Babinushal – Nâzomkib
Friendlytreason – Dreamynet
(https://i.imgur.com/yXxNStI.png)
Have you always wanted to live on a volcanic, reanimating mountain, with local bitter sludge and eerie mist, in a world that is mostly an evil biome and is infested by goblins? Would you like to play a succession game without rules EXCEPT one? Do you commit treason but in a friendly way? Then this fortress is made for you!
Let us know if you are taking over and I'll happily add you to the succession list below. Being dorfed is welcome as well.
Rules
- Avoid FPS death at all cost
- You may play as long as you like in-game but the turn has to should be submitted after one week, coordinate with next overseer
Successions
» year 193: xkcd1963 part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8303962#msg8303962)
» year 194: Mobbstar part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8306235#msg8306235)
» year 195: NordicNooob part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8307079#msg8307079) • part 2 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8307637#msg8307637) • part 3 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8310248#msg8310248) • part 4 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8314779#msg8314779)
» year 202: xkcd1963 part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8344323#msg8344323) • part 2 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8344483#msg8344483) • part 3 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8347455#msg8347455)
» year 205: Bombyx Mori part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8351447#msg8351447) • part 2 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8361036#msg8361036)
» year 208: AvolitionBrit part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8366461#msg8366461) • part 2 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8368018#msg8368018)
» year 211: StrikaAmaru part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8373182#msg8373182) • part 2 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8373220#msg8373220) • part 3 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8374639#msg8374639) • part 4 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8375820#msg8375820) • part 5 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8377624#msg8377624)
» year 215: AvolitionBrit part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8378248#msg8378248)
» year 219: StrikaAmaru part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8382549#msg8382549) • part 2 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8383392#msg8383392) • part 3 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8386077#msg8386077) • part 4 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8387474#msg8387474) • part 5 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8388168#msg8388168)
» year 220: AvolitionBrit part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8393205#msg8393205)
» year 220: xkcd1963 part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8392393#msg8392393)
» year 228: StrikaAmaru part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8395495#msg8395495) • part 2 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8386077#msg8386077) • part 3 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8396931#msg8396931) • part 4 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8397475#msg8397475)
» year 229: xkcd1963 part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8399034#msg8399034) • part 2 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8401154#msg8401154) • part 3 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8435792#msg8435792) • part 4 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8436401#msg8436401) • part 5 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8437332#msg8437332)
» year 231: StrikaAmaru part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8441039#msg8441039)
» year 239: dikbutdagrate part 1 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8448369#msg8448369) • part 2 (http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=178865.msg8448369#msg8448369)
» next: ?
Some screenshots
(https://i.imgur.com/N05TqOM.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/jN0XusW.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/VyOZG5C.png)
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(https://i.imgur.com/YKeFedK.png)
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(https://i.imgur.com/ciuImfd.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/RWYUb30.png)
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(https://i.imgur.com/Ku0LRZV.png)
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(https://i.imgur.com/CrU4L3q.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/UnHUUXy.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/Se8mpIP.png)
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(https://i.imgur.com/YfUEBIe.png)
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(https://i.imgur.com/rRsps0J.png)
Comic strips
(https://i.imgur.com/bPLw8Zi.jpg)
Current population cap: 75
DF version: 0.47.05
Fortress map size: 4x4
=== Original Post ===
Hi there. I'm relatively new on the Forum so I might have missed that there is maybe a room for this type of play.
Anyway, I was recently reading the story of Headshoots https://lparchive.org/Dwarf-Fortress-Headshoots/ and as far as I understand it, some people gathered together playing DF. Not quite multiplayer but each player would rule the fortress one year and then somebody else would take over the save file, starting a new year. Players also reserved names for dwarfen personnel that was integrated into storytelling "sorry McUrist but you died again of thirst during my reign".
To summarise the story quickly, the humble beginning towards common progress turned quickly into a madhouse, each ruler only possessed with creating the most pompous tomb to be remembered for. Quote "This is it - Headshoots - the most legendary and the most notorious dwarven outpost on this continent. Its abysmal architecture doesn't seem to follow any kind of logical structure. There are half finished towers, flooding corridors, terrible death traps and labyrinths. Citizens crawl through long corridors in muddy rags."
Would anyone be interested to play together? It would be good to also write what happened during your year and posting some screenshots.
Something else, while reading the story of Headshoots I realised they were playing an older version of DF (2014?) or had mods installed, I'm not sure.
» There was a bottomless chasm, it seems the current DF version doesn't support this feature anymore. I found it quite interesting. It's literally a hole without end (leading to a bottom that seems to erase stuff)
» Mighty warrior dworfs frequently smashed enemies that flied off in an arc often 20 tiles into distance. I had a very strong adventurer once but I can't recall being able to just smash enemies into the air with an object
Most community forts will gladly add you to their queue and it'll be your turn in a few weeks. Some even say something along the lines of "looking for overseers" in the title and the only thing stopping you from reviving old forts is whether the last person posted their savefile.
Noted. Do you currently play one?
I know of Archcrystal, which has managed to keep running for almost 500 years now (since 2015). It is not a community fort though, that would be extremely impressive! Perhaps a new player every year is too slow for that.
Archcrystal, an amazing fort.
I wonder if it were fun to make a community fort where every year, a lever/tripwire with some functionality must be added. Can be as easy as a door control, or as disastrous as a self destruct button. If you have to take one down for whatever reason, you must add another elsewhere.
Ok. I've added plenty already (see below).
Good thinking! The suggested parameters sound good to me.
Okay, here we go then (0.47.05): https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=15636
»The Land Of Brilliance«
Location: The ungodly tooth
Mountain: The order of fire
Civilization: The Dreamy Net
Fort: Friendlytreason
Government: Friendlydevils
Official goal: Extract minerals for the glory of our king
Expedition leader Athel Inkyvory – 15th of Granite 193
It has been a very dangerous ride to reach the tip of this mountain. Luckily none of us got into squirrels with the local wildlife. Wildlife is not precise, it's rather dead animals that somehow continue to live. Their flesh has disappeared but they continue to roam this forsaken place. Where do these beings take that strength from? Anyway, I've to focus on my mission, we are to extract the minerals that this place has to offer and send it to the southern commonwealth. The decisions that have been made in the mountainhomes are good from commercial perspective. This mountain is rich in minerals. We've already found ore for gold, silver, lead, zink and copper. No iron in sight yet though.
Expedition leader Athel Inkyvory – 18th of Granite 193
It's raining bitter sludge! Why oh why did we decide to come here? This hellish beast of a flying skeleton is freaking me out! And an eerie mist is roaming the countryside, I'm glad we did not come in contact with it.
And our first kill goes to Zuglar:
(https://i.imgur.com/giByyyJ.png)
Catten has been badly wounded by an undead wolverine while running to a pond to clean himself from sludge:
(https://i.imgur.com/DeHPb0A.png)
Expedition leader Athel Inkyvory – 15th of Felsite 193
We've finally established a secure place for ourselves. We have killed 23 undead beings, poor Catten seems to have taken big hits, though his bended extremities look somehow fascinating to me now, I'll have to investigate that. We've started to dig down. Though there is sure enough beverage for this year to come, we need a source of emergency water. New reinforcement has arrived from the mountainhomes, they won't see whats comin these fools.
(https://i.imgur.com/BV4RogP.png)
–removed due to duplicate–
New temple inquired:
(https://i.imgur.com/C0h2TzK.png)
Marriage of expedition leader and Catten:
(https://i.imgur.com/gI4t9do.png)
Expedition leader Athel Inkyvory – 15th of Granite 193
One year is over. After we have had closed ourselves in, nothing particular had happened. I started my duties as priestess of the Blockaded Sanctuary (change the name if you like) and I've no more time to manage this fortress for the time being. We are running very low on food and beverage, but we've already established farms close to the watersource and many more are supposed to be build. Maybe we should consider cave fishing, although it is very dangerous to go out in the caves.
Music suggestion: Shadows by Rasmus Fynbo (https://rasmusfynbo.bandcamp.com/track/shadows)
2nd Year
15th Granite - Aban Mebzuthďteb
Our food stocks are low. Our leader Athel Likotsosad has put me in charge of rationing and protecting what little we have left. We should be able to survive on water and scraps until the first harvest, and we will have to. The caverns are not safe and fishing seems like a bad idea too, given the curses that befall all dead in this land. Our unfortunate liaison's beheaded body claws at the fort gates at this very moment.
21st Granite - Aban Mebzuthďteb
I've begun planning a more varied kitchen to allow us the processing of sweetpods into syrup. This will take a while, but should bolster our food supplies enough so we need not tighten our belts until the farms are finished and the crops ripe.
The earth around the upper cavern rumbles. More draltha must have fallen victim to - and thereupon joined - the horde besieging us. With every apathetic step they take, their enormous injured bodies send unnerving shockwaves to our fort. They never seem to sleep or rest. It is starting to wear on our sanity, and we fear they will never let loose. What if the contrary comes true, and they continue to grow in numbers? We have reinforced the barricade with a brick wall, but will that be enough to keep us safe?
(https://mobbstar.gitlab.io/cdn/df/2021-08-19_friendly-treason/carnage.png)
18th Slate - Aban Mebzuthďteb
We now have enough food reserves to make it through summer, and our farms should keep us fed. We might even be able to make booze again! In light of this success, I have been declared account keeper and work manager, and will assist in all future projects.
Sibrek has requested Kulet that they go outside together and strike down any straggling husks, so that new workers from the mountainhome may arrive safely. The latter disagreed, called it foolish, and mentioned Cattens numerous scars as proof. While I am terrified by the thought of heads-on battle against such unwavering, uncaring opponents, I also wish the siege would finally be broken. Perhaps the mechanics can develop a trap to defeat the shambling corpses without casualties.
1st Felsite - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
Workers from the mountainhome have arrived. The only obstacle to their entry was the headless liaison. Oh, the irony! We have locked her it in a room and hope it doesn't rise yet again. Though, if it does, we could at least use it to test traps with...
5th Hematite - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
Against our better judgement, we are considering to carve a trade depot into the rockface. Such a room would require at least two sturdy gates: one to protect the inner fort, and one for the merchants to protect themselves after their arrival. Perhaps we could create this before autumn, in hope of dwarven goods, but we mustn't hurry such a dangerous matter.
The mechanics and metalsmiths have prepared cage traps, which will capture any creature careless enough to step on one. It worked against a relatively small, but no less meaningful, opponent: Liaison Dumat Lokumnazush's corpse, which the merchants can hopefully return to the mountainhome for a proper burial. I suppose that would count as an offering, though it'll hardly stoke goodwill.
1st Malachite - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
We have begun walling off a section of the lower caverns, far enough that no horde can wander within earshot. Our dear leader Athel Likotsosad insisted on doing her part, despite expecting a child soon. Too soon, as it'd turn out. The boy came out healthy on a bed of moss, and is now with his father Catten, at the masonry.
(https://mobbstar.gitlab.io/cdn/df/2021-08-19_friendly-treason/mossbaby.png)
8th Malachite - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
Life in Friendlytreason is getting better, but our attention keeps turning to the stampede. We are getting desperate for a solution. Tapping the volcano seems too haphazardous, cage traps require much more metal for this many adversaries, and we just don't have enough fighters to stand a chance in direct combat. These haunting dead never rest, and neither must our approach to the matter. On a prayer, we will dig deeper and try to capture a magma crab, to be used as a sentry as well as its own lure. Even if nothing comes of that, we will get more metal ore for cages.
10th Malachite - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
Blast! As we dug down, we hit another cavern, and a swarm of creepy crawlers ascended. They are upon our farms and our stockpiles, constantly hoping to slip into a barrel of food. The bulk of them, however, went the other way, into the secured caverns. Perhaps they smell the dead above, because they seem to wander towards a crack in the ceiling. If we are lucky, they'll eat the flesh off our nightmares, leaving only bones to be smashed. Or the draltha will stomp the crawlers and liberate us of our newfound worry.
Either way, we must focus on securing this new cavern while it is empty. The silence is only broken by our own miners and masons, and the distant wails of a jabberer. That might be a good sign, since only the living can feel pain, meaning it isn't dead. Yet. Such a collosal beast is sure to crush or withstand smaller dead, but we must be ready to retreat should it quiet.
(https://mobbstar.gitlab.io/cdn/df/2021-08-19_friendly-treason/jabberer.png)
16th Limestone - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
Miraculously, the dwarven merchants have arrived safely and taken shelter in our new depot. With great horror, they observed our captured specimen, and are willing to trade for them. A blood-thirsty, nigh-unstoppable and yet restrainable monster must seem like an excellent war animal. I hope they heed our warnings and treat the beasts with caution. As for the liaison, the merchants refused the body, therefore it has been cremated on-site.
Work on the deepest cave has taken most of the past month, but we find it quite a relief to be away from the siege. Some have even slept on the soft moss, despite the threat of hungry heads floating over the half-set walls.
24th Limestone - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
A large, unfathomable beast has snuck into the cavern perimeter. Some of the armed dwarves heard the tormented jabberer die and held ground. Apparently the intruder strongly resembles a monster from a nursery tale, wherein it eats children who stay up late. Can't fight anything bigger than children it seems, because nobody got injured in the battle. Now we hurry to destroy the bodies before they destroy us. (I had a nightmare that a single feather managed to slay the whole fortress. It is quite amusing, in hindsight.)
12th Timber - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
I won't need to ration food anytime soon. We could last longer than a year on Thob's glazed meat alone! (And the syrup should keep it fresh as long as we keep the vermin off it.) For the first time in months, possibly since I arrived here, we've been jolly.
(https://mobbstar.gitlab.io/cdn/df/2021-08-19_friendly-treason/feast_for_a_king.png)
17th Timber - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
The gemcutter Sigun Ekirstukos has superceeded my authority, constructed a jewelery workshop, and took a gem. At least she made up for it with a truly marvelous flask, made of pure garnet. She calls it Flickeredlead, though I do not understand what our lead cages have to do with it.
(https://mobbstar.gitlab.io/cdn/df/2021-08-19_friendly-treason/flask.png)
10th Opal - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
At long last, the lowest cavern is secured. Short of fish, we don't expect to get bothered from down there.
1st Obsidian - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
Momuz Lalurvad, who had been spared of most labours, and Solon Isdenkogan, are now the proud mothers of the second and third children to grace this fort. The boy is particularly energetic and both are clearly healthy. What joy!
8th Granite - Aban Mebzuthďteb, Manager
The constant shaking around the upper caverns, however faded, still troubles me, and I am sick of pretending otherwise. All things natural get warped into nightmares around here, and it is up to us to make ourselves a home. I have implored the mechanics to come up with a better solution than cage traps. Time will tell if we can secure ourselves some quiet at last.
(https://mobbstar.gitlab.io/cdn/df/2021-08-19_friendly-treason/mayhem.png)
The file: https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=15644 (https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=15644)
I wish whoever continues this a very Fun time reclaiming that cavern.
It sincerely was fun, though nerve-fracking. Especially the forgotten beast. If I forgot to mention something feel free to ask!
(Edit: using different image source; if you read this, i did a history preservation for YOU!)
Hail HailMobbstar, who created the legendary engraving of the second part of Friendlytreason in the year 2021! His reign gifted us three children and made the fortress a lot more secure for future generations.
Great music theme. I really like the statues at the trading entrance a lot. Ingish killed the forgotten beast, Tulon and Sakzul also had their fair share with the rodent men. I had totally ignored the liason, were you really not able to trade his corpse back to the mountain homes? Does fishing undead biome cause undead fish? Where did you get all the meat from or rather where did you capture the creatures? The feather is hilarious, maybe we could use it as a secret weapon for future sieges hahahah.
Amazing job with the walls! Awesome. I've one point of concern though, if we are to eradicate all undead on the first cavern floor, the game will have more available slots for creatures to spawn. There is much more open border space on the 2nd cavern floor than on the 3rd (I think only one opening at the 3rd) through the water, e.g. some forgotten beasts can swim and fly and could hence spawn at 2nd and 3rd floor. I'll try to reclaim the pools with magma at some point.
Can't wait to drink from Flickeredlead!
I think flexible yearspans is a very interesting idea; we could just change it depending on fort objectives, the current player's free time, and FPS. If we're struggling with undeadsplosions five year turns starting year five could become very long and very bad if somebody finds themselves unable to progress on the front of stopping them. But if we're way past that and the player has a free weekend and a good computer, I could also see somebody blowing through ten years in that weekend: the most I've done in my fort is a bit more than 10 years in a day, and I wasn't even AFKing it for half that; 16 is about the maximum for ~100ish FPS.
How about we change the rule then that the amount of years is flexible per turn (and thus we aim for longest in-game playtime as a goal) but that after claiming a turn one has a maximum of one week to post the new gamefile. Optimistically in a real year we could have 52 turns, let's say average game time 3 years, so 156 years in-game playtime.
