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Author Topic: Thob Goes to the Surface  (Read 57471 times)

Su

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #15 on: May 12, 2020, 03:58:17 pm »

ptw. your writing style is excellent!
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Loam

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #16 on: May 15, 2020, 08:34:41 am »

Thanks for reading, everyone, and the compliments!

I know it's just a bit of trim-and-paste, but your photo editing is excellent. So is your storytelling.
That's probably my favorite pic, actually. I got lucky with the "It is noon" announcement.



For a while now Thob had noticed the light getting dimmer; he had thought it was just his eyes adjusting, until he noticed that the bright thing had almost completely disappeared behind the western mountains. The blue dome overhead was darkening, and everything was taking on the dark subtle hues of the caverns. It was also getting noticeably colder. The sudden change was a surprise to Thob, but a welcome one. Whatever the bright thing had been, it was gone now, and the surface looked a lot more like home in the darkness. Thob realized now how the ancient dwarves had been able to live up here: it was probably that bright thing’s appearance that caused the dwarves to go underground.

He found himself feeling tired—he’d walked the whole length of the valley, almost. There were no beds about, but the green fungus was decently soft in places. He found a good spot and dozed off.

He was awakened by the awful light again. That bright thing was back, hovering over the eastern mountains this time. Thob sighed, but picked himself up and trudged on.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Nearby was a large cluster of stone buildings, small towers and pyramids, in front of a much taller structure rising from the sand. There didn’t seem to be anyone around, so Thob decided to go check it out.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)
The smaller buildings were open, and abandoned. Thob looked into one little pyramid, but there didn’t seem to be much inside. It was probably just some old house—maybe this was once a dwarven surface-city?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)
The main tower was an irregular, imposing structure. Cautiously Thob went inside. The interior was a maze of small rooms and hallways, full of table and chairs but not much else, except for several books and scrolls. They were very old and dusty, but mostly intact. Thob picked up a few and scanned them.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Most of them were about the place itself, which they called “Brightbrand.” They were all in the same hand and signed “Mosus Presentracks.” But they didn’t tell him much about what the place was, or had been.
He thought he’d look around the other structures a bit more. He went over to the nearest one, a boxy building a few stories tall, and looked inside. He saw, to his astonishment, some piles of stuff on the floor, in chests and bags. He crept over to investigate: all the goods were of quality dwarven craftsmanship, and made of good material. This must be a treasury! Since no one seemed to live here Thob thought he’d help himself.
He found, to his excitement, a fine iron pick and a nice iron buckler, which might help against dangerous animals. There was more to the place, and Thob was searching eagerly through the fine goods, when suddenly…
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
With a rusty rattle of mechanisms a bronze pike shot up from the floor: Thob jumped away just in time to avoid a skewering. The weapon was heavily decayed, but would still have made a mess of his insides if it had hit. Somewhat shaken, Thob decided to leave the rest of the treasures alone; he took his new gear and left the building, and the strange complex, behind.

Ahead was nothing but sandy wasteland. Thob knew he could follow the mountains east to Stoneclasped, but it was a long way off and the land looked forbidding. Still, he had to try. It was his best chance of finding some alcohol.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)
At last he approached the old fortress, nestled in a corner of the mountains. He hoped there was food as well as booze inside—he’d eaten the last of his rations on the way.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
There was another temple to Doren inside the top cavern—she must have been a popular deity with the old dwarves. The temple was partially collapsed in the center, but among the rubble Thob saw something glinting in the faint light. He turned over a few blocks, and found two masterfully-worked swords!
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
He recalled that Osmod, in Dawngloves, had mentioned some dwarven artifacts at Stoneclasped, and these matched their descriptions. He stowed the swords in his pack: maybe if he got them back to Dawngloves, the king would be more likely to listen to him, and help him out.
There was a trade depot here full of goods, and (more importantly) food. Thob took a few rations for the return journey. But the tavern was another disappointment: all the casks were empty, and had been for a long time. Not even the smell of alcohol remained.

