finally i got enough free time to compile a report fot autumn and winter
here it is:
Vabok dasselCatten.
Right after we celebrated the arrival of summer, a fearsome monster from the desert came to seek out blood. We were training at our improvised hall, when suddenly we saw it sitting on the other side of the moat.
It was honey badger - a beast so horrific that giant lions are known to get of its way, and it was in skeletal form. Monster sat, silent and motionless, like if it was waiting for us to come and accept the challenge.
We were cold with fear, and noone dared to come out. None but sister Geshud. We heard her voice
"pull the lever" - she said. I'll go take care of it. I swear i saw the monster grin evilly when brother said that. One of our newcomers ran to push the lever, and Geshud walked slowly to the bridge. It extended swiftly - nice work of Medtob, our mechanic, and they ran toward each other. That fight was a piece of art by Geshud, she never let the monster an opportunity to attack, while landing square hits herself. With a swift and graceful move she
punched the monster in the left rear paw with her right hand and the severed part sailed of on an arc! We were seeing already that monster is defeated and rushed to the entrance to chase it down in case in decides to run away, but something strange happened. Badger stood up on his three remaining legs, and a cloud of dust came up from earth and cloaked the monster hiding it from our sight. Enraged, dwarf kicked through the dust cloud, but her foot met nothing - there was no badger anywhere. Still, it was a victory well worth celebrating!
Five days later, our monastery was attacked again by the evil forses. Someone had let the entrance brigbe extended after badger combat, and huge skeletal camels saw a quick way inside.
our dogs attacked them, but their deaths bought us only a few minutes. It would be too late for us to rush for the bridge-controlling lever, and we went to fight the undead face to face!
Only two camel could break through cage traps, but in my opinion even one is too much.
This time sister Zuntir lead six our new apprentices in battle, but she was unlucky in that battle. Monster's bones were too hard for her fist to shatter, and it stroke back, bashing her to the ground and bruising her heart with a powerfull kick. The camel could land one more blow before she scrambled away and her apprentices came to the resque. They flailed at the camel so madly that it haven't a single chance to start another attact, and finally in disappeared in a dust cloud after Zuntir punched his tooth off. The second camel was promtly swarmed over and kicked into non-existance.
The next two months were quiet and non-descript.
We continued on our daily work, fiinshing the wall around the monastery and making a few stone mugs for the caravan to come. Another group of dwarves, desiring to excel at martial arts, arrived at our monastery. One of them was a Talented Kicker, and, respecting his skill, we allowed him to have his apprentices in a squad of his own. Autumn caravan wes in time, and we were glad that our small monastery is not forgotten up at mountainhome. We chatted lively with merchants and caravan guards while Medtob was discussing more pressing and business-like matters with their leader, Ustuth Fashlogem. We also exchanged pump components we no longer needed and a few stone mugs for a bag of rock nuts and an anvil. We enjoyed the two quiet autumn month when no skeletal monsters ambushed us and no deadly menace shone over the monastery, but with the start of winter they ended abruptly.
With the first winter day, cold wind brough skeletal birds again upon us. Vultures descended from the cloudy skies right in the monastery's yard and started clwing and biting around. There were six of them, but two got caught in our cage traps. Despite their unearthly rage, birds were still not a match to a trained dwarf, and the battle was ended in minutes. Caged one were taken down to the stockpile. We seem to have collected quite an undead zoo.
Next time the evil spirits attacked from within our monastery. One of Zuntir's apprentices, Dodok Oddombesmar the farmer, missed the morning mediatation, and Zuntir said he was posessed by some unknown forces. We hoped his soul would be able to prevail, creating an artifact and banishing the evil force posessing him into it. We tried to help him as much as we could and gather everithing he demanded. On the 7th of Opal, the first artifact of Fightclub was finished - Muzish Tad, a fungiwood harp. Although noone of us can extract any muzish from, it's undoubtedly an example of superior craftsdwarfship.
It has two images on ot, the first one relates to the ascension of Monom BoltKnives, the warrior-king of the Second Dynasty, to the throne in 28, and the second is far more creepy. It depicts a monstous head flying over the sandy hills on bat wings. A note explains that the monster is Dosla Tearzeal the hungry head, and it's traveling in the Dune of Crucifying. Medtob said that head is featured in the goblin legends as one of minor desert monsters, but is not particularly famous for anything.
You might be wondering why it is me, Vabok Dasselcatten, writing these words about the winter's history of our monastery as well as the autumn's. The answer is, it was brother Earthenfury whom we had chosen to do this, but soon after that he told me confusedly that he didn't know how to read and write. He sits aside me now, and we are trying to remember and write down our history together. I hope he'll smile when he reads these words.
On the 5th of moonstone, a group of newcomers met with Medtob and me and they told us we should have a place to sleep and eat. I didn't understand them at first, but that's my fault - i was living aside from any civilization for too long, and i got out of the habit of having a bed or a table with chairs. We agreed though - a little bit of comfort never hurts, especially for our newer monks. We spent winter months building two neat stone houses in the southeastern and northeastern corners of the wall. Valican, Geshud and two masons furnished them properly, and now we have a communal dormitory and our dining room is almost complete, too.
Monks have now a dormitory, almost finished dining hall, operational clothing, beekeeping, food and booze industries. They are organized in three squads on inactive duty and traind whenever they have free time. No newcomers reached novice level though. Down there we have cassiterite and tetrahedrite, a marble layer, bituminous coal and some clay. Four caged skeletal camels can be used against ambushers if we devise a way to do do. They've got enough seeds for a farm, too. They can make some stone crap or a bronze serrated disc to sell to elves.
Having completed my turn, i retire as Sakzul UrvadTenshed the broker and weaponsmith. Maybe i'll someday forge a legendary weapon for our weaponmasters.
this is the save
http://dffd.wimbli.com/file.php?id=45252UltraValican:
If you ask how to play downloaded save game then you should unzip it and place it in your /data/save folder, renaming if nesessary (it's called region2 now). I never played with graphics so i can't help here sadly.
EDIT: I supposed to play this fort at 0 popcap (for a while at least). If you don't have specific plans for more dwarves, i'd like you to set popcap to 0 in d_init.txt. It'll keep things a bit easier, too, with fewer goblins and less food consumption. We're at 20 dwarves now, and are eligible for moods when noone is drafted.