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[mahrgell]

12th Limestone
Oreprocessor and Smelter are done. I started working on extracting some copper now. I really need some help, right now I have to do everything alone.

17th Limestone
We were attacked for the first time. Sort of... A bunch of grey langurs tried to break through to our stockpiles. 3 died between our drakes and tuscox. The fourth made it through just to meet Nil, who then who then used the chance to show off a bit. He stabbed the poor langur about 30 times before finally finishing him off.

17th Sandstone
Not much has happened. I'm still waiting for my anvil. But today... today 3 more lost souls entered our little settlement. I immediately requested a helping hand for copper production. A girl by the name of Khob was assigned to me. Gonna tech her how it is done, she has never done any metal work at all. Well, actually she has never worked before at all. I already see us all dying in a fire cause by her. And i will surely not let her at the forges!
Then there was a guy called Watson. Was an expert glassmaker. We are not producing glass right now, so he got assigned stonecrafting, maybe he can make some tradegoods before the inspectors arrive.
Last was Solon. She claimed to have some experience in the gem industry. Not sure if she meant gem crafting or jewellery robbery. Anyway, she could keep her job for now and got tasked some more minor work.

18th Sandstone
Happiness about our new townfolk abruptly ended. We are missing Ushrir. Everyone went looking for him.

20th Sandstone
Solon took a pick and went down to the tunnels. And found Ushrir, dead.

The first casualty of Hexxedgarish. Everyone was crushed. It seemed like time was flowing more slowly. We couldn't figure out his reason of death, but someone suggested he might have died to coal dust. Solon grabbed Ushrirs pick and continued to dig. I guess she needed some distraction. May she live longer then him.

7th Timber
Solon tries her best, but she she has never done some serious digging work before. Mining is very slow right now. Nil and kamikazi decided to hunt down some kiwis. Not sure why.
I took some time to watch the spectacle, and could understand why kamikazi was pissed when they returned, when they both claimed 2 kills. She was much faster then Nil, and while she pummeled the poor kiwis, Nil caught up and just finished them off  with one hit stealing her kill. Then she ran off again, chasing the next one, while Nil slowly followed her and the same happened again. Hopefully Nil's egoism does not strain their relationship too much.

13th Timber
A caravan and the inspector from the mountain homes arrived.

It seems like they really want to trade with us. Problem is, we have nothing to trade for. And right now everyone is busy at work.

16th Timber
Moseythepirate still had some talk with the inspector. He defended our progress, but the inspector was not happy. Mosey then ordered some steel and a trade licence for next year. Those are incredibly expensive. Not sure how he thinks we can afford it. But maybe he has a secret plan. Like a bank robbery.

21th Timber
The inspector told us about the needs of the mountain homes. Most of the stuff we could never produce anytime soon. But when having a closer look at the list he gave us we were baffled. WHAT?

The mountainhomes would pay more then double the normal price for hourglasses? We surely could do that... Suddenly there was hope for acquiring the goods we wanted next year.

26th Timber
Kobolds!!! A thief showed up at our entrance. Then he saw the drakes and turned tail again.

29th Timber
More kobold thieves. 2 had a short fight with the drakes, hurting one drake in the leg with a large mithril dagger. Then they again decided to run. Cowards!!! Nil and kamikazi meanwhile didn't even bother. They continued their training as if nothing happened.

1st Limestone
Winter has arrived. The drakes chased down a kobold. So this was now finally the first slain enemy.  Sadly the victim only carried a copper dagger. Would have loved to get some mithril in my hands.
But i have to have a talk about work efficiency in our fort. My anvil is still not done! Maybe that is the reason, why Nil and kamikazi ignored the thieves... They are also waiting for my quality work.
And instead of doing vital work, Watson decided to waste his time with 'arkeologi' I doubt he even knows how to spell that properly (who does?). He even built a workshop for it. Calls it research. He better get some results from this, because right now wasting labor time on some weird hobbies can't be accepted. But i guess he heard me ranting, because i just noticed he is now finally doing my anvil. Hope it done quick.

[mahrgell]

7th Moonstone
The anvil is done and i immediately finished constructing my forge. Starting to work on some proper copper armor for our military. Finally no more old scaleplate rags.

14th Moonstone
Watson has started doing his research. Examined some old trash Ushrir and Solon digged up. And wow... This was actually useful. Sometimes the crazy also luck out, it seems. He found some coins (500 copper, 1000 silver, 500 gold), a gold training hammer and gold battle axe. Said it is from an old long lost civilization. Not surprising they got lost in history if they used those weapons...
Next was a golden throne and table. Moseythepirate immediately claimed those.
At last Watson found a silver cage, a large silver pot and an anonymous silver statue (This is a statue of a .)
Whoever all that belonged too... they surely were rich, but not very efficient. Can't wait to see Moseythepirate wanting all his food in the silver pot, and then seeing dwarves breaking down under it's weight...

16th Moonstone
The caravan decided to leave today. Not even our new riches could convince them to stay longer. Maybe putting the corpse stockpile right next to the trade depot was not such a good idea. At least finally Ushrir was put to rest. He is now resting with everyone else... in the dormitory.

But it was decided, that a new sleeping area was to be built before next summer. With individual rooms! Finally! But if I apply my experience, how fast things are done here... it will probably take 2 years.

20th Moonstone
Watson continued with his research. This time he brought up a some gems, a bunch of bars (2 copper, 2 silver, 1 gold) and again some silver items (jug, sarcophagus and a table)
Mosey wanted to claim the sarcophagus but then noticed, this might not be seen so well, so instead he gave us some warnings. Our new riches might attract unwanted visitors. His words echoed in our heads. We started worrying... I went back to my forge to finish the armor sets. If there will be visitors... We have to be ready!

26th Moonstone
Nil and Kamikazi had a party today. When asked for the reason they told me, that they finally achieved weaponmastership. I looked at bit odd at kamikazi, but she pointed at her trusty old knuckle duster... Looks like she is taking this really serious!
kamikazi:

Nil


23rd Opal
While the construction of our new apartments has started, i think that Watson has gone too far.

That crazy dwarf brought up a greater megabeast soul! I wanted to burn it immediately in the forges. But somehow the others disagreed. They said it must be a sign of armok. Crazy people! They want to build a temple and sacrifice the soul to armok.

15th Obsidian
So everyone went crazy about that soul. First everyone built candelabras. Most didn't even know how a candelabra looks like and built braziers and fireplaces instead. Then they built a temple. Once done, they noticed, that a temple was not the right place to sacrifice a soul. They razed the temple and rebuilt an altar instead to sacrifice the soul. It was Watson himself who offered the soul to Armok. Only one iron bar appeared in front of him. He looked a bit disappointed. Looks like Armok was not pleased about razing his temple. But better then him raising the megabeast again. So I consider us lucky. Hopefully now everyone goes back to normal....

