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Yes

4 (14.3%)

No

1 (3.6%)

It was fun for a long time but towards the end it just started to drag

6 (21.4%)

I wish I could have joined in.

17 (60.7%)

Total Members Voted: 28

[WillowLuman]

[Oh, that's right, he'll be waking up any day now. And there might be some assistants for him on that boat, too. We'll see.]

They all knew they had to see this. It simply could not be missed. At Mita's call, all the forumites (and non-busy dwarves) issued out of the dining hall where they'd been idling, and followed him outside. Sure enough, there was clearly a ship stranded down on the shore.

As they reached the ship, a pair of rutherers and a dozen dwarves were disembarking. One of them, a heavyset dwarf man wearing a very official looking robe and hood approached, a leather envelope in his hand. "I am your liason from the Mountainhome. Which of you is in charge here?"

Showing no reaction to the condescension in the liason's tone, Eric Blank said "That would be me," and took the envelope.

To the Twelfth Bay,

The reign of King Dakost Castlewaters has ended, and the reign of King Bomrek of Stonebinds, formerly Duke, has begun. Though King Dakost had a particular fixation with your settlement, with the new regime comes a realignment of the goals of the realm. The King feels it best to invest the efforts of the realm into other colonies, and so must regrettably divert resources away from forts which have not returned the investment and probably do not exist. As such, all support from the capital is henceforth terminated. The King wishes that you enjoy your independence, and is almost entirely certain that you are not and never have been a blight upon dwarfkind.

[Zanzetkuken The Great]

To the Twelfth Bay,

The reign of King Dakost Castlewaters has ended, and the reign of King Bomrek of Stonebinds, formerly Duke, has begun. Though King Dakost had a particular fixation with your settlement, with the new regime comes a realignment of the goals of the realm. The King feels it best to invest the efforts of the realm into other colonies, and so must regrettably divert resources away from forts which have not returned the investment and probably do not exist. As such, all support from the capital is henceforth terminated. The King wishes that you enjoy your independence, and is almost entirely certain that you are not and never have been a blight upon dwarfkind.

(Should we consider this message to have been summarized aloud, or should we wait for Eric to do that?)

[WillowLuman]

[As sad as it makes me to say it, I feel that people have gone their seperate ways and moved on to other things, and the thread just doesn't have the inertia it once did. People undoubtedly now find it too hard to take time out of their other things to return. Which is too bad, as it was the interaction of the Characters, of us, the people of Bay12, that made it so special.

We wrote ourselves into a corner of boringness, and couldn't get out due to trying to preserve pacing. Well, no more.

SO HERE IS WHAT I AM GOING TO DO: I'm going to do one last timeskip, and then just keep writing. I will try to maintain the spirit of the essential personas as best I can, and if anyone still feels like writing for themselves, they are welcome to do so. But I must move this. At nearly 3 years, I need some closure.]

[WillowLuman]

[Let me know if anyone seems out of character]

Eric Blank closed the letter. "You all realize," he said, "that this changes nothing."

Everyone around the table simply returned his stare. Sighing, he pulled out the other piece of paper before him. "So, Wierd, this response might be a bit unnecessary."

Joykill took the paper. The blueprints for the scepter certainly were not subtle in their connotations. "All I have to say is good riddance. It's a moot point anyway, since Gizogin put a hole in that boat. 'His Highness' would never receive my little joke."

"Yes... which brings up the whole slew of problems that he's just dropped on me. Forty dwarves! At least!"

HugoLuman made a sound analogous to clearing his throat. "Well, as much as I don't like the idea of holding people against their will, the hard fact is we need more bodies."

"More WILLING bodies!" Eric put his face in his hands. "Look. We've got a boatload of people, all of whom, except for a handful that were just along for the ride, want nothing more than to sail on back home. How do you think they'll react when they find out we intentionally stranded them here with us? Hugo, you're the one always wondering about "our Enemy." Don't you think this is exactly the kind of thing that could kick off a loyalty cascade?"

"I know, I know, but what else are we going to do? Clearly our enemy doesn't want us getting any more migrants in the first place."

