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[Torgue]

Date: 1 Slate 159

Stupid liason finally left, saying that we are officially a county.  Which is confusing, because there are no counts here.  Crazy bastard.





I was inspecting the new statue garden/meeting hall today when I came across a major design flaw!  Apparently someone forgot to build stairs in the stream trench, and left a conscripted miner and her child trapped inside.  The kid was sleeping, and the miner was hunting for a small creature to survive.  Too engrossed in her gross task to think rationally, she ignored the fact that she has a pickaxe and could dig her way out.



Not wanting two deaths staining my hands or the meeting hall, I ordered every single miner to drop what they were doing and run to the area, where I had ordered a staircase to be dug.  I also ordered the construction of a stairway in case a mason happened to be closer.



While this was going on, some kid was possessed by unknown forces to make something beautiful, and likely completely worthless.  He did not disappoint.





He claims it's worth 40800☼.  Yeah, whatever you say, kid.

I also learned that the blueprints for my quarters appear to intersect the aquifer.  This is an OUTRAGE!  I picked that spot so that it would be in the middle of the fortress, and now it's RUINED!  Fine, I'll move it somewhere else.

Anyway, the miner managed to be freed and make it to the nearby food stockpile without starving to death.  Despite her predicament, she didn't seem too upset about the whole ordeal.



Date: 17th Felsite 159

Uh oh.



Shit.  ShithshitshitSHIT!  Oh this is not good.  We're screwed.  I've never even been in an ambush, let alone a full blown siege!  No, they cannot do this, they cannot defeat us, not while the project is underway!  Go, dwarves, defend the fortress with your lives!



Thankfully, this siege seems kind of small for an assault team.  Maybe they're getting demoralized after years of failure?



Not that I'm complaining, of course.

Unfortunately for the pack of guard dogs at the entrance, the first squad to hit the walls are bowmen.  The poor animals are slaughtered mercilessly, without laying so much as a tooth on the enemy.

OOC- The charging goblins reminded me of this http://youtu.be/GJoM7V54T-c?t=43s /OOC



But, their deaths were not in vain!  They allowed just enough time for a couple of marksdwarves to reach the battlements.



There does appear to be a design flaw in the sniper tower, however.  Namely, the giant fucking hole in the middle.



That's gonna be fixed soon.  Thankfully, neither soldier is injured.  Nor is the marksdwarf that fell a few minutes afterwards.

EVERYTHING THAT FOLLOWS IN THIS POST IS NON-CANON AND NEVER OFFICIALLY HAPPENED
It is then that I record the first fatality, of a child that followed its mother into combat, when it should have been in the burrow because of the alert.



It's his own fault, really.

Soon, another marksdwarf is struck down.



These disheartening events were interrupted by a moment of hilarity as I spot a pack of trolls chasing a donkey across the land.



Oh dear.  The donkey and a troll managed to get inside the fortress.  This is bad.



FUCK.  WELL, it turns out that the bridge to the pasture WAS in fact raised and that I had LOWERED it.  Well, this is bad.  I immediately order the bridge to be raised again.  Maybe it will take out a few goblins.



"I'm not trapped in here with you!  YOU ARE ALL TRAPPED IN HERE WITH ME!!"

A dwarven child trapped outside the walls was killed by a goblin.  I also receive word that a miner known as "Mr. Wiggles" has been missing for a week.  I can only assume that he died of thirst after being trapped somewhere, but there are more pressing matters at the moment.  Such as the goblin army invading the farms.

A milk spider tries to help the dwarves, but only succeeds in trapping the squad in its webbing.



The siege at the front gate appears to have been eliminated, so I order most of the squads there to assist at the farms.



A maned wolf gets in on the action:



This stupid milk spider is preventing the dwarves from fighting, and they are being beat on by the marksdwarves.  A mace lord gets shot in the head and dies while trying to free himself.  A dwarf by the name of Escondida bled to death after encountering a goblin axe lord.  What he was doing on the surface, I don't know. 

This is quickly getting out of control.  I order all civilians to take refuge in the queen's future rooms.

I notice a militia captain, one "snackfox," frolicking around on the surface "on break".  He is going to be severely reprimanded should we survive this.  I fear I may even have to relieve him and lock him up for desertion of duty.  I'm also going to shove all milk spiders in a small hole far from any area where conflict is likely to arise.  The siege wouldn't have been such a disaster had they not intervened.

A thief steals an artifact.  Great.



