Alright here's a step by step:
open a cmd prompt and navigate to where you installed/extracted the wtf tools. (In my case: p:\games\wtftools)
wtf2txt.exe "<directory info>\fortressintro" (in my case specifically: wtf2txt.exe "p:\games\Dwarf Fortress 31.25\data\announcement\fortressintro")
-This allows you to look at the file first (and make sure you can correct anything missing in the next step)
wtf2txt.exe "<directory info>\fortressintro" <outputfilename> (in my case specifically: wtf2txt.exe "p:\games\Dwarf Fortress 31.25\data\announcement\fortressintro" fortressintro.dwarfless.txt)
-This decrypts and outputs the file you want to change into a file in the wtftools directory.
At this point notepad should be fine (or whatever you have txt files associated with)... fast way to it: start <outputfilename> (in my case specifically: start "fortressintro.dwarfless.txt")
Change:
After a journey from the Mountainhomes into the
forbidding wilderness beyond, your harsh trek has finally
Into (for example):
After a journey from your homelands into the
forbidding wilderness beyond, your harsh trek has finally
Note anything missing (I seem to recall the "earth!" bit missing on the end of my file)Save the file, and close notepad (or whatever you have txt files associated with).
back in the cmd window:
txt2wtf.exe <outputfilename> "<directory info>\fortressintro" (in my case specifically: txt2wtf.exe fortressintro.dwarfless.txt "p:\games\Dwarf Fortress 31.25\data\announcement\fortressintro")
And viola the file has been adjusted. Note however that there are NOT a whole lot of things you can mod in. Mostly standard text. The variables are a crushingly small set. So while you could have you civilization spammed everywhere in it... you couldn't have it say dwarves/magmadrakes/mangamen because there's not a variable (Basing off of "Local_large_creature" being specific to the section that seems to cover the intro in the String Dump).
Anyone wanna chime in and correct me if I'm wrong? I'd really love to mention species, and not just the Parent Civilization...