The Everseeing Dimensions (Dominated by the much-less impressivley named "Land of Cacti") is a world rich in three things: Minerals, Magma from its fifty volcanoes, and Megabeasts (so many that even at 1050 with the starting pop of beasts dead, the world is still in the Age of Myths because they bred). It teems with both good and evil, and overflows with weird and interesting embark sites. Though designed with advanced parameters, it's ultimately a vanilla DF world.
When I genned this world, I was hoping to find one good site for a succession game. Instead, I found more than I could reasonably hope for, that present a mix of fun and ‼Fun‼ for dwarven fortresses. Before I get to the five-and-a-half candidate sites, some basic rules for the succession
1) One year = One Turn. You'll be starting on the First of Granite and when the cheery green text declaring "Spring has arrived!" shows next, that means it's time to hand the fortress over to the next
madman overseer.
2) When it's your turn, you have one week to take your turn. If you start but don't finish, please upload the save because the next sucker gets to finish your turn in addition to doing their spring-spring turn. If you're providing a constant stream of updates, you'll have a bit of a grace period, but please consider the people after you. If you don't start or vanish without posting your save, we'll just go from the last end-of-turn save.
3) If the fort gets utterly trashed to unplayability in a way not befitting the end of our little story, we'll revert to an older save. If there's any hope we can recover from the mess, though, we'll soldier on. Hopefully this won't happen. In general, don't open the circus without both a plan to handle it AND a failsafe mechanism should your plan go pear shaped (I'd say don't open the circus, but we might get to the point where that becomes an option), try to avoid flooding the fort with sourced water/magma, and realize that FPS massacre like draining sourced water into the magma sea for perpetual cave-in fun will probably be frowned upon.
5) Dwarf people on the Dwarfing List when possible. Try to report dwarfings and deaths of named dwarves in your turn
6) Depending on what embark we pick, there will be... extra challenges: suggested themes for the fort and rules/missions for overseers to follow.
THE EMBARKS
Note: All embarks have shallow metals and deep metals, because I forgot to change the scarcity from my "toying with evil, need more resources" paramaters. Additionally, unless otherwise noted all aquifers will be breached with the "Modding" method, so you can safely ignore "Aquifer" marks in the site finder. We've also got a lot of levels above ground to have fun with (and levels "at bottom" should we get there)
1) The Scintillating Swamps: a Serene, Temperate, heavily forested Freshwater swamp. The embark location is at a place where the massive major river Grizzlesong seems to be crossed by another waterway: all four map edges are connected by a river. This is probably the easiest embark (the one I'm least likely to lose horribly year 1), so I can leave the aquifer in upon request, though that will probably result in a very dull start to the fort. Access to all races.
Suggested Fort Name: Watertrades the Merchant of Rivers
Fort "Theme": Founded where rivers meet, Watertrades is poised to control the trade of all the surrounding civilizations. Based around Greed, the main goal of Watertrades is accumulating wealth and creating opulence
No Aquifer: I bring skills on my dwarves, food, drink, seeds, domestic animals, one anvil and one copper ore. All tools other than a minor assortment of containers will be home-made.
Aquifer: I bring normal supplies, and loads of stone for dual-slit aquifer piercing in case the rivers don't give us a way under that mess.
Special Conditions: First, Watertrades is a merchant outpost: We must trade with every caravan (no pissing off the elves), and cannot offer (except offering ~7500☼ to our home civ once to get the monarch). Military must be kept at or under 20% fort population in active duty. Generating wealth (especially pointless wealth like gem-encrusted gold statues or masterpiece engravings in the cistern) is priority one.
Second, Years after Year 1 will have special challenges! (The year 1 challenge is either piercing the aquifer, or dealing with the start conditions). Specifically, the player passing off the save gets to set a challenge to the next overseer. These can be constructions to build or conducts to obey. Your imagination is the limit, with three caveats. 1) it must be, conceivably, doable in a year; 2) It must not destroy any megaprojects created through other challenges (repurposing them is fine. If one project was "Build a glass pyramid", "Fill the Pyramid with Magma" is acceptable); and 3) It shouldn't require more than a handful of dwarven deaths (Being prone to hillarious levels of death should a mishap occur is fine). It's preferred if a successfully executed challenge adds to the "merchant prince"/"Conspicuous consumption" vibe, but not required.
2) The Plain of Artifice is a Calm temperate plain, but our embark contains two other biomes: The serene temerate desert known as The Desert of Clearing on one edge and the Sinister temperate ocean called the Disgusting Gulf of Decievers taking up the most overall area. The embark contains two streams, which are not connected to each other. Access to all races.
Suggested Fort Name: "Innsmouth" (you CAN do that, I checked) or the more fortress-y "Darkwater the Seal of Forever"
Fort "Theme": Town with a Dark Secret. Overseers are urged to get Lovecraftian with their descriptions. Above-ground constructions to give the fortress the look of a small, run-down fishing town are encouraged.
Embark: Nothing Special: dwarves with a decent mix of skills, and a good, hefty dose of supplies and tools.
Special Conditions: Forgotten Beasts are Objects of Worship and must be treated with respect. Ideally, they'll be caged and their cages built in tempels underground or in town. If that can't be managed, they're to be left alone. These rules don't apply to above-ground megabeasts (even titans), nor to the Clowns should we meet them. Krakens, Sea Monsters, and the like are also suggested to be honored guests, though -- if we can get a sea monster pit and feed them invaders, it'll be great..
