Bay 12 Games Forum

Aha! Well, quoting from my revised edition of TACTICUS: A Complex Guide to the Simple Basics of Tactical Gaming: "Should the When All Else Fails, Start On A New Sheet! rule be invoked, any prospective gentlemen with a mind to play who have not yet encroached upon the game may immediately set up a piece and act out the most rudimentary of turns."

Taking this fully in mind, I place a respectable Human Carpenter by the name of Carv O'Woody on the board, inside this small generic walled building. He is armed with a small wooden hatchet and a knife for plying his trade.

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Naturally, no good carpenter likes to see a doorway exist without a door within it, so he immediately seeks out the nearest wood source. Quoting my copy of the supplement Forests: or What to Do When All The Wood Runs Out (1987 archaic language edition, don't you know!): "Whenst yt should occur that a man of carpentry or woodcuttyng should hav no materyals for hys work, the game board wyll, of yts own volytyon, extendeth yn the most logycal dyrectyon to accomodate a wood of 2D10-D6 trees."

Rolling these dice, I get... 3, 2 and 6. Blast!

... but wait! The supplement continues with a footnote: "As stated yn the orygynal Pantsheym ruleset: 'Should a negative number of trees ever be called into existence by a dice roll, the result should be treated as whatever minimum positive result could occur, plus one.'"

Thank Armok! That means I can summon a vaguely healthy two trees. I choose to let this forest appear to the East of this rudimentary dwelling.

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The trees are, naturally, Acacia.

At the risk of someone invoking the overruling TL;DR - Too Bloody Much! rule, I end my turn here.

And by "votekick" I mean setting up a vote to ban someone else from voting.
This thread seems to have some troubles like that. Of course I'm not naming anyone but it seems like some people are just messing stuff up.

Regretfully, that would violate the charter (unless the dwarves in particular had been agressing or coercing upon other dwarves). Having observed what has gone by, I don't personally believe such things are warranted.

I am considering looking through the charter and making a summarised version of it, mainly for the benefit of newcomers.

Emmanovi gathered the dwarves of Equalvoice in the smoothed-out meeting hall, looking at each of them squarely in the eye.

Lav opened the meeting session, nodding at Emmanovi to begin his report. Looking down at some sheets of wax and chalk, Emmanovi spoke with a calculated and military air, his list of actions past and events happened almost bullet-like in its delivery.

"Early this Spring, as we know, the Elves arrived to trade. As much as I hate dealing with the incessant pansies, we did need to see what they had to offer, trade-wise."


"Well, glancing through their wares, I was somewhat offended. Apparently they expect us dwarves to wear socks as large as our legs, shirts that reach the floor and caps we could hide in. Despicable." At this point, he shook his head in disgust. "There were some useful things, though. A couple of wooden swords, for sparring; some assorted plants; and a spare bag we can use for seeds."


"I gave them those lay pewter goblets Lav made before in return for these items. Not a bad deal, I should say."

"Anyway, one item on the agenda for this Spring was some exploratory mining. Now, we've had some great success with this, even though we didn't fulfill the quota of one drill every regmabit. Firstly, we found ourselves picking through hematite. Iron, stout dwarves! We've struck grey gold."


"Next discovery was in the North-West. The prospectors hinted that there might be some of Armok's precious blood in the earth around here, and they were certainly correct! We've found a whole vein. There are some nasty critters in it, so I'm ordering all dwarves to keep away for now."


"Next came two great finds in quick succession. First, we chipped away a little bit of native aluminum. This should make for some valuable crafts, eh Lav? Then almost immediately afterwards, dearest Grail was bashing her way through the rock, only to find herself nearly falling down a cavernous maw of a hole. Thank Armok, thank Orshar, thank Kebul... she didn't fall to what would have been certain death. However, we now have access to what seems to be some sort of pit down to the very bowels of the earth. Critters galore for the slaughter! I sense a military training exercise here." His eyes glittered.


"In other matters..." he continued, referring to his notes, "some new dwarves have decided to make their way to our little Democracy. For now, as prospective citizens, they shall be known as Sarvesh Therlethudil, engraver; Kûbuk Fotthorreg, farmer; and Mistêm Astthabum, dyer. They have been briefed, and have already been helping us complete some of our tasks. Let them be welcomed."