He took a look around the lower fort as well, though he didn’t expect to find any booze.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
He didn’t find any, but there was plenty of other good stuff around. The old dwarves had left a sizeable hoard down here. Among it Thob found some armor, made of the best dwarven steel: a breastplate, helm, and some mail leggings, along with a pair of iron boots and bronze gauntlets. The stuff was heavy, but you couldn’t ask for better protection. He was in a new world, and who knew what dangers lay in wait for a lone dwarf?

As if to drive the point home, when he came back to the surface several strange creatures had gathered around:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
a gray, scaly thing with a knobby trunk paced through the sand;
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
on top of the fort sat a fat, one-eyed black creature with bat wings;
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
and among the rock fields nearby stood a couple small, scaly things with bug-like mandibles, whose skin seemed to let off a dense smoke.
None of the things bothered him, though they watched him warily. Still, he hefted his iron pick and kept a close eye on them. He really hoped the king would help him find something to drink: he couldn’t wait to get back to the caverns.
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Thob Goes to the Surface (Adventure Mode story, in progress)

TheFlame52

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #17 on: May 15, 2020, 02:41:52 pm »

Soldier of Ral extract? I don't think I've ever seen an experiment with gaseous extract before. What does it do?

Loam

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #18 on: May 15, 2020, 06:06:12 pm »

I've no idea. Thob gets caught in some in a later episode, but I have yet to see any negative (or otherwise) effects.
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Loam

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #19 on: May 19, 2020, 10:18:19 am »

A short bridge episode before part two:


It took Thob another day to get back to Dawngloves. When the bright thing went down behind the mountains it was sweet relief again, but he wasn’t surprised this time when it came back. About when it reached the highest part of the blue dome, he made it back to the fortress.

He was quickly surrounded by the chatty barons, and showed the fruits of his labors to the one who called herself “countess of Dawngloves,” Tekkud Splattertongs.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
So Thob returned the ancient treasures to the Sandaled Key. The other barons were delighted, and Thob was regarded with no little esteem in Dawngloves, as a “treasure hunter.” He liked the sound of that.

All the rest of the day he told the nobles about his adventure and the strange things he encountered on the way. He learned as much from his listeners as he told, mostly the names of things that he had seen: for instance, the green fungus was “grass” and wasn’t actually fungus, the woody mushrooms were “trees” and weren’t actually mushrooms, the blue dome was the “sky” and was actually nothing at all, and the bright thing was the “Sun” and had been there forever, and was actually the reason anything could live on the surface at all—which made about as much sense to Thob as saying water was cleaner than alcohol (although the surface water had been, to his surprise, noticeably nicer than cavern pools).

The day was drawing to a close when Thob was approached by the strange king of the dwarves, Urvad Whipgem.
   “You made it over the desert and back, with two artifacts, I see,” he said, a gleam in his eye that Thob found strangely unpleasant. “I seem to have underestimated you. Perhaps you would do a special job for me?”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   "That depends,” said Thob. “What’s in it for me?”
   “You are, I believe, in need of alcohol, yes?”
   “Haven’t had a drink in three days.”
   “Well, should you accept my job—and perform it satisfactorily—I’ll see about getting a shipment sent over to… what was it you called your hometown?”
   “Lawmined.”
   “Ah, yes, Baron Id’s estate. What do you say?”
   “What do you want me to do?” asked Thob.
   The king’s eyes got a far-away look and he was silent for a moment. Then he said, “Have you ever heard of… the Death Wars?”
   “Can’t say it rings a bell.”
   “No, I suppose it wouldn’t. It all happened very long ago. I’ll spare you the long history lesson, but for many years—years! centuries, really—terrible wars ravaged the world, and practically destroyed civilization. You may have seen how empty everything was out there? Well, that’s why. But in addition to destruction, many of my, er, our artifacts were stolen by enemies of the dwarves. You catch my meaning?”
   Thob nodded slowly. “And who are these enemies?”
   “The Plates of Scouring—once they held vast domains, but they’ve little of their former glory left. Their so-called chieftess, Onget Netyells, is holed up in a towering fortress she calls Brightplums.”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “And this Onget has your—that is, our—artifacts, and you want me to get them back?”
   “No, no, no. You’d never make it into Brightplums—not alive anyway. I have a simpler task in mind for you. It happened that a number of these stolen artifacts were lost, in a great battle at a place called ‘Scarredpaddles.’
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “As far as I know they’re still there, untouched after three hundred years. No one lives at Scarredpaddles anymore, so I imagine they aren’t guarded: you just need to get there, find them, and come back, safe and more-or-less sound.”
   “Doesn’t sound too bad,” said Thob. “How far away’s this Scarypads?”
   “Some days journey to the southeast. But you may need to go around the mountains—I don’t know if the tunnels go all the way through.”
   “And you’ll get the booze when I come back?”
   “If you have the artifacts—yes.”
   Several days of travel, over the surface, to this place and back. It sounded like an ordeal, but if it got Thob his drink it would probably be worth it. And why would King Urvad lie to him?
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “Right then,” said Thob, “you’ve found your dwarf.”
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Thob Goes to the Surface (Adventure Mode story, in progress)

