We are The Strategy of Baiting, and we have come here to die.
Now, that's certainly a dramatic way to put it, but I'm afraid it describes the reality of our situation all too well. As soon as the first outposts fell to the newly empowered goblin menace, the Queen knew that something had to be done. From the reports of the scarce survivors that made it back to the mountainhome, it was clear that we could no longer rely on the simple
existence of our walls to protect our deep vaults from them. Something more had to be done. But what? Nobody had ever faced a threat like this before. New strategies will have to be developed, and quickly. But what shape they would take is a mystery at this point. It will have to be discovered in practice, through, well, the
strategy of baiting (hence the name of our group - I take credit for that, although the strategy itself was very much the Queen's idea). Presenting the goblins with a juicy morsel and hoping that we can learn something from the way their jaws snap shut around it, then preserving as much of that newly gleaned information as we can, and if possible, bring it back home. In addition, to maximize the learning, the overseer of the fortress is ordered to relinquish their post every year, to be replaced by another.
We will start a new outpost somewhat separated from the others, make ourselves as alluring of a target as we can, hope the goblins take the bait, and try to survive. I was left the freedom to choose the exact spot, and I picked a place at the confluence of two rivers, where they cut through a nice little hill that will hopefully serve as a natural defense in itself. The reports from previous prospecting expeditions indicate that the soil and rock underneath this area should hold everything we will eventually need for a proper dwarven fortress, if we make it that far. It is reputed to have rather savage wildlife, but in comparison to the goblins, that is not much of a concern for me.
The group is not exactly elite, but we have been assigned an experienced soldier - Obok - to get us started on building a serviceable military, alongside the usual selection of professions needed to establish a new fort.
As soon as we arrived and started unloading the supplies, I had a walk around the cliff edge near the river to take a look at the local wildlife. It seems that the river is home to two kinds of alligators: the mundane sort (which are scary enough already) as well as their gigantic cousins.
I have taken the executive decision to forbid anyone from fishing in the river, for reasons that are hopefully obvious.
Obok has immediately taken to training outside the temporary fortress entrance, hoping to refresh his skills.
Meanwhile, horrifying noises come from the river canyon below. For a moment, I thought some new monster had arrived, but when I ran over to the cliff to look down, all I could see was water being churned, with worrying amounts of red in it, and the occasional flash of crocodilian flesh. It seems that the two different magnitudes of alligator are having a bit of a spat.
Suddenly, one of the shapes in the water below broke away from the scrum. To my surprise, it was one of the
larger shapes, and once the water calmed down a bit, it became obvious that somehow, the smaller kind of alligator had prevailed over the giant one.
"How strange," I thought, and ordered the piercing of the aquifer layer to take top priority. From what I've seen of these animals, they don't seem to like taking long trips overland, or even leaving their watery holes at all, but best not take any chances.
Fortunately, not too long after, we have hit solid, dry rock. The real work can begin now!
We kept digging down, and to my surprise, after only a few days the miners came back to report that they had discovered an expansive cavern only a few standard zee-levels below ground. This puts a damper on some of my plans, but it has a very important silver lining to it: along with the usual mossy overtones, the miners reported the unmistakable sulfurous smell of magma emanating from the cavern entrance, meaning that a magma pool must be nearby. This will help us establish metalsmithing facilities with much more ease and speed than it would take if we had to find our way all the way down to the magma sea, or - Armok forbid - have to process and utilize coal for smelting.
Some migrants have arrived, and not a moment too soon. We could use the extra hands. Grab something and help out, newcomers!
I took a peek into the caverns to see how dangerous they might be and saw slimy, tentacled shapes in the darkness of one of the underground lakes. Pond grabbers, just what we need. Vicious little beasts, best stay clear of them.
Since we don't have many entire rock layers to ourselves above the caverns, I have ordered the bedrooms to be dug out around the contours of some of the higher cavern levels. Perhaps later we can install some windows into the bedrooms so we can admire the dark beauty of the rocky crevices below.
Work has also begun on the excavation of the future forge area.