Also, do we want to restrict the amount of dwarfes/visitors? To which maximum?
weird as it sounds, that xkcd actually got me into DF; that comic enlightened me as to its existence — which I guess dates me, but in the opposite direction to usual :D
pick a number and get dwarfed, hah :P
Want me to pick one for you, or would you rather wait your turn and choose one yourself? EDIT: I did not dorf you since it looks like you're up next anyways.
It's either BudTomazi or NordicNooob now, unless somebody else wishes to take over. What is the idea of being dwarfed, it's about having a dwarf with your name and some roleplaying right?
I've a vision for what we could build ontop of the mountain:
Barad-dűr(https://i.imgur.com/amgSorB.jpg)
Babinushal Preliminary Progress Report
Preface: This report and those that follow are written with the intent to inform current and future leadership within Babinushal and within The Dreamy Nets as to the purpose and progress of my mission inside Babinushal. If this report (or any that follow) is read and received outside of fortress Babinushal, destroy it immediately after reading, as it is critical to the safety of the fortress Babinushal that that this report (or any that follow) not fall into enemy hands.
The Mountainhome has recognized the fortress Babinushal, Friendlytreason in laydwarf's terms, to be in need of immediate military assistance due to its proximity to the enemy, most notably the goblin fortress of Fiendpulps. Unfortunately, trained soldiers cannot be spared (even untrained civilians are scarce in these dark times), so I, Ral Gemurdatan, have been sent with the mission of creating a passable fighting force from the civilians already there. The first part of this mission has been observational, to allow me to greater understand the current infrastructure of Babinushal and determine the necessary actions to prepare the populace for invasion.
This observation period has passed, and the second phase of my operation has begun. As is tradition in a true Dwarven fortress, a new overseer is chosen to lead the fortress through each year. The overseer role has near complete control over the workings of the fortress, and with this control I will be able to effectively circumvent any administrative obstacles towards completing the necessary preparations to ensure the survival of Babinushal. These preparations are:
1. Re-designating of citizen labor structure. In order to keep the civilians pacified, no dwarf should be allowed to overwork themselves, and as such a detailed overview of labors is required to balance efficiency with prevention of riots.
2. Construction of a true military. Under my observational period the previous overseer established the workings of a basic military to keep hostile wildlife at bay. I will rebuild this into a true fighting force by establishing weapon diversity, expanding the ranks, standardizing equipment and eliminating shortages,
3. Destroy the undead plaguing the lower reaches of the world. The site where Babinushal resides is cursed to give no rest to the dead, and as such the regular conflicts of underground wildlife have spawned undead that themselves kill living wildlife and bring it into the ranks of undeath. Given the lack of a usable and sizable military, this will have to be done in an unconventional manner.
4. Secure the final pieces of the third cavern layer. My predecessor has mostly sealed the cavern layer away from intruders, and when the seal is complete it will be a very valuable resource in addition to serving the express purpose of preventing the proliferation of unlife.
5. Establish protocol for where civilians are and aren't allowed. It is important for rapid security that coordinated evacuations are able to occur.
As of 2 Felsite, 195, progress on these objectives is such:
1. The civilian labor structure has been completely re-organized into a well-balanced labor force. Extra laborers currently exist to provide unskilled labor such as hauling and construction, as well as serve as backup laborers in the event of casualties or unforseen high demand of a particular labor.
2. The military has been re-structured into four squads of four soldiers each:
- Swordsdwarves, led by myself.
- Hammerdwarves, led by Solon Isdenkogan
- Axedwarves, led by Aban Mebzuthiteb
- Marksdwarves, led by Reg Mishthemudil
Equipment is scarce, but melting the decorative copper statues placed in the main hall has yielded enough copper to forge the minimum necessary equipment to complete the existing sets of copper armor and provide basic armaments for all soldiers. Superior materials are expected to arrive with the autumn caravan, so this situation will likely be resolved before the end of the year.
3. A velocity-based trap has been devised and construction is nearing completion on its basic functionality. It will utilize a minecart loaded with heavy metal to crush the undead and render the corpses unable to be reanimated. This alone will not secure the cavern layer, but it will prevent the buildup of undead.
4. Plans for a waterfront seal to completely secure the third cavern layer have been readied, and materials have been procured for the construction of the necessary screw pumps.
5. No progress has been made on establishing siege protocol or designating safe areas. This will be remedied.
There are other objectives, but they do not take precedent as they are not critical to the security of Babinushal. They are:
6. Establish clothesworking. Many civilians are starting to note wear and tear on their clothing. A textile industry will be important to self-sufficiency, but is not an immediately pressing matter yet.
7. Construct a lever room. A central hub is important for engineering projects, as without one it may be difficult to locate the proper release quickly. Currently, a room has already been dug out for this purpose.
8. Quantum stockpiling. This is an experimental and highly effective method of mass-storage, and will be far superior to bins, which result in some difficulties in locating items. This is a low-priority objective, and has not been started.
9. Obsidian generation. By utilizing the volcano and a fresh source of water to cool it, renewable stone can be quarried from the earth for large-scale construction. This is a low-priority objective, but may be critical later on to securing vast quantities of construction material for defensive fortifications.
END REPORT
Finally got some time to work on stuff. I should be free for most of the weekend too, so I should be able to wrap up my turn. Hope you enjoyed the dull military drivel, because there's more where that came from. It mostly fits Ral's character, though there's some secondary traits that haven't really come into play yet, or won't be seen in the formal reports that Ral is making.
Overall things are going pretty well, though. Report establishes most of what I've been up to (barring a carpenter whose artifact bucket I turned into iron), and I'm ahead of schedule in most areas.
(barring a carpenter whose artifact bucket I turned into iron).
You what?! Are you the king midas of iron?
Yes. ;D
In actuality, if you forbid the main material of an artifact after the dwarf has started work, there will be no valid main material and the game will default to the first material entry in the raws, which in the case of vanilla DF is iron. You can normally identify the main material based off the moody dwarf's profession; I just forbade all the logs the carpenter picked up. Make sure you leave at least one material unforbidden, or the dwarf will simply go insane, and if you can identify the material with less forbidding that is better, since each one of those extra materials is a decoration you're ripping off. I suspect that the main material of an artifact will always be the first picked up, but I haven't seen anything to confirm that and haven't looked too closely myself, so I forbid based off what materials said profession will take as their main material.
It's obviously a glitch and frankly a bit cheesy, but it's fun to do and isn't that OP because if you can't control artifact material through normal means chances are you won't have a great artifact anyways, with exceptions for furniture items (iron bed is hilarious) and arguably clothes, because who doesn't like iron cloaks? (not that I've gotten a cloak before, I've had two clothier moods and both made iron undergarments, I suspect kinky shenanigans)
Oh yeah, and here's what I decided on for population jobs:
(https://i.imgur.com/Q4Vkruf.png)
In order to keep the civilians pacified, no dwarf should
I agree with these
[/quote]
And frig, I knew I accidentally left something unfinished. I hop to and fro whenever I write stuff to avoid writer's block, or maybe just for no good reason. It's a thing I do, regardless. The statement does ring true, though. Corrected, because I'm fundamentally boring.
Somehow we have managed to survive in this accursed land for 10 years.
I do not know if this is an act of mercy by the gods, or if we are merely being kept alive for some darker purpose.
Regardless, we have delved deep into the earth, and secured our new home.
However, I feel this is not enough. For too long us dwarves have been forced to hide underground.
The goblins continue to dominate the surface world while we hide in our mountain halls. Even here, where few goblins dare tread, the living dead continue to hunt us.
I feel that we need to leave our mark on this cursed mountain in some way.
To this end I will attempt to build a monument to our achievements at this place. I will also attempt to create a secure passage for traders.
These tasks will be frought with peril, and some of us may perish.
However, when the bitter sludge has settled there will stand a beacon of hope that will strike fear into the cold hearts of the undead!
Or there will be nobody left to tell the tale.
My first concerns are of a much more mundane sort. While we are not in any immediate danger, we will need many materials to complete my dream.
Additionally we have a severe shortage of clothing that needs to be addressed.
Work continues slowly deep below the earth. This day marks the beginning of spring, although we do not feel the change in heat.
To assist in the various excavation projects I am working on, I have decided to enlist more miners.
(https://i.imgur.com/AD4AuVL.png)
A fresh victim emerges into the undead infested second cavern layer. I hope that it can at least kill some of them before joining their ranks.
(https://i.imgur.com/GyB88mu.png)
I have long wondered why this fortress has no glassworking industry, as we have skilled glassworkers and plenty of sand.
It seems that some dwarves have even died due to a lack of glass. I have decided to fix the issue.
(https://i.imgur.com/11RYccY.png)
I have designed a trap that should allow us to capture two undead monstrosities on the surface.
I have taken steps to eliminate any danger to the fortress during the capture operation, but it will still be dangerous.
(https://i.imgur.com/Wc1rR0k.png)
Success! We have trapped both of the beasts in the first attempt.
(https://i.imgur.com/cy6Nep2.png)
Now my main concern for safety on the surface lies with the so called 'Eerie Mist Zombies' that roam the mountain. Thankfully they are not always present, but we also need to avoid the clouds of Eerie Mist themselves. We must ensure that we will be spending as little time as possible on the surface.
(https://i.imgur.com/z5VdmBw.png)
Another season passes. We have excavated most of the stone required for the project, and must now set our masons to work carving stone blocks.
In other news, our clothing situation has improved greatly.
I have decided that it is time to open the gates and try to secure the surface. I will personally lead our military to make an opening for our workers.
-=Report of the interim overseer Iden Atisaval, 21st Galena 203=-
I can't remember the exact sequence of recent events, but I shall recall them as best as I can.
My squadmates and I were going out to the surface to fight the undead. At first we had some successes against a group of Eeerie Mist keas.
(https://i.imgur.com/zeYhr8G.png)
Next we regrouped, then we sallied out again. Some of us stayed outside to watch for zombies, I returned for more provisions.
The next thing I heard was that the dwarves stationed at the entrance, our overseer included, had turned into undead and were now fighting amongst themselves.
We quickly shut the inner gate. I think the only reason this fortress hasn't fallen and I'm still writing this is their focus on fighting each other.
(https://i.imgur.com/bBPTsQe.png)
In total we lost 5 dwarves and their equipment. I do not know how the curse was able to spread, as all soldiers present were fully armoured in adamantine.
(https://i.imgur.com/P1rqWf1.png)
One of my former comrades fall at last. Hopefully all will meet a similar fate.
(https://i.imgur.com/u6OzO2h.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/L3cLhyY.png)
It is Autumn now. Our nobles have decided to hold a mid year election for a replacement overseer. I hope the new overseer will prioritise the safety of the fortress.
The past month has shown how quickly things can go wrong.
-=-=-
I was working today when our mayor came up to me and told me I was overseer.
"Why?" I asked.
"Because you were voted in."
"But I wasn't a candidate. Anyway, don't we already have an overseer?"
Instead of replying she just gave me the *granite scepter* of office and left. Nobles.
Well, unfortunately I've just been given command of this madhouse. Let's see what I can do.
The first order of business is to find out what happened to the previous overseer. It seems he was infected by a dead bird with some sort of necromantic curse that turned him and half his squad into undead killing machines. I didn't have much of an idea what I was going to do before, but now I know to never leave the caverns under any circumstances.
So here's the plan. I just focus on improving the caverns while putting as much rock between myself and the surface as possible.
(https://i.imgur.com/9sE4RuE.png)
Unfortunately given the current... predicament regarding our trade depot, the caravan from the mountainhomes cannot access our fortress.
I have decided that we need some proper bedrooms. Every dwarf will have a bed, cabinet, and chest.
Honestly I find it strange that nobody did this sooner. Half the dwarves in this place snore.
(https://i.imgur.com/BOW6Uad.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/yKE4mOB.png)
It is winter now. Work continues on various projects.
I had torn down one of the barrier walls in the third cavern layer to find a safe source of flowing water. The past month has been spent fighting off an endless horde of monsters.
Things are starting to smell awful.
(https://i.imgur.com/7NBwPbK.png)
This entire season so far has been dwarves going to operate a pump and then getting spooked by a tiny undead hand.
Seriously, they're getting scared by things like this.
(https://i.imgur.com/qqosiwG.png)
I've decided to start slaughtering some of our bugbats in a new area that has been sufficiently
protected against reanimation related incidents.
(https://i.imgur.com/gmTwrlH.png)
Here's some good news at last from the second cavern layer.
(https://i.imgur.com/IMKGBcl.png)
This one should be impervious to necromancy.
Nevermind, it doesn't seem to have even entered the caverns. Maybe the sheer amount of undead has formed a wall, blocking any more creatures from entering?
In other news I have decided to abandon any hope of adding a fortification to prevent creatures from entering through the gap in the third cavern layer for now.
As soon as the water level was low enough for us to construct it, a group of crundles came through! Someone else can probably think about fixing it though.
(https://i.imgur.com/AD4AuVL.png)
It is the end of the year. I'm not sure if I'll be able to stay in power, as there is quite a lot of grumbling recently. Especially from the military, who have had to stand in miasma for months now. Either way, here is the end of year report.
(https://i.imgur.com/aWgZDpL.png)
I've decided to separate the artifacts made during this time from the rest of the update. Here they all are:
(https://i.imgur.com/whKuKaG.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/4jySvtB.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/4ukL3Lu.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/0QtvFIX.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/KygdN21.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/NC6Yhbe.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/ffwgH89.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/CfqyHtn.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/L2fTTWc.png)
There's also an artifact that was being made at the end of the year by none other than Mossbeard!
(https://i.imgur.com/3WZdXNg.png)
Well, that certainly wasn't the most successful turn, but it was definitely !!fun!!
We did lose half our military, but at least the clothing situation has been fixed thanks to a large cloth stockpile at the beginning of the year and two clothiers working non-stop.
Here's the save: https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=15840 (https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=15840)
Also, if nobody else wants a turn I can continue for an extra year.
Sorry, here's the update. Enjoy.
Well, the good news is that I was able to stay as overseer for one more year.
Now you might be wondering why being in charge of this madhouse is a good thing.
I assure you that it isn't because it's an 'honour' to be overseer or anything of that sort. I'm certain the nobles didn't see it that way either when they gave me this job.
The answer is that I can excavate some living quarters for myself, fill it with valuables, and no one will think twice about it.
I'll be sure to make it secure as well. Those military dwarves are still angry about last year after all.
In other news, We've finished placing a barricade preventing creatures coming through the gap from entering the caverns proper. Now the militia dwarves can get some
well earned rest. They might also hate me less. Also I've given them the third month of every season as a break from training.
There has been some mysterious occurrences in the caverns. Firstly, our well, which hasn't been operational since I first became overseer, has started working again.
Also, someone's arm got ripped off by a ghost. I should probably fix that.
(https://i.imgur.com/QJVpqHo.png)
My predecessor can rest at last. I have placed his slab underneath where we believed he wanted to build a tower of some sort.
It was a foolish idea. Eerie Mist birds would've infected the workers in seconds. Still, his idea to build a tunnel connecting us to the outside world was a good one.
Especially since the disaster in our former main entrance...
(https://i.imgur.com/j58SyLG.png)
I think I still hear them sometimes, clawing at the inner gate. And sometimes I hear this whispering coming from the other side, a voice that never belonged to them in life.
It tells me of blasphemous things, hidden away in the depths of the world, waiting for dwarves who are brave enough to break down the barriers that hold them...
I haven't gone near the inner gate for a long time.
Needless to say I'll make sure I'm safe before trying anything risky on the surface. Once we've hopefully got a safe route, then maybe I can even try to make my way out of here.
(https://i.imgur.com/MN5uvMh.png)
There is sad news today. Our carpenter has been found dead in the main stairway. She will be sorely missed.
The cause of death is unclear, but no foul play is suspected. The best theory seems to be that she died of an infection.
Unfortunately, she doesn't stay dead for very long. I've sent in the military, so hopefully no one else need die.
A miner is able to slay the undead, but a few limbs might be at risk of coming back.
(https://i.imgur.com/ACox9Jl.png)
Time passes slowly below the volcano. As summer dawns, we prepare to reestablish contact with the outside. There are low numbers of undead on the surface and no Eerie Mist zombies,
so things should go smoothly. We can seal everything in case there is an emergency. The military will be stationed outside. There is nothing to be afraid of.
I'm still going to be staying inside.
(https://i.imgur.com/i607lRv.png)
Meanwhile below the caverns, our miners have dug deep, finding another spire of adamantine. I shall begin excavation soon.
I have been having nightmares about it recently. Strange, considering it protects our warriors against the undead.
Still, in my dreams I hear those same whispers from the gate...
I have ordered the breach to be made. Armok help us.