Superdorf

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #20 on: May 19, 2020, 11:19:11 am »

king
creepy king
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DrCyano

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #21 on: May 20, 2020, 03:18:16 pm »

Love the story! Keep it up!
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A mad scientist necromancer, a peasant with a dream, a secret message inscribed on a gem, a giant bridge.
Come witness the Saga of the Puzzling Sea!
A documented Dwarf Fortress v0.47.xx game combining Fort Mode and Adventure Mode.

Tournesol

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #22 on: May 22, 2020, 05:05:34 pm »

Good tale-telling, a delightful read. I must try adventure mode some day, though the ASCII would kill me.

Poor Thob, going for so long wiithout a drink.
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King Zultan

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #23 on: May 23, 2020, 05:27:15 am »

Maybe one day he'll get his alcohol.
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Make sure not to step on any errant blood stains before we find our LIFE EXTINGUSHER.
but anyway, if you'll excuse me, I need to commit sebbaku.
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Loam

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #24 on: May 23, 2020, 02:04:31 pm »

I must try adventure mode some day, though the ASCII would kill me.
You have to make your own stories with it, although that goes for all of DF. But if you've got a decent imagination (and a high tolerance for buggy behavior) you can have some really memorable adventures.



On the Road Again

The next morning Thob set out on his journey. To get around the mountains he would first have to return to Scarredpaddles, across the desert. It was a trek, but a familiar one; and when night began to fall he was safely at the old fortress. He took another look around the place, to see if he could turn up anything else—last time he had only been looking for booze, and stumbled upon the swords. Sure enough, searching the main hall he found a magnificent mug, clearly an artifact of value:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

In the morning Thob crossed over the mountains to the east, and after several hours found himself facing another desert. The rough dirt track that led through the peaks ended at another dwarven fortress, while in the distance he could see another strange tower.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
The fortress, as the ancient roadsigns told him, was called Postrelieved, and it was laid out much like Dawngloves or Stoneclasped. There was a small chapel in the upper cavern, dedicated to a certain “Sizet the Sugary Dessert”—not a deity Thob was familiar with, but he sounded enticing nonetheless.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
There was, unfortunately, no sweet cinnamon in the church, but there were some books. Thob picked up a bit of mathematics before moving on.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
The lower floors of the fortress were in serious disrepair: stairs that led nowhere, piles of junk left in the hallways and (somehow) stuck into the walls… but among the rubble Thob found a shiny pair of steel boots to replace his iron ones.

He considered where to go next:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Brightplums was only a short ways to the east: although the king had warned him about the place, his curiosity was piqued, and anyways this “Chieftess Onget” was supposed to have many treasures in her keep. Scarredpaddles was much further to the south. Still, Thob thought it prudent to go after the relics there, then perhaps pass by Brightplums on his way back, just to scope it out.
He decided to head south overland to a nearby fortress; then by tunnels to another on the other side of the mountains, and from there make his way south to Scarredpaddles. He wanted to go from fortress to fortress to check on their beer supplies—if they had any. There was none in Postrelieved.