I may have been a bit too impatient to get us underground after arriving. Reviewing the layout of our entrance right now reveals numerous possible entry points for goblin siegers, now that they can punch through simple walls. This will have to be remediated in the future, along with moving the rest of the temporary stockpiles
properly underground.
Among all this work, time has been passing quickly. It seems like we only just arrived, but the fact that the autumn harvest has come in clearly shows otherwise.
And with the autumn harvest, the first caravan from the mountainhome has arrived.
It appears as if their only purpose here is to check on us. They have brought us barely anything of use. The rock crafts that we quickly scrounged together, and that I was afraid wouldn't be enough to buy what we need from the caravan, ended up being more than sufficient to purchase the
one barrel of booze the caravan brought over. We traded for it anyway, with the hopes that next year's caravan might be more bountiful.
Some monster hunters have also arrived, eager to explore the depths on our behalf. Who am I to say no to free scouting? Go ahead, explore to your heart's content.
Libash, one of the new arrivals (whom I also appointed to be the fortress' bookkeeper), screamed out in inspiration this morning. She ran off to claim a workshop, grabbed a boulder, and in what felt like no time at all, carved it into a truly exquisite crown. What a display of craftsdwarfship! Even if the materials are plain, the artifact is undeniably beautiful.
The forge area is fully excavated now and we have begun filling the magma chamber below.
And with the magma chamber filled, we've got plenty of space for many forges and smelters. Armok willing, this place will one day become the beating heart of a strong fortress.
Perhaps it was the fresh impression of the forge area, newly dug, radiating with magmatic heat and ready for construction, that filled me with the confidence needed to send Obok on a one-dwarf raid against one of our nearby goblin neighbors. It seems that although early reports indicated hostility, we are not currently strictly speaking
at war with these goblins. As much as I would love to keep it that way for a while, we are here on a mission, and that mission is meant to be dangerous. He returned with some assorted spoils, but claimed to have made it back undetected, so I suspect this will not provoke the goblins into seeking us out quite yet. Perhaps for the best.
Winter is upon us, not that that means much in this hot and humid climate.
Screams come from the caverns below. It seems that one of the monster hunters has finally met his match. The guttural roars mixing with the screams point to a cave crocodile being the culprit.
The hunter injured the crocodile, but it killed him before he could finish it off. I have sent Obok to put the beast out of its misery, and thanks to his armor (mere bronze, but more than enough for this task), he fared much better than the monster hunter.
Disaster strikes! I absent-mindedly ordered the dumping of some extra boulders from the forge area into the magma. In my past assignments, I had always been very careful to never approach too close to an open hole with magma immediately below, but in the rush, I forgot just how dangerous exposed magma can be. I couldn't make much sense of the survivors' panicked babbling, but it seems that magma had splashed out of the hole and set something (or more likely, someone) on fire, which immediately proceeded to fill the chamber with smoke, so nobody could see what was going on. In the chaos, Libash the bookkeper (and newly minted legendary stonecarver) and a child had fallen into the magma pits below. We'll have to be more careful in the future.
As my tenure nears its end, I am forced to deal with another annoyance, this one decidedly less lethal, if not less chaotic. A swarm of naked mole dogs had come skittering in from the caverns and right into the meeting hall. The dogs took care of some of them, creating a disgusting bloody mess in the hall.
The rest spread across the fortress and I had to send Obok to chase them down, which he did with some grumbling.
Finally, just before my appointed time to turn over the operations of the fortress to the next overseer, I attempted to slightly rectify the sorry state of the entrance with some reinforced walls. I hope I have set the fortress up for success, even if only in the narrowly defined sacrificial sense envisioned by our Queen when she sent us out here.
Well, I overshot my own time limit by a factor of two. Yay me. There are some ghosts (from the magma accident) that I didn't have time to put to rest (I haven't found corpses, so slabs will have to be engraved). The fortress is currently very insecure both above and below, but it wouldn't take much building to wall us in safely again. Note the cavern entrance is just fully open right now.
The save is
here.
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Topic: [UPDATE] Vaultsmash the Victim of Sieges: A Siege Update Succession Fort (Read 1216 times)