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[Fool]

DWARF FOOLTRESS - THE SAGA OF ABBEYHAMES
Or: What Happens When You Put a Noob In Charge of A Fort


The year is 252 in the Plane of Myths. The Low King of the Dwarves, in his infinite wisdom, has seen fit to order the construction of a new fortress, to serve as a shining example of glory to all dwarfkind.

He has also seen fit to place "The Fool" Athamsazir, a lowly mining foreman with no administrative experience, in its position of leadership.

No one outside of the Low King himself expected Kuletezum - "Abbeyhames", in the vulgar tongue of Man - to survive its first winter. The immigrants sent to join them expected to do nothing more than loot the ruins and return to the mountainhome. Instead, they found a working fortress. Not a pretty one. Not one that would be celebrated for its architecture or its innovation or its opulence. But Abbeyhames works.

It's anyone's guess as to how long that's going to last.

Welcome to your new home.




Hello, all, and welcome to my first attempt at a community-influenced fortress. Come to that, it's my first attempt at any kind of functioning fortress, ever, so you can all guess how this is going to end. It's just a matter of how long. And how, of course. That promises to be entertaining.

In the meantime, I'm offering all of you a chance to get in on the ineptitude and chaos - and, of course, fun. Your amount of involvement is up to you. It can be anything from simply being dwarfed and then ignoring the place entirely, to helping me to decide what your dwarf does, to role-playing out your dwarf's thoughts and feelings about recent events, to offering ideas - in or out of character - as to what to do next for the fortress (or for your dwarf to wander off and do without permission, of course). If you'd like to see what the fortress is like as of this posting before making any requests or comments, just scroll down to the next section.

If you're interested in participating, all you have to do is post in this thread and let me know what you'd like to do. If you'd like to be dwarfed, tell me what criteria - if any - you have for selecting your dwarf. If you'd like to write journals for your dwarf, go ahead and post them. If you'd like to try and sway the development of the fortress, just post what you'd like to see done.

I'll do my best to accommodate all requests relating to your dwarf - for example, if you'd like your Mason to suddenly decide he wants to be a Carpenter, thus throwing the stone-goods-production of Abbeyhames into chaos, I can do that easily. I might - it's very unlikely, but I might - have to turn down any requests that I think would result in the immediate complete and utter collapse of the fortress, but it's bound to happen eventually anyway. Requests relating to the development of the fortress as a whole will be considered, but are more likely to be accepted if more than one person wants them to happen. Especially so if all of those people are dwarfs, because they can just head off and do it themselves!

So place your bets, people! How long can an absolute newbie keep this fortress functioning?


The Hamlet of Abbeyhames, 2nd Slate, 252

Abbeyhames is still a relatively small fortress, early in its second year of life. As of now, it has a thriving bone crafts industry, but not much else other than a few farm plots. Oh, there are other workshops up, but no real call for their services - or, in several cases, no materials that they can make use of. Textile- and meat-producing facilities lie empty and unused, along with a forge and a wood furnace. The mason and carpenter see constant work producing doors, beds, tables, chairs, statues, barrels, bins, and crossbow bolts, however, due to the fortress' only two near-inexhaustible resources being wood and stone.

The fortress survived its first year with no casualties, save for a borderline-psychotic armorer (fond of beating kangaroos to death with his bare hands, then chasing their families back into the fort's dining hall and beating them to death there) who died of thirst while standing next to a barrel full of ale. The sixteen citizens who dwelt there during that year were all kept constantly busy, but now twenty-eight immigrants have arrived, increasing the fort's population to forty-four dwarves and placing a serious strain on resources. Beyond that, there's just not enough for them all to do.



Beyond that, the fort has yet to strike any ore other than zinc, meaning that there's no iron - or other metal - to be found anywhere in Abbeyhames. And there's no river anywhere nearby, which means that the only sources of water to be found are stagnant pools which will have to be filtered before use - and said filters have yet to be installed. The fortress' "military" is ten random dwarves who had no jobs who were pulled out of the halls at random and had a crossbow shoved into their hands.

In short, Abbeyhames sits on a razor's edge. If something goes wrong, it may never recover, but given a bit of good fortune, there may be hope for these dwarves yet.

Until the goblins show up, that is.