(https://i.imgur.com/n4l8jQc.png)
Things are going well so far. Unfortunately the dwarves won't build a regular wall too close to the designated fortress limits, so we will have to use a more
time-consuming option. Other than a skirmish with a dead nanny goat, there's been no sign of the undead.
(https://i.imgur.com/BRSynt0.png)
Things aren't going... too smoothly right now, but everything is under control. This was just an isolated incident, an elk bird that died in captivity
reaninimating and somehow escaping its cage. We'll be more careful in future.
No, don't worry about our mayor getting chased across the surface by a dead owl...
(https://i.imgur.com/Dp9xjHf.png)
Everything is under contro-
Who am I kidding, seal the gates!
The ironic part is, this is completely independent from the surface reclamation efforts.
The military arrives at last, and the threat is put down. Now we can get back to work.
(https://i.imgur.com/syaXbUF.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/f8KrLfU.png)
Unfortunately, 3 dwarves died, with one severely wounded.
(https://i.imgur.com/5dvPbW3.png)
At this point Sibrek decides now is a good time to go strolling around on the surface. Not my idea of a nice place for a walk.
(https://i.imgur.com/zJGjXZH.png)
Kib joins him on the surface. Sibrek decides to fight a magma crab on top of the fortress, and almost dodges into the volcano.
There's clearly something going on here that I don't understand. Is it some sort of test to see how many laps of the volcano you can make?
(https://i.imgur.com/7UTm45z.png)
Oh Armok they've found me get me out of here please Armok have mercyyyyyy
(https://i.imgur.com/TtFNRPI.png)
Thank you xkcd!
AND CAN SOMEONE PLEASE GET THESE ZOMBIES OUT OF MY FORTRESS!
The rest of the journal is covered in blood.
(https://i.imgur.com/bTDC9QF.png)
-=[Second] Report of the interim overseer Iden Atisaval, 3rd Malachite 204=-
The position of overseer seems to have had a curse put on it. The past weeks have been fraught with trouble, most noticeably the large amount of undead murdering
dwarves in the heart of the fortress. The latest victim being... our replacement overseer. We're going to have a hard time getting anyone into the job now.
At least we are making good progress on the surface, but that hardly matters if the entire fortress dies in the meantime.
To this end I will be halting all work on the surface. My squad is urgently needed inside right now. It should however be easy to continue work at a later date.
The main cavern is currently a scene of absolute chaos. For Armok's sake, why are dwarves climbing down to the water to get killed by a hand.
(https://i.imgur.com/6IYyfsb.png)
Something that the overseer forgot to mention in his logs is the new farm area he was working on. Strange, seeing as that is probably one of the most useful things he did.
(https://i.imgur.com/o9BOy9R.png)
Speaking of farming, guess who just died! That's right, one of our legendary growers!
(https://i.imgur.com/YVyldki.png)
We have dubbed this undead hand Berdanstigaz, or Walkrasped. If we do not kill this, it may lead to the demise of the fortress.
The problem is that it's in a pool.
(https://i.imgur.com/dNTM8id.png)
The miners have devised a plan that might be able to kill it. In the meantime, the main way to the central area of the fortress everyone is using seems to be...
climbing along the wall of the volcano while getting attacked by Walkrasped. Why they don't just use the perfectly usable bridge, I don't know.
Maybe all that Bitter Sludge on the surface had a toll on their reasoning abilties.
Yep, they're all climbing down a spore tree, climbing along the wall and doing a jump to land in the Blockaded Sanctuary. While they're climbing Walkrasped is attacking them from below.
The best part is that the dwarves don't even fight back.
(https://i.imgur.com/oieQIxU.png)
Walkrasped claims another victim. If only it wasn't for that elk bird, none of this would've happened.
I decided to put a sign up saying something to the effect of "Use the bridge if you want to live!"
Surprisingly, it managed to get through their thick dwarven skulls and they've stopped jumping headfirst into danger.
I'm not sure why one of my comrades decided it would be a good idea to go swimming in the undead pool, but Onul did. He almost made it away before he drowned too.
(https://i.imgur.com/fo1LNJg.png)
Onul's corpse then reanimates, climbs onto the bridge and kills a child.
(https://i.imgur.com/ZXYi9JH.png)
I was wondering why no miners had arrived to finish killing Walkrasped. It seems that the burrowing alert from when we were trying to secure the fortress had not been ended,
so they were not allowed to destroy an undead creature that is responsible for the deaths of 4 dwarves and the injuring of many others. Not to mention completely
disrupting all work in the fortress and causing loss of equipment.
We can finally rest at last.
(https://i.imgur.com/eaPEbvP.png)
This has certainly been an... unfortunate episode in our history. Hopefully it will never happen again.
Now that things have settled down somewhat, we need to find someone to dupe into becoming overseer. Someone in the fort would have to be mad to volunteer for the
position now, so we may have to give it to some unsuspecting migrant.
(https://i.imgur.com/SHQENdu.png)
Hopefully we will be able to trade this Autumn. We've reopened the surface, and are going out to finish the construction of the tunnel.
An elk bird reanimates and maims one dwarf, but xkcd is able to take care of it.
(https://i.imgur.com/ekWHjXc.png)
A group of 5 migrants were able to make the trek here, to their almost certain demise. At least things will get done a little faster.
(https://i.imgur.com/kgGyGoM.png)
-=-=-
Ah, we've finally arrived at this god-forsaken pit. Truth be told, I wasn't expecting to make it this far.
But my struggle has been rewarded! Yes, the dwarves of this place have recognised my greatness, and have made me the overseer of their fortress!
I'm sure that true wonders await me inside!
...
The first thing I notice are the skeletons. Strewn about in all public areas.
All of the dwarves in this place are constantly looking over their shoulders, as if they expect an undead elk bird to suddenly leap out of the shadows
and murder them. Some careful interrogation reveals that there have actually been a few incidents like that in recent months.
Unfortunately, as I am making my way back up to the surface to leave, an alarm sounds. It seems two of my fellows were unable to make it inside the fortress, and were turned into
undead mist zombies of some sort. Now I'm sealed in with the rest of these lunatics.
(https://i.imgur.com/17pJUTg.png)
One of them falls, but now the other is lying in wait at the entrance. As reopening the escape trade route is of prime importance, I will try to create a trap for them.
Someone was just severely wounded by a zombie on the main stairway. I need to get out of here. Apparently that corpse was our former mayor.
Also, the victim just bled out on the way to the hospital.
After a long and incredibly risky battle, the eerie mist threat has been put down.
(https://i.imgur.com/NxoqzCk.png)
Unfortunately, it cost the life of one of our soldiers. It's worth knowing that an unarmed and unarmoured one of these eerie mist zombies is powerful enough to fight
two trained warriors clad in adamantine. It also emphasizes that I need to get out of here.
Of course, the dead don't stay that way long. Momuz reanimates, but doesn't do any damage.
(https://i.imgur.com/mOe1dd6.png)
It's winter now. The eerie mist zombies still haven't gone away, so there's no escape just yet. Since I will be staying here,
I've decided to carve out some quarters befitting of my station. I'll be sure to include emergency supplies in case the zombies get in.
Unfortunately we don't have any skilled blacksmiths. They all seem to have perished in the past year.
Well, the surface is clear of eerie mist now. But still, when I set out from the mountains it was with several other fools. I don't know how far I'd get without them,
so maybe it is safer staying here.
(https://i.imgur.com/TuYWj7Z.png)
A mason dies from his wounds.
(https://i.imgur.com/2KhtkAE.png)
My quarters are finally complete. I should be able to live quite comfortably here for a while. Maybe once a future overseer has secured the surface better I'll make my escape,
but for now I'll stay in these rooms, and make sure never to enter the fortress proper, lest a wandering zombie kill me.
(https://i.imgur.com/mFjTZxM.png)
My short time as overseer is over. I wish my successor the best of luck, and pray to the gods they don't let the undead in.
Here's the fortress' situation.
(https://i.imgur.com/O3Ys8hq.png)
Now for the artifacts:
(https://i.imgur.com/xTJgNr6.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/eFcVCTM.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/0T7FwyH.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/7DARCJZ.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/xr2nQp5.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/jvrUQar.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/UtXw5EX.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/mkZ5eFm.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/uhQyzcW.png)
That was quite a year. It's unfortunate that I died again, but at least my third dwarf got some nice rooms.
As for the surface situation I believe all that need to be done is to link the outer bridge to a lever within the fortress (I have placed a lever for this purpose up in the old fortress)
and to pull the lever. After that we should be able to trade safely.
My dwarf is currently burrowed into some rooms above the main fortress. I've set it up so that he can continue working without leaving. Just check to make sure that food is getting delivered and try locking the door if the undead get in again.
Good luck to whoever is next!
Save: https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=15864
I’m guessing it’s my turn? Groovy.
I’m still not doing grand with time, but I’ve also lost the ability to give a fuck. (The fabled release date was repeatedly pushed back for a total of one month, and the next prognosis is ‘soon’. With ™ attached, probably. So I'm in the exact same spot as I was a month ago, when I originally posted in the thread. Screw it).
I'll play as time is available, including during 'office hours', but I'll try to hold on on story posts until AvolitionBrit posts his story.
Moving on, to more interesting things.
Firstly, does anyone mind if I post Phoebus screenshots? Everybody else posted ASCII, but every time I tried playing with ASCII, I got a splitting headache in a few hours. Obviously, I’ll sanitize the save before I’m uploading it; that’s just basic decency.
Secondly, we have a 40 dwarf popcap; this is probably way too low, especially since we already have 11 children on the map. SmallHands pulled it off, but SmallHands occupied 2 embark squares, not 16. On the other hand, if we go over 50 dorfs, we need to deal with a dumbass mayor… (EDIT: for some fricking reason, we do have a mayor, Moldath Mengteskom. How this happened with less than 40 morons, I cannot tell you. Unless the pop used to be much larger, and that's why I have to deal with the noble). Screw it, I'm increasing pop to 75.
Here's what I'm planning to use:
[POPULATION_CAP:75]
[STRICT_POPULATION_CAP:75]
[BABY_CHILD_CAP:10:100]
[VISITOR_CAP:10]
[INVASION_SOLDIER_CAP:100]
[INVASION_MONSTER_CAP:50]
[SPECIFIC_SEED_CAP:50]
[FORTRESS_SEED_CAP:3000]
Popcap is self-explanatory; baby cap got reduced to 1/10 of previous; invasion cap is probably never going to come up but I keep it about equal to population. Same for seed cap.
Thirdly, I intend to use a bunch of weapon traps for clearing thinning the zombies in the second cave. Weapon traps are poorly regarded sometimes, as making things too easy. Just wanna make sure nobody thinks I’m cheesing too hard. On the other hand, there’s already that bridge corridor trap thing on level 157, so I’m pretty sure that ship has sailed.
And lastly, are you ok with some DF commands? This one’s not saved in the main play-trough, but this is what it would do:
(https://i.imgur.com/UvBn4q4.png)
------------------
A superficial fort overview:
We have a really compressed map; about 80 levels from the top of the volcano to the deepest pit of hell. The surface goes as high as 169, cave 1 is from 131 to 128, cave 2 119 to 115 (and connected to cave 1 with a passage), and cave 3 is from 113 to 108.
We have so many items strewn around, most of them forbidden (which bodes ill about how they got strewn in the first place). We have so many corpses, and parts of corpses, just laying around.
We have a biome that creates two kinds of hostile undead, and two open entrances into the fort. One should have been sealed with a bridge, that was never completed. Another, with doors; I suppose that’s good enough for zombies, but if WHEN we get a building destroyer, we’re all in trouble.
(https://i.imgur.com/gca1xgu.png)
Our military ‘forces’ consist of 3 mace-dwarves, one of whom is practically unusable due to having a stress of 94,500! Combined with the Legendary+5 skill, that gal is a TPK waiting to happen; she’ll be removed from her squad, and left to do some relaxing task, such as weaving.
Why do we have 70 bugbats, and a bunch of birds left in cages? The llama doesn’t count, she’ll get slaughtered asap due to zombie related reasons.
(https://i.imgur.com/3wPxIvj.png)
Cave 1 is walled off, secure, and is absolutely wallpapered in webs. A mass-gathering may be highly profitable.
Cave 2 is open, flooded, and absolutely wallpapered in zombies. For the sake of FPS they need to be dealt with.
Cave 3 was walled off (with one small water-based exception at the upper-left corner), and seems to be the main hub of the fort. It still requires a bit of cleanup.
Props to XKCD for walling off the caves; I know from experience that it can be ridiculously tedious.
My priorities so far:
Seal access to the surface. I don’t trust doors, unless they’re over ramps and unassailable due to pathing bugs.
Burrows are a bit baffling; at the very least, they haven’t kept up with later excavations. My first instinct is to create a bunch of new ones, but in the interest of minimizing chaos I should try and modify the existing ones.
Military needs to be beefed up; it needs armor, and way more peeps than it currently has.
Corpses need to be cleaned away, from both surface and underground. There are stockpiles of remains in the third cavern, which have no business existing. Normally, I’d settle for a simple bridge to atom smash them but I’d better make an incinerator, given where we are. Or, heck, both.
De-zombify the second cave.
While the next report is being compiled, have a few large pictures of FriendlyTreason:
The entire world, as seen in fort-mode civilization menu. It’s interesting in the Chinese curse sense:
(https://i.imgur.com/N05TqOM.png)
The embark site, from the top down (and with multilevel 15).
(https://i.imgur.com/jN0XusW.png)
The eerie mist, descending upon the western forest; a single magma crab was in the way, and it was not affected:
(https://i.imgur.com/VyOZG5C.png)
I'm tentatively assuming this mist has different syndromes if it's inhaled or smeared on -- inhaling it does close to nothing, while smearing it on means death. BattleFailed was like that, in DF2012 -- mist caused brief nausea if inhaled, but if it was mixed with the neighboring biome's foul muck, it rotted you alive from the inside out over the next 2 weeks. Now remember we have that bitter sludge biome next to the mist...
Two samples of the first cavern; when I say the place is wallpapered in webs, I mean the place is WALLPAPERED in webs:
(https://i.imgur.com/gBXrNyP.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/LcwQ0QF.png)
By overseeral decree, there will not be any cats in FriendlyTreason; those little bastards will happily ignore creepy crawlies in the food pile, and instead come to munch on cave spiders. I've had forts where cats completely annihilated the cave spider population.
Days 2-3 -- 208-11-18 to 209-12-28
TL;DR, Population increased to 61, second cavern partially de-zombified and made into the fort’s farming & plant processing zone, third cavern fully sealed while keeping the water source; available corpses butchered and/or atom-smashed. Trading is a complete failure.
Soon after Obsidian began, Madam Iden stopped being useful. She no longer equips her clothes or weapons, and ignores commands; she didn’t completely break yet, but she alternates between depression and ‘attending a meeting’ all by herself. Compounding the problem, she started doing this after I had let her out for garbage gathering, so now there’s a completely naked, thoroughly depressed, unresponsive were-tortoise wandering at random on the surface.
Speaking of the surface:
(https://i.imgur.com/RNBIn8A.png)
Another dwarf was ruthlessly murdered. By me. Tosid the BEEstMaster was nearing 50k stress, and was constantly either tantrumming, or yelling at the mayor. He got locked in the mayor’s dining room, and died of thirst. Then he rose as a zombie; when I got some free population (so in 210), he was caged and atom-smashed, cage and all. His slab was built already, he’s no longer a problem.
Also on the subject of happiness, the fort has two unhappy dwarves with stress around 13,000, hopefully making them salvageable: one’s a random civilian, and the other is Sibrek, one of my 2 skilled hammer-dwarves. They were removed from hauling jobs, and assigned masonry & bone crafting; both these jobs are in high demand currently.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. The last month of 208 saw everybody removed from jobs, except for food hauling and lever pulling… and everybody proceeded to store food in stockpiles for the next 2-3 weeks. Wow, that might have been my best idea, and I didn’t even know.
Migrants have arrived… all the way towards the end of spring, on the 24th of Slate. They’ve successfully navigated the berserker were-tortoise and all made it into the fort, with the help of one hastily-defined meeting zone, some strategic door locking and unlocking, and some helpful dark gnome zombies who distracted were-Iden until they all made it in.
The fort’s been enriched with eight adults and 2 more children. Between them and the two children who grew up, the summer of 209 begins with 34 working adults and 11 children (and one were-tortoise).
Meanwhile, in the third cavern, the problem of the one open tile was resolved without destroying the water source. It’s going to require a temp save with clean all and autodump used, because there’s just that much crap obscuring the poor thing. But to sum up: the water source tile had a fortification built in it. A temporary wall was built to stem the flow and allow me to work (the grey andesite wall standing out among the white granite). Two floodgates control the water channel, one here at the start and the other (not pictured here) all the way at the eastern end of the drain.