19th Obsidian
Today I passed by the archaeology lab of Watson and had a look into it... Guess what i found! The megabeast soul. Watson really cheated everyone by sacrificing the soul of some moleweasel or whatever. Didn't yet have a chance to talk to him about that. Won't tell it to the others for now either...

1st Granite
Spring is here! We have survived one year! Well, not everyone, we lost Ushrir. It still saddens me. Sorun is trying her best to do all the mining now. But still, overall our first year went well. But also our defenses haven't been tested yet. Nil and Kamikazi both call themselves legends by now, even though they havent fought anything more dangerous then a langur. Time will tell, if they will stand their ground. Moseythepirate announced to make a summary of the year soon and an outlook for what is to come.


---
A years summary will follow soon.
Until now i'm not that happy with the returns of my archaeologist. I would have preferred some military supplies but instead got expensive gold stuff. (Yeah eah, i could have selected those finds... but that not how my dwarfs do it) Well... we are alive ^^ First year went surprisingly smooth, but above ground forts progress much more slowly. Usually i would hate that mess my workshop area is now, but constructing takes time... And diningrooms/bedrooms requiring roofs doesn't make things faster either.
And that megabeast soul confused me quite a lot... It was actually me screwing up like a dozen times in a row. Didn't know they don't wither and wanted to sacrifice it to Armok (manual somewhere said armok would be happy about that...) But built the wrong building, still in a hurry because i thought the soul would be gone in a few days... Then built altar, sacrificed it, was disappointed... Then noticed half an hour later (was doing some writeup) that the soul was still there... ^^  luckily meph helped me out, guess it will be handy later on.

[mahrgell]

In the afternoon Moseythepirate, our current expedition leader, gave a speech. Everyone had to listen to it. He must be on a power trip or so. He also always put weight on how the settlement has evolved under his leadership. How much he has done... Should really learn some respect, he only profited from my excellent leadership in the first year! Whatever... i just ignored his attitude and pretended he was complimenting me.

Overall we had started the year with 7 dwarves, and 8 more migrated here this year. Sadly we lost Ushrir to that unfortunate accident. So now we are at 14 dwarves. Food and alcohol are plenty in our stocks.

(kamikazi is a legendary striker, but is listed as a normal wrestler here)
We spent the year quite peaceful (surprising considering where everyone came from...) Only some animals were slain and a single kobold that fell to our drakes.

When talking about the current state of our camp, Mosey pointed at the various areas:

Our new sleeping area was progressing faster then expected. The temporary wooden buildings will probably be razed during the coming year. Our workshop area was an utter mess. Everything was built where ever there was some space. This surely needs restructuring.
But most important was our moat being completed (when he talked about that, everyone lowered his head a bit remembering Ushrir) and also the entrance walls. They would give us some warning time and channel any invaders into our military before they could harm the civilians.

Naturally he next talked about the military. Right now we we were defended by our 2 legendary dwarves Nil and kamikazi, 4 adult drakes, 4 babydrakes and two mountain tuscox bulls. Nil would finally get his own squad and would have to teach Kosoth about the art of war. Kosoth decided that a warhammer would be his weapon of choice. Typical legionnaire. kamikazi would be joined by Lenz. Lenz decided to stick to the sotry of him being a marksdwarf and chose a javelin thrower. With the abundance of copper, we have, there should be no problem for him to waste some for training. Still, it was an odd squad. kamikazi with her knuckle duster and Lenz who didn't even know how to properly hold the javelinthrower he just received. Even though... you would not want to look at kamikazi the wrong way. She got damn dangerous with her little toy.
Mosey also praised our advances in the metal industry, but didn't mention me once by name. Such a dick, as if he could have done it himself. It was all me, ALL ME! We had enough copper, even though processing it was a bit slow still, and had endless supplies of coal and even some anthracite. But it is a bit worrying, that we didn't find any other metals yet. Digging further may risk striking the cavern and is thus not yet on the agenda.
When it came to our civilians, the judgement was mixed. Everyone has lately complained of rain, but there is no chance this will change in the near future, if at all. Also the lack of private sleeping quarters was an annoyance to everyone, but this would be solved soon. Meanwhile most complimented our architecture, especially the dining room. This was a bit surprising to me, but i guess when you come out of prison you aren't used to much. Also most were satisfied at work.
Finally it came to the plans for the second year. The masons would busy all year, that was sure. A lot of buildings had to be constructed. We decided to settle with copper first before we would dig deeper. It was also planned to finally start trading in a more serious fashion. We would produce some trade goods so we could fill our gaps. At the same time it was decided to keep a low profile and grow our riches slowly and steady. Financial crisis had taught that and there was also no reason to attract too many uninvited guests. At the same time we expected more migrants the coming year. Infrastructure had to be prepared for that. But that would also mean, that most of us could finally specialize on their prefered tasks. We were also hoping for someone to wartrain our drakes in the near future. They were still our first line of defense. And another goal was to build up an hospital. Right now we are not even close to this, but with some more hands, there may be hope.

When the official speech was over, i sat together with a few fellows and we talked about our personal issues these days. Even Mosey joined. It was quite relaxing to just sit there and talk for a bit.







PS: Nil and kamikazi are basically maxed out on str, agi, toughness, endurance, willpower, spatial and kinesthetic sense...

[mahrgell]

17th Granite
Kosoth and Lenz finally joined the military today. I improved Lenz' javelin thrower with some mechanisms so it fires faster. Quantity instead of quality, I would say considering his skills. Lenz obviously didn't understand how much I had done for him and dared to refuse my copper armor. Said he wants rigid scaleplate armor instead. Well, he can have the old rags from Nil, I guess. Kosoth thankfully accepted my equipment. Good guy. Hope they learn their stuff fast. Don't want to craft sarcophagi next.

2nd Slate
Just when the first rooms in our new apartment complex were finished, new migrants arrived. When we sighted them first, everyone was very cheerful. At first... But it turned out to be an endless stream of dwarves. Where did they all come from? Quickly i saw worried faces in the town while more and more migrants showed up. Who should supply all those?

5th Slate
By Armok... it finally ended. 24 adults and 4 children total. This is tripling our population. And they were not even inside the fortress when the first one snapped and started babbling. Oh the insanity...  Another guy, seemingly a trader by profession, decided to just stand around in front of the town.... standing there and standing. Seems like he doesn't want to belong to us.