Notable Dwarves:

• "The Fool" Athamsazir, Professional Fool (male) - Fool
• Sodel Daskostgusgash, Legendary Miner (female)
• Tun Astom, Bookkeeper (female)
• Inod Melbilton, Manager (female)
• Morul Atirasdug, Trader (female)
• Rigoth Athelvucar, Broker (male)
• Sazir Shukarber, Completely Inexperienced Militia Commander (female)
• Zefon Ritholkib, Completely Inexperienced Chief Medical Dwarf (male)
• Bomrek Berrir, Master Butcher, Dog Trainer, and De Facto Huntmaster (male)
• Mestthos Sobordidok, World's Laziest Farmer (male)

[DeKaFu]

Not sure why there's no comments yet, this looks pretty good.

I'd like to request a Gemcutter/setter/Metalcrafter named Corvus (preferably female but either is okay) Best if they like sparkly things like gems or precious metals. "Gem hoarder" for the profession.

Then start turning that zinc into sparkly things.

[Fool]

Not sure why there's no comments yet, this looks pretty good.

I'd like to request a Gemcutter/setter/Metalcrafter named Corvus (preferably female but either is okay) Best if they like sparkly things like gems or precious metals. "Gem hoarder" for the profession.

Then start turning that zinc into sparkly things.

Done. Unfortunately, there were no female dwarves with access to gem- or metal-related skills, but I did find a Gemcutter who fits the bill otherwise.



There'll be an update later today; I've been distracted by the release of the new Warhammer 40,000 6th Edition rulebook, but I haven't abandoned this.

[Fool]

6th Slate

Yeah, I knew this was too good to last. I finally manage to get the new arrivals all working, and then everything starts to break apart at the seams.

First one of my new arrivals, some useless Gemcutter who's been sitting around in the dining halls being useless, decided to change his name to "Corvus" and started babbling about how we should be using all that useless zinc ore that's sitting around in the mining areas below. For what, I asked him. We don't have anything that we could turn it into an alloy with. He's got no idea. He just wants zinc. He's run off to go start working the smelter by himself now. Hell if I know what he's gonna do with it all.



On top of that, Bomrek, our butcher and Master of the Hunt (since he trained all the dogs and was the only guy here not too lazy to pick up a crossbow and go shoot at some dingos), has apparently overworked himself to the point where he literally passed out in his workshop.



I mean, at least he's being productive. So there's that.

A couple of the useless fishery workers have decided that they want to prove themselves to be not useless, so they've gotten in a group and gone to go trawling around in one of the stagnant pools around here. Yeah, here's betting that they get precisely squat out of that. Props to them for effort, but I wish they'd get over here and do something vaguely useful. Or at least that they'd stop complaining to me about being stuck outside in the rain. I'm not telling them to go out there. That's their choice. You don't wanna be out in the rain? STOP GOING OUTSIDE WHEN IT'S RAINING.



7th Slate



Called it.

11th Slate



Yeah, great. That means the only competent dwarves we've got are spending their time cutting pretty pictures into the walls. I mean, gods, look at this.



How in the hells is anybody supposed to walk over that floor? And one of them has just fallen asleep in the middle of the hallway, for gods' sakes! I've told the engravers to keep their engravings on the walls, for now, so people can see where the hell they're going. Just keep smoothing down the walls. You can put pretty pictures on them later, when people can walk through the place without breaking something.

On the topic of more annoyances, the fort is starting to get something of an animal problem.



And there are puppies and peahens and chicks and gods know what else running around out there, crapping on everything. I'm getting close to just ordering the lot of them butchered. The only thing that's keeping me from doing it right now is that Borek is one of the few competent people here in Abbeyhames, and he's managed to kill a few dingos single-handedly, thus introducing some meat into our diets. Gotta give that guy credit. You give him a job, that job gets done. He's even doing all the butchering himself.

Meanwhile, our so-called "professional" rangers have yet to bring in so much as a kangaroo carcass. Yeah. They've been about as helpful as our fishery workers, so let's hope I can find some use for them soon.

Meanwhile, I've begun construction on a paved road out of Abbeyhames, along with an archery range for our incompetent valiant defenders and an indoor trade depot. With my luck, the paved road is just going to make it easier for the goblins to stroll up to our doors, but I'm building it anyway.



Still no iron ore. Here's hoping we strike some soon.

EDIT:

12th Slate



It's official. The gods are mocking me.

[Hugo_The_Dwarf]

Interesting, watching.

