[Level8Mudcrab]

Could someone upload the map to the DFFD every year? I'd like to see how the fort grows (and maybe see if I can get a general feel for the layout so I don't have to spend ten minutes looking around every time I want to find something when my turn comes up.)

I think that's what the plan is. Once you finish your turn you upload the save to DFFD and the next person downloads it and continues frrom there. So you'd probably be able to take a look at it yourself.

On the other hand, not knowing your way around the fortress is half the Fun. :smallbiggrin:

[Gnoman]

Pretty sure he meant DFMA, not DFFD.

[Shpadoinkle]

Yeah, that's what I meant.

[Maulrus]

Randomly generated sewers. (http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/imgs/under2.png) Get excited.

In other news, my weekend turned out busier than I expected; I'll start my turn right now!

EDIT: I actually can't figure out how to gen the world we agreed upon that was posted earlier in this topic. I put in the seeds exactly and I get a rather different landscape?

[Grif]

Different version perhaps? The seed might be from an older version of DF.

Can't wait to see the results of the first year.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

The older version doesn't replicate consitently. Try the latest version. That's the one I run.

[Maulrus]

The older version doesn't replicate consitently. Try the latest version. That's the one I run.

.25? That's what I'm using :/

[RPharazon]

Interesting fact about Dwarf Fortress seeds.
Any changes in the raw files, and in general any file save the init files and the basic, basic configurations (and already-saved saves) modify the seeding algorithm. This is affected by even a single character being changed in any of the raws.

So any seed numbers you get from other people have to be absotively, posilutely generated from the exact same version and build of DF as the seed givers, elsewise they generate different worlds.

Just something to ponder.

[Shpadoinkle]

The older version doesn't replicate consitently. Try the latest version. That's the one I run.

You could try putting the region folder in a .rar or something and email it to him, or put it up on the DFFD or something. The week is already 3/7ths over, and I'd kinda like to see SOMETHING accomplished.

[iyaerP]

Interesting fact about Dwarf Fortress seeds.
Any changes in the raw files, and in general any file save the init files and the basic, basic configurations (and already-saved saves) modify the seeding algorithm. This is affected by even a single character being changed in any of the raws.

So any seed numbers you get from other people have to be absotively, posilutely generated from the exact same version and build of DF as the seed givers, elsewise they generate different worlds.

Just something to ponder.


I never knew that before now.

That would explain why I could never replicate the adamantine space elevator though.

[Shpadoinkle]

Well, looks like this died pretty fast. :/

[Incomp]

Why do you say that?

[Shpadoinkle]

Because the first week is already 4/7ths over and there hasn't been a single update. Unless something has changed since his last post in this thread, Maulrus doesn't even have the region folder.

[Gnoman]

That is due purely to an unexpected complication. It is not an indication of the death of the thread.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

Someone posted earlier that they genned a simliar world with a good volcano spot. Have't really heard anything else. Either way, I regenned my world and uploaded it here. (http://dffd.wimbli.com/file.php?id=4327)

[Shpadoinkle]

*pokes with a stick*

Yeah, I'd say it's pretty much dead, since Maulrus hasn't posted in the last three days. Maybe skip to the next person?

[Grif]

Agreed. The next person to gen and start the fort?

[Shpadoinkle]

That would be billtodamax, then.

[Gnoman]

Alternatively, I could take the turn and give max the second turn as originally planned.

[Incomp]

*Shrug* Whatever's fine.

[billtodamax]

You take the turn if you want it, otherwise I'll start it tomorrow after school (32 hours or thereabouts).

Oh, and I'll need instructions on how to download a save.

[Shpadoinkle]

1: Go here http://dffd.wimbli.com/file.php?id=4327

2: Click 'Download Now' and save the file to your computer

3: Open the zip file and extract the 'Calm Volcano' folder into your saves folder (it'll be something like C:\Dwarf Fortress\data\save)

4: Open DF and load the world like you would any other

[Gnoman]

I'm starting with the embark linked above. I'll post journals as I go, probably have the year done tonight.

[Gnoman]

Townslaughters Expedition Log
Gnoman KingdomFloors, Tyrant of The Palisade of Inprisonment

1 Granite 287
We have arrived at the volcano. Immediately upon our arrival, we heard a great crashing and rending in the depths below. This is likely due to instabilities in the caverns below. To be safe, I have decided to build our city surrounding the volcano itself. Although this carries risks of it’s own, I feel it to be the safest of our current options. I have ordered a smelter and smithy to be put up to smelt the steel ores that we brought with us. That will provide the picks and axes needed to tame this land, and a weapon and some armor for me to defend it.

27 Granite
The pick and axe have been forged. I have builded us a Depot and am preparing to lay a bridge across the caldera for the use of mercantile traffic. Ere long, this will be our primary entrance.
4 Felsite
The great bridge is going well. I have had a still and carpentry worshop erected. Now a steady supply of drink is pouring into our stockpiles, brewed from the strange plants that grow wild aboveground here. I may order the farmers to begin growing some of these plants. Unusual alcohol is a fine trade good, and a welcom change in our routines. The initial tapping of the magma is nearly complete, so we will soon be able to begin the manufacture of my armour. Besides this, a rather nice vein of gold was exposed to the surface here, and we will use this for trading.
5 Malachite
No sooner had the great bridge been completed when a party of migrants appeared on the horizon. While I hold little hope that they will be skilled, this nearly doubles our population, and there is a vast amount of work to be done.

1 Sandstone
More Migrants. This is not unexpected, and I hope that this means that the caravan draws near. I intend to retire from rulership at the end of this year, for I believe that it will behoove me to spend more time preparing for battle than in managing lazy dwarves.

17 Timber
The caravan has come. I have traded a small fourtune in gold crafts for a large quantity of meat, drink, cloth, leather, and many anvils; along with a few metal bars and a small amount of weapons and armor. By melting down the anvils, I should be able to equip a small militia squad to act as my bodyguard.
1 Granite
The time of my retirement from rule has come. I entrust the fortress to another, although I will step up again if the need should arise.




The fort is in good shape. Every dwarf has a bedroom, we have a great deal of food and booze, and there is a fully equipped militia commander. I was unable to get another solder completely equipped, but he has enough armor to fight if needed. I didn't go looking for metals, but there's a good bit of gold left unmined in the exposed vein, and some copper down in the magma sea.

Save
http://dffd.wimbli.com/file.php?id=4343

Map (Put all future maps under this listing. Do not upload them seperately.
http://mkv25.net/dfma/map-10366-townslaughters

[SYPIAC]

Wow! That's the speedrun!
People, please, spend more time on making post, add screenshots or even videos. All the fun of playing bloodline is reading other people reports, isn't it?

[Gnoman]

Yeah, but in the first year, nothing really happens. I suppose i could have written out the arrival of the merchants over the Great Bridge (admittedly, this would be a rather intimidating experience,) but other than that, there were no mishaps, nor did I want to mention dwarves by name when people will be taking and renaming those dwarves. I'll check to see if Overseer has been updated for .25, and post a screen of that. For in-game screens, check the map.

[SYPIAC]

At least make dates in bold and separate events one from another

[Grif]

Interesting. I wonder when the inevitable goblin sieges will start?

[SYPIAC]

Interesting. I wonder when the inevitable goblin sieges will start?
At my turn, sure!
They know who fail defence horribly

[Gnoman]

All that gold I processed probably will draw ambushes pretty soon...

[SYPIAC]

In old versions goblins start to appear when mayor arrives.
And mayor arrives when you hit 50+/-? population
So you could menace your fortress with spikes of adamantium and gold, but they won't arrive till you get high pop
I don't know how's it now, thought

[Grif]

At my turn, sure!
They know who fail defence horribly

You haven't seen how my 100 dorf fort fell to a puny band of 6 goblin marksmen and pikers. :smallbiggrin:

[Gnoman]

In old versions goblins start to appear when mayor arrives.
And mayor arrives when you hit 50+/-? population
So you could menace your fortress with spikes of adamantium and gold, but they won't arrive till you get high pop
I don't know how's it now, thought

Hostiles are based on both population and wealth. The size of migrant waves is dependent solely on wealth. I beleive that the population for ambushes and snatchers is ~30. It is not uncommon for a single migrant wave to exceed 20 dwarves. We're at 15 now. In short, we're almost certain to get thieves very soon, and snatchers/ambushes before too long. Sieges start at 80 population, but even ambushes are dangerous.

[Shpadoinkle]

billtodamax, looks like you're up to bat.

[billtodamax]

Uh... lessee...

I might be using a fair whack of the week for this you guys. Thursday is probably when I'll be handling most of the year, finishing and polishing on Saturday.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

I like the bridge over the caldera. Very nice and very dwarfy.

[Incomp]

I am going to withdraw interest. Sorry guys, have fun.

[SYPIAC]

Here goes new list:

Gnoman
billtodamax - current turn
RPharazon
Shpadoinkle
iyaerP
Celesyne
Level8Mudcrab
Grif
ObadiahtheSlim
SYPIAC
kpenguin
Maulrus

Just had problems searching last one

[Level8Mudcrab]

A nice first turn, I love the bridge over the volcano.

[Grif]

Uh... lessee...

I might be using a fair whack of the week for this you guys. Thursday is probably when I'll be handling most of the year, finishing and polishing on Saturday.

Take your time mate. That's why we allocated a week in the first place.