Mosey asked me to help him screen all those newcomers.
This time there were not only former prisoners but also normal people fleeing the crisis at the mountain homes. Many obviously bought into guilds before coming to us, hoping to get a better standing here. They were wrong. All it would lead to would be more work for them.
All in all there were sorted by guilds:
2 legionnaires, Akrul and Kigok, neither had combat skills to show for, but they would be drafted anyway
1 guard, Tholtig, but he was still a child... Not sure how he received that honor. Surely rich parents played their part
2 merchants, Kob and Vukrig, but Kob was just babbling.... not sure what would happen with him, again neither had useful skills – their future was yet to be decided
1 smith, Olin, but no experience whatsoever. Well... I decided she would assist me as well now.
1 medic, Urvad, and she had even worked in a hospital before. Her work there was limited to surturing, but still, she was a very welcome sight
1 apostle, Mothram, again no further skills, but we decided to build him an shrine asap, so he could do his stuff... and leave us alone
2 craftdwarfs, 1 still being a child.(Zevut) The other one (Kilrud) oddly had worked as a milker and chemist before... I hate those flipflopper. Well, now she would take over all the craftworks here.
The remaining 17 were without any guild background. There were:
Amost, a talented tailor and competent machine operator, would do all the engineering for now
Berim, a novice cook, our new chef
Inigz, an expert oven operator, sadly it is hard to see much use for his talents, so we sent him digging
2 dwarves by he name of Kokdath, one was a toolmaker, one a glassmaker – Watson wasn't amused about another rival, but both arrivals had not much use at the moment, so now they have to help our masons
Kol, she had done some digging before coming here.. she will continue doing that here
Led, a cheese maker, since there is no use for that right now, she was tasked to create some stonecrafts
Medtob, who was good at talking, but nothing else... Could talk now all day while building our new homes. (masonry)
Morul has helped out in a hospital as bone doctor and consoler before... He got assigned as assistant for our new medical task force
Naltish, a gem cutter, we decided to let him do that here as well, even though our supplies of   gems were quite low
Ngalak, an expert trapper and poisoner. This wasn't an industry branch we had considered yet, but maybe we can consider it to sue his talents at some point.
A girl and a guy both called Osheb, how weird. Maybe Osheb means useless. One is a child, the other had no skills at all. We assigned him to the masons.
Rerras and Udib, 2 novice marksdwarfs. They would join Lenz and form their own squad
Stinthad another useless bastards, also assigned construction work.
Zoden (like our Mason, but this time it is a girl) another child

Worth mentioning is also a war animated iron spear. We decided to let it hang around the training area so it could help in case of emergency.

Once done we checked our food supplies:
about 200 units of food and 200 units of booze we had. Cerol surely had done a good job last year in keeping us stocked. When talking about survival everyone always thinks about the military first. But people forget it are the farmers that feed everyone and make this all possible. And of course the smiths. Smiths surely don't get enough respect either.
Anyway, Cerol was already at the farm plots again. I trust her. She will keep us alive. Now we just need a lot of beds, thrones and tables.
For that immediately a new masonry quarter got assigned. The old mason work shops will get removed and instead we make a designated masonry district. Even though this will also be just temporary, until construction of solid buildings is done. It should be way faster now that we tripled our masons workforce.


8th Slate
Kob started some work in the craftdwarfs workshop after grabbing the bones of some gnolls, that got slaughtered by our drakes last year.

Those gnolls try to fight the drakes every season... They never gained anything from it.
I'm right now working at the armors required for our new militia member.

12th Slate
Kob finished his work. An animal trap. He really expressed his hate for gnolls with it:

Now we have an expert trapper and an artifact trap. And still no use for it.

17th Slate
The first floor of the appartment complex is finished. But those are only 8 rooms. Masons immediately continued with the second floor.


14th Felsite
Slowly the fortress has calmed down. Most dwarves follow their normal work. The equipment for our militia is almost done. Watson also used his new spare time to do some more archaeological research. He found a dozen gems and some more gold furniture. Wish he would find some more useful items and not just expensive ones.

16th Felsite
Nothing is calm anymore. Elves arrived.

Actually they are bringing goods. Not sure they know who we are. Actually there are only 2 merchants, a diplomat and 2 guards. Maybe this is a trap? Everyone is on alert right now, kamikazi and Nil instruct all the new military dwarves how to deal with this. Even Akrul and Kigok, who hadn't even had a single sparring session yet had to report for that.

18th Felsite
The are unloading. They just passed our drakes and it seems they really want to trade. We all have to hide our grim faces. It actually worries me, that the guards are mostly using mithril armor. But I know there is no choice. It has to be done. And that mithril will be useful in our hands, that's for sure.
We are drawing our drakes back to the depot. The military is still training right next to it, so they don't raise an suspicion.

20th Felsite
They asked Mosey what to bring next year. He asked for mithril bars. Even though he knows they will never be able to bring that request back home.

21th Felsite
Our military pretended to have a closer look at the elven goods.

They were completely surrounding the elves, when suddenly Lenz threw one his javelins at the bladedancer. Nil immediately followed this up with his spear. The elf tried to dodge the attack, but got hit in the arm and lost his shield. His fate was almost sealed before he even knew what has happened to him.

Kosoth and kamikazi now also joined the battle and hit the bladedancer so hard that he fell over and lost his weapon. Blood and vomit filled the trade depot. Elvish blood and vomit. Not a single strike has yet hit a dwarf.

Now everyone was hitting the bladedancer, while his companion hadn't yet have a chance to join the battle. Nil actually twisted around his spear in the elfs head, when Kosoth decided to make a spectacular finishing move and crushed his opponents head.

Bloodlusted looked the militia dwarves at the bowdancer. He knew this were his last seconds in life. In panic he tried to hastily shoot Lenz, but he parried the arrow from a short distance. But his second shot hit Lenz in the torso. Lenz screamed in pain, when Nil ran through the elf with his spear. He was in rage about the injury of the recruit and the elf had to feel that.

With now everyone on him he didn't get another shot off, until Kosoth again got the final blow and ended the bowdancers misery.

What followed was a brutal slaughter of the 2 merchants and the diplomat. Unarmed and unarmored they didn't stand a chance against the raging militia. While Kosoth and Nil claimed the merchants, kamikazi quickly took out the diplomat with a forceful hit to the head. And so the first real combat at Hexxedgarish ended. We didn't lose a dwarf but Lenz had to be brought to bed, when he fell unconscious. May our doctors prove their worth.

23rd Felsite
We started sorting out our loot. Besides tons of mithril items, that have to be melted, there was also quite a lot of cloth and some steeloak acorns.