[Fool]

28th Slate

Well, progress on several jobs has stalled entirely, due to the complete and utter lack of any work ethic whatsoever in this fortress.

The road that I instructed be built out of the fortress hasn't even been designed yet, let alone constructed, despite my instructing multiple dwarves to go and take care of it. I mean, how long does it take to walk outside and say "hey, we need some rocks here"?

Apparently too long, since more than a quarter of our population is spending its time hanging out in the main dining hall doing absolutely squat to actually contribute to their own continued survival.



Even Mestthos does more work than these people! I mean, seriously! This is just getting ridiculous!

Our mad Gemcutter, Corvus or whatever he's calling himself, has flooded the metal stockpiles with bars of zinc. I actually had to order a doubling of the storage space there just to give him more room to pile the stuff up, as useless as it is.



And I had to carve it out with my own two hands as well, since the rest of our miners are too busy looking for iron ore. Speaking of which:



It's official. We've found everything there is to find except iron.

I've had a second Craftsdwarf's Workshop constructed so we can have one producing bolts and the other producing trinkets for trade, and I'm pondering a second Carpenter's Workshop so we can get one making training weapons. Speaking of construction, I managed to get the Trade Depot up, after shouting at no less than six different people (mad zinc-hoarder included). Now I'm having the same problem with trying to get somebody to build a gods-damned Leatherworks.

Nobody wants to do anything! They all just want to sit there and wait for the booze to run out! Then, presumably, the cannibalism will begin.

[Teh_Duke]

A docterin' dwarf please

also you can use d->v to toggle if engravings are shown

[Fool]

5th Felsite

So we've had another outbreak of insanity. The "chief medical dwarf" - actually just some sod I grabbed and told to be ready to patch people up if anything goes wrong, which it will - has started calling himself "Teh_Duke". Damned if I know how you're supposed to pronounce it. He never actually says it out loud; he just has a name tag with "Teh_Duke" written on it. He insists that everybody refer to him as "Chief Doctorin' Dwarf Ritholkib".



Whatever. He's not the first person to crack here. Corvus is still downstairs, playing in the piles of zinc he's flooded our stockpiles with. Since he's so in love with the stuff, I've told him to start turning it into stuff we can sell, at least.

On top of that, Shazir Shukarber has made me regret placing her in charge of the militia already. She's had all her "subordinates" grab crossbows and ammunition, but they haven't actually been doing any training. When I asked why the hell they weren't practicing, they said it was because they didn't have an archery range.

Fine, I said. I'll install one. And I did.



Five targets, even. Which is four more than I think they actually need. But I came back upstairs yesterday, after spending the past two days straight down in the mines looking (futilely, I might add) for iron ore, and found all ten of them lounging around in the kitchen. When I asked her why in the hells she wasn't training, she fished out some fancy book on military rules and regulations and waved it in my face. Said that the only army training that could take place was in a barracks.

I said we've got a barracks. It's right next to the archery range. She said that the archery range hadn't technically been laid out in the blueprints for the place as part of the barracks. I put the point of my pick against her throat. She rapidly came around to my point of view. Hopefully we'll get some training done soon.

The road out of Abbeyhames still hasn't been designed, by the way. I've told no less than nine people to get off their lazy asses and do it, but they all just sit around in the dining hall doing nothing.

I hate these people, but I'm going to keep them alive if it kills me. This is a matter of professional pride now.

6th Felsite



Fantastic. Solonmetos is the only competent Mason we've got. Now he's babbling about gods and ancient cities rising from the waters and heroes and myths and not having any iron. Or maybe that last one is just the voices in my head again. Anyway, at least he's holed himself up in his own workshop instead of taking over some other place. Hopefully he'll stop being nuts soon. We need more doors around this place.

8th Felsite



Oh, good. It's only taken him two days to get around to it.

9th Felsite

That... was the single most disturbing thing I've ever witnessed.



Don't ever let anyone lie to you about the "miracle of childbirth", journal. Just don't. Trust me. If you had seen what I have seen...

Perhaps it wouldn't have been so bad if she didn't do it in the mining tunnels, still digging the whole time.



I hope to never witness such a disturbing thing again as long as I live.

12th Felsite

The militia still hasn't been training.

I went and hunted down the commander again. When I had her pinned to the floor under one knee, and the point of my pick against her eye, I very calmly asked her why she wasn't doing what I had told her to. She almost managed to wave the book of regulations in my face again before I put my other knee on her windpipe.