It took him longer to reach the first fort, called Basementfree, than he had thought. The country was divided into little valleys with impassable mountain walls between them, which he had to go around—journeys sometimes of several miles. Basementfree was at the end of one such valley, situated in a desert of black sand.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
There was another chapel here: the “Chapel of Radiance,” built by the Light Sect, as he read on the signs. Engravings on the walls depicted ancient dwarves fighting many battles. Losing many battles, actually:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Thob noted grimly that most of these conquests were the work of the Plates of Scouring—the old enemy of the Sandaled Key, as King Urvad claimed, of which Onget of Brightplums was chieftess. But these battles took place six or seven centuries ago! Had they really been fighting the Plates for so long? And if the Plates had been so unstoppable then, how had they been finally driven back, as they evidently had?

Thob slept at the fortress; when day came he descended the long spiral stair to the caverns, and set off through the tunnels beneath the mountains. It was refreshing to be back in the close, damp, faintly rot-scented air of the caverns, in the darkness under a roof of good, solid stone. The fungi and great mushroom trees, variously colored, seemed to greet him like old friends.
He traveled south through the mazy tunnels for many hours, until he stumbled at last upon the most homely of sights: a field of stubby plump helmets stretching before him and vanishing into the gloom.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Nearby was the entrance to a deep hall, a place just liked Lawmined. It made Thob feel positively nostalgic.
That is, until he took a closer look around.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Hovering in the air over the road was one of those eyeless creatures, like he had seen on the surface. This one, however, wore clothes of dwarven fashion. Was it civilized, then? He knew the things could talk: warily, Thob hailed the creature.
   “Hello, there. My name’s Thob.”
   “Greetings,” replied the thing civilly. “I’m Zaneg the glassmaker.”
   There was a pause. “I’m a dwarf,” ventured Thob.
   “Yes, I know,” said Zaneg slowly, as though Thob had said something obvious.
   Another pause. “Ah,” said Thob, “could I ask, maybe… what are you?”
   “The dwarves call us ‘Èzum’s Eyes’,” it said. It chuckled. “I guess Èzum had a sense of humor.”
   “Dwarves? There are dwarves around here?”
   “Used to be. Mistress Vabôk and some others went off to Mythtin a few weeks ago—an old fort east of here they wanted to rebuild. Personally it’s not a journey I’d want to make. There’s talk of dangerous folk about, brigands and the like.”
   “Brigands? In the caverns?”
   “Yes,” said Zaneg. “Hiding out in some mountain hall up north—”
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “—by the way,” it asked, “where did you come from?”
   “I, uh, should be going,” said Thob hastily.
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Thob Goes to the Surface (Adventure Mode story, in progress)

Tournesol

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #25 on: May 23, 2020, 02:38:29 pm »

Hilarious twist at the ending! "Are we the baddies?"
You have to make your own stories with it, although that goes for all of DF.
Yeah, I know. Am about to publish a chronicle of my current fortress, just need to get the imagery ready. Will be tomorrow at the latest.
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Loam

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #26 on: May 27, 2020, 06:06:08 pm »

There were several other Èzum’s Eyes in the mountain hall, all willing to chat with Thob (and he with them, although their eyeless stares were unsettling). They didn’t talk about much except the dangerous beasts that lived nearby.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Thob figured they must be exaggerating. A thing shaped like a dwarf, but a hundred times the size—living in a dwarven fortress? How did it fit through the doors? Likewise their tales about walking nightmares and shadowy demons:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
If these were true, the place would be covered up in these monstrosities! And the descriptions of these creatures were vague, characteristic of tall tales. Take, for instance, the so-called “hyena”:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   “What’s a hyena?” asked Thob.
   “Well,” said the Eye, “it’s sort of like a large dog.”
   “What’s a dog?”
   The Eye looked at him sideways (or would have looked if it had eyes). “A dog? It’s… um, it’s like a small wolf.”
   “A wolf?”
   The Eye furrowed its brow and thought for a moment. “Okay, imagine a naked mole dog, but hairy, and with fangs instead of big incisors. Oh, and it laughs.”
   Probably it was a naked mole dog, but the Eyes, being surface creatures originally, didn’t know what it was and made up all sorts of scary stories about it. He wondered what they’d make of a blind cave bear!