The military is unable to move anywhere because the fucking milk spiders are trapping them with the webs.  This is not one of my finest moments.

To be continued...

[Torgue]

Ok, to tell you guys the truth, I don't know if the fort can progress passed this point.  Both sides of the siege are stuck in a deadlock fight that literally cannot happen because no one can move with the milkspiders doing their thing.  Because it's happening in the main stairway, civilians run up and then get trapped in the webs, and will basically be stuck there until 1) the siege breaks in a few months, or 2) every stuck dwarf starves or dies of thirst.  I'm not even sure about the first one, because I think they'll still be stuck anyway.  I'll be willing to ride this out a little longer if you guys want to, but I also have a save from when the siege starts, before the goblins enter the pasture if we really need to save-scum.

I'll leave that decision to you guys.

[Zaerosz]

Yeeeeah, I'd savescum here. I'm starting to think milkspiders were a bad idea...

[escondida]

Honestly, I'd say it's up to you. If you think you can come back from this, go for it, or if you can bring the fort down in the truly spectacular fashion it deserves, go for it, or if you want to save scum...go for it. As long as a good story comes of it, make it so!

[Torgue]

Yeeeeah, I'd savescum here. I'm starting to think milkspiders were a bad idea...

It's less that they were a bad idea, and more that they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.  Had I actually paid attention to the pasture gate, I feel the siege would easily have been won.

[snackfox]

Yeah, I think we should savescum, but it's up to Torgue what happens.

[Torgue]

The following takes place shortly after the slaughter of the dogs at the main gate.

Date: 19th Felsite 159





One of our elite marksdwarves, Sibrek Thîdasmörul, is raining hell upon the goblin invaders that plague the fortress.  Her accuracy is unerring, every shot hits its mark.  Her targets go down in screaming agony as she aims for the limbs.  One of the sniper's victims manages to fake death long enough to be slaughtered by the melee forces.



She eventually manages to kill the goblin elite marksman, and the rest of the soldiers seize their chance as the disorganized goblins scramble around the beach.



The goblins are slaughtered without mercy, volleys of arrows doing nothing to stop the implacable dwarven soldiers.  Not a single dwarven casualty occurs in the melee.



As the victorious dwarves fall back to the gateway, a goblin maceman squad approaches from the northeast.



They too, suffer their ends without any dwarven losses, beyond a baby who got hit in the hand with a mace.





It is now that I notice two trolls have broken into the cottage atop the cliff.  Preoccupied with destroying the windows, they ignore the plainly visible entrance to the fortress in favor of trashing the house.  This cannot stand.  I order a squad to surprise them through the tunnel to the fortress and wipe them out.

Only one marksman squadron and a few trolls remain to be taken care of.  Dhoor, the militia commander becomes the first casualty as a troll distracts him enough for a volley of arrows to rain upon him.  Champion Thîkut Zuglardallith Stistmig Akam rushes to his aid, and the troll is soon dispatched.





The dwarves charge the final squadron of goblins, seeking vengeance for wounding their leader.



They quickly mop up all survivors, and the two trolls in the cottage are also eliminated.

Dhoor is in bad shape with multiple severe fractures, but he should pull through in a few weeks.  As soon as I lift the civilian alert, a dwarf runs to pick him up and carry him to the hospital.



I also order the catwalk in the tower to be widened, to prevent marksdwarves from falling after dodging arrows.  Cleanup proceeds as quickly as it can with the few idling dwarves that we have.  It will take some time before the battlefield is finally clean, however.





The siege is broken, and project work can resume!  The dwarves quickly return to their daily tasks, as I start my own preparations for its final phase.  While this is still a long way off, I find it better to start preparing long beforehand.  Everything must be perfect.

[escondida]

Nice siegebreaking! Sad to hear that Dhoor was wounded, though. Still, one injury isn't too bad compared to...what could have happened. Did my dorf survive this time, out of curiosity? I have ever-so-clever plans for her miraculous return, if not, but hopefully that won't be necessary. <(}-:

[Torgue]

Yep, Dhoor was the only casualty.  Everyone else made it unscathed, except for the baby with the bruised hand.

To tell you the truth, I was kind of excited about the first go around because it reduced the number of babies in the fortress quite significantly, I think it went from 100 down to 85 or something like that.  Now that I think about it, I wouldn't have been too excited at the inevitable tantrum spiral, but I had other things on my mind at the moment.