I told her to consider this a direct order. If she's not in the archery range by sundown, I'm going to appoint a Hammerer.

I might even assign myself to the post, just to make sure it gets done right.

Also, the mad Mason has finally finished his work. About time, too. He almost starved to death in there.



I've also told the farmers that, when summer rolls around, they're gonna start growing pig tails. We could do with some new clothes.

19th Felsite



Elven caravan is on the way. Good thing I got the trade depot up a few months back. I've ordered everybody to start moving our supply of cut gems and kangaroo bone crafts into the depot for trade. I don't care if they are stuck-up bastards. We've got to get rid of this crap somehow.

20th Felsite



Our Bookkeeper, who was busy (finally) planning out the road to the fortress, decided that she wanted a place on my list of absolutely crazy she-dwarves by giving birth without even stopping in the process of drawing up the blueprints.

What is it with these people? Are they all insane? Why do they have to keep doing things that will haunt my nightmares for weeks to come?

24th Felsite



The caravan finally arrived, and I managed to dump off most of our useless stuff on them in exchange for a bunch of cloth and other goods. That'll keep our clothiers working for the next few days, and keep us from running around in rags.

1st Hematite

Summer's here. And the elves are still hanging around. And the road still isn't built. And we still haven't struck iron. And the gods-damned militia still don't want to get to training. They refuse to spend any decent amount of time in there.

This entire place is just one giant mess. This is going to be a fun summer.

[Hugo_The_Dwarf]

Haha interesting writing
"<The Fool> Athamsazir has witnessed childbirth, he has been scared recently"

[NRDL]

Count me in, the writing is pretty organized for a "newb".  Bravo.

Please give me a military dwarf, but NOT a crossbow one.  Since you don't really have any (?) metal, just make him into an unarmed fighter.  I'm not asking for a weapon, or armor, just another person to spar with, so his skills train faster.  Name him "Nix" please. 

[DeKaFu]

For the Military (assuming you want advice)...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Have you set the barracks so that each squad has permission to train there? (So that a 'T' appears next to the squad name in the barracks). Missing that step was the issue I had when nobody would train for me.

Apart from that, no way are you wasting cut gems on the elves. I won't allow it! D:<
Gems are staying home and being encrusted onto things made of zinc and other things.

[Fool]

Count me in, the writing is pretty organized for a "newb".  Bravo.

It's not the first thing I've written, even if it is my first real attempt at a fort. And I have read things like Boatmurdered and Battlefailed, so I know how it's done, at least. But thanks!

Please give me a military dwarf, but NOT a crossbow one.  Since you don't really have any (?) metal, just make him into an unarmed fighter.  I'm not asking for a weapon, or armor, just another person to spar with, so his skills train faster.  Name him "Nix" please.

Will do, on my next play session. I've got stuff to do tonight, so an actual update will have to wait for tomorrow, but I'll get it done ASAP. And no, I still don't have any metal other than zinc. But I have ridiculous amounts of kangaroo bone and gems.

For the Military (assuming you want advice)...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Have you set the barracks so that each squad has permission to train there? (So that a 'T' appears next to the squad name in the barracks). Missing that step was the issue I had when nobody would train for me.

Thanks for the help. I think I've got it worked out, since I've been using the wiki pretty liberally in order to guide me through this game. But the advice is appreciated.

Apart from that, no way are you wasting cut gems on the elves. I won't allow it! D:<
Gems are staying home and being encrusted onto things made of zinc and other things.

I'll get you right on that, then. 

[TheBlueSteel]

This fort looks shiny, and I love your writing style.

If I may..... I would gladly be dorfed in as one of your miners, named "Blue". And if it isn't too much of an imposition, he should immediately begin mining out any soil layers you have from inside the mountain, muttering something about "secure wood production".

[Fool]

1st Hematite

The epidemic of complete and utter insanity continues. One of our useless immigrants - of which we seem to have an endless supply - has renamed himself "Nix" and declared that he wants to be a professional wrestler. Why? He won't say. He just shouts a lot, shows off his nonexistent muscles, and goes around asking others if they can smell what the rocks are cooking. Which makes even less sense than it seems to, really, since I've ordered the kitchens closed until we can stock up on raw food.