Zaneg the glassmaker had said some of their people went off to resettle the fortress of Mythtin. That would probably be a good place to return to the surface—and maybe to get some booze.
   The trip was short and uneventful, barring one odd occurrence. Crossing a bridge over a cavern pool, Thob was struck with a sense of growing uneasiness:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
He couldn’t tell immediately what caused the feeling, but when he had crossed he noticed, some distance away, a troll—unaware of him, fortunately. He guessed his dwarf-sense had reacted to a troll near a bridge, after his last encounter with such a combination. But he passed by without incident.

Mythtin was another dwarven mansion, carved from the brown schist of the mountains. As Thob descended the central stair, who should he meet first but a fellow dwarf!
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
She looked a lot like King Urvad, both in physical features and in the anxious, suspicious sort of look she cast on everything around her. More strangely, she clutched close to herself a child’s toy hammer and a wooden bracelet. They were magnificently crafted, but still rather odd things for an adult dwarf to carry around.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
   Thob greeted her: she jumped a little, turned, and fixed a spooky eye on him. “Ah… hello,” she said, “I’m Vabôk Ramparttunnels.” Then she closed her eyes and stood up very straight and turned her face toward the ceiling, and intoned, “The True Honor of Palisades will reward Knitimage.”
   What knit image, thought Thob, and who’s this True Honor? But he didn’t want to offend her, so he nodded warily and said “Uh-huh” as if he understood. “So,” he said, “what do you do around here?”
   At once Vabôk snapped her head back down and glared at him. “I’d rather not say,” she said, and walked off.
   Thob guessed it’d be pointless to follow her. Naturally, the first dwarf he’d met since leaving Dawngloves turned out to be a crazy and paranoid. Even if she knew where some booze was, she probably wouldn’t tell him. He looked around on his own.
   Mythtin was, to his surprise, abuzz with activity—but not dwarven activity. The whole fort was full of the strange Èzum’s Eyes:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
They were polite enough, but it made Thob yearn for the company of dwarves all the more. The grand but decaying architecture of the forts he had seen suggested the onetime glory of the dwarven era, now all in ruin or resettled by alien beings. Was there anywhere left, he wondered, where the old grandeur still lived on?

Predictably, there was no alcohol in Mythtin. The tavern was dry, although not empty: several Eyes hovered around, talking and joking. And by “hovering,” Thob meant actually hovering:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
He wondered if it might be nice to have wings—it’d simplify his travels greatly if he could just fly over the mountains—but he thought better of it. Being on the surface was bad enough; flying around over it, up in that awful empty “sky,” must be positively terrifying.
   He saw by the outside light that it was getting late, and he was tired. The tavern may have run out of beer long ago, but it still had beds—well, the remains of fungiwood cots, but it was better than cave floor. The room was snug and small, and he was soon asleep.
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Thob Goes to the Surface (Adventure Mode story, in progress)

King Zultan

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #27 on: May 28, 2020, 02:53:33 am »

What a world to live in, not a drop of alcohol left anywhere and no one to make more.
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The Lawyer opens a briefcase. It's full of lemons, the justice fruit only lawyers may touch.
Make sure not to step on any errant blood stains before we find our LIFE EXTINGUSHER.
but anyway, if you'll excuse me, I need to commit sebbaku.
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Can I have the sword when you’re done?

Spriggans

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #28 on: May 28, 2020, 04:28:06 am »

"This storyteller is very good !"

Thob sounds so naïve and cooperative. I wonder how he will be when if he ever gets drunk.
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[ETHIC:MURDERING_DWARVES:UNTHINKABLE]
[ETHIC:CUTTING_TREES:REQUIRED]
[ETHIC:USING_EXPLOITS:JUSTIFIED_IF_GOOD_REASON]

Tournesol

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Re: Thob Goes to the Surface
« Reply #29 on: May 28, 2020, 07:03:17 am »

Taking such an interest in the characters (especially Thob) is what makes this chronicle stand out. Keep going.
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