[Zaerosz]

Zaerosz' Journal, 19th Felsite 159

Gods damn it, not my house again.

[Torgue]

Journal of Torgue, Date 23rd Felsite 159

So!  Goblin siege!  Went pretty well, all things considered.  Sucks about Dhoor, the men are kind of upset that their commander could have been harmed like he was.  I went down to the hospital to check on him, and he's in pretty bad shape.  All his limbs are at weird angles.  Fortunately the CMD says he can set them all, but he may need some more plaster to do so.  I set in an order at the kiln for some plaster.

The project seems to be progressing well.  Mining work has definitely sped up now that the conscripts have some experience.  Still, much remains to be done.  Progress is slowing in the forges due to a lack of silver ores to smelt, but the miners have some they plan to dig out.

The dreams have become more vivid.  I fear I cannot put them onto paper, in the event this journal gets stolen, I can't have them refusing my orders on the account that I am crazy.  All I will say is that the images are horrifying.

The new meeting hall is almost completed.  Had a little mishap there, a miner and her child stuck, but they seem to have escaped fine.  An interesting development came to my attention during the siege.  I paid little mind to it with Goblin Claus knocking on the door.  But now, it worries me.  It appears that one of the miners, Mr. Wiggles, has gone missing.  I fear he may have died of thirst, trapped in a hole somewhere, but for the life of me I cannot figure out where he went.  Poor bastard.

Anyway, I'll soon be able to open the waterfall trench to the aquifer.  Hopefully it won't flood.  We might even be able to get some water power out of the deal, but I don't know what we'd need it for.  I might even use it as an entrance for Benev's temple, should I get the opportunity.

I noticed an... interesting statue being placed in the meeting hall.  Seems someone made a little joke at Benev's expense.

[escondida]

Hey, Torgue, if FPS is a big problem, you might try setting up traffic areas. The wiki has a pretty good article on it. Also, atom-smashing excess items and caging wandering animals never hurts. It might be a good idea to re-engineer things so that paths can't possibly lead in circles, too.

Oh, and for the record, I, the real escondida, have no problem with judicious save-scumming and am very glad you saved the fort. Dwarf-escondida, however, would be understandably worried given her paranoia, so don't take in-character comments as a negative judgment on my part.

-~-~-~- From the diary of Uzol "Escondida" Estilvucar -~-~-~-

If you are reading this, then congratulations! You have gained a little reading skill, and may be of use in upcoming experiments to determine why reading skill is associated with extreme longevity.

Something's not right. Pages I remember writing are gone from this journal, but there is no sign of them having been ripped out. Crops I would have sworn were ready to harvest are young and green. And I have the strangest feeling that I shouldn't be here.

I had already begun to suspect that there was something wrong with time itself here in Harvestcoast, that maybe time is slowing down. But this...this is new. And somehow, it all revolves around this new overseer, Torgue. When the siege came, it was as though he knew their troop movements in advance. He ordered the troops with stunning foresight, and what must have been hundreds of goblins fell. Dhoor, who may be the only one capable of truly controlling the military, was mysteriously the only one injured in the fray. Could it be that Torgue is somehow manipulating time to his advantage? If so, what does he want? To control the fortress forever, using his ill-gotten foreknowledge to stifle any opposition before it can even occur?

And yet, despite my suspicions, he spares me. Why? What does he know? Why would I help him? Or is it just that I am below notice, assigned as I am to menial duties?

Most worrying of all, why can no one else remember anything? Why does no one else even suspect? I hesitate to even think it, but...did I die? Is that why I can remember so much, because there would be no need to wipe the memories of dwarf who was already dead? A dwarf who would likely die again, but who by some oversight managed to live? How...how many times have the last few months happened, I wonder? How many times has history been erased and replayed until it met with Torgue's satisfaction? How long has this been going on? I must know. I must find out.

I will throw my old logs into the sea. I will hide this one. I have to keep this one, because whatever may happen, I must remember. If I can remember, maybe I can understand what is going on, and maybe, just maybe, I can fix things.

[Torgue]

Hey, Torgue, if FPS is a big problem, you might try setting up traffic areas. The wiki has a pretty good article on it. Also, atom-smashing excess items and caging wandering animals never hurts. It might be a good idea to re-engineer things so that paths can't possibly lead in circles, too.

I did those as soon as I started my turn.  Honestly I was kind of surprised they weren't there already.

[escondida]

Aw, dang. That's rough.

[escondida]

Any progress?