(https://i.imgur.com/c1aG8eM.png) (https://i.imgur.com/gztVtt6.png)
Their controlling levers are built beneath the tavern, and named appropriately. Also in this picture, the tavern’s underground storage area for booze and prepared meals.
(https://i.imgur.com/8o8hBa9.png)
On the upper level, the screw pump was moved one tile to the East, an unavoidable process seeing as I just built a wall in its former input tile (actually, this pump might be pretty useless now that we have the floodgates).
(https://i.imgur.com/7TvdyiG.png) (https://i.imgur.com/nZ41hST.png)
I’m just gonna say this change increased FPS from 9 to 11, despite the bump in population.
Onwards: given all the corpses, I made a slaughter area in the third cavern. There were already bugbats pastured near it; I added a refuse stockpile restricted to corpses, an atom smasher right by it, and 2 rooms in the above levels: one for bone-crafting, and the other for fat and meat cooking:
(https://i.imgur.com/GuIF9ty.png) (https://i.imgur.com/CpABk2X.png) (https://i.imgur.com/fg111U6.png)
And just to make the lever for the atom-smasher very obvious:
(https://i.imgur.com/qH59eNi.png)
Summer doesn’t bring a human caravan. What a bummer, who’s going to buy all our bone crafts?
And speaking of bone crafts… the civilian wisely stuck to bone-carving for the past half-year, and was in the clear by this time, with 12 levels acquired. Hammer-dwarf Sibrek has spent some time cutting blocks, then cooking food, then making some crafts, and not improving his mood at all. He’s at 16k stress; this is the point where I kicked him out of the army and put him on crafts permanently. Spoilers from the future, his mood did improve, but very slowly. The next summer finds him as a legendary bone-carver, and at 11k stress despite mass-producing masterworks by now. Really, some people are just curmudgeons.
Mid-summer, on the 19th, we've been visited by a were-chameleon. It got into a fight with our resident were-tortoise, and beat the snot out of her. All this is were-tortoise blood:
(https://i.imgur.com/bVP8CKj.png)
Summer migrants arrived 2 weeks after that; another 8 adults, and no babies.
Autumn arrives, and with it the caravan and outpost liaison. The caravan reaches all the way to the depot, then turns right around and fecks off. There were no messages in the announcements or reports, but a missing wagon in the units list points out the cause anyway.
There are some forbidden ‘wagon logs’ in the depot itself, so I’m assuming the stupid thing made it in then just kinda exploded (they couldn’t be from before, I reclaimed everything in the room when the caravan arrived). What I don’t know is the actual cause, because there were no undead around, and, as said previously, there were no combat logs involving a wagon, or anyone else for that matter. I can only shrug, deconstruct the old depot, and build it anew a few tiles indoors.
The outpost liaison receives orders to bring certain birds. Turns out I was wrong about one thing after all: we don’t have breeding pairs of birds, we have a bunch of females without males, or a bunch of ganders without geese. After he leaves, I remember I should have asked for iron ore as well, but now it’s too late.
Seven migrants arrive in the autumn. We now have 51 adult dwarves in FriendlyTreason, and they all have plenty of work.
In the second cave, there are 2 big projects underway: a plant processing area with all the bells and whistles, and a safe(ish) zombie grinder.
The zombie grinder is a simple winding corridor, with some cage & weapon traps in it, and sealed off with 2 bridges. The levers for the bridges are 2 levels above, in the newly-minted farmer’s guild. A separate corridor allows archers to shoot incoming zombies. The whole assembly is kinda temporary; once the surrounding cave is marginally safe, it will be deconstructed and rebuilt right next to the next large pile of zombies.
(https://i.imgur.com/3BXsEf4.png)
A miner opened the corridor in late autumn; every on-land zombie in a 40-tile radius shuffled towards it. The traps were very effective, therefore the whole thing ended up kinda underwhelming; less than 1/3rd of traps were even tripped. Still, there are several zombies stuck in trees, and even more in the water; none of them have budged when the corridor opened. The area is far from safe.
The crossbow squad has failed to shoot anything, and upon closer inspection, I find out they don’t have any quivers and therefore no bolts. I did look at their uniform and their military equipment, and each of them has a crossbow assigned and equipped. I still don’t know why they’re not picking up their gear.
The plant processing area is mostly done right above the farm itself; there was a large room already excavated there, for flooding the farm below. I even manage to build a dedicated stair from the middle of the farm to the middle of the room; this requires me to rebuild the farm plots themselves, turning the nine 3x3 farms to four 4x5 ones.
(https://i.imgur.com/ON5GHzt.png)
I built a still, a farmer’s workshop and a loom in it, and added stockpiles for all plants (minus dye plants) and an empty barrel pile. This is where brewing, leaf bagging, plant processing, and plant weaving gets done.
Next to it is the cloth and tailoring area; it only includes actual cloth, since thread is processed wherever it’s made - plant thread in the loom next door, and silk in the cavern where it’s picked. The remaining space gets filled with dyeing infrastructure. Dye plants have a stockpile off to the side, where the quern-stone and the empty bag stockpile is; the fort’s only dye workshop sits by it.
In winter, the were-chameleon returns, and makes the mistake of lingering until his transformation ends:
(https://i.imgur.com/6WH4nFr.png)
Iden is thankfully accepting commands at this point; she’s ordered to kill Stukos, and does so. He’ll raise later as a zombie, but that’s fine. Zombies are much easier to kill than were-chameleons.
… Wait, the turn was one week not two? Fiddlesticks, I thought I was still playing until Wednesday. Ok, I’ll wrap up a few projects and post the save. Meanwhile, I’m also splitting 210 in 2 parts, because there’s plenty to tell.
Year 210 (part 1)
Population has slowly increased to 75, 67 of which are adults. One miner died, during events which will get expanded upon. Iden still lives locked up in her tiny room, and 3 eerie mist zombies are still beating the crap out of each other. The second cavern is ruled by zombies; some interesting game behavior has been noticed, and this too will get expanded upon.
But first, all the projects that have used up some of that dwarf power.
First and foremost, I wanted to use strategic cave-ins to rid the fortress of its most dangerous denizens. The first and easiest targets were two undead feathers:
(https://i.imgur.com/AHNOpXA.png)
A single cubic plug was carefully detached from the rock above, and left to drop on top of the abominations:
(https://i.imgur.com/5D1KZsI.png) (https://i.imgur.com/e0qhqzJ.png) (https://i.imgur.com/vx4U8Cm.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/MlMFiWh.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/6aMdsKN.png)
This is where the miner died: I expected to not have any major problems, so made the plug to drop via channeling one last floor tile. But no, that was enough to slam the poor miner on the ground and kill him. He was immediately atom-smashed before rising (actually, I think he was mangled enough that he could have been buried; but better safe than sorry).
Apocripha #1: DO NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCE, DIG OUT THIS BIT OF STONE.
(https://i.imgur.com/6aMdsKN.png)
Look. Normally, when a solid stone plug falls on something, that something should stop existing. Atomized into non-existence. Well not these two assholes; they are dead, and therefore cannot die. When I foolishly dug out the stone plug to expand the neighboring smithy, I found them both untouched:
Animated Feathers: (https://i.imgur.com/8qCLyJ9.png)
Inanimate Feathers: (https://i.imgur.com/FAUOtzu.png)
Thinking little of them, I ordered them dumped, and forgot about it. No problem, they reminded me pretty quickly, when the stupid Forgotten Beast Feather rose again (regrettably, I didn’t screenshot Usbu’s feather running amok though the bone carving area; it was very clear that I needed to ditch that save)
It can’t harm any military dwarves, although civilians are a different matter; conversely, military dwarves can’t harm it.
(https://i.imgur.com/1TZI6de.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/pGExs7y.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/ea3BnwG.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/1TZI6de.png)
And the poor civvie:
(https://i.imgur.com/LmqLg3M.png)
We now return to your regularly-scheduled program.
The next target was the forgotten beast locked in the bridge corridor. This one’s a bit trickier, because it can move around. However, after one year of careful observation, I noticed that it’s only walking back and forth in about 10-15 tiles.
(https://i.imgur.com/NU4dxL3.png)
I chose 10 where it’s usually found, and dug out a plug in that shape. This time, I learned from Minkot’s death; I built a support and connected it to a distant lever.
(https://i.imgur.com/5EKkBfy.png)(https://i.imgur.com/i0lVGy7.png)(https://i.imgur.com/X3lLMCy.png)(https://i.imgur.com/JlTUXTQ.png)
Then, when everyone was clear, the deed was done:
(https://i.imgur.com/87NsHh4.png)
There are still two undead titans imprisoned in FriendlyTreason; there’s technically the possibility of dropping a plug on them both, with care, but it will be a bit trickier because this will have to dig outside in order to disconnect the plug. That, or we can unlock that southern door and hope they’ll both choose to shuffle forward underneath the mountain:
(https://i.imgur.com/TJQeiwb.png)
Frankly, they’re nowhere near as big of a problem than the second cavern.
In the second cavern, one more trap corridor was used, in the north-eastern corridor.
(https://i.imgur.com/DJ8Zy27.png)
Once again, the undead stuck in water refuse to budge, even when they’re one short hop away from dry land, and from the waiting cage traps:
(https://i.imgur.com/9JICC4R.png)
The process revealed yet more lake trees with loads and loads of undead stuck on them. The total number of non-fortress critters has reached 310; if the last unrevealed corner of C2 has about the same concentration of undead, then there should be around 350-400 total.
Cage corridors do clear the land, which is nice, but it’s nowhere near enough.
Most of the undead are staying up on 3 trees connected to the map’s edge. Unless the bastards can climb, I really don’t think there’s any solution besides obsidianizing all of the lakes in the cavern. And if you think undead make lag, you should see what happens when you dump magma on top of water.
(https://i.imgur.com/l4P2QrK.png)
(Apocrypha #2)
And yes, the undead are indeed to blame for the lag we’re experiencing. For the sake of science, I did an ‘alternate timeline’ which started with running exterminate undead. Several things immediately happened:
- FPS jumped from the current 8 to 35. Then it immediately started to drop because…
- about 25-30 previously-placid corpses have suddenly risen as undead, and…
- 40+ cavern critters, most of them crundles, have spawned on the edge and…
- the new arrivals and newly-risen corpses have started fighting, and…
- one previously-invisible Forgotten Beast has started murdering all of the above.
I say invisible, because it didn’t spawn then -- I’d have gotten a message. Nor was it in the unit lists -- I looked for FBs, the only “official” FB we had was the one I dropped a literal bridge on, and nothing but undead afterwards.
And more importantly, because that FB had officially arrived two months prior to the experiment; then it just vanished from the unit list, and re-appeared after the undead had been magically annihilated:
(https://i.imgur.com/f7UgHP6.png)
Both the initial spawn and the post-extermination location were in this tree:
(https://i.imgur.com/uu1hTLV.png)
All of the above makes me think the game does have mechanisms in place to keep zombie-splosions under some form of control -- suppressing new spawns, suppressing new reanimations, outright pokemon-ing an entire FB?!? It’s just that the game also considers very low FPS to be perfectly playable.
(End apocrypha).
Ok, here’s the save (https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=15947), and it’s also linked at the bottom of this post. If I keep doing “one more thing”, I’m going to end up playing until I conquer the entire world.
Year 210 (part 2)
Firstly, the military.
Unfortunately, very few citizens have any pre-existing military skill; tactically, we have 2 armchair generals (one skilled leader and one novice tactician with no other military skills); they’re currently unused, but if this fort ever gets to raid its enemies, they might come in handy.
The only skilled hammerers are those that we already had; so, Kib who’s Legendary +5, and whining little Sibrek at level 8; Sibrek was only drafted in late autumn, after he had finally crafted enough masterworks to drop below 10k stress. I’m not counting poor Iden, because she’s no longer picking up a hammer, despite definitely having access to one.
A full hammer squad, made from these two alongside 8 complete n00bs, have been allowed to train since spring 210. Except they didn’t; they did sometimes do individual training, and have acquired a tiny bit of experience, but the desired cyan S never appeared. Most of the hammer-dwarf skill that exists was acquired by executing caged zombies.
In the ‘other weapons’ department, the fort has a level 5 axe-dwarf who I drafted in his own squad as emergency troubleshooter when I got the fort. Later on, he was left to train 2 months of the year just to keep up his skills. Besides him, we have three novice hammerers, one novice sword-dwarf, and one talented spear-dwarf (aka, level 6). All of them are unused, and live as civilians.
The crossbow squad is doing better, having gone up to 7 members with the addition of 3 new recruits. They used to have a problem, where they didn’t pick up quivers and bolts; the problem went away after deleting and recreating the squad (literally nothing else was changed). Then, they were stationed in cave 2, near specially-carved fortifications facing the zombies in trees. They really suck at hitting anything, but they manage to kill a crundle… eventually. At least they’re getting XP.
(https://i.imgur.com/hSJpG9V.png)
More concerningly, they’re not hitting the forgotten beast sitting up in a tree. I presume they can’t see it, with all the trunks and branches in the way.
(https://i.imgur.com/qwS7pGy.png)
The melee squads all have barracks prepared next to the fort’s main exit; only hammers and axe are assigned:
(https://i.imgur.com/yE99VVI.png)
Some time in late 209, every dwarf was allowed weaving, the first cavern was mass-forbidden, then spammed with looms; since then, I’ve gradually unforbid the webs nearest to the looms:
(https://i.imgur.com/WizaHZH.png)
As of spring 211, I considered I have enough silk; there are 1000+ silk bolts, and that’s with multiple ‘do silk x’ jobs firing occasionally. Only 2 weavers are now allowed in FriendlyTreason; they can just barely keep up with random web spawns. We’ve barely made a dent in the existing webs, and most of the cavern is still forbidden.
Part of the reason why I’m focusing on the cavern silk is that I’m trying to not massively increase the number of items in the fort. Growing pig tails would add new items (be it plant, thread, cloth, or finished clothing item), but the silk already exists. It will get transformed, not created.
We may still have a problem with all the webs suspended in trees, since they’re both unreachable and still count as items. There’s not much we can do about them, besides maybe clear-cutting trees and waiting for new trees to destroy them, by growing over the suspended webs. That, or build massive floors in the cave. Or, y’know, use autodump & atom-smash them, which is arguably cheating.
In related news, the number of items reported by cleanowned has gone from 38,000 to 40,000; which isn’t all that much for 2 years of play, and I’m willing to bet most of that increase is from blocks and bars.
Back up on the surface; when migrants arrived, I took the chance to do some cleanup. The depot finally got a bridge to close it off; its lever is by the tavern.
(https://i.imgur.com/Eet8AQO.png) (https://i.imgur.com/vcbekRl.png)
I don’t let dwarves walk outside unrestricted, due to pools of eerie mist. I’ve only found one of them, but that's about one too many. So, I made a new burrow, named ‘Outside Access’, and included a small area in front of the depot. Dwarves were allowed to access only the general underground burrow and that little outdoor area.
This is how the depot was reconstructed, the bridge built and linked, and a few of the nearer corpses moved to the third cavern for processing.
Whichever one of you dug out this massive room: firstly, I appreciate your dedication. Secondly, WHY?!? Thirdly, I'm going to wall out most of it. The only things of any use are the native copper chunks, and arguably the gems.
(https://i.imgur.com/92kAFR6.png)
Autumn comes and goes, without any sign of the dwarven caravan. Well that’s unpleasant…
Well, might as well build more trap corridors; this is when the second trap corridor was built in the NE, and cleared that speck of land too. Then the third, near the second and planned to open above the zombies in the tree.
(https://i.imgur.com/DJ8Zy27.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/0j1MNk5.png)
The levers to control it are in the tavern; they're properly labeled, so you'll know them when you see them. There's also a third unused lever there, by the way, if you need it.
Turns out the guys do indeed climb, and fast at that. This trap corridor might actually be underpowered, while the other two were overpowered. But it’s not all good news: as soon as a zombie dies, it’s replaced by one (or more) from the corpses existing in the cave.
Year 211
There is no longer any doubt: the only solution to the second cavern is to obsidianize the entire place. Trying to reduce numbers with traps has proven to be outright counter-productive - for every zombie we cage or kill, at least one more takes its place, and usually several. The third trap corridor has run three times, and every time the population count has gone up, not down.
I’m not saying trap corridors are completely useless: the land in cave 2 is mostly clear, and when we’ll build walls around the former lake, we could definitely use traps to clear the pockets of water and undead hiding under trees. But until then, the corridors are decommissioned: the outer bridge was raised, and all traps were deconstructed - the cage traps for being useless, and the weapon traps to free the weapons within. I’ve already killed off all the caged zombies, I’m not letting them pile up. Even so, we’re at 330 ‘others’ on the map, literally all of them zombies.