1st Hematite
Summer has arrived.
We are still busy with all the loot. So busy that still no doctor has diagnosed Lenz. That should have top priority. We have to show our militia that we care and honor their service.
Mosey also announced that research has to be started soon. I want more advanced forges. That will be great! Only thing worrying me are the elves. What if they come back in force? They will miss their caravan and even if they lost just 5 people... you never know what happens when they swear revenge.

[razorback]

Those damn elves.... and don't even dare to let me die!


Btw: isn't copper inferior to rigid scaleplate?

[mahrgell]

I doubt you die. Even if they forget you you will probably selfheal and survive. And true, rigid scaleplate is supposed to be better. But my char is the smith and would never admit it. Also we have abundant copper (TONS) while i always forget to shear the drakes and at last having metal armor boosts armor levels per item by one. So not sure how big the difference really is.

Oh and some fancy statistics:
in the last battle of the dwarves in copper none got hurt. Of the dwarves in rigid scaleplate 100% got injured. Argument won!

[mahrgell]

2nd Hematite
Well, Urvad was requested to diagnose and treat Lenz, but instead decided that having a look at the dead elves joint movement would be more urgent right now. While I certainly agree on the importance of finding the elves weaknesses, every day Lenz had to stay in bed was lost training time for him and also threatening the fortress in case of an attack. Lenz was needed to lead his squad of javelinthrowers, so we need him back and kicking as soon as possible.

5th Hematite
Finally there is some diagnosis on Lenz. Apparently his torso and pancreas have serious cutting injuries that need some dressing and suturing.

Urvad said, that long term injuries are unlikely. Well... unless there is some sort of infection. Considering our ack of clean water and soap, we have to hope for the best.
To motivate Lenz a bit more, he is now finally made a sergeant and Rerras and Udib started their training in his absence to make a better impression once he would be there to lead them. Our militia was slowly taking shape, and only kamikazi was a bit grumpy about it, because right now she was a missing a trainingpartner with Lenz now having his own squad. But I promised her to find a new recruit as soon as possible.
In the meantime Olin has started melting down all the elvish mithril items. There were really none of use in the entire caravan. But soon the mithril would run through my hands and would create the finest items dwarven eyes have ever seen. Well, at least the eys of the dwarfs here.

13th Hematite
Urvad has finished his treatment of Lenz. He would be still resting for a few days, but it seems like everything went without complications. We are looking forward to see her back soon at the training grounds. Also it was decided that a secured platform for our ranged fighters would be built as soon once the current level of the apartment complex is finished. 

1st Malachite
Dumb Kigok. Barely knowing how to wield it, he has grown attached to his copper axe. Doesn't he know there are so many greater weapons for him, once the time comes?


5th Malachite
Construction on the second floor of our bed room building have been finished and 8 more rooms have been completed. More and more dwarves can now claim their own home. But still, half of us have to sleep in the dormitory. But for now, the masons have started their work on our new overpass for our javelin throwers. Security is more important then luxury right now.
Just when I finished writing this, migrants have arrived. Let's see how many have found their way here this times.

6th Malachite
7 adults, 2 children. Has the situation at the mountain homes maybe improved? We are now counting exactly 50 dwarves. But let's introduce our new arrivals:
Tekkud and Birut, 2 female dwarves from the wrestlers guild. Birut had no active combat experience to show for now, but it looks like Tekkud was a sparring partner before. (5 Doging skill, nothing else) Kamikazi asked for some knuckledusters for both of them. While at first i thought it was a joke, it seems she is serious. And i won't dare to argue with kamikazi.
Feb is a talented Dyer, but right now there is no use for this here. Well... we surely have some work for her to do.
Genlath, who seemed to have some previous military experience as a hammerdwarf. This was a welcome sight, and he would probably be drafted very soon.
Inod, a expert stonecrafter. He would also be useful, as he would now replace Led as our main crafter. With the caravan demanding for hourglasses there would be a lot of work for him to do.
Lorbam and Lur were the two new children in our fort. They would probably hang around the dining hall and hopefully not disturb any of the working dwarves around them. Children can be a great distraction.
Mugshith was an odd one, when asked about his talents he only answered 'Throwing' Not sure what to make of that. I was told it could be useful in military but would not help him with throwing javelins like the others. Odd. For now he would be hauling until further use is decided.
Last was a dwarf by the name of Ushrir. The same name as our beloved and lost miner. But this Ushrir now was a member of the carpenters guild. Our masons welcomed that and gave her all wood related tasks, so they could focus entirely on stonework from now on.

19th Malachite
Just when everyone was about to calm down and go back too their usual work, Igbit dropped his construction work and started shouting.

He first claimed a masons workshop, before he started running around like a headless chicken. He grabbed a couple of rocks and took several valuable gems Watson had discovered earlier.

Then he started hammering on those. No one could figure out what he was working on. So we would have to work. Hopefully his waste of gems would at least pay off.
On the more useful side we built an apothecary's workshop for Urvad to train his skills a bit more. While he had done good work on Lenz, surely we would require his qualified work more often in future.

26th Malachite
Igbit finished his construction. An oil shale door...

While his creativity in decorating was lacking and Watson looked annoyed about the waste of her amethysts, Igbit explained us, that this door would be even able to withstand the kicks of a troll. Not surprising Moseythepirate immediately claimed the door for his future palace. Well... it would be still a long time for it to be built.
Because even though the overpass was now finished, the masons had already started on our new dining hall. The current one had only some cramped space for 8 dwarves at a time which was way too small. Also the ground where the old one was built, was now needed for new constructions.
Overpass:


1st Galena
Work in our smelters had been slowed down by more and more slag produced as a side product of our work. So a slagpit got built and Led would from now on also work in supporting the forges.
Also research of more efficient buildings was recommended. We should really look into that soon.

11th Galena
Being too long in the military certainly damages your brain. Nil is now calling his spear by name. Weirdo.


13th Galena
But today again proved, we need those crazies. An orcish berserker tried to sneak into our fortress.
But he got spotted by a moleweasel and when he saw the drakes coming for him, he turned and ran.
But at least now we knew the orcs knew of our settlement and could prepare ourselves, if they would come back.

16th Galena
It seems those Orcs are allergic to moleweasels. 3 more Orcs had been spotted today after then busted out coughing when a moleweasel passed by them. With their cover lost they again started to run. If all Orcs are like those, there is no reason to be afraid of them.

19th Galena
Looks like we are the center of the world. First some Kobold thieves decided to give us a visit before running away, and now a Human caravan has arrived. Maybe they have something of value. Even though, besides the hourglasses we still lack trade goods. And those we would like to keep for the dwarven caravan, which we are expecting in about 3 month.

