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[malimbar04]

Story-ified beginning.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

It's the 27th of Granite, 139, and I've been called to save a fort from it's own stupidity. It's a relatively large fort, with Udil Dreamcraft voted mayor. The fort, called "The Avalanche" seems to have... fallen downhill by this report. haha.

With over a hundred dwarves (exact figures are sketchy), the king thought it necissary that this fort live. I don't see why, it hasn't exported anything of great worth, and... oh no, I think the king is punishing me. I knew I shouldn't have laughed at him when he asked for forgotten-beast silk clothing. Damn, I should know better next time.

Anyways, as I sneak up through the forest, I see a hopeless battle of some sort. At first I thought it was normal lazy hunters - a few animal corpses were left in teh snow to rot. Then I saw vomit, and I thought I heard some dwarves running around. I have no patience for this nonsense. The only time this should be happening is when a fort has fallen...

uh oh.

i see  a dwarvish lass ahead of me, and quickly sneak up to her. I ask for a quick assessment of the battlefield, and it seems that there are several goblins baring weapons of copper or iron running around. They've already slaughtered several dwarves by teh sounds of it, and she thinks she heard the doors lock everyone else out. How many? it looks like 6.

i told her a tactic to try, and snuck up to the only minor walls they had. It was a tricky and obviously one-way trip, but I climbed a wall and fell down into the entrance, right behind a gate. I knocked a few times to an answer along the lines of "go away goblins! we can't open the gate". Yeah... well... not good.

I hear some screaming outside the second gate. Then I hear some chearing, or is it crying. Can't tell, but I think the goblins left. Yay! the tactics... well if you call "grab everyone you can outside and gather in one place, you're in the miltiary now"... if you call that a tactic I guess...

Anyways, that got me to tell them to open the gate briefly. Wait... they can't find the lever? DAmn! (seriously... where is the lever?). Damn... I'm doing it the crappy way and disassmebling the bridges entirely. In the meantime, I'm calling out orders verbally. It's difficult, as I also hear screaming and yelling beyond. people are not happy.

I'm also telling them to remove all stockpiles, as from what they're telling me, there is no organization at all.

And... I look behind me. That bridge is completely down. It doesn't raise. Damn! destroy this gate right now!

Sigh. Busy busy. After some orders were given, I declare these done so far (or at least in progress):

 - dissuaded goblins from staying around temporarily. lost a few dwarves in the process
 - created burrow I call "inside", and assigned an alert for all civilians to go there the next time something happens.
 - got rid of military and captain of the guard, as they're a bad idea right now. Sorry Aban Elderoils, but you're not doing this now.
 - I ordered all weapons moved inside though, just in case we can get that done before sealing off the fort. By extionsion, all armor should be moved as well.
 - I allowed cobaltite a buildable material - am going to seal off the outer wall with that.
 - about tripled the raw area of the dining room. It's still ugly, but that'll do for now until we can get something better.
 - ordered several small farms up top. Ordered biscuits to be made from plump helmet spawn, as well as any seeds only useful for making dye. We're not making dye anymore.
 - ordered hole dug over the accidentally created water something or other. Seriously, there is like a little pond in the middle of the fort. We're drinking form that now. Booze is a luxury.
 - ordered a second kitchen built where there used to be a farm. It's a silly place for a farm anyways.
 - Ordered the planting of plump helmets, quarry bushes, prickle berries, and strawberries. Hopefully... we wont' all starve.
 - I actually enabled the planting labor on a bunch of dwarves. Most of the farmers wouldn't plant anything!
 - set up 2-dwarf military to train in the dining room.
 - expanded doorway of dining room - dwarves should move through here easily than they currently were.
 - started the production of Coffins

Edit: added things I've done.
Edit 2, with story update:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Holy Ikud Rītholidek, deity of rulership, this is a near pointless task. I have designated three people to be masons at all times, creating coffins for the dead. we're actually having to mine out more stone to accommodate. It's slowly reducing the corpse stockpile, but the shear quantity (and the propensity for that stockpile to grow as more dwarves throw tantrums) is getting ridiculous. We're down to about 50 or so dwarves (exact numbers aren't important when the number fluctuates this much). Half of them are children.

I've went to the top of the wall briefly when there were reports of screaming. Apparently a wave of migrants came to help, and stumbled across a few dozen goblins on the way. It wasn't a pretty sight, but at least they're not going to bother us while we try to see if we're even going to survive this.

I kepe having to tell people specifically to do things, which is slightly annoying. Seriously, why can't a few dwarves just say "hey, yeah, I'll plant some plump helmets". No, instead they all insist in sitting in filth and clutter in the dining room (where about 2/3 of the tables and chairs have been destroyed, with miscillaneous clothes and items lying around the mossy floors... it's a mess).

Then, every time I order a new stockpile organized, I have to not only tell them what I want there, but I have to FORBID, explicitly, everything else. Someone once told them that the default stockpile has everything in it. I have no idea why they're still fighting me on that.