For the purposes of future obsidianization, I’ve set up mason’s and mechanic’s workshops in the giant dug-out space of level 159. Here, the existing stone will be used to craft mechanisms, floodgates, hatches, and blocks. Basalt and alunite are magma-safe; they’ll be the main materials for the above, and for a few grates just in case. Diorite and gneiss will be used exclusively for blocks, since they’re not magma-safe. I’ve also ordered 20 nether-cap corkscrews and pipe sections; this should be enough for any magma pumps we may need. The plan so far is to use level 120, right above C2, for all the magma works.
Also among my (mostly ineffectual) attempts to increase FPS, are restricting access, and reducing travel times. A whole bunch of walls, with doors in them just in case, were built in the wider spaces of the fort, including the massive open space by the fort’s main entry and in the caverns.
The tavern is really nice, but it’s also really far away. It’s about 100 tiles from the stairway, never mind any other places where a dwarf might need to go. To alleviate the problem, I’ve built a ‘subsidiary’ in the first cave - a room with food and drink, that’s also part of the tavern. Hopefully, dwarves will use it to fill their needs without going all the way to the main tavern.
(https://i.imgur.com/F8S6Ofn.png)
And after all of that was completed, I’ve spent half of spring and summer doing one thing I said I’ll never do: letting dwarves roam outside unrestricted. With all the essential tasks accomplished and without any great hopes of completing any major projects, the only time waster I can approach is cleaning the surface. It’s also the kind of task I can leave running in the background while I’m actually doing my dayjob.
Then, when I can actually focus on this puppy, I embark on a last and very dangerous task: digging out the deadly feather’s tomb, and dumping it in magma (before it rises again to pester the fort).
Success!
(https://i.imgur.com/kM9ZzSr.png)
Lastly: there is a new Forgotten Beast in the second cavern:
(https://i.imgur.com/q6LqKyg.png)
Curiously, it’s not engaging any of the neighboring zombies or the hidden FB that’s arrived in 209. It’s just sitting there, in its happy little tree.
I wanted to play until autumn, when the dwarven caravan may or may not arrive. Regrettably, it didn’t arrive; apparently, the mountainhome still likes us enough to send migrants, but the outpost liaison wrote us all off.
And that’s about it. I’m leaving you in the late autumn of 211, with decently usable dwarves. There are no active dump zones, clothing and booze industries run on their own, more or less. We even have a safe amount of wool thread & cloth; I’ve managed to shear our 4 wooly critters with some help from the military. Cooking and butchering still require micro-managing, but I left a sizable amount of lavish meals laying around. The mayor occasionally mandates figurines; that’s perfectly doable, we have a really nice bone stockpile on level 109.
Also, there are only 74 dwarves; one of these guys succumbed to infection in late spring. There’s a strange symmetry, where I lost one dwarf in every year: in 208 Iden got were’d, in 209 I locked the Beestmaster to die of thirst, in 210 I stupidly killed Minkot the miner, and now in 211 Stakud finally rolled a 1 on his ‘survive infection’ check.
Once again, the save (https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=15947).
Food got solved pretty quickly, by slaughtering two of our remaining bugbats; half the fort rushed to the butchery to claim one chunk of meat each. This indirectly caused both rawhides to rise from the dead: with everybody busy eating, nobody even tried to tan them. They’re not actually a problem, they both got trapped in the cage traps around the butchery. The army will be later called to re-kill them, and then they’ll be processed properly.
Meanwhile, I’m shutting down brewing, and ordering some plump helmets to be gathered from the spontaneous flora in the caverns. That should tide us over until a new batch of plump helmets grow in the farm. And looking at plant stocks, it’s obvious that I can safely disable all other kinds of farming for the rest of my turn: we seem to be drowning in cave wheat and sweet pods (both of which can be brewed, but not eaten raw).
(https://i.imgur.com/YX8XHWJ.png)
For the near future at least, the farm has been disabled, except for one plot producing plump helmets ad infinitum. I’ve also built a kitchen in the plants stockpile, to cook some of those plants; this does destroy seeds, but it’s not like anything can go permanently extinct, we have an eternal backup on the cavern floors.
On to the next crisis: clothing. More than half the clothes currently in use by dwarves are tattered (aka, they’re XclothesX, aka, they have wear level 2 or even 3). Besides giving bad thoughts on their own, it also means we’re only a coupla months away from an epidemic of nakedness. I added automated tasks for making clothes in my last turn, but their trigger conditions have been set way too strictly -- they’re supposed to launch when less than 10 unclaimed clothes exist in the fort. This unfortunately also counts all the unreachable clothes on the surface, so the tasks practically never fire.
For the time being, I've upped the limit to 100 (which might be too high, but I’ll deal with it later), and I’ve manually chained up the five basic clothes -- shoes, trousers, shirts, gloves, caps -- before using cleanowned X to ditch the worst offenders. This also released back to the fort a bunch of prepared meals, that some bloody fool has been ‘storing’ on the floor of his room:
(https://i.imgur.com/uYLu0SU.png)
A dwarf was thrown in a cage for “failing to meet mandates”, and has been left there until she went irretrievably insane:
(https://i.imgur.com/hrHZbEd.png)
She, and her cage, will eventually get thrown in the atom smasher, but right now I have more important things to do.
While everybody eats and hauls rags, I turn my eyes towards the surface. Which is filled with a depressing number of (un)dead dwarves, and one eerie mist zombie ettin. The ettin doesn’t seem to carry any mist contaminants, but does carry two named weapons. One of those is a shitty bow worth only 30 dorfbucks, but the second is an actual artifact halberd that has been well-used:
(https://i.imgur.com/j4PKeqS.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/PbJP4FM.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/oaUusD3.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/W3vP2L9.png)
Since I don’t want to risk any spread of the eerie mist syndrome, the surface is getting cleaned via traps. The left-side corridor looks like a good spot for the task; a line of cage traps gets built in all but two spots, which got bypassed because they held masterwork engravings, and building cages on top would have destroyed them. Then the door gets unlocked, and every zombie on the surface rushes in:
(https://i.imgur.com/qDvQLhB.png)
I’m a bit surprised the doors can still be locked and unlocked afterwards; I’d have expected them to be ‘taken by invaders’ and uncontrollable by the fort until a dwarf passes through them to reclaim them. Either the conditions have been relaxed, or undead don’t count.
While the cages were being built, the life, death, and undeath of the fortress carried on. A sleeping mason was attacked by a violent ghost, and got his leg ripped off. Somehow, he managed to not wake up through the whole ordeal, and is peacefully still napping amidst the ruins of his own battered foot:
(https://i.imgur.com/eCSsCqB.png)
The leg didn’t rise, which surprised me; it even got to sit around for nearly a month, seeing as everybody was busy. Six dead dwarves were then memorialized.
The second cavern was untouched by us, although the time draws ever nearer. During the above-mentioned preparations, we’ve been visited by two Forgotten beasts; the first one is once again placidly sitting in a tree, but the second one started a fight with the resident zombies and got instantaneously murdered. It won't rise again, since its corpse is both mangled and mutilated:
(https://i.imgur.com/PHQs2xe.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/g7qb49d.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/I1ci1Ef.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/lEkhxJN.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/4QZx0pv.png)
The second cave now has at least 4 forgotten beasts, 3 of them living and the last zombified. Minimum.
-----------
This was the progress for around six months; so mid-winter 215 to mid-summer 216. My FPS is around 4, but that's during work hours (so DF has serious competition for processor and RAM). Next up: I'll do my best to tackle the second cavern. I may or may not fail miserably.
Apropos of nothing, Miss Aban OarPost, one of the eerie mist zombies, has briefly appeared in Dwarf Therapist, thus allowing me a glimpse at her stats.
(https://i.imgur.com/2FeVW9X.png)
She was listed as a guest (with name in italics and uneditable jobs), and she didn’t stick around for long. I’ve looked around for her since then, and she never reappeared. I’m assuming Dwarf Therapist has briefly glitched; when she showed up the first time, I had just changed settings from hiding children, to showing them.
[edit] Miss Aban keeps appearing and disappearing from Dorf Therapist; I'm guessing there must be something wonky in her loyalties. That said, I'm not letting her out; she's still an eerie mist zombie, opposed to life.
Part 2 (216 winter - 217 autumn)
The final pre-obsidianizing preparations have occupied the next half of the year. Everybody is already clothed, we’re doing decently with food, and two little projects have been started in the first and third cave. Namely, two rooms were built on the edge, their floors covered in cages, and then a small portion of the wall torn down. Yep, I just deliberately ruined the cave seals.
(https://i.imgur.com/R0EX23F.png) (https://i.imgur.com/pzVFePP.png)
I’m hoping that having spawn options in all caves will make the second cave a little less busy when it’s time to wall it up. Also, as you can probably figure out, the trap room for the third cave was really badly planned. So, I tore it down and rebuilt it; the exit of the corridor had to conform to the existing hatch airlock, resulting in an… interesting… design. Whatever, it’s supposed to work well, not look good.
(https://i.imgur.com/K7W9DoF.png)
And it definitely does work well, because the third cave spawns a whole bunch of beasts; a good half of them are crundles, of course, but we also got some rutherers, reachers, elk birds, etc. Most of them have been tamed and slaughtered; our meat stocks have gone from absent to overflowing. The only survivors are 3 crundles, who now make up the fort’s only breeding animals (as it's recommended, as soon as they produce the first generation, they’ll get butchered). The semi-sapient animals (plump helmet people and gorlaks), were assigned to a built cage nearby, and were left there.
(This little misadventure resulted in 3 civilian deaths, bringing the population to 45).
Apropos of nothing, I remade the hospital, and temporarily moved the well above a spot in the pond with 2-deep water. The previous well had run dry; or rather, water level finally dropped at 3. Dwarves keep using it for washing themselves… which I can’t really blame them for, now can I?
(https://i.imgur.com/YlgNY41.png)
The well is temporary due to safety concerns; its new water source very much allows critters to climb up into ‘safe’ fort areas. A new well is getting built… somewhere, as soon as I figure out a spot for a cistern.
It is now winter, I’ve run out of distractions, I have 3 very unhappy dwarves and 2 unhappy ones, let’s punch some holes in a volcano.
(https://i.imgur.com/yAmCYz4.png)
The first target is the northern lake; it (probably) has no Forgotten Beasts around, so if I screw anything up it shouldn’t be that much of a disaster. A single-tile channel will carry magma to the northern edge, then be redistributed closer to the intended target, by way of other channels. Unfortunately for this log, screenshots of the channels make no sense outside of their context, so they’ll get skipped. Instead, I’ll focus on their effects.
The initial plan for moving magma did not include any pumps, and relied on normal flow to move the magma. I’m not doing that again, because it took about five months and achieved mediocre results. It did have results, obviously -- the zombie tree was partially set on fire, many of the zombies loitering in water got annihilated via obsidian casting, the map edge itself was partially obsidianized, and is about 2/3rds of the way ready for construction (so it’s not yet ready). Between late obsidian 216 when magma started falling, and the start of summer 217 when flow was cut, mob numbers went from 359 ‘living’ & 286 dead to 288 / 422.
(https://i.imgur.com/ilwzbQU.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/o4lzGwo.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/NY6R621.png)
Lastly, the three very unhappy dwarves have survived carving a fortification in the volcano; yay for them. Unfortunately, all three of them keep tantruming, beating up dwarves, destroying all sorts of things, and generally exhausting my reserves of patience. The spring of 217 was their last season alive; they were, at last, convicted of the long, long list of transgressions they’ve committed, soundly beaten, then they were locked in their respective hospital pods. By summer, the fort was home to 42 dwarves.
… I should build cage traps in the hospital pods. That may well save a lot of trouble in the future.
Summer started with a few small changes to the magma channel -- namely, the addition of 3 pumps to put some pressure in the flow. It’s not a super-safe system, and a small bout of magma flooding already took place when I stupidly let the ‘input’ pump going after the ‘output’ ones had stopped.
(https://i.imgur.com/xatbSJJ.png)
But, the desired blob of obsidian has expanded noticeably. This section of the edge is fully sealed, and can be built on top; minus that tiny tree that’s still home to ~15 zombies. I’m not counting the zombies caught below the tree; those are completely enclosed, they can’t exit until the obsidian is dug out. They’ll be eventually dealt with manually, with the army’s intervention. That’s part of the reason why I expanded the military; that, and just… well, did you look where we are?
(https://i.imgur.com/jIvhGse.png)
Now, this took until end-autumn; the new death score is 279/449 (~160 new deaths, only 3 of which were dwarven). Let’s talk about what else I’ve done in the meantime.
Firstly, the army was expanded and armored some more. There are now 16 hammerers (only 10 of whom have skills), 2 axe-dwarves, and 5 crossbow-dwarves. We’ve spent all copper bars making some very crappy armor (because somehow both our skilled armorer and weaponsmith have been killed). But there is still not enough for everyone, so the surface will have to be opened. The military can pick up armor, and the civilians can reload the traps. As well as whatever else, I guess.
I’ll have to delay a bit though, another were-whatever popped up:
(https://i.imgur.com/bxqgkqC.png)
So I’ll take the opportunity to drop another bridge: the one keeping the hammerer eerie mist zombies sealed.
Aban and Mistem pay no attention; they’re still locked in their tireless struggle. But the third one, Shem, rushes for the exit… and is promptly caught in a trap. Too bad s/he has no armor or weapon:
(https://i.imgur.com/9UsfHUT.png)
For the endless dancers, another plan is underway: a corridor was dug out parallel to the wall, and fortifications carved into it. The five crossbow-dwarves will eventually fire at the fighters. I’d expect all their shots to miss or get deflected; they’re relatively low-level, their bolts are carved from bone, and their enemies are clad in adamantine. I’ll keep track of archers’ levels progression, though -- for the record, we have one dude at level 9, three at 8, and one at 4. If they can’t kill the dancers, at least they can level up.
(https://i.imgur.com/IA1dn7K.png) (https://i.imgur.com/TcOqzn6.png) (https://i.imgur.com/FNrTlet.png)
But that’s autumn stuff, let’s get back to summer. Dwarves are on the surface, rushing in all directions. Armor gets picked, cages are reloaded, occupied cages are hauled to the basement, and so are all the corpses on the surface. Dwarves seem to have a fairly strict priority about tasks that are in the same category, they pick them more or less in the order they’re listed in the {j}obs screen. So, traps were handled because they were their own separate job type, but the hauling jobs executed in order: first refuse and corpse hauling, then storing random food items in barrels, then storing in bins, in bags, and lastly in the hospital. Well, that was educational, but also annoying, since nobody got around to dumping a few choice items. And by now it’s nearing autumn, so the outdoor excursion is canceled. Back into the fort!
Oh, and the army is still not fully kitted out. Screw it, I’m going to carve out a proper smithy and bar storage.
And that’s where the end of autumn found me: with a mostly-completed smithing complex, and most dwarves hauling stone.
(https://i.imgur.com/h2egSWP.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/dAvLNX7.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/OqBDE1k.png)
Part 3 (217 Autumn - 218 Autumn)
The smithy has been completed. Some of the bars have been moved underground, thus decluttering smelters, and allowing them to process some badly-needed copper at a faster rate.
(https://i.imgur.com/KmszTUM.png) (https://i.imgur.com/mn4tYsC.png)
While the peasants are hauling, miners have moved above the second cave, carving out new magma channels all across the northern map edge. This revealed the North-West corner of the map where I once feared another zombie tree. There was no such tree, in fact there have been no zombies whatsoever. Because that map corner contains this monstrosity:
(https://i.imgur.com/Kt7jver.png)
It has been annihilating every creature unfortunate enough to cross its path, living or dead:
(https://i.imgur.com/FCq4udm.png)
I was really worried it might cause me issues, and was also low-key hoping it would sit in the way of magma so it would either melt, or become encased in obsidian - a sure death for any creature. But it did neither; instead, it swam away, along the western edge, and stayed out of view for the rest of my turn.
(I never got the bastard’s name. ‘The Bismuth Monster’ will have to do).
And speaking of pouring obsidian: the results of half a year of digging, constructing, and pumping:
(https://i.imgur.com/vq4ICRI.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/If47Foo.png)
Walling up around the tree was a lot more of a pain than I expected, and took several save-scums to figure out how to deal with the stupid 15 zombies still stuck on it. The rest of the walls were a breeze, but this thing is the curse that keeps on giving.
My first idea was to station the army at its bottom, and hope the zombies will jump down on the new obsidian floor, to their deaths. Instead, they stayed up on their little perch and attacked down towards the dwarves, who were in turn attacking up. There were casualties on both sides, and it just took so damn long… After three failed runs I ditched the idea.
My second and much better idea was to channel above the tree, let zombies walk into the fort, and use the now venerable cage trap corridor to thin the horde. Military can handle what survives the traps; three jabberers, specifically. This was a great success, with one complication: the dwarf who went to dig the channel chose to jump down among the zombies, thus ensuring he died like a moron, and that the horde was delayed while killing him.