26th Galena
Another couple of Kobold thieves showed up before starting to run again, and now we also encountered some Goblins. What wrong with all those? Kamikazi decided to chase some and even caught two of them. They were never able to strike back, while kamikazi somehow decided to use them as training dummies, breaking them every bone in their body before finally letting them die. Galena.

1st Limestone
Autumn is here. Especially the end of summer has shown us, that the attention to our settlement has grown. While those were certainly only scouts, more serious threats have to be expected. But training of the military has progressed nicely and I feel we are prepared. Our masons also have completed some work, but there is still a lot to do. The lack of housing is bothering quite a few of us. Also our supply of rockblocks is too slow and hindering construction. Maybe we should expand our masonry force even more? Right now out of 33 civilian adult dwarves 8 are working as specialized masons, having no other tasks. We will see.
We also found some trade goods. We still had some clothes, that wouldn't fit any dwarf, lying around. Also some caged animals we got from the elves and other trash they brought us. We will try to get  a good price for them.

[mahrgell]

Had forgotten pictures in the previous updates... Now it is updated. I will publish another season soon before I go to sleep. Gonna post more regularly again, was just busy during the last days with holidays ending and my turn in the community fortress.
I would be still more then glad about feedback and dwarfing requests

[mahrgell]

3rd Limestone
A bunch of wild boars scared all our workers, that tried to collect the stuff left by the goblins. After a day of civilians running around in panic, kamikazi send all soldiers to hunt down those disturbing animals. And soon everyone could go back to work, because our militia didn't fool around for long.

7th Limestone
Mosey completed trading with the humans. We sadly could not afford their steel equipment, but got some steel bars from them. As a small bonus we received some medical supplies again. It wasn't much, but then again, every little bit counts and the trade may help us keeping the humans friendly.
Once he was done, Mosey came to me and already from far he shouted at me: „156645“. When I looked at  him confused, searching for an answer he repeated it: „156645“. When I could finally could ask: „What? What the hell are you talking about?“, he answered: „156645 Urists! All in all this settlement is worth 156645 Urists!. I just asked a trader to help me pricing all the stuff we have here, and that's what we got!“ I was still a bit confused. „So is this a lot or not?“ „Well, i don't know... but that door alone is worth 75600 Urists... That door is worth as much as everything else here!“ I could just shake my head... „Economists... I will never understand them... Let me do the forge work and spare me those numbers... They give me a headache...“


28th Limestone
Negotiations with the Humans went uneventful. Today they finally decided to leave. And just when they were out of sight, a group of migrants showed up. This time their count was 16, 11 adults, 5 children.
As it is tradition, we again screened each of them individually:
Abshoth and Ducim, two dwarfs whose only mention worthy skills were in the social sector. Similarly Ongos only had some minor abilities (novice) as tailor, which were not needed here. Even worse were Fath, Zuglar and Degel. They had never done anything herself. Slowly we had a bunch of such rather useless citizens. We would certainly find work for them. Until now no one had complained about boredom at Hexxedgarish.
It was a welcome change when Rigtoh came to our table, giving us quite a long list of skills he had collected in his life. At first we thought, there would be no useful ones between those, but then we noticed he had some experience as a marksdwarf. Well, this sealed his fate, he would join Lenz' squad.
Dakost claimed to be part of the Guards, but never had actively participated in their activities. Well... that would change now.
Dumed was jewelers guild member, but until now had only worked as a security there, showing some of his striker skills. Our jewelers were already chronically under tasked. Not sure what we would do about him.
Takuth was a competent tailor and had done some archaeology before. This was better then those novices and those without skills we had before, but still, we added him to the list of dwarfs looking for a new field of employment.
Last among the adults was Vakist, who was part of the carpenters guild and even had actual work experience. What a nice surprise. He was a skilled/proficient lumberjack, carpenter and bowyer. We certainly didn't expect a useful dwarf in that bunch of burdens.
So we were quite dissappointed once done with the adults, and out of routine continued with the children. Sisal, Nobgost and Etur had no special traits but we were quite surprised when we noticed, that Zagel and Othsal both were actually part of the marksmenguild. Surely they would do their service, once they were grown up.
Still... we were wondering how they could have survived all the way to our settlement. Then we saw the answer. A huge Guardian of Armok was following them. And now it would protect us. Armok be praised. Let the Orcs come!

11th Sandstone
Armok wants to test our faith. A werelizard has arrived.

Kamikazi ordered the military to stand by. She wanted to test if our drakes and new guardian would take the werebeast down to reduce the chances of infection with the curse. Lenz' squad was allowed to take position on their overpass to pelt the thing with javelins, should it be able to break through.
Everyone was looking for what would happen, but then... the werelizard decided to charge a longhorn cow and would pay for it dearly. The cow would be no easy prey and was kicking the werelizard again and again with her hooves. Both were hurt by now, but neither was ready to give up when the werelizard slipped and fell into the moat. And there was just one way out... Right at the entrance to our fortress.
But then happened what none had expected. The lizard transformed back into a... kobold. A mere kobold. I don't know why, but somehow everyone felt with the poor Kobold and it was decided to let him survive.


4th Timber
Ongos was the next to turn crazy. Maybe it was because of his lack of tailoring work. Anyway, we quickly built him a Clothier's workshop so he could do whatever he needed to do.
Once he saw the workshop he quickly collected some materials. We somehow were used to that procedure by now. Only Watson was displeased when again it were her gems that were taken for that craziness.

11th Timber
Ongos showed us the result of his work.

A skirt! Seriously? Well, maybe some of our female dwarf would like it... We were also not able to figure out who the dwarf depicted on the skirt was. Strange. Ongos had said earlier, that he was married to a dwarf far away, but it wasn't her name.

18th Timber
The caravan from the mountain homes has finally arrived. As usual it was accompanied by more then a dozen Orc, Goblin and Kobold thieves, but all were spotted far from the entrance and didn't advance any further. Watson used the moment with everyone distracted to do some more of her archeological work. And she found another megabeast soul. Now we had 2. Watson again stored the soul for a later use. I'm not sure, I want to be there, when it is... used.

20th Timber
A goblin got eaten alive by our drakes and another Kobold got too close to the caravan guards, when a Orc berserker saw his chance and jumped a merchant. A hammerdwarf and  a sworddwarf escorting the caravan jumped at the Orc, but couldn't make it in time to save the merchant. The orc saw, that he wouldn't stand a chance against the well trained guards and with his last remaining power rammed his weapon into the mountain tuscox pulling one of the wagons. The other merchants immediatetly fled in panic. Looks like there won't be a dwarven caravan for us this year. Mosey was quite disappointed, was he looking forward to test his trading skills again. Then we noticed that the merchants had left one wagon behind. WOW! It was full of steelbars, food, medical supplies, some tradelicences and some other random items. Every dwarf started running for that huge pile of items.