3rd Hematite

The Squeezing Treaties have finally gotten around to training. I think that I may have "Nix" to thank for this, as crazy as he might be; he seemed awfully eager to get to wrestling some of the other dwarves. He might have managed to convince the rest that they should be as eager to train as he is. Perhaps this wave of insanity can have some positive effects after all.



18th Hematite



Those thrice-cursed elves that have been loitering in our trade depot for the past few weeks are just now considering leaving. It's about damned time, in my opinion. I can't stand those freakishly tall mockeries of the dwarven form.

Incidentally, I've placed a standing order for complete clear-cutting of all indigenous trees within a mile of Abbeyhames.

22nd Hematite

Ushrir Solonmetos, the mason who was struck with temporary madness previously, has been refusing to do any actual masonry since completing his "masterwork". He claims that he's needed this long to recuperate. Our "chief doctorin' dwarf" agrees, so I can't just order him to get back in there, but I say he'll take any excuse to be allowed to hang around doing nothing, filling himself with the elven wine we just traded for.



Can't stand the stuff myself. Not enough substance to it. Good dwarven ale, that's what I need. That elven stuff has no flavor. There's no substance to it. How can you even call it booze if it's so thin you can hardly chew it?

But whatever. I've drafted someone else to temporarily take Ushrir's place in the mason's workshop until he feels like getting off his lazy ass and getting back to work. We need more doors around here.

26th Hematite

Morul Dyedrums came into my bedroom this morning. Rather than wake me up pleasantly by stripping down and sliding under the covers as I had hoped, however, she started raving about how I couldn't order the export of any more bracelets. When I asked her what in the hells she was going on about, she said that, as "Mayor of Abbeyhames", she was ordering that all export of bracelets be halted immediately.

I asked her when the hell she'd become mayor. She said she'd been elected a few weeks ago. I asked her who the hell she thought was in charge of this place. She said she was, as per the will of the people. I asked her if she thought she'd actually be able to get any shit done around here. She said she could do better than I have.



I told her to go and grab a pick, and that she could resume her whining as soon as she'd dug out as much of this mountain as I have. In the meantime, she's agreed to stop badgering me as long as I set her up with a nicer room. I can't stand to listen to that shrieking any more, so I agreed. But one day, Dyedrums, there will come a reckoning. And when that day comes, I will be the victor.



5th Malachite

The road has finally been completed.



Welcome to civilization, Abbeyhames. Maybe now you won't be such a horrible, horrible place to live.

Then again, maybe it'll just make it easier for the goblins to get in.

10th Malachite

Still.

No.

Metal.

I've ordered several expansions of the mining area over the past few days. I'm deepening the mine shaft as well, so that we can start searching for ores deeper down. I'm starting to get desperate.



16th Malachite

Another wave of useless migrants. And just as I'd managed to get everybody in the fort working, too. I'm going to have to find something for all of these lazy asses to do as well, and we're still entirely without any metal whatsoever. That means that about half the industries available to your average, not-metal-starved fortress are closed to us. We're gonna have to work to find something to take the place of metal for the time being.

Because the gods hate me. It isn't enough that I was sent here in the first place. They have to keep heaping more and more administrative work on me while denying me access to even a single bar of good, solid iron.

25th Malachite

The migrants seem to have found work all right, after a short adjustment period. Or, rather, I found work for them, because everybody here is functionally brain-dead.

Fortunately, there's a huge herd of kangaroos outside, and Bomrek is getting to be a great hunter. We've got plenty of meat to feed all these new drains on our resources.

27th Malachite

A pack of dingos decided that it wanted a share of the kangaroo meat Bomrek has been harvesting. By the time news got back to me, though, he'd already murdered all of them, dragged their carcasses back to his butcher shop, chopped them up, and gotten some other dwarves to start on the tanning.



I respect this dwarf like no one else in Abbeyhames.

28th Malachite



Well, at least he's enjoying himself with all that zinc-encrusting.

3rd Galena



I thought he already was. Then again, this is Abbeyhames. Everyone here is absolutely gods-damned insane, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised that it took this long to register.

[Fool]

This fort looks shiny, and I love your writing style.

If I may..... I would gladly be dorfed in as one of your miners, named "Blue". And if it isn't too much of an imposition, he should immediately begin mining out any soil layers you have from inside the mountain, muttering something about "secure wood production".

Thanks for the compliment! I'll be happy to work you in next time I play.