With the tree finally clean, it’s time to start constructing. It went reasonably alright, excluding the odd zombie resurrecting or spawning on the edge. Not to say only undead spawned, we also had one gorlak, a flock of bugbats who are still flying around, and a few crundles who didn’t live very long.
Far more infuriatingly were the five dwarven deaths, including the idiot miner. Notably, none of them were from the military, all were civilians, and a disproportionate 4 of them were miners. For some reason, miners just love to rush towards danger, despite being practically popcorn when it comes to surviving damage. For crying out loud, you’re civilians, act like it!
Before operations were shut down, the lower level was fully sealed, while the upper level had floors built and was half-sealed. We ran into some slight issues with the tree itself, and the estimated 180-200 items blocking 5 tiles of the edge.
I decided this problem is best solved with magma.
(https://i.imgur.com/xOQKeXQ.png)
One unexpected benefit is that the tree itself seems to whittle down from having magma poured directly on top of it; considering the stupid thing can’t be cut, that’s good news.
(https://i.imgur.com/S454psX.png)
Anyway, while the tree and the garbage around it were burning, all but 8 dwarves were enlisted in the military. The exceptions were five miners, one woodcutter, one child and one very unhappy dwarf who will be kept away from any dangerous implements.
They were allowed to pick up armor while the magma evaporated. Then walling operations have begun again, this time with far less of a hassle. There still were two deaths, in the tiny exit off to the right of the main operation: a miner (of course) went and picked a fight with an undead giant cave toad who’d climbed on the obsidian from the surrounding lake. Equally of course, he got swiftly murdered.
Then a stupid draftee somehow ended up in the lake, and drowned long before the remaining 4 miners have even started to dig a ramp so he can climb out. This wasn’t the result of any combat by the way; the scene was peaceful, the dead miner had been re-killed weeks ago, and all the edge sealing up was very nearly done. He was left in the lake where he fell, and the island of obsidian was walled up away from the rest of the fort. He can be undead all he wants, as long as it doesn’t bother anyone.
(https://i.imgur.com/71IVN2p.png)
On the other end of the northern edge, an undead giant olm keeps things complicated:
(https://i.imgur.com/t9mdnw5.png)
It’s close enough to keep dwarves from building a floor, but not so close as to aggro on dwarves and come over to this side, where hammerdwarves can kill it. With only one month left until autumn, the whole area was left as it is.
Meanwhile, in the rest of the fort:
The caged eerie mist zombie was atom-smashed; this produced a specific death message:
(https://i.imgur.com/bDEvgs4.png)
The little airlocks have proven their value: two separate FBs have spawned in the first cave, while I was fiddling with walls, floors, and zombies in the second cave:
(https://i.imgur.com/8GudtWu.png) (https://i.imgur.com/8FgVk5d.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/FJdpnXH.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/e5rptO3.png)
They promptly got in a fight, which Sarek won quickly, although it got seriously banged up in turn:
(https://i.imgur.com/eQCcJLM.png)
Other than those two horrors, the first cavern airlock has produced nothing in its entire existence.
AvolitionBrit’s dwarf had a strange mood, and crafted a crown. If he weren’t a named dwarf (the only named dwarf still surviving in this shithole, actually), nobody would have cared. But since he is…
(https://i.imgur.com/nnyPx5v.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/lxaZFtE.png)
In the summer of 218, we received some excellent news: a human caravan has arrived in these blighted lands! Joy! This is why I wanted to extend my turn until autumn, by the way: to finish the trade depot, and to trade with the dwarven caravan, if any.
Unfortunately, we still haven’t traded for shit.
The first run (because yes, a bit of savescumming was involved), I’ve received the message “Their wagons bypassed your inaccessible site”. Excuse me, what the fuck? The trade depot in the center of the map, the one I built from platinum blocks, has been graced by caravans before (ok, it was one caravan, and the only wagon that reached it scuttled itself in the doorway); are you telling me it suddenly doesn’t have a path to the map edge?
Yep. There is no path from the depot to any map edges. How fascinating and infuriating. There’s an overabundance of boulders hidden under the muck, and they’re very good at making the surface impassable for wagons. You can see them if you look from above, every thicker dot is the top of a boulder:
(https://i.imgur.com/WJrFVVd.png)
My last save was on 218-03-15, so I can still salvage this. I hope.
My depot has been torn down, and the one built by AvolitionBrit has been rebuilt in its old place, at level 156. There are paths in place for a safe, sealed entry for caravans, and it’s about time it’s getting completed. The path is capped off with a bridge, and the bridge is linked to a lever in the tavern, next to the other lever that controls the inner bridge; the old ‘depot access’ bridges got renamed to ‘center exit’:
(https://i.imgur.com/3CSBCbK.png)(https://i.imgur.com/T9uNwfK.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/KS6eQDJ.png)
(the top-left lever is labeled ‘stairway-gate’, and I have no idea where it goes. Maybe one of the internal bridges)?
Unfortunately, the linkage job was picked by one of the slowest dwarves in the fort, and the bridge was still down when the caravan spawned. On the opposite end of the map. It followed a ridiculously circuitous route, turning every single tile to bypass all the boulders blocking its path, and it almost seemed like it would make it.
Then both yaks driving the wagons decided the best path possible is on top of a tree:
(https://i.imgur.com/sBMg7FN.png)
Both wagons scuttled, merely 20 tiles away from the entrance:
(https://i.imgur.com/daucde0.png)
(The humans were also attacked by a peregrine falcon corpse, but that's after trade was aborted)
(https://i.imgur.com/kuLuV1e.png)
Between this mess and the end of summer, the final walling of the northern edge was done. Not without pain and anger, and coercion from me: there is a new burrow covering select bits of the second cavern, that was active for most of summer and which illustrates my feelings on the matter:
(https://i.imgur.com/B4P1njE.png)
Then dwarves returned to the fort, to discover that animal taming does not, in fact, pass down through generations as a heritable trait. Most of the second generation crundles have gone semi-wild, despite having a tame set of parents. Making matters worse, the feral crundles prevent animal tamers from working with the still-tame ones:
(https://i.imgur.com/K6MYfDJ.png)
Eventually, I gave up on them and stationed a hammer squad in the animal zone. Six crundles survived, of the nearly 30 that we used to have.
(https://i.imgur.com/vLUvIUv.png)
Two things worry me about this fort: there are no migrants, and FPS didn’t increase.
I’ve started with 48 dwarves. Building the airlock in the third cave brought me down to 45. Then 3 very unhappy dwarves got killed by me due to lack of improvement and constant disruptions. From summer 217 until spring 218, the fort had 42 dwarves, under the limit of 45 dwarves that I have set out in d_init, and no migrants have arrived. Sealing the cave then dropped the population at 35. The civilization is still active, so that’s not it. We just don’t get migrants…
As for FPS, there is no change I can see, despite the slaughter in the second cave. In 216, there were 359 other units (all of them undead critters) and 286 dead/missing. Now in autumn 218, there are 266 others, including 22 living, and 613 dead. A good haul, but without payoff.
Here's the save file (https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=15994), linked, as usual, at the top and bottom of the last post.
Part 4 (218 Autumn - 219 Spring)
Behold! The dwarven caravan!
(https://i.imgur.com/gcjBz1J.png)
They spawned outside, again, because I was impatient. The outer bridge had a slight flaw: there was no floor right on top of the bridge. This meant an invader could crawl between the bridge and the constructed roof (I should know, it happened to me).
So, I dropped the bridge and had dwarves build one layer of floor/roof on top of it. This went reasonably well, and completed until the 7th. Then I called dwarves in, and decided to wait a few days before sealing the fort back up. And the caravan arrived on the 10th; mere seconds after I ordered the lever pulled, in fact. I quickly canceled the command, and hoped they would all make it inside without any difficulties. Then I pulled the lever, and this time it stuck.
They brought only two wagons, and no liaison joined them. I’ve traded for weapons and armor (almost everything they had from bronze, bismuth bronze and steel) and two animals: a gander and a rooster.
(https://i.imgur.com/FycPL73.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/DOvdGIP.png)
There was a single book available, in something like 7-8 different editions; I bought two of the cheaper ones.
(https://i.imgur.com/6B6xNLE.png)
While these indubitably good things were going down, the crundle fiasco kept getting bigger. The dead crundles have risen en masse, and killed the remaining living crundles, despite the army being stationed right in the room with them. Considering all the weirdness around crundle ranching, that’s probably for the best.
Crundle ranching is… odd. When crundles hatched from eggs all the way back in 217, they weren’t listed as babies; they were listed directly as adults.Their weight was insignificant; 30 to 60 grams, with all values in between in increments of 5. Their parents had weights around 10,000, for comparison. And the females immediately started laying eggs (which were fertile; ick). One year later, at the time of their demise, they were weighing between 500 and 600 grams, about as much as a kitten. If that’s their usual growth rate, then it’s not worth bothering.
The undead crundles also killed the two old birds that were in the same room; not those I bought, those were still up in the depot.
In the middle of the season, we were visited by a third Forgotten Beast. It joined the other two in the first cavern, and as is tradition, it got in a fight with the only living one:
(https://i.imgur.com/PvB053o.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/FrXTMoh.png)
It killed the previous champ, suffered grievous injuries, then quickly died itself. Both of them rose again. The biggest gain here is that half the cages got webbed, and webbed cages trap ANYTHING.
(https://i.imgur.com/bIIT32C.png)
(Or they should; really hope they didn’t change that…)
After trade completed, I took the chance to order loose clothes to be hauled at the depot; I don’t necessarily intend to sell them, but it’s pretty much the only way to gather them from all the random places where dwarves ditch discarded clothes.
This took until the caravan packed, at which point any remaining orders were canceled. Dwarves were then tasked with outside cleanup, over the remaining two months of autumn. The long list of ‘Store item in Hospital’ tasks has finally been whittled down to about 15, from the ~40 that they used to be.
I've floored over a bit of the volcano, to minimize the risk of dwarves walking next to lava, and getting pushed in at the slightest attack. Something else I noticed here: if the Cleaning job is left active, dwarves will cheerily clean all artificial floors, and any stockpiles. Good to know in general, bad for letting dorfs outside.
(https://i.imgur.com/Zqt57Ic.png)
The first half of winter passes with rest and relaxation. Only a bit of work got done, while everybody mostly relaxed. The miners were called to duty, to dig the future magma channels to the west side. The four unhappy dwarves were removed from their normal squads and placed into a special squad, named The Sad Sacks; they get armor, but no weapons. One pump operator has worked to fully extend the obsidian island on the eastern side of the lake. And lastly, a handful of dwarves have finally walled the little spot to the north that used to be infested by an undead giant olm (the olm had finally moved into the neighboring land, and was killed by hammerdwarves).
This lets dwarven eyes see new lands, and find new horrors: the Bismuth Monster has re-emerged. Its name is Baktur, and it’s barely even scuffed from all its fights:
(https://i.imgur.com/0YKk8kh.png)
It stopped on a land strip that used to be hidden; it seems to be doing nothing, so far.
(https://i.imgur.com/IvtRE20.png)
Zombies in general have been moving; giant toads, giant olms, and crocodiles that used to sit underwater have moved on land, including on the large flat land dominating the east of the cavern (I suspect it’s because of the poor bugbats: they were flying all around the cavern, and they drew the attention of submerged zombies). This gives me an idea: I rebuild some weapon traps in the previously unused corridor:
(https://i.imgur.com/zrh8gHp.png)
Just like the last time, any zombie that had a land path to the corridor has begun moving towards it. Around 30 have arrived, and only one survived the traps; it made it to the top of the corridor’s dedicated stair, just to get annihilated by the stationed hammer squad. This left the eastern side zombie-free; we still needed to wait one more month to wall up that edge, due to magma making the obsidian island impassable.
Meanwhile, dwarves are hauling all the corpses for butchering. A second meat stockpile was created right next to the butchery; by the end it’s nearly overflowing, and there still are some corpses left to butcher. A good thing, as long as you don’t think about where the meat comes from.
(https://i.imgur.com/JrpnOQr.png)
And, la piece de resistance: the western edge has been partially flooded with magma. Knowing what critters are sitting around in the trees, I didn’t dare punch open ways into the fort (though I did plan a few), and only relied on fully-sealed corridors for this: two stairways were brought to above water level, then one tile fortifications carved towards the zombies.
(https://i.imgur.com/pp79wQ1.png)
My advice for magma channels: opening > constructed fortification > floodgate to control the flow. This way, even if a forgotten best or another building destroyer gets in, they can’t do any damage.
The magma flood was a thing of beauty.
(https://i.imgur.com/6VCTT0Z.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/yY2tpYr.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/ePKKXCz.png)
In terms of results, I’m ending the year with 151 others and 883 dead. The mess with the crundles has fouled up the flow of numbers, but before magma was pumped, I was at 256/719. So merely obsidianizing the water, and setting trees on fire, has killed off 164 critters, of which 59 were replaced and 105 stayed dead/absent.
(https://i.imgur.com/w8KCExq.png)
At least one living jabberer has spawned between magma floodings, and was immediately killed by still-extant undead fauna. Then it rose, and then it burned away in a second, more targeted magma flood. Lol.
(https://i.imgur.com/ZJW3an9.gif)
Burning things with magma is far less of a sure-fire (heh) destruction method than I expected. Some flammable things catch fire as it’s reasonable, and others are just sitting there in a pool of magma, without giving any signs of decay.
(https://i.imgur.com/W49G1vJ.png) (https://i.imgur.com/WZvq1j0.png)
In the last month of Obsidian, Baktur the Bismuth Monster has fallen.
(https://i.imgur.com/S481eMZ.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/fgmF9oA.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/NmueoSF.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/qYA9AIk.png)
Its killer is yet another metal FB:
(https://i.imgur.com/iRajpir.png)
Amas has been in the fort for a while, it just didn’t do anything until now. Even now, it’s loitering on the western side of the map, bothering no-one except zombies.
At around mid-winter, there’s been a dwarven murder: Kol the very unhappy axe-dwarf killed one Stinthad, crossbow-dwarf. There is no report in the justice system, nor has one appeared over the ensuing months, so it seems like Kol gets away with it. There is a slab in the works for Stinthad, but nobody got to it yet. At least they managed to dump and atom-smash Stinthad's corpse before he rose.
My turn is approaching its end, and there is one last risk I’m going to take: walling up the eastern edge.
Work could only start in the last week of Obsidian. Some spots were still inaccessible due to unevaporated magma, but they can be dealt with later. There are 3 levels to cover, there’s plenty to do!
Work then stopped abruptly after the first week of 219; Amas is coming!
Actually, Amas has been loitering to the North; I may have been overly-cautious in calling all the dwarves back in. But it did make its way to the land mass, so maybe I was exactly as cautious as I should.
Eastern edge progress:
(https://i.imgur.com/DytcOR0.png) (https://i.imgur.com/KnpEKm3.png) (https://i.imgur.com/1450hAI.png)
Dwarves then spent the next week… mostly Storing Owned Items? Bullshit. You’re all wearing armor. Don’t tell me you actually need some spider silk left glove. And actually, do tell me why you didn’t do this one month ago, when you had nothing else to do? Hmmm?
Dwarf AI is weird. News at 11. Here is the save, made on 219.01.14th (https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=15994).
Random garbage time:
One dwarf of the four Sad Sacks has crossed below 10,000 stress, and was reinstated in the hammerdwarf squad. Finally, the silk gathering and weaving therapy is paying off. Of the other three, Kol seems increasingly like a lost cause, and the other two are slowly improving. I recommend they’re left to it, until they get better or die.
The dominant goblin civ is shaped uncannily like a scorpion:
(https://i.imgur.com/31X2Cbk.png)
Aban the eerie mist zombie, at the end of summer 218; he did show up in Therapist a few times, but not in Obsidian, so this is the most recent screenshot:
(https://i.imgur.com/VkRJCz0.png)
Despite my murder spree, FPS still hasn’t improved. I’m getting worried, to be honest.
I am definitely going to poke at the fort in Legends mode; if I find anything interesting, I’ll let you know.
At some point in my life, I will learn to set goals matching the time I have to execute them. That point is not now. Have part 2 of 3 of this never-ending turn of mine. Part 3 will follow tomorrow, along with the save. Right now, I'm just tired.
Year 224.
Spring was pleasantly boring, occupied with domestic tasks.
But in summer, a new siege has arrived. This one was a bit larger, closer to 60 than the 30-ish that had previously bugged us. I chose to finally release Mistem the eerie mist zombie hammer-dwarf.