Bringing them inside our perimeter was of highest importance! Also a trade storehouse was constructed right away to unpack all those crates. Certainly the mountain homes would blame us for the loss, but really, what could we have done? Well... we now had almost everything we needed, so we didn't care much about them right now anyway. And it was another year until they would return, maybe they would have forgotten what had happened by then.

24th Timber
Oops. We had forgotten someone. The dwarven liason had not run away like the traders. Mosey had a lot of trouble explaining the incident. He promised to buy a lot of things in the next year to make up for it. He again asked for various crates and bars of all kinds. We seriously need to improve our metal industry. The only thing we wouldn't need anymore were trade licences. We had enough of those now.

1st Moonstone
Winter is here. Of course we shouldn't be happy about what had just happened... But we were. What we had gained from the left behind wagon was way more then what we could have gained by trading. It would now be up to me to shape the steel for defense. Also trade workshops would have to be built.
But there were more plans. While the masons had shifted their focus away from the dining hall back to the bedroom building, which was, due to our newly arrived migrants, again more urgent then anything else, it was concluded that our settlement would need an outer wall along the moat. Right now we were safe from melee attackers, but in case of any create being able to attack over longer ranges we would be sitting there like ducks on a plate. This had to be changed. But this wall would require a ton of blocks.

[mahrgell]

12th Moonstone
Today Watson showed me some plans for a new kind of smelter.

Construction of it was ordered right away. Finally we wouldn't be restricted to copper production anymore. Watson told me, soon there would be more advanced buildings. Not sure where she is pulling those plans from.
Sadly most of the foodsupplies left behind by the caravan are rotting right now. Well, we are surely not lacking food anyway.

15th Moonstone
Tigers had attacked the workers hauling stuff from the lost wagon. The militia took care of them quickly. Also I had a chance to see Mothram 'working' at the alter. By now he is a legendary apostle, throwing one prayer after another to Armok. And actually Armok seems to be pleased and has granted us more then 30 bars through that

10th Opal
Now Kosoth has also started calling his hammer by name.

What's wrong with those guys in the barracks? We are working on mithril, steel and wolfram and they are naming their old rusty weapons.

18th Opal
Our population has grown by one.
Kilrud and Kol gave us the first dwarf born in Hexxedgarish.

(Add: I just noticed it wasn't the first dwarf born here... just the first one I noticed)

28th Opal
A greatforge and a blast furnace have been built. Watson is really making things happen. And he already talked about more ideas she had. But we had a new bottleneck in our progress. We ran out of rock boulders. Not blocks. We were seriously lacking common rock boulders, even though we have 3 dwarfs mining all the time. More sandstone has been designated for the mining. Also new furniture will now be built out of bone. We have more then enough of those.

8th Obsidian
They don't stop at their weapons. Now Kosoth has also named his shield.

A mere wooden round shield. I really hope to convince him of using something more useful later on.

17th Obsidian
We were celebrating the construction of our new ammocaster and metallurgist, when we had some new guests. Not the thieves, that were showing up almost every week during these times but a caravan.

A drow caravan. Let's see what they would have to offer.

24th Obsidian
Meh! The drow didn't have any interesting goods at all. To show some good will we traded some of our worst hourglasses we had for a few bags of plaster powder, but really... It wasn't worth it at all and all the excitement was wasted. Maybe they would bring better goods next year.

1st Granite
New Year! We had made it through our second year as well. This year our fortress had greatly grown and now home of 71 dwarves. We made several advances in forge technology, but also encountered new enemies in the Orcs and Elves. I had started producing kiteshields and better armor sets were also planned. The incident about the mountain homes caravan may have been unpleasent, but ended in great profit for us.Sadly the work on the outer wall has not even started yet. But the masons promised me, it would be done as soon as the final fifth floor of our appartment complex was built.

[mahrgell]

OOC: I changed the format here to two seasons because spring was rather boring and was over quite fast. Also just at the start of summer I noticed why I my blocks production was so slow... ^^ more about it in the update Also I wont talk about every single research advance etc anymore and cut some others things a bit shorter as the fortress grows. If we get down to 20 dwarfs again, there will be more individual attention again

10th Granite
Mosey had some talks with the Drow about their trade assortment. They actually don't have much to offer at all. At least nothing we need. Except... Mosey ordered a golem heart for next year. I can imagine his plans with this, but isn't it dangerous? What is he thinking? Does he not trust the weapons from my forges? I feel the advances of the last time made some of us a bit too lighthearted.

15th Granite
Kigok as well... I lost hope in the sanity of our militia.

20th Granite
While out food stockpiles went through the roof, we are sitting now at more then 1000 prepared meals... we ran through our whole booze stockpiles without noticing during the last winter. The drow have already left and our plants are not yet ready for brewing. Looks like we have to live off water for some time. I doubt the others will take those news well.

24th Granite
To make matters worse, migrants have arrived. 11 adults, 4 children, then a trader showed up and scared away any further migrants. I guess the traders still hold a grudge against us because of the caravan incident. So we were now 86 dwarves. Because of our experiences of the last times, we decided to screen the migrants more quickly this time. Actually the only noteworthy ones were 2 machine operators, Kib and Kob and a beast wardens guild member by the name of Sosh that had some decent experience in various combatskills including knifeusage.
To help with our almost nonexistent boozesupplies all nonessential workers have been sent out to gather some wild plants. This should help us to get over the spring, until our farms deliver.

26th Granite
It is back. The werelizard has forgotten the mercy we had shown last time and came back again. Well, we surely wouldn't spare it this time again.


27th Granite
Again it looks like the werelizard didn't come for us. This time it attacked the Drow caravan that was just leaving. A forest spider pulling a wagon was the first to feel the beasts rampage. A drow shielddancer tried to assist the spider, but came to late to save it. Now the lizard fought a long duel with the shielddancer. Both were quite skilled at dodging and neither could strike the other in a critical way (seriously, >2 pages with neither side hitting, both just dodging around).
Then another shielddancer joined the fight and the beast used the same escape strategy it had used last time. It jumped into the moat, transforming back into the Kobold it was originally and then running. So it seems like we spared it again. Let's see when he comes back. 

28th Granite
The rampaging trader has made way and more migrants have arrived, bringing our total number to 96. There were actually a few useful ones among them. Several guilds had sent a representative: engineers, healers, masons and marksmen.

15th Slate
Inod went nuts today. So he first claimed a craftdwarfs workshop, which is completely acceptable. What he did next wasn't. The only thing he decided to use for whatever he was going to build was a boulder of wolframite. Wasting our valuable military ressources like the should be punished! But it seems I'm alone with that opinion. It looks like we need some more ambushes to remind everyone what industry our survival is relying on. Only a well working forge industry can secure our existence here!