Sighing again, Eric sat up. "Oh, and it gets worse. I talked to most of them. Do you know what kind of jobs they have? They're sailors! Professional sailors. As in, it's the majority of what they do. I didn't even know Dwarves could have that job. Oh, most of them can fight, and a few of them can fish, but what good is that? What possible use could they be to us?"

[Eric Blank]

"Well, I guess they'd have some experience as carpenters, repairs and all that. Hugo, maybe you could bribe them into staying? Or at least convince them to put in a good word for us, perhaps transport willing migrants or defectors, or trade goods with us. Any ideas what we could export besides coffins?" Eric let out a weak chuckle, but stopped when he noticed everyone glaring angrily at him.

[WillowLuman]

HugoLuman stood up. "Tell you what. I'll go talk to these passengers you mentioned. I'm willing to bet at least some of them know an imminently useful trade."

As HugoLuman left the room, Gizogin spoke up. "I wouldn't worry too about the crew getting angry. In all likelihood they'll believe the hole was made when they ran aground. X is rather smart."

"Which reminds me. He's been seeming very... odd lately. Cagey. Have you been working on his brain or something?"


As he neared the ship, HugoLuman began to rethink this idea. People skills were one thing, but maybe not enough, now that he saw the way they stared at him. Maybe he should have found one of the Brewer sisters instead...

The liason veered over the railing. "Hey! Shoo! Go away!"

"I can speak, you know"

The liason recoiled, but didn't break his composure, merely deepening his frown. "If the wizards want something, go tell them to come down here themselves. Don't send their minions. Now go."

Damn. This kind of liason. "You know, for a diplomat you're not very polite."

[WillowLuman]

'The liason merely continued frowning at him, so HugoLuman just climbed onto the deck. "I just want to speak with some of the crew," he said. "I won't be too long." The diplomat still made no response.

The sailors mostly either ignored him or stared uneasily at him, but after a few minutes he located the Captain. "So, I take it yer've come ter talk. Well, out with it. I suppose there'll be plenty of talk, as we have ter stay here so long."

"Yeah... I noticed you were trying to shove off earlier with those Rutherers. What made you change your minds?"

The Captain stood awkwardly silent for a few moments, evidently having trouble getting his words in order. "Aye... erm... that were the Outpost Liason's instructions, actually. Truth be told, the voyage took much longer than we'd hoped. The old King seemed to know exactly where this place was, judging on how specific he was when he sent off that one big group... though, erm, we did'nae know if they were going somewhere that actually... existed, ye ken. Anyways the old King seemed to know quite clearly, but since he... well, anyways, we were a wee bit lost.

"Point is, we haven't got the provisions to make a return voyage, and with this freakish storm that's just let up, we've got some repairs to make. Aye, ye'll notice we've crashed into the beach. So, we've got to fix the ship, and..." he paused for a moment. "...well, no offense, but we've heard yer lot were a wee bit odd, and... ahem, but seeing how ye exist afterall, and yer all... well most of ye are dwarves, right? So maybe ye might have some supplies to lend..."

Oh dear, thought HugoLuman. Perhaps he really shouldn't have been the one to greet them, as clearly uncomfortable and superstitious as they were with this. "Well," he answered, "I'm not exactly the one to ask, but I'm all for helping those in need." Perhaps, though, (he hoped) his inoffensive demeanor was working. "As far as I'm concerned, our fort is your fort. We'd be happy to host you for dinner."

This pleasantry was, though, too strange for the Captain to accept. "Erm... no... that is, well, I think it be best if I stay with me crew. Nothing personal, ye ken."

"Very well. But say, I heard you had some passengers that wanted to stay with us. Any chance I might see them?"

"Aye... well... I suppose that were mentioned to yer mayor. Erm, they're down below..."

[WillowLuman]

After seeing the passengers, HugoLuman had to wonder if they weren't being deported. Or banished. There were a few that seemed a bit odd, and a few that seemed downright suspect. There also seemed to be some honestly competent workers, here in desperation for jobs, but in that case even they must have been unwanted by the mountainhome.

One such dwarf was pushing what looked like a big cabinet on a gurney. "It's me invention!" he said, opening it to reveal a set of pipes and, unmistakably, a small bone keyboard. "Ya just get som'n ta work the bellows 'round back, press these wee levers, and it plays music!"