[SYPIAC]

This useless message was posted here to get Thread Subscription.
I want to see new turn first and I want it badly

[iyaerP]

I would like to request a list of what named dwarves are doing what, so that we might begin to roleplay and add some madnesscharacter to the fort.

[Grif]

I would like to request a list of what named dwarves are doing what, so that we might begin to roleplay and add some madnesscharacter to the fort.

Oh yes. Am I the soon-to-be-legendary miner yet?

[SYPIAC]

As far as I remember we should choose and name our dwarfs ourselves, Maulrus named only himself.
UP: I just checked the save, there's no nicknamed dwarfs

[billtodamax]

I'll be working on it as I go.

1st Granite: I have taken over the fort from the previous overseer. A highly competent man - I think I'll have history rewritten so that I was the one in charge of getting the fort started up - it wouldn't do to have a military man such as him be a hero - after all, he'll be dead soon anyway.

He left a rather sparse journal - I'll rewrite something suitable after his death, I suppose.

I've begun construction on a small bridge over the frozen river. Hopefully it will allow us access to the other side when the river thaws.
http://i51.tinypic.com/xp34vc.jpg

Meanwhile, I've begun smoothing down the bedrooms, in preparation for future masterpieces. The miners have been given orders to dig out the exposed gold vein - It shall make suitable statues for my tomb.

26 Granite: Well, the river has thawed. And migrants have turned up.

These are not unrelated facts. The migrants have arrived on the wrong side of the river.

http://i55.tinypic.com/1r9oyh.jpg

I hate this migrant more than I thought it was possible to hate someone.

A couple of his friends showed up. I think I'll design a monument that depicts boiling them in lava. Some sort of floor mural, perhaps.

15 Slate: One of the migrants had a fishing rod. He's started providing them with food. Who knows? Maybe they'll last through winter.

27 Slate: More of the migrants keep arriving. They're just... standing over there, watching him fish. Sometimes one of them will drink from the river.

4 Felsite: One of the children in the other colony has withdrawn from society. Rather, he would have, had he found a workshop on that side in which to withdraw - as is proper for a dwarf.

Instead he stands around looking confused. This bodes ill for the other colony.

He's the ! at the bottom. You can see they're starting to chop wood.
http://i56.tinypic.com/16hp8k8.jpg

5 Felsite: I keep going down to the river to talk to them. They seem pretty happy over there, actually. There's roughly fourteen dwarves over there, they tell me. As well as a few tame animals. They're talking about building a small room to live in.

19 Felsite: Elves have arrived, and it has become clear that we don't have anything to trade with them. A craftsdwarf's workshop has been quickly sanctioned to be built. Hopefully we'll have something before they leave. Hopefully they'll have something for us, for that matter.

1 Hematite: The migrants have begun construction on a small compound to live in while they wait for the river to freeze. I've considered sending our miners to dig across, but they have more important work to do, expanding our territory.

http://i53.tinypic.com/5pppaq.jpg

5 Hematite: Snatcher! Protect the children!

He's targeted the other colony. They drove him off, but it seems he's aggravated the capybara, who are aggressively defending the trees. I suspect they're allied with the traders.

15 Hematite: The elves threatened to leave. I seized all of their food and a caged wolf. That'll teach them to be quiet.

18 Hematite: The migrants have begun to build a bridge across the river. They were concerned about the health of the child - who has now gone insane.

Unfortunately, upon deciding it should be done, none stepped forwards to begin. Extra booze and food is being produced expectant of the coming migrants.

28 Hematite: They've finally begun construction - only to have the insane child stolen away by a snatcher!

Well, not to sound crass, but at least it wasn't the sane one.

14 Malachite: They've completed their bridge and have set to depleting our food supplies. I've set the farmers to gather as many plants as they can - a temporary solution at best. Hopefully the miners will dig out the new farm room soon.

18 Malachite: More migrants! I've set them to work. Luckily there were a few fishers among them. I've begun making more bedrooms for them - but I don't think it'll be enough.

http://i53.tinypic.com/2hcoymv.jpg

16 Galena: Human merchants! And this time we have something to trade them! I've ordered the rock crafts moved up to the depot along with some gnomeblight I acquired from the elves.

26 Galena: Snatcher! Again!

This time they were unsuccessful. They got to the bridge over the caldera before they were spotted and ran like the cowards they are.

1 Limestone: I managed to get all of their food and booze for some stone trinkets, as well as a few tame animals. Nothing we really need.

2 Limestone: I'm getting pretty sick of snatchers.

6 Limestone: Snaaaaaaatcher.

7 Sandstone: More migrants! Hooray! I've started digging out more bedrooms.

14 Sandstone: Our animals have started to starve to death. I've put them in a pen that's almost certainly not big enough. A larger one will have to be made.

9 Timber: Our mason's workshop is absolutely clogged with coffins. I've ordered a large room dug out to serve as a stockpile.

13 Timber: A caravan has arrived from Thikendakost! Full - I presume - of dwarfy trade goods!

20 Timber: Dumat Sibreklecad (DS): I am your liaison from the Mountainhomes. Let's discuss your situation.
DS: What requests do you have of our merchants?

I asked for some alpacas and plump helmets. They wanted bracelets and toys intensely - I said I would see what I could do.

Trade demands, incase you want to see what else they wanted. I figured toys and bracelets would be easiest.
http://i51.tinypic.com/f3x4rt.jpg

DS: BLAH BLAH BLAH I'M DONE BEING INTERESTING.
(Highly paraphrased)

24 Timber: River freezes. I say the migrants could have held out until now.

11 Moonstone: An absolutely ludicrous amount of food has been acquired - for all of our crafts.

24 Moonstone:
http://i56.tinypic.com/357j6va.jpg

A giant!

5 Opal:
A clothier has withdrawn from society. The giant is annoying me by chasing after the animals - I might send out the
(1 man) military if he doesn't attack the fortress soon.

11 Opal: He finally stopped trying to kill animals and charged the fortress, right into a waiting cage trap.

19 Opal: Our clothier claimed a clothier's workshop after we built one for him. Unfortunately he wants cloth and "square blocks". We apparently don't have any cloth.

7 Obsidian: I shall have to leave this diary now - someone found it and told the military commander what I was writing and got me kicked out of office! Well, hopefully those who come after me will have the same sense and style I bought to the job.

((Being told to go to bed. There's not much more to do in my year. You'll have to rebuild the shops that were outside (A carpenter's workshop, fishery, butcher, tanner, kitchen, and maybe a couple others) and make sure that the clothier gets through his mood. I'm making some fiber cloth at the moment cause we have wool and silk. I made an alert to keep everyone inside.))

I need instructions on the save and map site, sorry.

[Gnoman]

As far as I remember we should choose and name our dwarfs ourselves, Maulrus named only himself.
UP: I just checked the save, there's no nicknamed dwarfs

Mine should Be named "Gnoman" with the profession "Tyrant." That is he only dwarf that I named.

[SYPIAC]

seized
What? Did you just STOLE from elves?
Also, what's the problem with migrants? Can't build the bridge? :-D

[Grif]

What? Did you just STOLE from elves?
Also, what's the problem with migrants? Can't build the bridge? :-D

Oh dear. War with the elves suddenly becomes inevitable. IT HAS BEEN FORETOLD.

[RPharazon]

Oh dear. War with the elves suddenly becomes inevitable. IT HAS BEEN FORETOLD.

In my latest game, I've seized all the elf goods (and threw them into the magma ocean) for three years straight, used them as gobbo bait, drowned them twice, and bridge-vapourized their entire trading party (and their Law-Giver). I've never had friendly relations with the elves, yet they still keep coming, and they still don't declare war on me. Damn those pacifist elves!

[Grif]

In my latest game, I've seized all the elf goods (and threw them into the magma ocean) for three years straight, used them as gobbo bait, drowned them twice, and bridge-vapourized their entire trading party (and their Law-Giver). I've never had friendly relations with the elves, yet they still keep coming, and they still don't declare war on me. Damn those pacifist elves!

Odd. Last time I tried a stunt like that, they posted archers right in my front lawn year after year.

Killing them with war hounds get old after awhile.

You must have gotten the hipster elves.

[Shpadoinkle]

What happened to the bridge you were building while the the river was still frozen?

[iyaerP]

I would like to lay claim to the primary architect dorf.




A letter that appears on the desk of the Overseer.

To: Our most Glorious and Exalted Overseer

From: Chief Architect iyaerP

It has come to my attention that we have would-be immigrants to our brave and bold outpost stranded across the river from us. Rather than construct a solid bridge over this natural barrier, would it not be wiser to make a retractable bridge, or even a drawbridge? The construction is not too terribly different, requiring only 3 mechanisms in addition to the materials for the bridge itself and would allow for a great deal more control of traffic in both peacetime and in say... the event of a goblin siege.

Call it paranoia on my part, but the recent snatcher attack leaves no doubt as to the risks inherint in settling so far from our imperious capital, and as anyone from the Royal Architechture League could tell you, forethought and careful planning are the mother and father of all megaprojects. A simple bridge may not qualify as a megaproject, but who knows what the future will hold? We need to be prepared for it.

I also feel the need to point out that not even the swiftest builder can keep pace with the average legendary miner who is tunnelling through soil or bedrock. Why not dig a tunnel under the river to allow our migrants access to the safety of our outpost and then reseal it to prevent potential invaders from having a way into our home.

Having provided my input to the current situation, I have no doubts that you shall choose wisely the best course of action to keep our home safe and secure while bringing new blood to the fortress. May Armok watch over you.