22nd Slate


A pair of dice? Really? Why do those people never make some useful artifact? Like a hammer? Or  an anvil? Whatever... The wolframite is wasted and even though Mosey valued those dice at 36000 Urists I don't wanna think about it any further.
Also the fifth and final floor of our bedroom building has been completed and roofed. It has now 40 rooms. This is still only enough for half of us. But the outer wall has a higher priority right now. But that will need a lot of blocks. Our masons force has been expanded to 15 dwarves now to deal with the high demand.

23rd Slate
A great bull has disturbed our workers for long enough. But now he has severly hurt Kib, one of our haulers. The militia finally took care of it and Kigok beheaded the bull with a single strike.
But now all plants in the area have been gathered and we are still out of booze. Complaints about the lack of drinks are heard everywhere. But it will probably be another 2 month before our stills will be back in business.

14th Felsite
Elves have shown up. And they are bringing several rothes, looking like they are carrying goods. Do they really think we will believe them they would be here for trade? Our militia is already waiting for them.

16th Felsite
I may have complained a lot about the lack of sense and intelligence of my fellow dwarves. But those Elves... It wasn't some plot, they were really trying to trade. Well... that didn't stop our militia from slaughtering them as soon as they reached the depot. What followed was a chase of their diplomat through the whole town, until he was finally struck down by Birut, one of our wrestlers.
When we inspected, what they had brought, everyone rejoiced. There were almost 100 drinks between a lot of mithrilitems, which were designated for melting right away.

1st Hematite
Summer has arrived and we are looking forward to the stills soon giving us booze again. Spring was largely uneventful, except for the short battle with the elven caravan. We are happy no one got injured in that fight this time. Kib, who received some injuries from a fight with the great bull earlier is still refusing to lie down for our doctors to diagnose him, even though his arm is obviously broken. Well... they will get him. No one escapes our medical staff!
Our outer wall in the south is already completed, but we are still lacking blocks. Mosey told me, we have already used about 1500 blocks for construction alone. And that is basically only the wall and our bedrooms. Considering that, we decided to recruit even more masons. Now we have 20 out of a total of 65 civilians doing only masonry.

21st Hematite
We finally found the reason in our stone blocks bottlenecks. When Mosey always ordered stoneblocks to be built in huge batches, those orders were only distributed to 3 different masonry workshops. This issue has now been fixed. Hopefully that finally speeds everything up.

7th Malachite
Mosey had been overthrown. A bunch of dwarves have decided to call a vote and elect Nalthish, our gemcutter, as mayor. He even mandated the production of barrels. But under pressure of the militia he had to surrender his new position again and Mosey had been reestablished, now as mayor. Dwarves are surely not ready for democracy and should respect their elders! But somehow the support of the militia and his new title gave Mosey some new ideas of greatness. He now wants expanded rooms and offices. Well... for now he has to stay in his little wooden office! There are more pressing construction projects. Also it will be hard to built a proper palace for him, because right now our towncentre is still cluttered with stockpiles and workshops and I highly doubt he would want to have his palace in some corner of the settlement.

12th Malachite
Another group of migrants has arrived. Again a trader showed up and scared away more migrants from coming to our place. Shouldn't they slowly get over it? So only 5 did resist his bad mouthing, but those were a big surprise to us. A legendary machine operator, an expert mechanic, and an accomplished shearer who was part of the farmers guild. They immediately went to work in our city. Also those 5 brought us to 101 dwarves total. Who would have expected that, when we had started with those 7 2 years ago?

26th Malachite
I can't bear it anymore! I think... I think... no, not anymore! I'm not one of those... I have to show them, that I'm better! I will craft what no dwarf has crafted before!

I don't need much for it... it is all in my mind already...


2nd Galena

Functionality over decorations, that was always my motto. We now just need a worthy warrior to wield it. Mosey valued it at 120000 Urists. That's one quarter of our total cities value.
Also I'm finally accepted as a legendary weapons smith. I may have to train my armor smithing in future to catch up with it, right now I'm talented at it, but there is always more possible.

13th Galena
Warlocks!

Well, at least a warlock thief doing evil magic has been spotted by one of the traders hanging around and telling lies about our city. Hopefully they kill each other.

14th Galena
They didn't. Instead everyone decided to run. What a bunch of cowards. Still, we have to improve our defenses.

16th Galena
Now the Human caravan showed up and got immediately ambushed by warlocks. Also one of the pissed dwarven traders got caught up in the fight. The fight turned quite messy with warlocks casting their spells at everything in sight, while the mountain tuscoxes and caravan guards charged at them. In the end two warlocks were laying dead on the floor, while the humans were badly injured and had were mostly feeling extreme pain from the warlock spells. The merchants decided to turn, but had to leave one of their wagons behind. Again... Of course we shouldn't be happy about what had happened.... But again we had gotten a full wagon of useful steel items for nothing. We just have to hope the humans can accept, that this wasn't our fault.
For security reasons it was decided, that bringing those items in would be delayed until the next month though, because we were not sure how many warlocks were still alive out there.

18th Galena
The guild representative of the humans had instead decided to search for protection inside our forest. He was now talking to Mosey about what had happened. But since he had been caught in the warlock magic Mosey insisted on not having too close contact with him, which lead to the poor human diplomat standing outside Moseys hut and trying to shout through the wooden wall.


20th Galena
The Warlocks and Humans were not the only visitors at the end of this season. Now even a dozen automaton thieves showed up.

They didn't even try to break our defenses but were instead standing outside the moat, scaring the masons working on our wall. A few javelins thrown across the moat by Lenz and his men convinced the automatons to run again.

1st Limestone
Half of the year is over again. While there wasn't much happening in spring, things picked up pace in summer. While the left behind caravan wagon could be seen as a good thing, it was now clear that the Automatons and Warlocks had their eye on us as well. Luckily the outer wall is almost finished, which should protect our civilians from random potshots from the outside. Still, our military would need further expansion. Also several construction projects are planned. The town center would slowly have to be cleared of clutter to make space for some proper buildings. A marketplace and a mayors palace would have to be built. But before that, the dining hall was on the list, since it was now delayed by more then a year. Also we are considering a few archery towers to enable our marksdwarves opening fire before enemies can even reach our main entrance. And as it has always been for the past 2 years, we are still lacking housing. A new bedroom building is already planned in place of the old dining hall.
Meanwhile our booze situation has stabilized, but we are not sure yet, if we have enough to get over the winter. Luckily the murky pools, even though their water is not the cleanest, are not freezing during winter here.