Another had his head wrapped in a thick, gray scarf, showing only his eyes. He sidled away when HugoLuman approached. "We picked 'im up on the way. Can't remember where, but it was a while ago. Think he's a cobbler or something."

There were others, of course, but he didn't have time to talk to them. They all seemed to have gathered their stuff when the ship landed, and after he explained the situation, they all started filing out the hatch. Well, at least someone seemed happy to be here.


Roead stretched in the late winter sun. He'd tried to nap during the blizzard, but there had been some kind of belligerent rats holing up in his tomb, so he hid in a big clay pot. Now it was time to see if he'd missed anything interesting.

He squinted. Or did the equivalent for a dessicated corpse. A line of Dwarves was making for the entrance, each carrying something large. He lifted his hand to shield the sun. Yes, it looked like... luggage?

"Bugger. Just when it was getting quiet around here."

[WillowLuman]

[Yeah... I don't think this is ever going to pick up again. Anyone want spoilers now?]

[Zanzetkuken The Great]

[Yeah... I don't think this is ever going to pick up again. Anyone want spoilers now?]

As long as they are in a <spoiler> so that those who don't want to know don't have to see it..

[Eric Blank]

[Well this took about twenty straight minutes of staring at to remember where I'd seen the thread title before. And I suppose I must concede that this honestly isn't very interesting to me anymore, either.

However, I did have a brief think about the original thread recently. I concluded that if the members of the bay12 forum mysteriously awoke in the wilderness in a strange land, none of us would survive very long. We'd argue each other to death. I also wonder how long it would take before anybody figures out what we all have in common.

Also, I still think using giant ostrich eggs full of gunpowder as catapult ammunition sounds like an awesome idea.]

[Talvieno]

I also wonder how long it would take before anybody figures out what we all have in common.

[Wouldn't take long. People talk about things they're interested in. This would come up quickly... once we got over shock at our situation.]
[Also, hello again. ]

[WillowLuman]

[Well, I suppose I'll lay out the Grand Scheme of Things for full closure, so people may know how this could have ended. We were pretty close to an end.]

[WillowLuman]

Right then. Here's most of the plot that hadn't been discovered yet. I already spoiled some of it to certain people long ago because of things. I left holes for other writers, but since they long ago lost interest, it doesn't really matter now.

Spoiler: The Big Bad (click to show/hide)

The ultimate enemy, (though it was probably somewhat obvious) was Armok himself, being one and the same as the RNG. Ever since Nist Akath he was angry at players having claimed to have "won" the game, subverting the natural order in his view. He hatched a plan of revenge against Bay12, testing it on the Boatmurdered people first.

There was going to be something about infinitely powerful beings being constrained by an infinite number of infinitely powerful beings with infinitely contrasting goals, thus the need for them to operate through rules and agents. These abductions were in violation of something but the results played out in Armok's domain, safe from any outside intervention, save one early on which was dealt with.

Spoiler: The Future (click to show/hide)

The only logical way to actually fight Armok/RNG I could think of was bizarre. Staying in this world wouldn't work, as sooner or later he'd win; the best we could have done that way was to live to ripe old ages and die peacefully, which wouldn't be feasible for some.

Eventually we'd have done some serious science to gauge some of the properties of this universe in relation to our old one. After noticing certain anomalies, we may have figured out that one of his weaknesses is time travel, since in DF it is impossible to see the future. Eventually he'd feel we were getting too close to an answer and trigger a final solution; all the problems that people had been building up to emerging at once. The Apprentice's army, Gizogin's sister's father, the corruption of the local land, all of it.

Out of desperation we may have released Clockwork Hugo, hoping to gain his knowledge on the enemy and his help.

The only way to beat the dimension lock would be to go through other dimensions of DF, rather than other continuities. The only hope of reaching Armok would have been to go through the Object Testing Arena, which naturally would be full of constantly spawning hordes.

Spoiler: The End (click to show/hide)

We may either have won or lost that battle, which may have dragged out into an all-out war. The scale of the areana was probably going to be .5m per tile.

If we lost, Armok would be free to begin the cycle again with another batch of forumites. If we won, Wierd may have been able to kill or defeat Armok somehow. Anything after victory is uncertain.

For those who still care, if I missed something you want explained, let me know.