-iyaerP

[Gnoman]

Odd. There should have been a little bit of gold crafts left, and, if you're mining the gold, making more should have been a mere question of dwarfpower, since we have a magma smelter and forge.

[billtodamax]

What happened to the bridge you were building while the the river was still frozen?

They got one column done. That's it.


Odd. There should have been a little bit of gold crafts left, and, if you're mining the gold, making more should have been a mere question of dwarfpower, since we have a magma smelter and forge.
I could only see a bunch of gold coins, which didn't get me much. I ended up just seizing them back,

I would like to lay claim to the primary architect dorf.




A letter that appears on the desk of the Overseer.

To: Our most Glorious and Exalted Overseer

From: Chief Architect iyaerP

It has come to my attention that we have would-be immigrants to our brave and bold outpost stranded across the river from us. Rather than construct a solid bridge over this natural barrier, would it not be wiser to make a retractable bridge, or even a drawbridge? The construction is not too terribly different, requiring only 3 mechanisms in addition to the materials for the bridge itself and would allow for a great deal more control of traffic in both peacetime and in say... the event of a goblin siege.

Call it paranoia on my part, but the recent snatcher attack leaves no doubt as to the risks inherint in settling so far from our imperious capital, and as anyone from the Royal Architechture League could tell you, forethought and careful planning are the mother and father of all megaprojects. A simple bridge may not qualify as a megaproject, but who knows what the future will hold? We need to be prepared for it.

I also feel the need to point out that not even the swiftest builder can keep pace with the average legendary miner who is tunnelling through soil or bedrock. Why not dig a tunnel under the river to allow our migrants access to the safety of our outpost and then reseal it to prevent potential invaders from having a way into our home.

Having provided my input to the current situation, I have no doubts that you shall choose wisely the best course of action to keep our home safe and secure while bringing new blood to the fortress. May Armok watch over you.

-iyaerP

I like them chilling over there. I'll probably just build the room they have up into a tower if I have the time or something like that, and connect it to the fortress at large.

[Shpadoinkle]

They got one column done. That's it.

Even so, they should have continued work on the floors, and built the walls once the floors were constructed. Did you cancel the build designations?

[Gnoman]

Hold on a sec. Did you build a bridge with floors? Why didn't you use an actual bridge. Those are much more efficient, and you can hook them to things.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

And bridges use less materials. Heck you could have the migrants make one out of wood. Just enable Architecture/Building Design on one of them.

[iyaerP]

And bridges use less materials. Heck you could have the migrants make one out of wood. Just enable Architecture/Building Design on one of them.




NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

I must be the only architect.



But yes, I agree with your point which was pretty much the same one I was trying to get across in my letter. Bridges made of floor and wall tiles are much more time consuming and less efficient than drawbridges. Drawbridges also allow for throwing, atomsmashing, and denying access by undesireable immigrants, sieges, and stupid elves alike.

[billtodamax]

Even so, they should have continued work on the floors, and built the walls once the floors were constructed. Did you cancel the build designations?
I looked away, the river melted, and the designations were gone.

Hold on a sec. Did you build a bridge with floors? Why didn't you use an actual bridge. Those are much more efficient, and you can hook them to things.
I wanted a permanent bridge with walls because I read somewhere that waves happen when rivers thaw. Not sure if that's true or not.

And bridges use less materials. Heck you could have the migrants make one out of wood. Just enable Architecture/Building Design on one of them.
...
>.<
Right, that's that then.

[Gnoman]

1. Waves happen only on the ocean. You are probably thinking of the very old 2d version's floods.

2. Bridges are permanent, and there's nothig keeping you from having walls on both sides as long as they touch the ground.

[Grif]

So, whose turn is it on now? I blame my amnesia for forgetting.

[RPharazon]

Still on billtodamax, since he last updated in Timber, which is late Autumn, if I remember correctly.

It's my turn next, though.

[billtodamax]

Finishing off the year now. Apologies for the lateness, I had a basketball game.

[SYPIAC]

Giant? On the second year?
How the **** can I live 10 years in underground cave and not see a damn Forgotten Beast???

[billtodamax]

Alright, I'm done, can someone give me the instructions for the save and map site so I can upload them tomorrow?

[iyaerP]

http://dffd.wimbli.com/category.php?id=19


The dwarf fortress file depot. Friend and savior to any and all succession games.

[Shpadoinkle]

Go here http://dffd.wimbli.com/index.php and register, if you haven't already. Then log in, click the Upload button, upload the save folder and fill out all the info.

[Gnoman]

For teh map, go to DFMA.com. There are instructions there.

[billtodamax]

It won't let me upload a folder. Do I have to zip it?

[billtodamax]

Save! http://dffd.wimbli.com/file.php?id=4388

Map! http://mkv25.net/dfma/map-10411-volcano

Thanks for helping me do this, sorry for not completing my year.

[Gnoman]

Hate to be a pain about this, but you uploaded your map to the wrong place. Upload it to http://mkv25.net/dfma/map-10366-townslaughters. That will allow it to inherit the points of interest from my map and make comparing years easy.

[RPharazon]

Righto, I'll get started on the fort after my flight. Should be later today. I think I'll be done in a few days, barring any extenuating circumstances. My deadline is the 19th or 20th, since I'm going on vacation for a few days after that.

[billtodamax]

Hate to be a pain about this, but you uploaded your map to the wrong place. Upload it to http://mkv25.net/dfma/map-10366-townslaughters. That will allow it to inherit the points of interest from my map and make comparing years easy.

Okay. http://mkv25.net/dfma/map-10413-townslaughters

[RPharazon]

This is a big one. I managed to power through my year in a single morning. I don't want to spoil anything, but it was a very interesting year.

The book is light and made of dog vellum paper. It is covered in blood and ichor.
On the cover are the words "Diary of "RPharazon" Minespun" in neat block letters.
Below that are the words "THE ONLY SANE DWARF" in scrawled, messy letters.

7th Obsidian, 279
Well, apparently the last overseer, a dwarf who calls himself "Bill the Amazing" (what kind of name is that?) was tired of keeping our butts alive, as it was taking time away from his accountancy duties or something. Well, the upshot is that by random choice (he screamed at us in the dining area, thrust a finger at the crowd, and yelled "You!") I am now overseer of this fort.

8th Obsidian, 279
The first thing I did was take inventory of everything. Our fortress layout was terrible. We somehow had workshops next to bedrooms, an unsecured and undefended magma pipe, no internal stockpiles (after almost two years!), gigantic bedrooms for every dwarf (wasteful!), and no defenses to speak of, apart from an awesome, dwarven bridge over the magma. But what if we're facing a beast of forgotten legend that can survive the magma, eh? Then it'll have unfettered access to the very insides of our fort!
I gathered the miners and we all started digging. As we were doing so, a farmer pulled me aside. Apparently we haven't got any farms! We have enough meat to last us a year or three, but how are we supposed to be self-sufficient if our farming is nonexistent? I told him that I would personally dig out the farm.
Well, I started digging out the farms, when another dwarf tells me that we do have farms! Apparently they were located in that dirt-filled corridor that I saw when I first came into the fortress! I thought it was a garbage dump! This cannot stand.

17th Obsidian, 279
We dug out the skeleton of the new housing complex. I won't kick any dwarves outside of their current bedrooms, since I'd have a revolution on my hands, but any new migrants are going to have to live in the new bedrooms. Original's prerogative.

http://img16.imageshack.us/img16/9238/df4p.png

20th Obsidian, 279
I created a large map of the area we need to dig out. This includes a barracks/jail complex, a defense wing, an office complex, a stockpile complex, a hospital, and a workshop complex.
I ordered two picks to be created, and I assigned a peasant and a fisherdwarf to learn the mining trade. We're going to need miners in the days to come. If they're good with a pick, then they can drive one into an enemy's head, then we'll be fine until we can get a military up and running.

21 Obsidian, 279
No sooner said than done, one of our mining party managed to break into a vast underground cavern. I ordered it sealed. That place gives me the creeps.

22 Obsidian, 279
I knew that cave was cursed. Some of our dwarves were ambushed when they went to get some food from the outside. Who the heck keeps food outside and far away from the fort? What's wrong with you people? Why?
Not to mention that the bridge isn't even connected to any levers, so we can't seal off the fort!

http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/3885/df2r.png

25 Obsidian, 279
We lost 17 dwarves so far because they kept going outside to get socks. I had to yell at them and threaten them to stay inside.
The first thing they do when everyone's inside? They hold a party.

What is wrong with you people!?

30th Obsidian, 279
I've sealed off the entire fort. The eggheads tell me that nobody brought in any booze before they were all stupidly killed by the goblins. We're down to 46 dwarves, with one insane, and three unaccounted for. I set a well to be created.

http://img195.imageshack.us/img195/1939/df1o.png

7th Slate, 280
We're slowly dying of thirst. The well can't come soon enough. Bill has already died of thirst, as well as a melancholy dwarf. Dwarves are beginning to tantrum.

1st Felsite, 280
Some migrants arrived, apparently. From the noise up there, I gather that the goblins are beating the tar out of them. Maybe they'll leave us alone after that. I dearly hope that my son isn't among them. I told him to join me at Townslaughters before I left. I dearly regret that decision. What a fool I've been!