Shuffling his documents, Emmanovi looked up and paused for a second, pulling out a sheet of wax with a number of objectives written upon it.

1. Exploratory mining on the entire map (at least one shaft per map region).
2. Completion of perimeter by digging through rock in the north-east and south-west sections.
3. Set up barracks and archery range (in tower).
4. Second level for outer fortifications, including a causeway (lower priority).
5. Expand tower upwards (lower priority).
6. Construction of a siege workshop.

"Item one: success, though objective incomplete.
Item two: near completion. South-west currently inaccessible from outside. North-east will be finished within a few days, if we get to work finishing it.
Item three: complete, though we could do with more beds.
Item four: not begun. We lacked the dwarfpower this season.
Item five: the floor for the next level has been finished, doubly serving as a roof for now. Bridges and levers are being installed for access to catwalks, when they are created.
Item six: complete."

Emmanovi clutched one large sheet, upon which was written several figures and readings detailing the current status of the fortress. This he pushed to the centre of the room for all to see. With a passing grumble about the lack of seating and tables, he nodded to Lav to continue the meeting.


{Would we like a save file, or an uploaded map file, both, or neither? I appreciate that my screenshots don't give the best overview, and I'm not sure what people would like.}

Apologies, I've had something of a busy week with rehearsals and things nearly every day. I'm free(ish) now though - as soon as I've gotten back from giving blood later today, I'll get right on it. =]

I should like to join as a judge, if I am able. =]

I had hoped that we might avoid negative comments on here, and instead work together in a positive light. Evidently my hopes were somewhat misplaced.

If I might recount a brief history as I recall it, currently only a year has passed. Spring, directed by Lav, mostly concerned itself with setting up bedrooms and a first farming plot, along with storage areas. In Summer, Grail took on the responsibilities of director and relocated workshops below ground, expanding storage space, beginning construction of a wall, and attempted to irrigate the second farm plot. I, Emmanovi, took directorship in Autumn, mostly completing the wall and moat, finishing off irrigation work and setting up a small irrigation system for the future.

Winter brought with it some difficulties, and the turn begun by Org was eventually restarted by Lav. It was during the Winter that a certain amount of debate and discussion was thrown up about some central rights and issues of the citizens of Equalvoice. It was decided to create a charter, which stands replicated in the first post of this thread.

Briefly, it outlines the rights of dwarves - the right to voice their opinion, the right to vote, the right to do as they please so long as it is not to the detriment of others... and so forth. The charter goes on to explain the democratic process of Equalvoice, and describes the system of voting, certain posts such as director and chairdwarf, and other administrative matters.

It was also in Winter, as well as in previous seasons, that several dwarves exercised their right to leave Equalvoice. This was for a variety of reasons - a lack of time available to participate, perhaps some lack of interest, or in some cases disagreements with certain members of the community and the way it was run. It was hoped that the creation of a charter might reconcile some of these individuals, once the basic rights of dwarves were established, but as of the time of writing, this has not occured.

I have missed certain elements of our history, since this was recounted from memory, and my memory is poor for a dwarf. *takes a refreshing swig of dwarven wine* Ahh, that's better. Where was I? Ah, yes. The current state of the fort. We number three active citizens at my last count - Lav, Grail and myself, Emmanovi. It is appreciably difficult to conduct democracy with a mere three citizens, hence this urgent call for more dwarves. Any questions? Put them to us! Interrogate us! We will happily listen to you and respond to anything you throw at us.

Simply express your interest here and I'm sure we can accomodate you, bringing you straight into the citizenship of Equalvoice. All that is asked of citizens is to comply with the charter whilst expressing their opinion, voting upon motions and discussing issues in a reasonable and rational manner. And this is much less of a chore and much more of an enjoyable activity!

We could start a new thread with a new opening post to reflect the changes that have been made to the game, and to draw in new people. Unless you can edit that straight up, but most cheap forum databases won't allow that. First post to say we're always taking in new players who are interested in joining our democratic experience, second post being an anthology of our exploits thus far, our charter, and the current map and download.

I concur with this idea. I imagine people can be easily dissuaded from reading 31-page long threads about forts which might need to be read in their entirety in order for them to be understood. Officially making a new thread with clear descriptions and so forth would be a good thing to do.

I'm not sure we can continue so easily with a small active community. Recruiting some new members is by all means the way to progress, the way I see it.