The fighting mostly happened on the slopes west of the central entry. I briefly believed this would prevent any good screenshots, until I remembered multilevel exists:
(https://i.imgur.com/2KGMcPd.png) (https://i.imgur.com/gvijhuD.png) (https://i.imgur.com/nduR6rg.png)
Mistem ran straight into the goblins' siege, leaving a trail of goblin blood and body parts behind him. But it wasn’t an entirely one-sided slaughter: Mistem is accumulating wounds, that will never heal:
Before the battle:
(https://i.imgur.com/cydzOQg.png)
After the battle:
(https://i.imgur.com/NzJX8Es.png)
Part of the reason might be his less-than-complete armor; he was trapped with full gear, so I do wonder if some of his armor was stripped away by dwarves, or if it simply broke while Mistem slaughtered the entire siege by himself.
(https://i.imgur.com/wwtFHpn.png)
Oh well, time to trap him once again. The first cages were filled with freshly risen goblin zombies, but there’s still five or six cages left to catch Mistem… oh come on, how are you trapavoid all of a sudden?!?
(https://i.imgur.com/Y4Sec5Q.png)
My only option is to call the army; there are no doors left to lock, and the inner bridge will not be raised in time. Luckily, no new eerie mist infections occur, and Mistem is killed at the cost of one dead dwarf, and five wounded who required hospitalization.
(https://i.imgur.com/pJf6N6P.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/WE3S0hU.png)
The aftermath of the siege is largely ignored; I finally figured out what I want to do for defenses. I’m going to reuse the old and cursed trade depot space, and turn it into a trap corridor; or maybe just a room to station dwarves before letting them loose. Next to it, there will be the Slaughter Tower -- a tower dedicated to processing siege results, both sentient and not.
‘Course, the first attempt at building the tower is constantly interrupted by many new zombies, rising from the summer siege. Even worse, the combination of sludge rain, zombies, and simply going outside after so long underground means that every step outside comes with a mood penalty. In less than two months, the fort goes from two almost-mended dwarves to two very unhappy dwarves and four unhappy ones. So, work is stopped, and the population is allowed to decompress over autumn.
Also, we traded with the dwarven caravan, everybody washed up thus expending all our soap, and several new stockpiles were laid down for diorite blocks (for the benefit of the tower), and for silver and copper bars (to clear out the smelteries); nothing really interesting occurred.
In winter, though… in winter we get a proper siege. Two and a half pages of invaders, including beak dogs and trolls.
(https://i.imgur.com/9i5GNyV.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/xSMKT2h.png) (https://i.imgur.com/Sm4eUVN.png) (https://i.imgur.com/2NsraJO.png)
I immediately decide to let loose the ettin, for the final time; there’s no way he’ll survive this. And indeed, he doesn’t.
(https://i.imgur.com/qHGY03V.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/4sVel2f.png)
He does extract a heavy cost, but not enough to break the siege. No syndrome infections happened, either.
(https://i.imgur.com/WNA5s7y.png)
Then, the siege is free to turn its attention on the fort. The trolls especially mean that our door system is about to go kaput; likewise, the gem windows decorating the central tower. Some half of the siege makes its way indoors, through broken doors and filled traps, despite the inner bridge having been raised since the siege started; then they kinda just stop. All but one troll, who entered the central tower and started smashing windows. One by one, and all alone.
(https://i.imgur.com/4MhIuNM.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/M4DDCmX.png) (https://i.imgur.com/AgccQ0F.png) (https://i.imgur.com/VWjDPuw.png)
I don't know if he climbed the outer walls, or if he just went up the center stair. That's one bit I missed.
Meanwhile, the army has been assembling in the training room. Forty hammer-dwarves and ten crossbow-dwarves are about to be unleashed on the remaining goblins. The bridge is dropped, and the middling two squads are sent down the old trap corridor, to annihilate trolls and goblins alike. Meanwhile, the weakest squad is sent up the tower to kill that oversized vandal before he runs out of windows (the gems are then forbidden; don’t want dwarves wasting time hauling them to stockpiles).
The goblins break before dwarves, and retreat mostly to the west, in the same direction they’ve arrived from. In the end, I guess around 10-15 of the original siege have survived; mostly by running faster than their peers.
(https://i.imgur.com/iTCF4e4.png)
With the siege broken, work on the tower can begin anew. I leave a squad of hammerers on an outcropping overlooking the carnage; their job is to kill off any rising zombies. Plus, the crossbow dwarves are stationed on top of the new corridor, to deal with the ever-present and infinitely-annoying fliers that keep pestering dwarves.
But, I don’t have much luck this time. The corpses on the inside have started rotting, and I won’t risk stacking miasma debuffs on top of all the other usual debuffs. Everybody is called inside; let’s go look at that cavern for a little bit…
The cavern has already had its two last open water sources obsidianized. Incidentally, this also annihilated ole Amas the Tin Monster -- for reasons known only to the AI, it had climbed up one of the magma nozzles, and stayed there (obviously, the channel connected to the nozzle was sealed with a fortification since it was made). Amas simply melted when magma was pumped over him.
(https://i.imgur.com/RGw0qqu.png)
Now, there’s ‘only’ the matter of dealing with all the zombies up all the trees, and the trees themselves. Easier said than done… and a plan for the next year. It is the end of Obsidian.
Year 225.
The year begins with an abortive siege; a few goblins crop up on the northern map edge, then leave right away. With the benefit of hindsight, I’m going to say this is the second goblin civilization, declaring war upon us.
Also, a baby has been born in FriendlyTreason! Given the dying status of our civilization, that is excellent news indeed! We may yet rise to conquer the world, and in the end, isn’t that all that matters?
Back to the zombies. A room was excavated in the roof near the tree. The plan is heavily inspired by the northern tree’s clearing: to punch a single path above the tree, and let zombies come to the dwarves. This… mostly works. Two civilians manage to somehow descend on the tree’s surface; they can’t get back up in the fort, they refuse to jump down on the obsidian, and the army can’t follow them on the tree, so they both die.
I had a slight savescum here: I tried to restrain dwarf access just by forbidding all items; if there’s nothing for dwarves to get, they won’t go there, I naively thought. But of course they went there anyway, because dwarves are stupid, and I soon had 6 dead dwarves. I did not accept that, and the game died so dwarves can live.
Learning from the above, the dangerous area was removed from the Underground burrow, and locked away with magma-safe doors. I know from the other annoying tree that the undead will leave large amounts of body parts behind, so at least one magma flood will be needed.
(https://i.imgur.com/6NSSEf6.png)
Dwarves then carve a dedicated access path through the rock bordering the former lake; one of the squads descends, and kills off as many undead as possible. But there are still plenty sitting in the damned tree, and the corpses have already started stinking… time to withdraw, and let magma flow:
(https://i.imgur.com/8pBko6V.png) (https://i.imgur.com/MWI8Hoq.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/OPVhkUy.png)
And this is where summer finds me: waiting for magma to evaporate. The human caravan has arrived, and I’ve bought most of their books in exchange for large troll clothes, and normal-size rags from goblins and dwarves.
Once that's done, I turn my attention to the second, slightly less zombie-filled area of the cave. There are supposed to be only four undead (crundles don't count) capable of free movement, currently sitting in the leaves of a spore tree. The undead blocked under various tree bits won't move until we allow them.
(https://i.imgur.com/LQLzh4v.png) (https://i.imgur.com/8sRYztm.png) (https://i.imgur.com/QgugUm2.png)
I figure the army can deal with the four; then, a miner can punch holes through the obsidian to release the hidden zombies, and when those are done in, woodcutters can cut the trees and the wall can finally, finally, be built.
It mostly went according to plan; the only complication was one military dwarf, who fought a crundle and dodged into a 1-deep magma pool on the first obsidian island, where he was not supposed to be. At least it resulted in some interesting game output, across the next two months, while his gear melted and cooled back down:
(https://i.imgur.com/cwwrOrP.png) (https://i.imgur.com/C07Q80K.png) (https://i.imgur.com/UCyP0qy.png)
These strange metal lumps, and one pair of excellent steel greaves that will be reused, are all that remains of the dwarf’s gear:
(https://i.imgur.com/JD5dfYx.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/b4CnCte.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/NHK9n2t.png)
That incident aside, most of the second island is sealed off. Work had to cease because of a sudden influx of undead, most of them crundles and bugbats. Through sheer numbers and dwarven stupidity, they manage to kill another woodcutter; we are now at 71 dwarves (two jumped in the zombie tree, one evaporated in magma, and now this moron). I still blame the quasi-armor implementation of miners and woodcutters for their unfounded bouts of courage.
Autumn: a siege was lucky enough to spawn directly in the depot airlock, and nowhere else. They’re far fewer than the last siege, have no trolls, and only one beak dog. I’ll have to check in Legends which of the two goblin civs is bugging us; it might be the Ghouls that I tried to trade with.
(https://i.imgur.com/ZlyVVlL.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/D63cHfX.png)
The first three hammerer squads are called to deal with them. The dwarves barely even have to slow down in the process of slaughtering the siege; by the 6th there are no more goblins in FriendlyTreason:
(https://i.imgur.com/hHV9spe.png) (https://i.imgur.com/d7fb9ZH.png)
Ultimately, we may still lose the dwarven caravan; although the siege itself got mulched, most of the corpses are still in the corridor, and all it takes is one lucky undead to scare those chickenshit traders into leaving.
Except we get lucky, and the six wagons of the caravan pass through the corpses without any of them rising to bite. Any future undead goblins were re-killed by a strategically positioned squad, and we trade without incident. Too bad the dwarven caravan has almost nothing we need right now; I only buy some fire clay, some magnetite, and a few bits of fish. And the caravan’s luck holds because they also leave without any complications (ok, almost; one trader somehow decides to leave through the second cavern, and quickly runs into zombies; but aside from that, everybody left safely).
The rest of autumn is spent cleaning up after the siege, walling up the two little lake edges, and finishing up the non-tree bits of the obsidian island. One crossbow-dwarf dies at some point; I don’t even know when or how. Screw it, I’m done with the second cavern. It’s as safe as can be made with the dumb tree in the way, and with the unbeatable zombies holding court. So, y’know, not really safe. I'm pretty sure I'll never talk about this area again, so have some screenshots:
The two small water sources, obsidianized and walled:
(https://i.imgur.com/lU05VVI.png)
A godawful mess in the staging grounds; the corridor goes up to the small water sources, and all the stockpiles were removed soon after.
(https://i.imgur.com/8CJhaAR.png)
Lastly, the entire second cavern, as my monitor can show it:
(https://i.imgur.com/yQ5b7Y5.png)
Now, only the tower and the surface remain. And internal cleaning, I suppose. Just as well, winter starts with another siege; again a small(ish) one, the presence of elves in the troops marks them as being from the Nightmare of Coasts; they took over an elven retreat, once upon a time.
(https://i.imgur.com/Tnpz5Cf.png)
Once again, they’re being ignored for the first two months. I really cannot stress enough how much hauling there is to be done. But once that’s more or less done, the army of FriendlyTreason makes very short work of them. No casualties on our side, of course. And with a whole month left in the year, I can get more work done on the tower…
File: https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=16041
In the spirit of Succession Games, I would like to humbly submit my application to be the the next Overseer without having read anything except the OP and the three posts on this current page.
About time I get back into the game anyways!
the fort was looking a bit too... organized? sane? straightforward?
I tried, I really tried. But during my reign a whole half a dozen dwarves died! In just a year..
Continuation:
- hammer 07 2nd gen (Bim) killed weaver "BEST_AXE" in a tantrum with a punch tearing the spine apart and second collapsing the upper body at the temple of no particular deity. I guess it was not a good idea to use the justice system on her. As she is a feasible warrior. I decided to assign her mining duty and send her to the 2nd cavern west to the zombie tree, if she survives, she may remain in the fortress. Two manera corpses finish her. With a hammer equipped she could have done far more damage. I'm thinking of creating an "asylum"
- dwarven trade caravan arrived and I sold all the old clothing and bought 17 iron anvils and some codexes
- our best hammer 3 is telling a story at the tavern with sixteen listeners, in midspring 220 Avolitionbrit ceased to be the militia commander. Some politics going on hm? Armorer Ralkakdal serves blueberry wine (I'm coincidentally drinking a blueberry milkshake whilst playing)
- it took me quite a while to figure out how you taped the volcano without losing a dwarf, but now I managed it, I had to use a quick engraver and quick pump operator
- we got an artifact adamantine scepter 150k value
- progress is being made on the 2nd cavern. Some pond grabbler zombies challenge our hammer lords
- marksdwarf Reg (got 40 kills) killed our broker after getting into an argument in the temple dedicated to Kikrost, basically punching the head until the spine broke. She is our marksdwarf squad leader. She won't cause much damage if I send her to the caves like with hammer 07, so I'll establish an asylum now, where she will be exiled. The asylum is north of the 3rd cavern tavern
- I decided to challenge the zombie tree with 3 squads. (Bim) goes down as well as various manera corpses. Essentially I just wait in the hall and from time to time manera corpses emerge. A combat log can take up to 31 pages with a manera. After a while I decided that it would be easier to work with magma dropping. Maybe, if we construct bridges on the edge, the magma will be able to reach the rest of the zombies
(https://i.imgur.com/DMXqaDJ.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/IW5pI1K.png)
- An accident happened where a dwarf opened a door, and behind that door was magma. Two dwarves perished
- whilst constructing the asylum, Reg got into a tantrum and kicked away the whole arm of our carpenter
- Sodel pushes our bowyer to death during a tantrum, then goes to the hospital and starts a fist fight. He'll go to the asylum as well
- I figured a nice punishment for Reg and Sodel. There is a forgotten beast on the 2nd floor trapped in the trees. Both are assigned tree duty and released to cut the tree down. Should they survive, I may consider expelling them. Bothom Tarem got consequently in a fight with Sodel. After some tarzaning on the trees the beast bites Sodel in the neck and lower arm, which explode into gore, Sodel is enraged and bites the forgotten beast back! Reg in the meantime drinks from the underground lake. Sodel scrambles away and probably dies from bloodloss. I assign Reg to kill Tarem, she, completely naked and only equipped with a battle axe, only tearing the skin and fat of the mighty snail. She fought well and did not get any damage. I let the next overseer decide what her fate will be
PS: I also leave the next overseer some fun with magma dropping (west tunnel) on the zombie tree and a jabberer reverting to a wild state, have fun!
PPS: The new lever to close the magma let-in (west tunnel) is one layer above the tunnel
File: https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=16041
I've finally figured out a way how to get rid of the cave underwater trees at the edge of the map DWARFEN SCIENCE COMMENCE:
Step 1) Install a ballista on the same level as the branch https://i.imgur.com/fxbPMg1.png (https://i.imgur.com/fxbPMg1.png) pointing to the branch
Step 2) Create a passage for a ballista arrow to the branch. In my case the water is leaving the map one z below through a fortification. Floodgates or gates might be useful to control the flow of water
Step 3) Shoot https://i.imgur.com/82sh3dF.png (https://i.imgur.com/82sh3dF.png). Ballista arrows don't fly necessarily straight, building the ballista closer to the branch might help
Step 4) Enjoy your tree free edge
(https://i.imgur.com/orM1LY2.png)
Sidenote: Soon after the tree disappeared of course a ton of new monsters entered the fortress. So having the military stationed closed by and builders ready to close off the edge again might be useful.
Sidenote: Ballista arrows disappear after leaving the edge of the map
The save broke during my 2nd session some how. Progress lost. Oh well, that's how it goes sometimes. Whoever wants to go next can grab the previous save posted here.
'Save broke', as in it keeps crashing without any warning or message at a certain point? Because that sounds like the 'can't spawn were-chameleon on the map edge' that keeps happening in this fortress. And only in this fortress.
Does the save crash around the dates when Full Moons occur?
- 25th Granite
- 23rd Slate
- 21st Felsite
- 19th Hematite
- 17th Malachite
- 15th Galena
- 13th Limestone
- 10th Sandstone
- 8th Timber
- 6th Moonstone
- 4th Opal
- 2nd Obsidian
- 28th Obsidian
There's no real fix for it, we just have to run the fort and keep rolling the dice until Dwarf Fortress succeeds. And then you'll have a were-chameleon on the surface :)
In completely unrelated news, I've been playing the game non-canonically, in order to go poke at the goblins. I shouldn't have bothered, because they keep poking at me; even more interestingly, the Ghouls of Whatever have brought half their demons in one invasion:
(https://i.imgur.com/M2vwmXD.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/nboCbm5.png)
Obviously, I made a save with all of them on the map, so I can play around with multiple strategies; spoilered because of its non-canon status:
Firstly, the absolute bastards are not willing to move; they're just loitering near the map edge where they spawned, and only move if some zombie goes to poke at them. When the siege is broken (because goblins are a lot easier to kill) their AI at least manages to get them to leave...
The demons of steam are kinda pushovers, but the leech demons are propa badass.
Here's what I tried with them:
- seal the fort, and release the 4 caged forgotten beasts: they're crap. A single leech demon beat the absolute shit out of them; it died at the end, but man. Also, one of the cages was not actually connected to its lever; oops. Had to run this scenario twice.