5th Felsite, 280
The well is finally up! It has enough water to maybe nourish the entire fort once or twice. We're making another well connected to the endless supply that is the river.

http://img94.imageshack.us/img94/9493/df3x.png

18th Felsite, 280
Knocking from the other side of the barricade means that the goblins are gone, as far as we can tell. The crisis is over, but the entire fort is pissed off. We lost about 25 dwarves. A child has been snatched, another has died of thirst. We lost 15 dwarves to the goblins, and 10 to thirst. This was an emergency waiting to happen. It's been two years, why didn't we bring all the food in? Why didn't we make a well? Why didn't we have any defenses? We had enough time to engrave most of the walls, but not build these necessary things? We had enough time to cut down all of the trees in our entire area, but not worry about the safety of our fort? This entire year will be a time of rebuilding. I just pray we won't be ambushed again.

20th Felsite, 280
Tragedy. A child has gone berserk, and somehow killed a metalsmith.

10th Hematite, 280
We've been having a lot of tantrumming dwarves. They don't go for the furniture, oh no. They punch people's brains in somehow. This is all terrible. I pray we can survive through this time of troubles.

http://img30.imageshack.us/img30/382/df5.png

15th Hematite, 280
The goblins are gone. I unseal the fortress, and we try to get booze and food. We have so many dead outside. We have so many dead inside. We cannot bury them all. We have to throw them into the tombs unceremoniously. The fisherdwarves that managed to hide outside and live on water and insects are let in. They do not speak to us. They are shaken.

17th Hematite, 280
Ye gods, the dead are rising. Dwarves have told me that the ghosts of the dead are rising, demanding that they be remembered properly. They're somehow attacking us, and they even knocked a fisherman into the magma pipe. The undead are rising! Armok have mercy!

http://img851.imageshack.us/img851/1691/df6.png

20th Hematite, 280
That fool. That utter fool! That herbalist threw a tantrum and destroyed the bridge over the magma pipe! We are cut off from the world completely. The fisherdwarves are stuck outside. No dwarf will venture out to remake the bridge. Our fort is coming down. I will be amazed if we make it through this year.

http://img52.imageshack.us/img52/2821/df7.png

27th Hematite, 280
I can't take this anymore. There's no law in the fort. I've set myself to become the sheriff. Everyone requires death. Everyone. Everyone.

5th Malachite, 280
Everyone's dying. People are going berserk. Honest, caring, dwarves are turning into beasts and craven animals. This is surely a spiraling doom. Armok have mercy. I am trying to keep everyone in line. Oh Armok, that soap maker's acting up agai-

The writing scrawls off, as if the diary had been thrown away in haste.
There are bits of blood and brains spattered everywhere.

****************************************

You pick up another diary, containing pages of cat vellum paper.
It is clean, but bears signs of wear, tear, and water damage.
On it are the words "Diary of "RPharazon II" Glovedbrands.

16th Malachite, 280
I have finally arrived at Townslaughters, but I fear that the worst has happened already. We went over to inspect the bridge, and it seems as if it caved into the magma pipe. We saw hints of the fortress down below, as if there was an opening to the fort. We saw smoke, and smelled a terrible stench. I hope that my father is alright.
On a lighter note, it seems that somehow all the trees outside of the fortress have been chopped down by dwarven power, yet the logs are still there, uncollected. It does not bode well for the fortress, but at least we have building supplies.

20th Malachite, 280
We've found a small bridge and it seems like the remains of a small habitation on the other side of the river. This seems as good a place as any to sit down, build a shelter, and rebuild our strength. We will do what we must to survive, and we will wait until we are strong enough to venture into the fortress.

http://img848.imageshack.us/img848/5055/df8.png

27th Malachite, 280
We found a survivor from the collapse. He is telling us horrible things, terrible things that have shaken us to our core. We simply cannot believe that dwarvenkind would do such things. He is completely inconsolable.

28th Malachite, 280
We found another survivor, but before we could talk to him, he collapsed on the bridge. The other survivor threw a tantrum, and destroyed the bridge. We have lost a dwarf already. It seems that depression is contagious. Now a river separates us from the fortress. Perhaps this is for the best.

6th Galena, 280
The survivor threw another tantrum and killed one of our fishers. We agreed that there was no other solution to his poor addled mind. I broke his legs and threw him into the river.

7th Galena, 280
A ghostly appartion of one of the dead fortress-dwellers has appeared to us! He tells us of the horrors he found. We cannot do a thing. We have no picks to get stone. We can't make any wooden slabs.

15th Galena, 280
A human caravan has arrived. They seem surprised to find us here. Perhaps they're used to finding the old trade depot across the Great Bridge. We have told them of our plight. They do not sympathize. Apparently, according to them, we dwarves do this all the time. We didn't have much to trade them aside from a few beds, and the clothes of our dead. It was enough to get us a bit of food and drink, though. And, more importantly, a pick. They don't seem surprised at the ghostly apparitions in the least.

http://img839.imageshack.us/img839/2411/df9.png

22nd Limestone, 280
We've acquired a pick from the humans, as well as supplies to feed us for the winter. We see more migrants on the other side of the river. We can't do anything about them right now. We don't have the supplies. We barely have enough for ourselves. We'll see about setting up a farm, and hope that they don't die on us before we're ready to take them in. I've plotted out a mini-fortress, good enough to keep us reasonably safe, and away from this damnable sun and rain.

http://img84.imageshack.us/img84/7141/df10.png

2nd Sandstone, 280
We've worked out an agreement with the new migrant group. If they can fish for themselves, and create their own food and supplies before winter rolls in, we'll let them join us across the river. According to one of them, the river freezes every winter anyways. This is truly an accursed land. The agreement is settled, and they begin working on a fishery.

http://img715.imageshack.us/img715/943/df11.png

16th Sandstone, 280
We've gotten a signal from a dwarf in the magma pipe ledge. Apparently the fortress is fine now. All the berserkers are dead, and the remaining dwarves are doing well. Not entirely happy, but they're not on the verge of going berserk. We get ready to move as soon as the river freezes.

15th Timber, 280
The dwarven caravan arrived. We've pretty much got nothing to trade them, but I got some food, booze, barrels, and buckets. The caravan did not care about our plight. They wish us the best, of course, but they aren't giving anything to us from the charity of their hearts. Capitalists. I ordered a bridge built. I think we're ready to take in the immigrants. Maybe they have crap to sell.

http://img685.imageshack.us/img685/6221/df12.png

25th Timber, 280
Well, the river's frozen over. Winter has arrived. I am debating on whether to rebuild the bridge, or simply tunnel to our rightful fortress. If the accounts of these ghosts are right, travelling outside is risky, and we're lucky we've survived this far. He also tells us various things too vile to mention here. I didn't even know what Agak meant until he started punching a goat. Now I know all too well.

14th Moonstone, 280
We're in the thick of winter. We're also collecting all the corpses of our fallen comrades. One day, we will bury them decently. Right now, we have enough to worry about. We cannot afford another goblin attack. I am digging the tunnel to the fortress as fast as I can.

http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/2066/df13.png

27th Opal, 280
I've broken through into the fortress. The rest of the dwarves don't seem surprised in the least. They just seem like zombies. Something terrible has befallen them.
Well, for better or for worse, we're back. I've begun transferring all the supplies into the fortress. I've also sealed off the provisionary fortress entrance. We have everything we need in the fort.

1st Obsidian, 280
I have found my father's corpse. I have also found his diary. He did not want me to come here, in the end, but I think that we have found a good life here. Most of the problems he complained about have been fixed. With his notes and schematics, I've found the fortress layout that he wished to carry through. I have taken up his pick, and I will become a miner.
I will still handle the trade duties, though, seeing as how I'm the best appraiser of the lot, and I was trained as a trader back in the mountainhome. I have become increasingly disillusioned with them, though. As for the remains of my father, I think keeping them in the common cemetary would be best.
He seemed to want to live as a common dwarf, so he will die like a common dwarf.

22nd Obsidian, 280
The year ends with a dwarf by the name of Vabok. He was apparently possessed by some outside force, possibly one of the previous fort-dwellers. He created a cheap artifact made of oak, and it has an image of three pine trees on it. Although its craftsmanship is unparalleled, it is still made of terrible materials so it's not worth much. I'd trade it away in a punch. Vabok is a big boy. He can handle it.

31st Obsidian, 280
I think my job is done here. My tenure as overseer has finished as the new year begins. While I did see the fortress through, and helped it recover its birthright, I have grown too weary. I have transferred leadership to another dwarf, and I left him notes strewn about the fortress. I can't remember his name, I don't care anymore.
I will place myself in charge of trading, accountancy, and mining. The fort can get back on its own legs. I am quite ready to settle down into a simple life of work. I just hope that we can get through the next year.
According to the beat-up and tattered records, a year ago there were 62 dwarves. Then two migrant waves came. Now there are barely 20 of us. I fear nobody will want to migrate. Not after the traders tell news of these catastrophes to the mountainhomes.

http://img802.imageshack.us/img802/2789/df14.png

Yes. I underwent an entire tantrum spiral. By the end, there were 6 able dwarves left in the fortress when we broke through from the provisional fortress tunnel. Quite honestly, I did the best I could. There were two goblin ambushes, three snatchers, a titan, and they caught most of the dwarves outside.
On that note, the dwarves only went outside at all because the food stockpiles were left outside, even two years after the founding. I am really, really disappointed in you, Gnoman and Billtodamax. How can you leave a fortress without water supplies, without real defenses, without any emergency capability, without any real farms, while leaving the supplies outside, and uselessly smoothing everything, after two years?
Oh well, what's done is done. I don't think a savescum is necessary, thankfully.

