I haven't been playing for very long, but I really enjoy this game. I wanted to share an incredibly fun fortress with you all.
I have a tendency to regenerate a new world each time I start a new fort when I lose interest in one or it becomes so slow on my machine I can't bear it. I think if I could somehow turn off pets I'd be okay because migrants always bring them and refuse to let me send them to the butcher. Anyhow, I figured I'd make one world and keep at that one to build up some history while exploring in Adventure Mode. I generated a large map set to end when 50% of the megabeasts died, but checking at year 2. This hopefully will mean I'll run into them more often. Plus, I hated that all my worlds started in the year 200.
In the spring of '42 a group of seven dwarves set out with the idea of creating the trading center for the eight great dwarven houses. They stopped their wagon at the mouth of a troll cave. They were never heard from again.
In the spring of '43 a group of seven dwarves set out with the idea of creating the trading center for the eight great dwarven houses.
The embark map looked like this:
? ^ ^ ^ ^ ?=OtherFeature
~ ~ ~ ~ O ~=Underground River
# # # # ^ #=Chasm
^ ^ " " " O=Bottomless Pit
^ " " " "
^ Mountain - Dolomite/Gabbro/Diorite - Wilderness
" Temperate Shrubland - Clay Loam/Dolomite/Gabbro/Diorite - Calm
Although there is no magma (which I haven't yet played around with yet anyway) it looked like there were going to be a lot of nice surprises. Not to mention that there was a nice mix of sedimentary and igneous extrusive layers. So in addition to lots of flux there should be a wide variety of ore. I don't know what these other features are. I've seen some spoiler warnings in the Wiki so I'm guessing it's a pretty big surprise. Don't ruin it for me, I'll find out soon enough. The chasm is visible on embark, the river and pit are not. The shrubland has a staggering amount of trees and I already begin scheming how to enclose them all in a massive wall.
Tradesnarls: Strike the Earth!
Year 43 of the Age of Legends in Elathu Ewe
Headmaster Urust Ushul's Journal
Expedition Notes for The Banner of Trading
Headmaster Urust Ushul
Blademaster Nish Sashasoddom
Shieldmaster Cog Loratir
Woodmaster Tulon Tashemlikot
Hidemaster Zasit Ibrukiteb
Bonemaster Sodel Aknunnil
Stonemaster Edzul Rirathel
Spring '43
It immediately becomes apparent that this place is inhospitable. We halted our wagon at the edge of a huge crevasse. It almost splits the land given to us by our master, Minkot Tongsfish -- praised be -- in two. Going around it will be troublesome, but on the other side trees and a few ponds can be seen. We will need the wood to fuel the forges once the tower caps we brought run out.
The skies are filled with giant birds that look like fearsome swallows. At night when the swallows sleep the giant bats come out to prey! Even more numerous are the half human half swallow creatures that seem to plague the land. I have called them swallowmen. They disturb me greatly. The ground is littered with ratmen and gremlins skitter in and out of the shadows. Priority was to get underground quickly and worry about traversing the ravine later. We have dug a mine shaft and built a tower with the waste stone so the crossbows can keep the flying nasties at bay while we move supplies underground and finish digging out a livable area.
Summer '43
Excavation has taken more time than I expected. Then again, none of us are miners by trade. We have gotten all supplies below and organized and sealed off the mine shaft. We should be considerably more productive without two guards on duty all the time to watch the skies. We have built a drawbridge across the chasm to allow entrance into the fort.
I ate a fine turtle recently.
Fall '43
Our caravan showed up as expected, although it didn't do us much good. Curse it! They brought one measly barrel of wine and a few peices of meat. No rum! It boggles the mind that they thought elaborately ornamented plate mail would be something this new expedition might be able to afford. At least I was able to meet with the liason and put in a request for more useful and cost-effective supplies. What we have will have to last us the next year.
I have instructed my Blademaster, Shieldmaster and Hidemaster to use up our remaining supply of hides and metal. We are going to need it to clear out the previous residents of this area.
Winter '43
This has been a trying season.
I am not sure what lies the caravan mercahnts spread about our wealth and fortune but we have had none. Nonetheless, you could just feel the chill of winter in the air when a group of migrants showed up unexpectedly. The fools. Rather than taking the safe route through the calm woodlands they were travelling off the roads through the mountains. They were immediately beset upon by a group of ratmen. One of the migrants was crippled and fell behind. Despite the fact that his brave donkey, enraged at the wounds caused to his master, tried to defend him, the two were quickly cut down. At least he didn't have any family to miss him. I ordered the Woodmaster, Stonemaster and Bonemaster to arms to rescue what migrants they could. The attack had scattered them and they were running in different directions, none of which was towards the fort. One of the peasants, unaware of the dangers of this land, escaped the clutches of the ratmen by hiding at the bottom of the chasm.