Oh, and speaking of stockpiles, I found out that we actually have leather. We have enough to make perhaps 2 sets of armor and 3 helmets. We also had no shields, so I ordered some made from wood. We could have had a workable military long ago, but alas we had nothing. Really, we don't have much now either, but at least my two dwarves (oops, one died, gotta recruit someone), at least they have shields now.

[Hans Lemurson]

My 4th attempt ended in a Goblin assault where they were mounted on giant cave swallows and brought cave dragons.  The swallows flew over the walls, and the dragons busted the temporary door I had set up to reach the outside when my outer gate malfunctioned.

Note to self: MAKE AMMUNITION FOR YOUR MARKSDWARVES!!!

[Sprin]

Iam curios but is this a challenge you made on purpos or your new... OR !!FUN!! luck?

[malimbar04]

5the Hematite, 140, early summer'
Next part of story

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Bomrek Towerpanted is the Mayor now. I honestly don't remember if she was the mayor when I arrived at The Avalanche or not. Also, even though I've fired about half a dozen captains of the guard, they keep replacing them. Now it's Alåth Crowdediron, and I suppose she'll do, I'm sure she has the right temperament for the job. Neither of these nobles have anything that they "require", but I don't really care right now. If we continue doing as well as we have been though, I see a future where they'll be ecstatic with their arrangements.

What's so wonderful? Well we got a migrant wave. Ok, not the BEST news in the world when we're closed off, but after a few of them died they chased off the goblins. We know, because they weres tanding in a meeting area immediately outside our walls. We let them inside, and it wasn't long after that when elvish merchants arrived. It so happens that they could come right in as well!

I'm not normally one to care for elves, but we have two problems that they can solve. We have a HUGE excess of clothing lying around, and we have a lack of booze and food. Yes, they only have above-ground crops. But those crops can be brewed darn it! Also, they have alcohol already in barrels! By my guessing, we have perhaps 200 units of food and booze each now. It's not an accurate estimate, but all that matters is that it's quite a lot. YAY! Alcohol is back on the menu.

That's such good news that (oh sweet, a ghost in my room just dissappeared. Thank you coffin makers!), it's such good news (oh, there goes another one!)... that I told them to make a minecart! Why such a luxery? because I now see a future where all of this clutter is organized and off the floor. We're stockpiling all these clothes next to the trade depot soon.

Breaking news! (IE Edit)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

scouts have spotted three new developments recently. First some migrants arrived. They didn't go to the gate, so I forgot about them. Then some merchants arrived, and I figured "oh no, forgot to get the migrants to find ambushers and such! Can't let them in yet. I promptly made some hand signals for them go to to the front of the fort. Then... we spotted them. A vile force of darkness!

I wasn't worried at first - we built these walls for a reason! Then I noticed that it was far worse than you might think. Those goblins, looking menacingly over the hill... thery were riding things. Specifically giant rats, giant oms, and *gasp* giant cave swallows. And then... even more... war cave dragons. The goblins at some point bread cave dragons, and trained them for war. This... is not good.

The scout relayed the battle to me as I panicked. They scattered and slaughtered the migrants first. The migrants were actually quite impressive for a while - running for their lives distracted those beasts for a long time.

I told the carpenters to starrt building a roof over the walls. I doubt it'll do anything to help honestly, but I have to try.

They then slaughtered the caravan. It wasn't any real fight there. Humans never knew what hit them.

And then... nothing. They're still out there, not attacking. they're... just not figuring out how to get into the fort. We just might live through this!
 

Some more news, though less critical

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Siege left, migrants came. I started a new policy though for migrants. If you want to come into our fort, you must first give the fort an offering of six corpses and six weapons. There is plenty lying around outside, and you must put them next to the wall for us to gather upon letting you in. It's a near success, though the migrants got slaughtered by kobold bowman before they could finish.

I started putting a fortification on the second level as well, but with poor timing. The bowman shot a few of our internal dwarves, and now they're dead too.

Oh, second waves of migrants, yay! And this one looks to be a success! 6 more weapons and corpses closer to making this fort viable.

The Return of the darkness!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

So sure, the old vile force of darkness left. We got a handful of new weapons and smoe of the outside corpses taken care of. Good for us. Now though... we've spotted another force. A larger force. And this one, I'm sure, has the law-giver of The Ancient Curses. That's right, none other than Kulet Udibtangath, riding a giant rat with extremely long amber hair and an iron mask. Not much else in the the way of armor... but that doesn't matter. What matters is that they mean business.

Good thing I was able to close up the hole int eh wall before they arrived. This will be funny to see if they actually do anything.

[Hans Lemurson]

After repeated attempts at saving the fort, my best stabilization has resulted in a population of just 50 dwarves.  The fort used to be overcrowded, but now with all the expansions I've made, it feels so empty.

I was playing with a low population cap, so didn't get any migrants to shore up the population with the legions of the sane.

I've learned a lot about tantrum spirals, but sadly not how to break the cycle.  It'll probably take something drastic.  Would it work to shove off all the "Miserable" dwarves to their own special burrow of shame so that their tantruming and fistfights won't ruin the healthy folks?