To the next overseer, please read the notes. Or do your own thing. The [N] menu explains things, though.
Also, you might want to use Foreman or something. I made a lot of the migrant group into carpenters and fisherdwarves, since we needed a lot of them quickly. Just go over the jobs.

Also, Gnoman? Your dwarf somehow survived throughout the entire ordeal. You're one tough mother.

Save: http://dffd.wimbli.com/file.php?id=4398

Map: http://mkv25.net/dfma/map-10420-townslaughters

[kpenguin]

Already, the story of Townslaughters is full of Fun.

[Keios]

I would like to participate on this, but not quite yet. I have three or so busy weeks ahead of me. More than anything, I wanted to express my willingness. I'll officially announce my avilability to play in the future, so don't include me yet.

Been reading this post though, quite and amount of fun in it.

[Shpadoinkle]

Sweet merciful crap, the fortress is only three years old and already it's a bloody disaster. I've got my work cut out for me... My first update should be either later today or tomorrow.

[Grif]

Oh lord. The !!Fun!! has already started? :smalleek:

Tis' gonna be a horror when it finally reaches my turn.

EDIT: Anyone compiling these gems of the stories? It'll make them easier to read in the future.

[Ilena]

BTW required viewing for any new dwarf fort leaders :P

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNrLMob39qI

[Shpadoinkle]

Okay, here we go.

So, I was appointed overseer. It's tradition in many frontier forts, for some reason I will never understand, to rotate the position of overseer every year or so. I think it's incredibly stupid, but maybe just MAYBE, I'll be able to get the fort back on its feet.

The last year was pretty much one disaster after another, and I have to hand it to my predecessor- I think he handled it better than I ever could have. My first act was to take stock of everything the fort had. I marked all the non-meat food we had to be barred from cooking, as cooks always forget to remove the seeds first.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59164/TBU3.jpg
One of the things I noticed during my tour of the fort was a stone stockpile. We have stones all over the damn place, and the damn crafters and masons can haul their own damn rocks. Stockpiling stones is just busywork, and there's too much to be done to engage in busywork.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59165/wFc.jpg
We also have a ton of cage traps... and zero loaded with cages. Fantastic.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59166/EpS.jpg
Despite the tons of food in the trade depot, it's all been forbidden and left to rot. I rectified this immediately.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59167/RlxeH.jpg
And our only farmer has a broken toe. I am AMAZED by how things went bad so fast.

I located the soap maker and told him to do nothing but farm plump helmets.

To be honest, I had no idea who any of these dwarves were or who what they were doing, I just picked random dwarves to do whatever needed to be done. Security of the fort is my main concern at the moment, and anything else can wait.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59168/hgAli.jpg
I have no idea what these rooms were intended to be, but they're our food stockpiles now.

For some reason it seems every dwarf in the fortress was told to fish in the river whenever they had a spare moment, despite the tons of food declared to be forbidden and left to rot in the old trade depot. I put an end to this and told them that fishing could go to hell and to put that damn food away before it went bad.

The bonecarver got a new job as the stonecrafter. I told him to start churning out mugs immediately.

The former hunter is now the mechanic and architect because he was the closest to the caldera when I ordered a new bridge built, and also we have tons of meat already and don't need more. He told me his name was iyaerP. I told him I didn't give a damn and to get to work.

We also have a grand total of 27 bins. This is inadequate. I order more made immediately, along with some large clay pots, as we're running low on booze. We have enough for the next six months or so, but it's very easy to lose track of time and not realize you're out of alcohol until everyone's complaining of thirst.

Spring came and the river thawed. As several dwarves were complaining of the ghosts wandering around, I ordered some memorial slabs constructed so the ghosts would be able to rest in peace.

[Shpadoinkle]

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59202/mXE.jpg
I've started construction on a well fed from the river.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59203/Vvc6.jpg
http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59204/5KLS7.jpg
I've also set up a clay collection area INSIDE the fort.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59205/xCRSH.jpg
Migrants. Lovely. Oh well, at least they'll be able to help get things organized.
We got...
- 2 Trappers
- 1 Fish Cleaner
- 1 Siege Engineer/Tanner
- 2 Cheese Makers
- 1 Wood Crafter
- 1 Glazer
- 1 Pump Operator
- 1 Miner
- 2 Animal Caretakers
- 1 Farmer
- 1 Herbalist
- 1 Fisherdwarf
- 1 Leatherworker
- 1 Gem Cutter
- 1 Engineer
- 1 Stone Crafter

Bringing the total population of Townslaughters to 41

The Fisherdwarf, Seige Engineer, and one of the Cheese Makers had some fighting experience so I assigned them to the military.

[Grif]

Just asking. Do you think we can move to another thread where one of us can update the OP regularly? That way I don't need to scroll back another 6 pages later to read the story if I want to recap.

It's tragic Maulrus himself disappeared. :smallannoyed:

[Shpadoinkle]

Oh, hooray, the bloody elves have found us.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59213/kIKfB8.jpg
AN AMBUSH!

I mobilize the militia and tell them to charge. Hopefully they won't be slaughtered.

Obok Vucarbabin, normally a cheesemaker, adopts a fighting stance and does his best to hold off the goblins until his squadmates can arrive. As he was outnumbered, he entered a martial trance almost immediately. Even so, his chances don't look good due to the fact that he had none of his equipment with him.

A few minutes later he was killed.
http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59214/Tmqn.jpg

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59215/8psa1.jpg

Shortly thereafter Rith Orsharlitast arrived and promptly beat the **** out of one of the goblins with his bare hands. The others wisely decided that maybe this ambush had been a bad idea.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59216/CYjWMB.jpg
********************
http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59217/TJH1.jpg
ANOTHER AMBUSH! A few days later. I mobilize the militia again. Morul Akrulnoglesh was he first on the scene and promptly got brained by an axe.

As the goblins were discovered very close to the entrance of the fort, I ordered the levers that retract the bridges over the caldera pulled.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59218/QEv.jpg
Rith Orsharlitast charged across the bridges and immediately got his ass knocked over the edge and into the magma. This is not a good month.

So much for the new recruits. They didn't even survive an entire month.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59219/lMsuq.jpg
Three dwarves were on the northern bridge when it raised and were flung into the magma below. I don't think they could have asked for a dwarfier death.

Meanwhile, the metalcrafter got caught outside and got his ass kicked, then thrown int he river, where he bled to death.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59220/6hiKIj.jpg
Sukos Fikodrithar got cornered on the eastern side of the river by the goblins. Deciding he was tired of this crap, he turned around and charged the goblins. Predictably, he was killed almost immediately.

Later, two more dwarves wander outside like morons, and are also chased down and butchered.


Ugh... My computer's a piece of crap and this embark runs at about 8 FPS for me, so it takes ages for anything to get done. It's late spring/early summer now, and I'm not sure I can put up with it for another 9 months of game time.

[Gnoman]

There was, at the end of my turn, substantial food and drink storage inside the fort next to the dining rooms. They are MARKED ON THE MAP.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

Gotta love people who just leave junk outside. That's just asking for 'fun' after the first year.

Also next guy should go in standing orders and forbid dead and forbid dead items. That way people do run out over the socks.

[SYPIAC]

Ha-ha! Someone was complaining about "calm" embark?
I'm sure if we were on evil one this fortress would die on the second year

[Grif]

Ha-ha! Someone was complaining about "calm" embark?
I'm sure if we were on evil one this fortress would die on the second year

Fun is inevitable. Even on a calm embark with no neighbours.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

If it isn't the neighbors it'll be some (semi)Megabeast or Clown. Heck could be the dwarves themselves. They could have mining or plumbing accidents that cause a tantrum spiral.

[Shpadoinkle]

So, the elves are leaving while the goblins are still out there. Fine by me. Point-eared bastards can go get themselves killed if they want.

Some other dwarves, being horribly stupid, wandered outside and got murdered. I don't really care at this point.

The elves tried to leave via the bridge over the caldera, but I had to pull the levers to keep the goblins from getting in as the cage traps have yet to be reloaded. Naturally, this dumped the elves and all their hippie crap in the magma. Couldn't have planned it better.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59248/6jgX.jpg

Hm... the goblins are standing on the bridge, waiting for it to extend... What I just did to the elves gives me an idea. With some planning and a little luck... First things first, though- I create a burrow encompassing the entire underground portion of the fortress so far and order everyone to stay the hell inside.

Second... I order the levers for both bridges to be pulled, to extend them. iyaerP, the Chief Architect, can see the importance of this task and volunteers to do this himself. Fitting, I suppose, as he was the one who designed and constructed the bridges and the mechanisms for operating them.

I cross my fingers and hope he won't let us down... if he does, the whole fort is doomed, as we have no weapons or armor available.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59249/xZRz.jpg

SUCCESS! HAHAHA!

The goblins are dropped directly into the mouth of the volcano and meet a fiery demise. I order two statues made to commemorate the event- one in my honor, of course, and one in honor of iyaerP, the designer and builder of the trap. They were supposed to be statues OF the two of us, but instead we got statues of Laltur...
http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59251/1xf.jpg
And of... just some random people, I guess. One of them does kind of have my jaw though, and the other sort of looks like iyaerP, if you're drunk and squinting and a long way away. I guess the metalcrafter just sucks at rendering accurate likenesses of people.
http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59252/qlSLpQ.jpg

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59253/KV1I.jpg
Apparently the dropping of the goblins into the magma inspired Gnoman, as shortly thereafter he got an odd look in his eye I was all too familiar with. Gnoman ran over to the mason's workshop and commandeered it from Kadol Onulubal, grabbed a piece of andesite and a piece of alunite and set to work.