- open the slaughter corridor, and wait for invaders to come to us. Only 3 leech demons were willing to path towards the fortress; and all the goblins, of course. This particular attempt ended with 7 dead dwarves, 6 of which were killed by those 3 demons (the last one was an extremely stupid crossbow-dorf, who decided the corridor is a great place to hang. All alone. His death was from lame-ass goblins, and entirely his own fault).
- sending my 30-odd hammer-dwarves to take the siege head-on (the other 2 squads were left to guard the fort).
-- go directly for the demons: didn't really work, goblins rushed for dwarven troops. With the siege effectively consolidated in one place, it went really poorly for our dorfs...
-- go for the goblins first. That went a bit better; dwarves annihilated the goblins, and the siege broke. A few demons left, but most have seen the dwarves, and engaged. This ended with about 10 dead demons (only 2 of them were leech demons), and nearly 20 dead dwarves.
I also had an attempt at retaking our old mountain home, demons or not; it went extremely poorly, a lot of dwarves were caught and imprisoned:
(https://i.imgur.com/XicDwup.png)
Edit: forgot to mention, demon corpses don't rise from the dead. I don't have enough confidence to make a sweeping generalization that 'NO demons rise from the dead', but this was my experience with both steam and leech demons. It makes sense on some level: steam demons don't even leave a corpse behind, only a puddle of water, and leech demons only have 3 body parts (body & 2 wings); I suspect none of these parts have the fabled [GRASP] tag that allows a body or body part to rise from the dead, so that's why they're immune to the evil biome's resurrection effect.
I would very much like contribute some new ideas for this fort.
And potentially recondition any of the dwarves who elect to openly disagree with these new ideas.
Can I have the job? I'm taking it.
--------------
Currently in late spring. And we're definitely going places with this... New places... Scary places...
New government - New Rules - New social order
Also, everyone gets a number, and now consequently is that number.
(https://i.imgur.com/hCGOldA.png)
Also, everyone has new hats. This is the best I could to giving them giant hats featuring bolded numbers corresponding to their rank/number/name designation.
(https://i.imgur.com/gwGTLBm.png)
A description of one of the hats.
(https://i.imgur.com/p2U7SYH.png)
And if they don't wear the hats, well...
(https://i.imgur.com/m8aOtpP.png)
Looks like there was a typo in "Numbr 28"'s name. Good to see that our spellcheck-volcano is in good and working order.
The old mayor is #1, but #2 runs the fort. Idk what happened with #1. They sequestered themselves in some room after drawing these pigs all over the wall, and later died of insanity. Tragic, but interesting! In accordance with their design, the fort now functions according to their alleged will. However due to the biome effects, #1 continues to persist as an undead ghoul, still trapped in the pig chamber, who according to fort propaganda, continues to divulge their wisdom to the current leader #2 through hushed undead whispers of madness and paranoia; as well as haunting dream visions pertaining to occult pig-worshiping idolatry.
-----
"Yes, the fort continues to benefit from the wisdom of the former dead leader, who is now accursed in the eyes of both the living and dead. And yes, while this same very creature now wishes to devour all of this fort's inhabitants, we would like to remind citizens that this is, of course, no cause for alarm. We have tasked several committees with compiling and disseminating the truths the ghoul-father presents us. And we assure citizens that all specially appointed committee members must undergo a rigorous screening process, overseen by #2 himself, to verify the individual abilities of each committee member to discern the lies from esoteric cosmic truths from the unintelligible wails of mindless corpse monsters.
One such official subcommittee, presently working with the ghoul-father to discover his wisdom, would like to issue a statement for the general public's consideration at this time, which is as follows:
"Do not be alarmed!"
However, if you, or a party you belong to, do still feel alarmed, in spite of the very explicit instruction provided just now on behalf of the Calculators of Cultural Anticipation Subcommittee, you, and/or the party to whom you belong, are hereby requested to report immediately to a temporary holding cell pending arrangement with a Truth-Conciliation Adjudicator. An appointment shall be made available to you shortly in order for you, and/or the party to whom you belong, to address any and all safety concerns and grievances with the volcano. This will, in no uncertain terms, relieve you, and/or the party to whom you belong, of all concerns, personal aspirations, personal belongings, special assigned numerical identification aluminum cone-hats, flesh, and teeth which may, or may not, belong to you, or to other affiliated concerned party members who shall no doubt be meeting with the volcano shortly after you.
We hope you experience an unexciting and productive rest of your day!
[Please note: food-ration demerits issued as penalty for the destruction of one's special numerical identification cone hat will be redistributed among the closet relatives of a dwarf in the event of state-mandated volcano grievance addressal. Removing the hat prior to attending the meeting is not permitted, and will result in further food-ration demerits being issued to the grievance-addressed's next of kin, following the meeting.]"
------
I'll post a full log when I'm done.
Oh! So after #13, the old hammerer, went mysteriously missing, after having repeatedly refused to wear their designated #13 hat, we got a new #13/Hammerer, and they made a thing! "The Barb of Rot" - A fly chitin amulet
(https://i.imgur.com/1DE2qPk.png)
Link to save file listing for FriendlyTreason - Winter of 239:
https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=16375
Not going to have as much time for the write up I was planning. But I'll share what tidbits of the notes were compiled and weren't later incinerated for secrecy, which in addition to the last post, should provide enough of a summary of what happened.
----------------
Late winter 238:
Former Mayor, now known only as number 1, went crazy placed pig statues everywhere. Another dwarf, known only as number 2, has now taken over the fort as totalitarian dictator for life, for a year, by 5th of obsidian. A change in regime has occurred for FriendlyTreason and democracy, as an institution, is dismantled.
(https://i.imgur.com/uFeUR85.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/Hd1K3kZ.png)
Everyone is given a number (wrote about it in the last post)
The fort commissions odd looking pig statues and glass windows. The new "mayor" is provided with an office befitting his title of the dictator for life, for the year. Golden pig statues are placed behind the crystal glass windows within the office, the purpose is alleged to be symbolic.
BIG CHANGE: Everyone has new hats!
(I wrote about this and shared screenshots of what the hats look like in the last post.)
Number 13, the old hammerer, did not see eye to eye with the regime, and would not put on his new hat, and was consequently cast into the fire of the volcano. Number 75 is promoted to Number 13 and designated as the new hammerer.
Early Spring 239:
Reduced thread production. Seriously wtf? Why is there so much thread? My game lags for like 10 minutes trying to view all of it in the stocks screen. I'm probably going to start tossing this stuff in the volcano.
(https://i.imgur.com/xYfGxNf.png)
Increased pig-watching propaganda.
Iconoclasm - A mob of citizens, loyal to the new regime, destroys the heretical church shrines of the false gods. The Fortress adopts a one size-fits-all cult-like worship of the hierarchical leader, Number two.
(https://i.imgur.com/yqiLMiW.png)
More people keep taking off their hats. More purgings ensue.
(https://i.imgur.com/QcKTM82.png)
The new naming conventions have proven confusing to some of the dwarves.
Additional purging options for citizens who are ill-suited for the new regime are now being considered.
(https://i.imgur.com/f15gGVR.png)
Mid Spring 239:
Number one succumbs to her insanity and passes on into undeath, wherein her mad whispers of pig worshiping idolatry continue to provide ever illuminating guidance for the party and the population as a whole.
(https://i.imgur.com/kiYI7Cd.png)
More purgings.
(https://i.imgur.com/AUrgcrH.png)
The new Number 13 is apparently related to number two, and produces a strange artifact.
(Showed it in the last post. Bizarre fly-chitin amulet, which features bituminous coal and bumblebee chitin. Unclear where this stuff came from.)
Late Spring 239:
Begin project toss excess thread into the volcano.
I myself go nuts, and after having made all of these tiny little hats for the dwarves, and picking up and individually placing each one onto a citizen's head, a number of them won't wear them, and immediately take them off. I wrestle with these citizens for hours, just trying to keep their hats on on their stupid little heads. A couple of the dwarves are pretty good about wearing the hats, in fact, they won't take them off. The problem with these specific dwarves is that they're NOT wearing the RIGHT HATS. And everytime I try to get them to take them off, they immediately run away. I tried everything. I tried purging, I tried reconditioning, nothing works! Hours and hours of just micromanaging these STUPID LITTLE HATS, whose idea was this?! I've had it! These anti-hat maverick citizens are just going to take off their special individually numbered hats, no matter how much re-education I throw at them! I NEED HELP! Well, perhaps in more ways than one, but for this specific problem, I'm going to need help from the fellow loyalist dwarves.
An investigation reveals a conspiracy involving the military, who were clearly opposed to the new order of things, and subscribed to "enlightened" ideals concerning free hat wearing expression. They continued to wear their more effective metal combat helms.
And so, I disbanded the military.
In place of the military are now special designated Citizen-Uniform Verification Support & Wrestlemania Squads. These squads each have a leader, and will meet several times a year, in order to verify that citizens are wearing their special hats. They will likely also discuss how much they appreciate the leadership and sociocultural micromanagement provided to them at no expense by the new regime.
All citizens are placed into military squads with have no supplies and the requirement they wear a metal helm. All other metal helms aside from the aluminum and lea numbered ones are forbidden to ensure the specially individually forged ones are worn.
(https://i.imgur.com/Y3ZoF2y.png)
Early Summer 239:
Invasion starts - Perhaps dismantling the military was perhaps not the best idea.
(https://i.imgur.com/pOxjwBX.png)
Whatever, it's fine. The dwarves will continue to be trapped within the volcano/mountain fortress of information control and retrieval. And the goblins can stand there forever and get pecked to death by zombie owls, for all I care.
Mid Summer 239:
Top secret government research yields fruit. A new breed of surveillance attack pigs are grown, and now patrol amongst the citizenry, ensuring everyone wears their hat, lest they be devoured. The best part is that pigs wear hats too! These are special hats which signify their status. The pigs are truly loyal. No pig has removed their hat thus far.
(https://i.imgur.com/kFnlC6v.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/iSgw9WD.png)
Late Summer 239:
New state sanctioned cult of pig worship. Roman style temple, with similarly style roofing, is built.
(https://i.imgur.com/v6NryoH.png)
Still haven't resolved the invasion crisis. Continue to assure the citizens to continue to maintain their unwavering confidence in the assured decisive victory of the state over the invaders. However, the state appears to be clueless how to even begin to approach the task.
Early Fall 239:
Evidently one of the local zombie eagles managed to slay a goblin even after its head got cut off, whose severed head was quickly reanimated by the biome and proceeded to join in on the fight. The goblin reanimated and chaos broke out amongst the goblin ranks. Siege lifts and goblins return home 5th o Limestone, 238.
Somehow, we manage to get a trade caravan into the fort alongside the fort liaison. Somehow they weren't devoured by the local wildlife.
I sell them a bunch of surplus meat in exchange for more aluminum and platinum bars.
Mid Fall 239:
The merchants leave, no incidents occur somehow.
Early Winter 239:
Annnnnndddd another invasion! Alright, I'm out of here.
(https://i.imgur.com/HKqu5cv.png)
Old Number Two out!
img
Are you also running df on macOS? I've the same issue with retina screenshots (2x the normal size)
How.. how do you assign **helms** to pigs?
EDIT: I updated the OP. So who is our next overseer?
About the screens:
I am, I was wondering what the deal with those screens was.
About the artifacts:
Macabre moods are wonderful things.
About the pigs:
Thats none of your damn business.
About whose next:
Evidently nobody. Which is really a shame, as I was really looking forward to wherever this fort was going.
I guess someone could take another turn, or the thread can just linger around on page 1, getting the occasional bump, at least until someone bothers to take over for a year.
Number 2 decided to follow his curiosity and investigate the shiny metal that has never been excavated properly at the lowest cavern layer.
:::
A great roar filled the air as the iron gates of Friendlytreason Fortress were thrown open. The very foundation of the fortress shook as a powerful force of energy burst forth with a deafening sound. It was a hellish energy, filled with hatred and malice.
The air around the fortress turned to an acrid smoke, and the land around it began to burn. The flames spread quickly, consuming the walls of the fortress and setting the buildings ablaze. The cries of the people within could be heard, but there was nothing that could be done to save them.
The inhabitants of Friendlytreason were doomed to suffer an eternity of torment. From within the depths of the inferno came the sound of tortured screams and agonized howls. It was a sound that echoed throughout the night, a reminder of the suffering that awaited those who had dared to challenge the power of hell.
No one could escape the grip of the burning flame, and no one could hope to survive the onslaught of the damned. The noise of the inferno was deafening, and the heat was unbearable. As the fires started to burn, the screams of the damned gradually died away. All that remained would be charred and smoldering ruin, a testament to the power of hell.
:::
Specter Of Shadow
Enormous blob composed of ash. Has broad shell and bloated body.
Pterosaur Fiend
Spiral shell, long and wavy hair. Poisonous gas.
Spirit of Embers
Dimetrodon composed of ash. Has wings.
Slug Devil
Feathered slug. Has wings. Noxious secretions.
Wrath of Soot
Quadruped composed of ash. Three stubby tails.
Specter of Steam
Humanoid composed of steam. Has knobby trunk.
Scorpion Fiend
Feathered scorpion. Wings. Poisonous sting.
Demon of Steam
A nightjar composed of Steam. Two tails, bloated body.
(https://i.imgur.com/hnZ8nR6.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/49m69Bi.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/MYbuwiN.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/QSqgSNQ.png)
:::
To be continued...
https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=16507 (https://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=16507)
After examining the old excavation site, number 2 erected a plan to prevent wildlife from a potential 4th cavern breach to infiltrate the fortress. The dwarves had never dug deeper and even though the magma prevented further downwards digging, the excavation material seemed to be durable enough to withstand the heat.
:::
Year 238. As it stands, we are facing 20674 goblins:
(https://i.imgur.com/9PtJUWz.png)
Historical figures remaining (note the last polar bear man):
(https://i.imgur.com/ZDEneP7.png)
Events by type in Friendlytreason:
(https://i.imgur.com/k4nQzAG.png)
This is an all-inclusive forum, we care about all creatures in Gomathsil, doesn't matter caste, race or size!
(https://i.imgur.com/VEHIyMt.png)
Also, wtf:
(https://i.imgur.com/G693hcw.png)
:::
Btw I'm at incredible 48 FPS! Is it maybe because so much cleaning has been made? The fortress is in top shape!
:::
It has been only a small siege of about 20 goblins.
:::238-10-28:::
Number 2: A very distressed Number 5 approached me running and screaming that horrible creatures emerged from the 4th cavern layer. I tried to calm him down but he wouldn't listen. We activated all gears in order to close off the 4th cavern layer, just in case. What can be more horrible than a couple of zombies? He didn't see anything actually, only heard very frightening noises.
:::238-10-29:::
Number 2: Number 5 would not stop being in panic about yesterdays incident. I already warned him that he would be spending time with the pigs soon, but it made me think that we should probably investigate a little further. Number 5 usually has his head on the shoulders, and if he thinks this must be a new kind of monstrosity, maybe we can use this to our advantage.
:::238-11-02:::
Number 2: I decided to see how the current goblin visitors will fare against our new monstrosity. The gate that connects the surface with cavern 4 is not open...
The demons did a very short work of the goblins, on the same day there are no more remaining forces.
(https://i.imgur.com/aeAirlJ.png)
You've finally got your equipment together, such as it is. Now it's time for action and adventure! In the rush of excitement, you've forgotten where you were going to go. Perhaps some of your friends here can remind you.
I arrived in Necrogear after travelling from Axeshin to the west in hope to find an acquaintance; my ancient home was completely devoid of life since I last had checked a couple of years ago. Where did everyone go? I've many friends in Friendlydevils who I know since my earliest childhood, but it is a cursed place. Have all lost their mind and went there?
20th of Opal 238
Only after one day of travelling on a very dangerous path to Friendlydevils, I arrived at this cursed mountain of doom. It is currently snowing.
(https://i.imgur.com/FVcHEWH.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/ah0vh1Z.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/11IsPtg.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/iuOjlu4.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/1Nsgq2Y.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/YZ2lJ2t.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/0p6fr85.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/DQTHsJS.png)
I enter a very cozy housing with an artifcat figurine, how pleasant it is to look at.
(https://i.imgur.com/yVO8kgi.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/03HuP09.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/95Z3HmI.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/uR4FBTH.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/tcMDM4Q.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/N0iT276.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/29MQfWI.png)
(https://i.imgur.com/08VwVsh.png)
- When exploring the fortress I found a baby on the floor and tried to pick it up, searched through all the adventure hotkeys.. well I found x Perform action but decided not to use my natural ability to spit.
- In the dormitories I was handing over white stork bone rings for making myself popular, but of no avail did anyone join my adventures. I tried to joke "at least it doesn't rain down here" and again my charisma was not enough. After a while I performed a poem and this apparently convinced anyone to join me as entertainer
(https://i.imgur.com/zGkqDeS.png)