Eventually we were able to clear out the many ratmen lurking in the mountains. The swallowmen and other flying creatures prove too elusive and will have to be handled some other time. Once everyone was safely inside the fortress the remaining migrants were either conscripted into the military -- to relieve the more skilled founders -- or handed a pick and told to dig to earn their mushrooms. I ordered the Stonemaster to stop his strange task of making door after door to build two coffins for the fallen migrants. We left the donkey, brave as he might have been, to rot.
After checking my stockpile list it became apparent that we would not have the food stores to last until spring. The only viable soil is on the other end of the chasm, so I had the conscripts halt their drills and stand on the bridge as watch. This let the miners clear an area to make our entrance more defensable and to allow for crops. One of the miners, clearly not liking his new career, volunteered to be the planter. It's just as well, we didn't have much more clearing left to do.
I was approached by a marksdwarf, Reg. He explained that he was a Ranger and that he could teach his Trapper companion to hunt the groundhogs in the forest for meat and fur. I didn't like splitting up our defenses but considering how dire the food problem was looking I decided it was worth the risk. And the mountain goat biscuits and groundhog roast was sure tasty after eating dried turtle meat for almost a year. Unfortunately, the rest of the fort was busy with other tasks so the unpleasant job of butchering up their kills fell to me. And I started to get worried when they began bringing back much larger prey. Reg explained that most of the forest creatures must have moved further south for the winter. Since they were clearing out the giant swallows and bats, it seemed like an acceptable risk. It turns out it was not.
It was the 4th of Obsidian, a day I will remember well.
I had earlier in the week instructed the miner on how to effectively stripmine. Rather than digging from the top down, dig ramps up. It's always safer to dig up than down! This is what my father taught me, and what his father taught him before he was killed in a cave-in. Which was somewhat of a coincidence since my father was also killed in a cave-in. The miner seemed confused and terrified when I told him this but set to task anyway.
The first sign I knew something was wrong was that the ground shook and pebbles fell from the ceiling onto my ledger. This usually does not happen. Not even when Edzul drops a door on the ground. Then I heard shouting from outside. I couldn't make out what the yelling was about so I headed toward the drawbridge and was met with a cloud of dust. As I stepped through into the sunlight I could see Zasit and Sodel digging through the pile of rubble where the hill we were stripmining used to be. I stared for a moment before I noticed Tulon near me. He had brought his axe back to finish chopping a tree, but was frozen, just staring at the rubble. Without moving he explained to me what had happened.
The miner miscalculated the height of the hill and, thinking he had cleared enough of the top level dug out the foundation. The top of the hill fell and, since there were very little supports left, pancaked the whole hill. Underground, the farmer and the entire crop of plump helmets were crushed. The force of the collapse and the debris it scattered knocked not only the miner into the ravine, but the two soldiers standing guard on the bridge. Along with their weapons and armor.
The hunters didn't return from hunting the previous night. Considering their propensity to sleep on the ground, it wasn't exactly unusual. But it also meant we were unguarded. I explained to my Woodmaster that the axe he was holding was the only thing we had between us and the beasts. He turned a pale green. He still hadn't moved when I went back inside a few minutes later to speak to Edzul. He was caught up in his work on making yet another door and didn't realize what had happened. I told him to make four more coffins. He has been getting grumpy lately.
That night and the following night the hunters did not return. A search of the forest revealed nothing. Up in the mountains above the fortress we found most of the body of the trapper. The blood on the handle of his crossbow and lack of bolts seemed to indicate he was trying to kill a giant cave swallow by bashing it with a poorly crafted wooden crossbow. We never found the ranger, or his steel crossbow, bolts and armor. A broken steel bolt near the edge of the chasm leads me to believe he, too, has fallen in.
Ore and gemstones be damned, this chasm has already claimed five dwarves before the first year is out. I have named it Blundermaw. On the plus side, the food problem solved itself. There were once again only seven of us.
We gave the trapper's bloodsoaked leather armor -- minus the sleeves that was torn away -- and I had the hidemaster use our last peice of groundhog hide on making him a sturdy leather shield to protect himself with. Despite my repeated ordering him to stand guard on the bridge to watch for theives, he stays well inside the confines of the fort. He also takes a rather unusual amount of drink breaks, something I will bring up at his next performance review.
When I told my Stonemaster to stop making doors and make two more coffins he threw his chisel at me.
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Topic: Tradesnarls: Strike the Earth! (Read 812 times)