A while later, he finishes his work. It's a coffer.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59254/J5tQ.jpg

A really nice coffer, granted, but still just a coffer... Which for some reason has a picture of itself on it. Gnoman calls it "The Naughty Fortress," whatever the hell that's supposed to mean. I'm not sure I want to know. I order it put in the dining room so everybody can admire it and ask Gnoman to carve a couple more statues to spruce up the dining room. I also ask him to create some slabs to the ghosts wandering around will quit bothering people.

I also ordered the well to be deconstructed and replaced it with one made entirely from gold. Well, almost- the mechanism that operates it had to be made of iron, but otherwise it's solid gold.

There were also some mining plans that one of the previous overseers had left. Evidently he was going to place the barracks, jail, and weapon stockpile in the rooms he'd planned out, but it seems he never got around to it. I had them mined out anyway. I probably won't get to doing those things either, but the the rooms will be there in case a future overseer chooses to make use of them.

[RPharazon]

I see that Gnoman is still being weird. Going through a fortress collapse and seeing about 55 dwarves dying in front of him should be a bit traumatic for anyone.

"The Naughty Fortress" indeed.


Also, I did see the food stockpile next to the common room. It was tiny, and I tried to expand it, but the downfall occurred. And the booze was still outside, in the end. In fact, most of the food was outside.

[Gnoman]

There were hundreds of units of food in that "tiny" stockpile, and booze was forbidden in the outside stockpile.

[iyaerP]

From the diary of iyaerP, Chief Architect of the Fortress of Townslaughters.

It has been quite some time since I last put down my thoughts in stone, and I must admit that although it has been nearly three years since I have done so, the time has gone by in the blink of an eye. I believe that a great part of that is due to the fact that I was demoted to performing manual labour during this time. Though loathe to give up my chosen profession and abase myself to working with the dregs of society, I did what I had to do. The survival of the fortress comes before all, and the orders of an overseer are absolute and unquestionable.

But enough of that miserable whining. I am no elf and the most recent crisis has proved to most admirably demonstrate my competance and the merit of my prodigious intellect. I had been doing my menial job, out hunting the terrible beasts of the wild so that the fortress might survive a while longer, when I was confroned by the latest in our succession of overseers.

"You there. Hunter dwarf. What's yer name?" Our rather brusque and burly overseer demanded of me. I couldn't help but noticing his rather military beard-braiding, and the way that his keen eyes constantly combed the volcanoscape around us as if expecting to be attacked at any moment.

"I am Chief Architect iyaerP. I was assigned here by the Royal Architetural League to administ-"

"Good enough. Shut up and rebuild the caldera bridge before any goblins show up. Don't just stand there like an idiot with yer jaw open! HOP TO!"

I must admit to having suffered from quite the shell-shock at hearing the arbitrary and near random reappointment to my beloved post. No more trudging through rain or snow to pot at a far off mountain goat with a crossbow barely worthy of the name. No more carrying 125 pounds of dead goat all the way up the steep sides of our beloved home. No more having to desperately try to beat some poor creature to death when I run out of bolts. None of that any more for me. The only possible conclusion that I can draw was that Shpadoinkle must have seen my proposals to our previous overseers regarding my plans to bridge the river that migrants and merchants might arrive and cross without fear of fording the rapids, and decided thusly that was the best dwarf for the job.

Such was my overwhelming joy at this pronouncement, I very nearly did embrace our most excellent overseer, and visions of glorious future projects raced through my head in rapid succession. By the time I was paying attention to reality again, our overseer was gone, and only the vital project of rebuilding our bridge awaited. I eagerly got to work.


It wasn't until later this spring that the merits of my professional design became apparent. Inspired by a hilarious accident with the elven caravan, when Townslaughters came under siege by goblins, there was only one sensible course of action. That didn't stop the military recruits, still wet behind the ears and believing every word of propaganda that they were invincible from charging out against four times their number, but the fact that they didn't really know what they were doing only made their slaughter that much worse. At any rate, Overseer Shpadoinkle assigned me to operate the drawbridge trap. Only fitting as I had been the one to design it.

I must say, as I sat at the lever in the control room, listening for the call to activate it, I felt an uncontrollable spasm of terror. If one single mechanism siezed up, or some tiny unforseen flaw revealed itself, it would ensure the failure of the drawbridges and the doom of us all as a dozen goblins murdered their way through the fortress. The fate of us all rested on the prowess of my engineering, and I found myself going over every bit of the minutiae of the construction in my head.

This actually calmed my nerves a great deal, and when I heard the sentry call out that the goblins had set foot on the bridge, I counted silently to myself and pulled the lever when I calculated that they would be 1/3 the way across. Had I pulled too soon, not enough of them would have been on the bridge when it retracted, and had I waited too long, some would have made it across.

But based on the roar of cheering that I heard from where the rest of the fort sat huddled in the safety bunker, I had timed it perfectly, and all the goblins dropped into the magma of the caldera.

I can think of no dwarfier way to end thid diary entry. I shall continue it when I have more news of importance.

[Shpadoinkle]

Hm... I'm puzzled. I have about a dozen units of fire clay, and the magma kiln is powered, but for some reason I can't make anything there. Anybody know what might be causing this?


http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59329/Rqtv.jpg
http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59330/a8hE.jpg

Hm... apparently a giant bat has gotten into the fortress somehow. I ask Gnoman to go kill it, as he's the only dwarf in the fortress with any fighting experience or equipment. He obliges and proceeds to brain the animal with his axe.

Several dwarves were complaining abut the smell coming from the mass graveyard. I ordered the doorway cleared (no small task) so the door will actually be able to be closed. Hopefully this will help keep the smell confined to the graveyard.

Despite thinking I wouldn't be able to get around to it, I more or less constructed a barracks and assigned some dwarves who weren't doing anything useful to the military. Hopefully they'll last longer than the previous recruits.

Oh, hooray, more bloody useless migrants. Oh well. At least now we have some more bodies for the milita.

This time we received:
- 1 Trapper
- 1 Metalsmith
- 1 Glassmaker
- 1 Soap Maker
- 1 Herbalist
- 1 Siege Operator
- 1 Clothier

Minus the deaths in the last few months, this brings our population up to 35. I tell the new recruits to grab whatever equipment they can find and start training.

We were running low on iron, so I had the miners go dig out some magnetite and limonite that had been discovered towards the eastern edge of our territory.

[iyaerP]

check your burrows and if the kiln has any restrictions on who can use it.


Also check the clay to see if it is forbidden.

[Shpadoinkle]

Ah, yes, that was it- the clay wasn't in the same burrow.


http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59345/XcUhR5.jpg

The pocket of magnetite was larger than I'd expected. With this we should be able to outfit most if not all of the military in iron at least- as the year is more than half over, I probably won't have enough time to get everyone outfitted in steel during my time as overseer, but hopefully the next overseer will.

I must admit, I'm puzzled about how the bat managed to get into the fortress. As far as I can tell all the entrances to the caverns are sealed up, and him coming in the main entrance is unlikely, considering how far down he was when he was discovered.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59346/p20ZCR.jpg
I've designated this area to be dug out for the placement of ballista. They should be able to cover the great bridge and more at this point. I doubt I'll have time to get them constructed during my time as overseer, but it's something for my successors to consider.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59347/PrXZ70.jpg
The human caravan has arrived. We don't need much of anything at the moment, but I'll see what they have anyway.

I traded a bunch of mugs for some stuff the humans had- some metal bars, raw glass in case of strange moods (there's no sand in our territory so we can'tmake glass ourselves,) and some booze to reinforce our own stocks. In between making plans and giving orders I'd been able to keep our alcohol supply more or less steady, but having extra on hand never hurts. None of the other stuff they had was very interesting but I gave them a healthy profit anyway.

[Gnoman]

Ah, yes, that was it- the clay wasn't in the same burrow.


http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59345/XcUhR5.jpg

The pocket of magnetite was larger than I'd expected. With this we should be able to outfit most if not all of the military in iron at least- as the year is more than half over, I probably won't have enough time to get everyone outfitted in steel during my time as overseer, but hopefully the next overseer will.

I must admit, I'm puzzled about how the bat managed to get into the fortress. As far as I can tell all the entrances to the caverns are sealed up, and him coming in the main entrance is unlikely, considering how far down he was when he was discovered.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59346/p20ZCR.jpg
I've designated this area to be dug out for the placement of ballista. They should be able to cover the great bridge and more at this point. I doubt I'll have time to get them constructed during my time as overseer, but it's something for my successors to consider.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59347/PrXZ70.jpg
The human caravan has arrived. We don't need much of anything at the moment, but I'll see what they have anyway.

I traded a bunch of mugs for some stuff the humans had- some metal bars, raw glass in case of strange moods (there's no sand in our territory so we can'tmake glass ourselves,) and some booze to reinforce our own stocks. In between making plans and giving orders I'd been able to more or less keep our alchol supply more or less steady, but having extra on hand never hurts. None of the other stuff they had was very interesting but I gave them a healthy profit anyway.


Image tags are better than urls. (fixed in the quoted spoiler)

[Grif]

Now I'm afraid of actually mucking the fortress when it's my turn. :smalleek: I need to learn how to set burrows asap.

(Yes, I very rarely used to burrow feature.)