OOC: Sadly the thrower skill is not an individual column in dwarf therapist... Guess a random marksdwarf will receive the artifact then.

[mahrgell]

10th Limestone
The outer wall is done and works on the dining hall are going on full speed. Unlike the other buildings it will be built entirely from basalt instead of sandstone giving it a much darker look. I just hope it fits in well.

10th Sandstone
A month had passed with nothing happening. Masons are already working on the roof of our dining hall, but our bone carvers are lacking behind in producing the needed furniture. Also we have to clean the dining hall of plants. We should probably pave it at some point.
But today again some migrants arrived. I'm wondering why it always happens around the same time every season. Maybe we will figure it out some day.
Among the 14 dwarves were 5 children, 1 marksdwarf and 2 beast wardens. They reminded us, that our drakes still required war training. I don't know how we had forgotten that until now.

7th Timber
Several soldiers have named their equipment again. I stopped caring about it. Nil at least gave the name to his iron kite shield unlike his companions who choose their old gar for that.

Due to the dining hall being almost completed, we moved our food stockpile from the city center closer to the wall and the dining hall. Gonna make some space in the center, but right now it keeps everyone busy, 2000 units of food have to be hauled. Also it was announced that once winter would arrive, the farm plots will be also moved. Except for that autumn is really uneventful until now. Today a few forest imps showed up, but i doubt they will dare to get close to our entrance. Still, tension in the city is rising. The caravan should arrive soon. And experience has taught us, that caravan time is usually also the time for invaders to show up.

12th Timber
And we were right.

We discovered a pack of Goblins, that were obviously not just here to try to grab some items. They wanted more. They wanted us. And it was unlikely they were alone. But our militia had trained for more then 2 years now. They were ready. It was their moment to shine. Kamikazi assembled everyone quickly and giving a motivating speech before raising her knuckle duster into the air.
Everyone took position close to the entrance where our drakes were pastured. But the goblins were smart. While the ones armed with bows stayed back, a flail swinger approached the entrance. Once he turned around the corner more then a dozen drakes and another dozen dwarves jumped at him. He didn't last longer then a view seconds. Akrul, still wielding his named shortsword, beheaded him. But now with everyone out of cover, the remaining goblins had a clear line of fire.

Kamikazi ordered a charge while staying back herself.
Several drakes got hit by arrows, while the dwarves mostly dodged everything shot at them. But for reasons I can't understand Kosoth had decided to take her baby with her into battle. While she was able to dodge one of the arrow, little Bem got hit into the chest. The baby stood no chance.

Kosoth was crying and rushed forward even faster and everyone followed her and they all fought with blind hate. They had all accepted to die in battle themselves, but the loss of the baby was something they could not let happen without revenge.
Once they had closed the distance, the goblins stood no chance. One of them tried to flee by jumping into the moat, but some well aimed javelins quickl took him down.
Once the battle was over we had a quick body count. 7 goblins were dead, none of the militia had taken any injuries. But the loss of Bem still hurt each of us. Kosoth was still crying. We had also lost a drake to arrowfire and few were injured.
To protect the workers hauling in the dead bodies our militia stayed around the entrance.

15th Timber
And promptly our militia got attacked. A warlock icemage jumped out of his cover. Poor Akrul got hit by the warlock spell and was shouting terribly.

I can hardly imagine the pain he must have felt. But with his cover gone, the warlock now had to face almost a dozen dwarfs in melee. He lasted surprisingly long, but was unable to cast another spell before he died. Just in the moment Kigok gave him the final blow, another warlock showed up. There was no time to rest. The thief obviously had a grudge against the drakes and killed two of them, with several more hurt. A bunch of goblin and kobold thieves joined the fray, but almost everyone focussed on the warlock. He was even tougher then the first one and lasted forever (7 pages combatlog of dwarves and drakes attacking) Luckily he focussed entirely on the drakes, so all dwarves stayed unharmed.

19th Timber
Just when everything was cleaned up and no more enemies were in sight, the dwarven caravan arrived.

Another warlock tried to attack the merchants, but was quickly chased away by the militia. While they were unable to catch the warlock, they ran into 3 more goblin thieves. Only one escaped their wrath.
With the warlock still in sight they decided to continue their chase, even though it was unlikely they could catch up. Maybe it was coincidence, or the warlock was just a bait, but suddenly a new group of enemies showed up right in front of our now already tired fighters.


Being far away from the entrance, there was no choice and so battle ensued again.
But it seemed the Orcs were as surprised as our dwarves. Their blowguns were of little use in close combat and they were quickly overpowered. Only a cragtoothboar, that had followed Birut into battle and an animated ironspear fell on our side.
Maybe even that ambush was just a distraction, because near the entrance a couple of orcish and goblin thieves try to sneak into our city, but the drakes were still on guard and chased them away again.

25th Timber
Even while far away, Solon, our trusted miner, couldn't handle all that fighting on the surface anymore.

He ended up claiming one of our dozen workshops and started gathering materials.

1st Moonstone
Winter! Kamikazi and the recruits spent the last few days hunting orc thieves. They killed another two and a few more fled the field. I just hope the new season all brings back some some peace. Autums was a season without anything happening for more then 2 months, but during Timber it felt like the whole world decided to meet up here. We had at least 25 thieves of all kind of races including 5 Warlocks(+Orcs, Goblins and Kobolds, no Automatons this season). Also we had a Goblin ambush in early Timber and another Orc ambush in late Timber.
Our militia had focused their efforts on the Warlocks and ambushes, but had also caught a few thieves. Overall we counted 11 Orcs, 9 Goblins and 2 Warlocks dead.

All Kobolds and other remaining enemies had fled the field. We had lost a few drakes and more importantly Bem, Son of Kosoth.
Beside all that happening outside the city walls, the dining hall has been completed, but was still lacking furniture. Right now everyone was busy hauling the remains of the battle inside and quite a few items were designated for trade, that also required hauling.
For winter we had a few plans. First of all we finally wanted to trade with the caravan from the mountain homes. Learning from what had just happened, it was also clear that we needed additional fortifications for our javelin throwers to engage our enemies from behind the walls. With the new dining hall completed it was also time for finally expanding the bed room building. I was hoping for it all to be done until the end of the year.

[mahrgell]

Once the year is over I will do another state of the city with screenshots off all the buildings etc. Right now it feels like invaders are mobilizing slowly. Last month of autumn was quite stressful.
And I seriously don't know whats wrong with the thieves. They come packs of half a dozen, and all races (except frost giants, phew) are sending them, often multiple packs per race per season.

[kizucha]

Its very enjoyable to read your story's in this fort, you master smith.

[ColdBones]

I'm enjoying so far - well done.  I'll be tuning in regularly!