Granite 1, 213.So, I have finally been chosen to rule this desolate fortress out in the midst of nowhere. At last my dreams come true and now I finally can bring order and security to my fellow dwarves.
Up until this great moment, I was just wasting my time and pretending to train marksmanship - a hopeless task if you ask me. Not because we slacked off or something. But our former leaders somehow decided that a single archery range half a mile away from the fortress is more than enough to train seven marksdwarves at once!
During my reign, no such crap will happen.
I have relieved myself from the ranks of military as my duties will take my full time and more.
Granite 2, 213.I have finished the overview of the place. The results are... well, from my time in the military I could only see a fraction of the fort and couldn't understand the true scale of our problems.
This is our legendary carpenter. Sleeping outdoors in the mud. For some reason he was tasked with all jobs that would make him travel alone out of the fortress walls. Probably my predecessors hoped he will stumble upon a goblin ambush or something.
This is the farms drainage system. The farms are irrigated by two levers. Both levers are located outside of fortress walls, perfectly accessible to kobold thieves, gnomes, gremlins and whatever critters decide it would be fun to pull them. Obviously, when both levers are pulled, the entire fortress is flooded and there's no way to limit the scale of the flood. That's what I call a perfectly secure and fool-proof design.
And this is our food situation. True, when I was in the military we were told to go drink from the brook, but I thought it was just regular military stupidity. Training the spirit or some other similar crap. As it turns out, the true reason was lack of alcohol in the fortress. Needless to say, all the dwarves are getting irky and do not work to the best of their capacity as the result. And in order to get a drink, the dwarves have to travel all the way around the fortress. Really, my predecessor obviously hated us all.
Granite 3, 213.I have completed the jobs reallocation. For some reason, the fortress had about a dozen engravers. What the hell for, I have no idea. I cancelled the road construction, surface fortress construction and halls of the dead construction. I'm not going to divert our precious resources to overambitious projects when our military is only six untrained and unarmored dwarves.
I have assigned a manager and a bookkeeper. I will need their services in the months to come. I have also taken the responsibilities of sheriff and broker as I don't want these minor tasks to distract other dwarves from their labour.
Four engravers have been drafted. At the same time, I relieved four soldiers from duty and assigned them some civilian jobs instead.
Now the fortress roster looks as follows:
- Stoneworkers: 4 miners (headed by Darkrider2), 6 masons, Koji the Engraver.
- Woodworkers: 2 woodcutters, 1 legendary carpenter.
- Smiths: 3 smelters (one doubles as blacksmith), 1 weaponsmith, 1 legendary armorer, 1 metalcrafter.
- Crafters: 1 butcher/leatherworker, 1 bowyer/bonecarver, 1 stonecrafter, 1 weaver, 1 clothier
- Farmers: 2 planters, 1 dedicated herbalist, 1 brewer, 1 cook, 3 threshers/millers.
- Military: 6 marksdwarves (untrained and unarmored - yet)
- Management: myself as Sheriff and Broker, 1 manager, 1 bookkeeper
- Cannon fodder: 1 child, 1 baby
One of the woodworkers claims he's actually running the place, but I think he's just daydreaming.
I have moved our stonecrafter into a new room and settled in his quarters temporarily until my apartments are built and furnished.
Old trade depot will be demolished and a new one constructed near the fortress. We do not need any dwarves travelling too far away from the fortress unescorted. Unless they are
useless our precious woodcutters and herbalists of course.
The major goals for now are: booze, planting, wall reconstruction, wells, military training, military equipment.
Granite 12, 213.Everything is going fine. Farms have been redesigned for a finer-grained control, we do not need those immense fields. I have also put masterwork beds in the rooms of former leaders, as exceptional quality beds in the rooms of the management. An order was put for some bucklers and helms for our military, miners are digging new rooms and archery training ground, miners are reconstructing the walls of the fort, craftsmen are doing their chores as well.
Then suddenly I get the news that the elves came.
However they cannot proceed to the depot as we have none. The old one is already demolished, but the new one hasn't yet been built. I ordered to prioritize this project.
Granite 16, 213.Troubling news. A group of goblins ambushed the elven caravan which was camping in the woods and waiting for us to complete the depot. Seems the elves are toast. Well, good riddance I say. At least they did us a useful service and we are now warned.
Of course the situation is not very good - our walls are breached in two places, but the goblins are far away so we'll probably manage to seal the breaches in time.
Goblins team has two heavily armored axegoblins and some wrestlers. They are not to be trifled with in the open, but with locked doors we can just bring the marksdwarves on the walls and fire at goblins with impunity.
Granite 17, 213.Bad news. Very bad news. Another goblin squad was hiding in the woods it seems. Now they attacked the elves as well. This second group has three bowgoblins. Unlike our so-called "military", they are trained and armored. Putting our marksdwarves on the walls suddenly no longer looks that promising, but if the goblins will spread out a bit, and if we stand a tight group, we still have a decent chance. Besides, our marksdwarves have high-quality buckers now. Unfortunately, no helmets yet.
I mobilized our miners and stationed them near the entrance.
Then two babysnatchers were discovered, trying to sneak into our courtyard through the backdoor which I built for an easier access to the river. I mobilized a couple of civilians nearby and also sent our miners to deal with the spies.
Meanwhile, elves are eliminated and goblins are closing in. I ordered the doors into the fortress locked - both front and back doors of course. Now the battle will be decided by bows and crossbows. Let the Armok give us some luck!
Granite 18, 213.Just as goblins were coming closer I suddenly discovered that one of the front doors is swinging open! "The door is taken by enemy". So the attack was coordinated and there's another spy in the fortress! And those two babysnatchers were just a diversion in order to distract our miners away from the front doors!
One of the civilian dwarves happens to be near the front doors. Wow, what a surprise - Koji himself!
Well Kojiis the one fully responsible for this situation, so I drafted him and ordered him to reclaim the door.
Unfortunately, I have little faith in his ability to do so in time as the goblins are coming closer every second. I sent the marksdwarves on the walls and ordered the full mobilization of the fortress population.
It seems Armok doesn't want to give us luck, he wants to give us blood. Not a big surprise, but an unpleasant one.
Granite 19, 213.Koji failed. On his way to the door he stumbled on a kobold thief and decided that strangling him to death is more important than reclaiming the door. As the result one of the goblin wrestlers got to the door first. Marksdwarves are raining bolts on the goblins but cannot stop the advance. Our only hope is that the goblins have split their forces and the second group is lagging behind a bit. But still, they are already within the firing range and are already raining arrows on my marksdwarves.
A horrible melee follows right in the guardroom as dwarven recruits rush the goblin fighters. Obviously, Koji is the first casualty. But, unfortunately, not the last.
Finally the goblins inside the guardroom are dispatched. However it seems that our marksdwarves have no chance in hell to win a firing duel with goblins. And the door is still not reclaimed and I cannot reclaim it without showing those goblins a way into the fortress.
So I order the dwarves to accumulate behind the closed doors and then make a surprise attack on the enemy. Let the Armok be with us!
Granite 20, 213.The battle is over.
Two bowgoblins managed to escape, the rest were slaughtered.
We lost seven dwarves, including Koji. Two or three dwarves are wounded.
Luckily, both me and Darkrider2 survived. However Darkrider2 has suffered some serious harm.
Aftermath.