[Shpadoinkle]

I know- the reason I haven't been using the image tags is because I haven't bothered with resizing or cropping or anything, and on the off chance someone has a slow connection or something I figured it wouldn't hurt to just link to the images instead of using the img tags.


Limestone 26th
More migrants. I had thought, after the constant disasters of the previous year, that we wouldn't get any immigrants this year but evidently I was wrong. This wave brings us...
- 1 Animal Dissector
- 1 Bone Doctor. Maybe he'll be able to do something about the stupid farmer who's been sitting in the dining room, complaining loudly and constantly and refusing to do any work because she stubbed a toe last year or something.
- 1 Carpenter. As if we needed more.
- 1 Peasant with absolutely no skills of note. He is an adequate flatterer, though. My guess is he spent a lot of time goofing off back at the mountainhomes and eventually someone in a position of power got tired of it, and he managed to talk his way into getting reassigned here instead of hammered.
- 2 Weaponsmiths. They would have been nice to have BEFORE we finished forging axes for the military...
- 1 Miller

Bringing our total numbers back up to 42.

14th Sandstone
Finally got all those damn ghosts to go away.

I must say, things are going well. Booze and food stocks are healthy, our army is training and will be fully outfitted in iron armor shortly, and the goblins have left us alone for the last several months. We have enough iron ore to last us for quite a while, though it'll take time to process it into usable bars. I've expanded the forge operations and added two new smelters. Presently the biggest problem is that the farmer won't shut the hell up about her stupid toe.

20th Sandstone
http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59353/5BZ.jpg
Oh, of course. Things were going far too well for me to think it would continue. Hopefully we have what he'll want.

[Shpadoinkle]

Apparently Degel wants bones and rocks. Well, we have tons of rocks, buddy, take your pick. As for bones... well, we're short on bones. I order a butcher's workshop erected and mark a couple stray animals for slaughter. Hopefully we can get that done before Degel loses his mind.

As soon as a stray water buffalo was slaughtered, Degel charged off for the butcher's shop, almost knocking me on my ass as he ran past. I knew better than to get in his way, though.

Evidently those weren't enough, so I had the butcher slaughter the other stray animals in the pasture. Hopefully he doesn't want even more.

Timber 10
http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59360/ClTmH.jpg
Degel finally began working on whatever it was that was so damn important. It's probably going to be something stupid like a scepter.

Timber 15
http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59361/HCSasM.jpg
http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59362/wdhp2I.jpg
Degel is finished, and it's... a door. Not QUITE as useless as a scepter, but still not something to get that excited about. I tell him to get the hell back to work making mugs for trade and figure we might as well get SOME use out of the stupid door, so I have it installed at the entrance to the dining room where people can admire it. He finishes just in time for the dwarven caravan from the mountainhomes to arrive.

Timber 19
just as the caravan arrives at the depot, a goblin ambush assaults one of the woodcutters. I order the militia to mobilize and sic them on the goblins. Let's see if their training has done any good.

[Shpadoinkle]

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59365/VaJ.jpg
Well, that woodcutter is screwed.

The entire military at the moment consists of fifteen dwarves. All of them have axes, but most are only partially armored. Reconsidering my earlier plans, I decided that instead of risking the partially trained and poorly equipped military against them, I figure I might as well give the bridge trap another shot.

The woodcutter is quickly caught and beaten to death. Everyone else is ordered to stay inside.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59366/ofiCJ.jpg
HAHA! ANOTHER SUCCESS! The entire macegoblin squad is dropped directly into the magma!

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59367/svU.jpg
The crossbow squad, completely disregarding what just happened to the other goblin team, approaches the great bridge as well. I order the bridges extended again.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59368/uVhN.jpg
AND AGAIN! Two goblin squads completely eliminated just like that! I must admit that at first I thought building the primary entrance over a magma vent was stupid, but now I have nothing but praise for Gnoman's idea. I have the bridges extended again and get to trading.

I buy mostly metal bars and booze, as well as any armor they happen to have so we can hopefully rely on the military should the bridge trap ever fail, and enough invaders make it past the cage traps to present a credible threat. The military should probably be the last line of defense, if any future overseers happen to read this. If any future overseers are more mechanically minded, they may consider trying to rig the briges to raise automatically when invaders try to cross them.

[Gnoman]

In future, the bridge should not be used too much. Not only does it make things easy, it deprives the fort of loot. There's no real option right now, but it is something to keep in mind.

[Shpadoinkle]

Well, the options were pretty much "use the bridge" or "let 90% of the fort get slaughtered."

Besides, I don't know if there's anything dwarfier than using a retractable bridge to fling goblins into a magma pipe. Boatmurdered had the magma flood- Townslaughters just cuts out the middleman and drop goblins directly into the magma.

As for loot, well, we've already got tons of iron ore, which is already being processed into bars, and tons of mugs for trade, so we don't need their clothes. We don't need anymore useless crap laying around.


Winter came, and the water directly under the well froze... while the rest of the water in the reservoir remained liquid. This is a complication I hadn't anticipated. As this makes the well useless, this needs to be rectified, and it's not as simple as simply routing some magma underneath it as the well is multiple levels deep. Despite the fact that originally I had placed the well outside in an attempt to help prevent sunsickness, it seems that if we want to have water during the winter months it's going to have to be moved inside. Consequently, I did just that. The building I had constructed around the well remains, should a future overseer find some use for it.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59381/DLfT2S.jpg
FORGOTTEN BEAST! However, it's in the caverns, which are sealed off (at least from everywhere I can see) so he shouldn't be a problem, as he can't get to anybody.

Opal 15
Id Alathkes, a fish cleaner who evidently died here, is pissed off and came back as a ghost. His first act was to disembowel Avuz Morlogem. I don't think he'll live. I immediately ordered a memorial slab for Id. Too bad he couldn't have done that to Dakost Duthnurkol instead, though...

Yep. He bled to death before making it a hundred feet. Queuing up a slab for him too.

http://www.dumpyourphoto.com/files2/59383/erH1q.jpg
Somehow I overlooked the obvious- the magma vent is open to the outside. These walls and floors should seal it off. They probably won't be finished during the last few weeks of my time as overseer, so I ask my successor to make sure they're completed.



Compared to the rest of the year, winter was pretty uneventful. Most dwarves are either ecstatic of happy, with a few content outliers. Food and booze stocks are pretty healthy, the military is mostly outfitted and training, and there are a lot of mugs for trade... I've pretty much pulled the fortress back to its feet, which is what I expected to be doing, to be honest, but only because I've read the stories of several succession forts already. We still need some doctors and a jail, but aside from that the fort is running fairly well.

Save: http://dffd.wimbli.com/file.php?id=4414
Map: http://mkv25.net/dfma/map-10427-townslaughters

iyaerP, you're up.

[Grif]

If any future overseers are more mechanically minded, they may consider trying to rig the briges to raise automatically when invaders try to cross them.

If no one does this by my turn, I'm going to try. For science!

[iyaerP]

iyaerP, you're up.
EXCELLENT. Tonight and tomorrow night are work nights for me, so my first update will probably come sometime Saturday or Sunday.


If no one does this by my turn, I'm going to try. For science!

I know how to do it, but I have a good reason why I won't.
Our current bridge setup is such that setting up an automated repeater that would be a dwarfpower intensive project with much required testing and a great possibility for friendly fire.

Also, I have other plans for said dwarf-power.

[Shpadoinkle]

Gnoman
billtodamax
RPharazon
Shpadoinkle
iyaerP - current turn
Celesyne
Level8Mudcrab
Grif
ObadiahtheSlim
SYPIAC
kpenguin
Maulrus


For future reference.

[Gnoman]

As for loot, well, we've already got tons of iron ore, which is already being processed into bars, and tons of mugs for trade, so we don't need their clothes. We don't need anymore useless crap laying around.


Goblin Weapons and armour can be used directly now. Whoever genereated the world removed goblin clothes.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

I genned it so goblins only wear pants and underware. Dramatically cuts down on hauling jobs after a good slaughter.

[SYPIAC]

I genned it so goblins only wear pants and underware
Do you mean... No armor?

[Gnoman]

No, he means no *cave spider silk thongs*.

[billtodamax]

But those are always so good to trade! I got so many giant cave spider silk outfits off of goblins.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

You still trade the +<<Spider Silk Pants>>+ It is just the other bits.

[SYPIAC]

Full suit is still more than only one pants

[Celesyne]

Due to unforseen circumstances at work, I'm going to be moving again. So, If you'd like to shunt me to the bottom of the list in order to guarantee a smoother flow of gameplay, I would greatly appreciate it.

[kpenguin]

Well, lack of armor just made fending off goblin sieges a lot less tricky, I believe.

[SYPIAC]

Well, lack of armor just made fending off goblin sieges a lot less tricky, I believe.
They already can't open doors! Why should we make it less FUNnier?
Maybe let's make lava temperature 10036 U°, disable sieges and starving at all?
That's really cool if you can play till all your dwarfs die because they're too old!
That was sarcasm. I always make goblins able to open doors on init.

[kpenguin]

That was more of a complaint than it was a sign of relief. Goblin sieges are a good source of fun on a calm embark.

[Gnoman]

According to the information I have ARMOUR WAS NOT REMOVED FROM GOBLINS, ONLY CLOTHING.

[Grif]

I genned it so goblins only wear pants and underware. Dramatically cuts down on hauling jobs after a good slaughter.