[malimbar04]

I think I can say it's stable now at 52 dwarves (23 of which are children). But I don't feel confident in it's completeness - there are huge sieges going on on a regular basis, and my two-person knife military that's just started sparring isn't going to kill any of them. So "stable" means "still cut off from the real world, but at least not committing suicide so often". Yup.

[Hans Lemurson]

I think I can say it's stable now at 52 dwarves (23 of which are children). But I don't feel confident in it's completeness - there are huge sieges going on on a regular basis, and my two-person knife military that's just started sparring isn't going to kill any of them. So "stable" means "still cut off from the real world, but at least not committing suicide so often". Yup.

And murder, don't forget the murder.

Something interesting which struck me through multiple replays is that it's usually the same group of dwarves who tend to survive.  It makes me wonder if perhaps the tantrum spiral weeds out everybody with weak personalities, who succumb to stress easily.  Is the average mental fortitude of the fortress increased after such a harrowing?

The random variable though is with the murders.  It's the murders that really make it spiral out of control, but they are simply the accidental results of the constant fistfights which are breaking out all over the place.  I think it's the fistfights, more than anything else, which is the primary "Contagion" of this insanity, since attacked people are often injured and unhappy, and the fort has no thread to suture wounds.  If you could just stop angry dwarves from hurting innocents, then I think it should be possible to wrap up the spiral with over 100 dwarfs left.

How would one go about protecting the innocent dwarves from the violence of tantrums?

[LoSboccacc]

a working jail maybe can lock fistfighter for a little while allowing them and others to cool off.

[misko27]

a working jail maybe can lock fistfighter for a little while allowing them and others to cool off.

Justice is bugged. Only murder, Violation of production order, and export-ban-violation shows up.

EDIT: I just had a massive deja vu just now. Weird.

[Rexfelum]

This was entertaining to read.  I haven't looked at too many shared fortresses, so is this sort of "fix my disaster" deal common?

And if not, why isn't it?  It sounds much more complex and interesting than standard "no resource" challenges and suchlike.

--Rexfelum

[Kamin]

This was entertaining to read.  I haven't looked at too many shared fortresses, so is this sort of "fix my disaster" deal common?
And if not, why isn't it?  It sounds much more complex and interesting than standard "no resource" challenges and suchlike.

I've never seen anything like this before. It is pretty interesting, too, although I'm not sure most people want others to "save" their fortresses, only to let someone else power through the Fun! parts. On another note, this particular fort sounds like it needs a little more than your standard share of forced resuscitation... 

[Joben]

lol yes this is a bit of a mess. Something like 1/3 of the inhabitants are Miserable, theres no food, no booze, no animals except one pet dog iirc, and no military personel or gear to speak of. A couple ghosts floating around, and about 6 beds for 100+ dwarves.

One of the few thing it has going for it is a drawbridge airlock on the entrance, and a half dozen cage traps.

[malimbar04]

One of the few thing it has going for it is a drawbridge airlock on the entrance, and a half dozen cage traps.

careful there - one of those bridges aren't raised, and I'm pretty sure there is no lever attached to either.

<snip>

And murder, don't forget the murder.

Something interesting which struck me through multiple replays is that it's usually the same group of dwarves who tend to survive.  It makes me wonder if perhaps the tantrum spiral weeds out everybody with weak personalities, who succumb to stress easily.  Is the average mental fortitude of the fortress increased after such a harrowing?

The random variable though is with the murders.  It's the murders that really make it spiral out of control, but they are simply the accidental results of the constant fistfights which are breaking out all over the place.  I think it's the fistfights, more than anything else, which is the primary "Contagion" of this insanity, since attacked people are often injured and unhappy, and the fort has no thread to suture wounds.  If you could just stop angry dwarves from hurting innocents, then I think it should be possible to wrap up the spiral with over 100 dwarfs left.

How would one go about protecting the innocent dwarves from the violence of tantrums?

murder... it hasn't been that huge of an issue for me. At least not intentional murder - only accidents happening during a tantrum, accidental starvation, and a few to strange moods.

The lack of thread is a problem, though I didn't honestly take care of any of the wounded anyways.

As for the personalities - there is definitely something to that. There is also the whole network-mesh not going through the whole fort. Not everyone is friends with everyone, so when a few die, not all of the fort is affected. Some of the dwarves were actually pretty fine all things considered.

For 100 dwarves left standing... without migrants bumping that up, I don't see it happening. You could minimize spirals if you quarantine i think, but there just isn't enough resources to keep any of them Happy that I see.

Maybe... if we dig deeper? Then we could hypothetically find valuable materials that all dwarves will love, and make higher valuable rooms/items for them to enjoy.

[Helgoland]

Couldn't you just atomsmash all the miserables? Missing dwarves don't get unhappy thoughts... or cause them, for that matter.

[Maur]

I took a look at the save. That's not a fortress. That a hastily dug hole in the earth packed with miserable dwarves.