3) The Satiny Hill, Temperate Joyous Wilds far north along Grizzlesong from the Scintillating Swamps. It's wooded, sloped, has some clay... and has access to a Tower in addition to the normal races, so the pristine, holy wilderness is going to get swarmed by zombies. This embark will include both a minor tributary of the great river in one corner (a brook, if I guess right) and a site called Aromnunur (which I believe to be a cave though it won't show in legends) in the other.
Suggested Fort Name: "Newchasm" or "Deeppicks"
Fort Theme: Exploratory mission. The fortress acts as "Base Camp" to sally forth into the suspected cave, the Caverns, or the like. Our purpose is to explore this strange new feature.
Embark: Two Miners, and two military dwarves (the exploration team), along with three dwarves that set up the base camp. Supplies include an overdose of things "useful" for exploring a cave and underwhelming supplies of actual fortress-building materials. Plenty of ropes, minimal seeds.
Special Conditions: Our wealth comes from exploring the caverns, and to a lesser extent our surroundings. Attempts must be made to cage the strange new forms of wildlife we discover, and if we do at least one sample of each species should be offered alive to the dwarven caravan if possible (at which point we can tame/slaughter others, or just kill them with military). If not possible (due to the creature being un-tameable and thus getting released when hauled to the depot), it's in spirit to build the cage as part of a "Zoo" somewhere in the base camp. FBs are dangerous enough that you can just kill them, though.
4) The Lustrous Steppe, a Warm wilderness Savanna. Also containing a slice of Satiny Hill (Warm and Mirthful at this point in the world), this is another embark along Grizzlesong: the major river cuts through one corner of the embark, while there's a volcano called the Mindful Blaze in the opposite corner. Nothing in between rates less than "Steep Cliffs" (7 in the finder) and in the quarter of the embark nearest the volcano, the cliffs get extreme. Sadly or happily, the Tower can't reach us here
Suggested Fort Name: "Bloodfires" or "Holyflame the Gifts of (Thread's favorite of Virgins, Virginity, or Purity)"
Fort Theme: Barbaric, ritualistic, and tribal. We worship the volcano, avatar of Armok upon earth, and feed it well.
Embark: no "Fancy" tools (wheelbarrows, minecarts) will be brought, but this is basically a normal embark since mechanics is vital to the long-term health and safety of a fort.
Special Conditions: Sacrifices for the Volcano God! Each year, if we have at least 40 population, a maiden (adult, preferably young, female dwarf with no lover nor husband.) must be sacrificed to the volcano by being dropped in if we have one. Pampering the sacrifice for most of the year beforehand, and/or getting her to wear some special regalia (or lack thereof) before being thown in is optional. Trash must NOT be disposed of in the Volcano mouth (atomsmash it or flood and drain a garbage chamber with magma drawn off the volcano if you really want it gone), but caged prisoners can be dropped in at the Overseer's discretion. Most living things get the same treatment as caged prisoners, but dragons are sacred and should be tamed rather than dropped down to be obliterated in SMR. Under no circumstances may the volcano be permanently capped or drained (Bleeding off lava to flood the world with or to fill cisterns for industrial use is fine. It just has to remain an active volcano where we can send things to their fiery dooms)
In the event we have 40 pop and no maidens to sacrifice, female children are acceptable. If we don't have any of those either, we can also offer an artifact, or some caged sapients to appease the volcano.
5) The God-forsaken Waste (I couldn't believe that was a random name at first) is an aptly-named Terrifying Temperate Sand Desert. While some bits are ever so mildly less harsh, our particular embark would have no trees, no plants, and no running water on the surface... nothing but slghtly rolling dunes of savage evil. Hopefully the stark desolation will keep the potential Thralled Giant Desert Scorpions off our backs. Access to all races. While I'll ABSOLUTLEY remove the Aquifer if we actually play here (terrifying surroundings that offer nothing are NOT where to learn how to breach an aquifer), it's worth noting that little gem would normally make this embark site even harder.
Suggested Fort Name: "Giftedlands" or "Angelgifted the Golden Immortal Fortress-Church of God"
Fort theme: Religious nutjobs on a pilgrimage/crusade. Need I say more?
Embark: Toughest dwarf gets to be a chump meatshield military dwarf probable martyr while I work on getting as many living dwarves inside as possible, along with wagon supplies. I've got to admit... this one might be REAL short.
Special Requirements: Just in case surviving the resource-less hellscape was too easy, I'll lay down some challenges. We need to claim as much of the surface for dwarven use as possible (Manifest Destiny -- every overseer should expand the surface that's "ours" if possible). and build a Great Cathedral with as much opulence as dwarvenly possible. Also, while we'll need them for wood importation if nothing else in the early days of the fortress, starting wars with the humans and elves is HIGHLY encouraged later on, should the hostility of the environment not do it for us.
List Of Overseers
1: Tevish Szat
2: UristtheGrey
3: Trev_lite
4: ?
5: ?
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Topic: The Everseeing Dimensions [Succession Game]: Choose the Form of the Destructor (Read 1057 times)