Ah you just took out the layer of clothing they wore underneath their armor? :smallamused: Guess that makes picking up after a siege a little easier.

[billtodamax]

Ah you just took out the layer of clothing they wore underneath their armor? :smallamused: Guess that makes picking up after a siege a little easier.

A little easier and infinitely more disturbing.

[Grif]

Speaking of which, my screenshots will be using one of them imagepacks. That okay with you guys?

[SYPIAC]

Checking out saves, la-la-la-la-la
WTF???
http://s006.radikal.ru/i213/1105/7a/bfc3b939b2cb.png (http://www.radikal.ru)
How did I missed that in reports?

[Gnoman]

Cage traps don't generate a report.

[SYPIAC]

But coming of giants might do?

[Gnoman]

True. I think it was before youre turn.

[SYPIAC]

My turn still isn't happened
But I'll put that guy in center of zoo on my turn

[iyaerP]

Well, I must say, pleasing though this is, it does come as some suprise to be appointed overseer of Townslaughters. While I had expected it at some point, perhaps as the result of many long and arduous years of work, I had not expected my natural brilliance to single me out this early. Well, you make do with the ore you find as my mother always said.

My first task as overseer is to go over and post in the public meeting area this past year's end-of-the-year stocks screen. It seems that INSERTNAMEHERE forgot to do it in the stress of rebuilding. No worries I say. So long as it gets posted, every dwarf in the fort will feel better about themselves knowing how productive we were even in a year of crisis management.
http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p287/iyaerP/StartoftheYearstocks.jpg

Anyway, as I was going through the records, I found that our current military, though moderately well equipped, had a downright LAZY training regimen. I posted a new order stating that all military squads must have no less than five dwarves training at all times. That should be enough to keep them in top form without causing too many complaints about being worked to death. Whoever set them up in the first place required only ONE dwarf per squad to be training at any one time. HA! One dwarf? Can you believe it? No wonder the militia was so dismal in combat. They were loafing off rather than learning how to fight.

Second order of business was to physically tour the whole fort itself. While we each and all live here, its not quite the same thing as methodically combing the fort for problems. And OH what a LIST I made. First of all, we had poor Dakost the farmer screaming and yelling at all hours due to still not having any kind of medical treatment for having lost his arm almost an entire year ago (OOC note: The announcement log is FULL of his spam for as far back as it goes, 26 pages.) When I ask Tulon, our chief medical dwarf about it, he says that he can't do anything because there isn't anywhere that is set up as a hospital.*Note from later in the year: There was one, but for some reason nobody ever gets taken there, and it has no well in it. I looked around, and sure enough. Nothing to be found. Our well, made explicitly for the use of healthcare and the treatment of wounded dwarves was just a dingy thing at the end of a dirt corridor. I ordered the area around it dug out and went to put in a bed and some chests so that we could stock medical supplies only to find we have no carpenter dwarf, let along a carpenter's shop.

Things went on like that, and before I knew it, half of spring was gone, and I hadn't gotten a single worthwhile thing done simply due to having to clean up so many messes.

1st of Slate: MIGRANTS! Excellent. I needed more manual laborers. Work doesn't progress quickly enough. Twenty eight migrants. What are we going to do with TWENTY EIGHT more migrants? Both military squads have been filled to capacity with new recruits from the useless dregs of the migrant population, and the rest have been put to work. Armok only knows where we are going to find housing and food for them all.

24th of Slate: Well, Dakost's horrible shrieking ended today. Despite doing all I could for him, building a brand new hospital, and doing my best to stock it, none of our SEVEN medical dwarves did anything to bring him to the hospital or even treat him. For Shame. In order to prevent incidents of this nature from occurring in the future, I have assigned Tulon, our CMD to a bedroom immediately adjacent to the hospital so that he will always be available for any dwarf needing medical assistance.

11th of Felsite: A fisherdwarf military recruit by the name of Medtob Abirtekkud was taken by a fey mood today. Such is the will of Armok, although since Medtob has no skill of any kind with any crafting, there is no predicting what sort of artifact he will attempt to create.

16th of Felsite: Joy. The elves arrived today. I wonder why they will leave in a huff this time. Better start tossing crap into the trade depot. And they are immediately followed by a goblin ambush. Given the state that the military is in, I shall resort to the tried and true method of dropping the goblins into the magma.
http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p287/iyaerP/flyingGoblins2.jpg
http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p287/iyaerP/FlyingGoblins.jpg


Well, that was simple enough. Despite the fear and trepidation I felt the first time our beloved home came under goblin attack, dropping them into the magma has become an almost casual and entertaining routine. Five dwarves (all relatively useless migrants thankfully) were caught outside and killed due to either ambush or failure to heed the alarm bells, but there is little that can be done on that count other than to bury the dead and get on with our lives.

Right as the last of the goblins disappeared into the magma below, Medtob announced that he had finished his artifact, Dalemnitig, an alunite trumpet. He used the bones of the giant bat that attacked last year, saying that it was poetic justice.

http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p287/iyaerP/Dalemitig.jpg

Well, trading went well enough. I traded a massive pile of mugs, dead dwarves and dead goblin's various articles of clothing, and a pile of shoddy mechanisms that I have been turning out by the binful as I practice the fine art of the mechanic. From the elves, I got a great deal of booze, a good number of various animals to be slaughtered for delicious new varieties of food, and a ton of cloth, barrels, splints, chests, and other odds and ends that may prove useful. Also, I grabbed some of their shoddy wooden weapons with the intent of making a row of weapon traps on the causeway that leads up to the retracting bridges. Because redundancy when it came to defense against the insidious goblins never hurt anyone.

10th of Hematite: Mining south of the forges in an attempt to expand them has stuck a gold vein. I have ordered it all mined out.


Today, our GLORIOUS mayor, Iden Otsusobok came to me and DEMANDED that I have three mini-forges made or to suffer a hammering. I raised an eyebrow at him, laughed merrily, and got back to REAL work. As he left in a snit, he shouted over his shoulder that his current living accommodations were completely inadequate for someone of his statue. I nobly refrained from making a joke about how his stature could do with a little reduction. http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p287/iyaerP/mayor.jpg

Still, I suppose that appeasing his ego is necessary if he is the mayor (since when have we had a mayor? Were there even elections? Shouldn't someone have told the overseer about this?), and told our craftdwarves to get to it “when they have time,” which I am sure will delay them enough to piss off our duly elected buffoon, but not so much that he orders a hammering.

Come to think of it, we don't actually have a captain of the guard. And looking up our criminal justice logs shows that our esteemed mayor is himself due for a beating. Perhaps it is time to get around to installing some law and order here in the fortress......


13th of Malachite: MORE migrants. As if we didn't have enough. Our population is now 72 (OOC note: This is worrisome. 80 is siege/megabeast attack range and we aren't prepared to deal with either of those. Despite buffing up our military as much as I can, they are still quite pathetic.)

11th of Galena: What the bloody HELL is this? Ghostly farmer attack? WHY WASN'T HE BURIED? We have SIX empty coffins. You FOOLS. Wait you mean she was buried? What, how WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY? Armok DAMN all ghosts. And why did you have to attack our Armorer. You never even knew him in life you despicable cheese-making ELF. Quick, someone make ANOTHER tombstone for the poor whiney ELF ghost that can't stay dead. That's right. You are no longer a Dwarf. You have been demoted to elfhood for your crimes you malevolent undead abomination.
http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p287/iyaerP/Solon.jpg



And the human caravan arrives. Because I am not retarded, and have a working sense of pattern recognition, I am going to preemptively order everyone inside and have the military standing by in the trade depot. Just.... cuz.

Well, my paranoia seems to have gotten the better of me this time. No goblin attack materialized, and we traded peacefully.

6th of Limestone: Sazir Nishthobut, one of the immigrant blacksmiths was taken by a fey mood. I can only hope for a good artifact.


You know what this fort needs more of? BINS. We have a mere 84, barely enough for ONE stockpile of goods, never-mind the multitude that this fortress has. I DEMAND BINS!


And our fey mood produces The Match of Braids, a gold splint. The ridiculousness of this item is offset only by the fact that it is worth almost 80,000 dwarfbucks. Far above and beyond any other artifact this fort has yet produced. I am not sure to laugh or cry at this one. A gold artifact, but it is a SPLINT. /facepalm
http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p287/iyaerP/splintdescription.jpg
http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p287/iyaerP/splintvalue.jpg


14th of Sandstone. More migrants. We now have precisely 80 dwarves. In a bureaucratic error, an attempt to form a marksdwarves squad using some of the migrants has resulted in one of them becoming captain of the guard and attempted to commence with dispensing justice, dwarven style. I managed to have him sacked from his position as captain of the guard, but not before he could brain our esteemed mayor. He has since been detailed to “guard” the caldera bridge during a routine performance test. He shall not be missed.
http://i131.photobucket.com/albums/p287/iyaerP/justice.jpg

[SYPIAC]

Awww, drowning expert marksdwarf sucks!
Also, nice two more ghosts. Just what we needed

[Shpadoinkle]

I set the minimum number of dwarves for military training as 1 because if there are fewer than the minimum number available then (as I understand it, anyway) the others will go to the barracks but just stand around not doing anything until the minimum number is reached. I didn't really have time to experiment with this during my year though.

Also, bear in mind this is the minimum, not the maximum. You'll notice all the dwarves in the militia had all their labors turned off. This means that, aside from eating/sleeping/drinking/breaks, the only thing there was for them to do was train.