Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

Mishrak

1 (33.3%)

Flabort

2 (66.7%)

HavingPhun

0 (0%)

Gigaz

0 (0%)

Total Members Voted: 3

[Ruhn]

I'm just short of 3 hours in on mine.  It's a little tricky finding more than 30 or 40 mins of time to plop down during the week.  It's progressing well, although I forgot to actually cook food and my dwarves were starving despite having 150 livestock, woops.  So I fixed that but lets see how we do.  First year is coming to a close.  I should be able to get a lot hammered out over the weekend (which I have no choice because monday is the 11th!)

Yeah for real, I'm gonna have to sink some hours in tonight and tomorrow.

[HavingPhun]

   I am just going to post little updates and then a full write up that kindof summarizes it. I wish I would have taken notes along the way. Kept more track of dwarfs so I could do it from ones point of view. I still might. My fps is lower than usual. Probably since I raised the max number of sites and the max popultation higher than default.

   A 1 eyed giant kaola arrived. Beware its webs! I was going to throw my decent military at it but then it killed my outpost liason and half of the caravan. A swordsmen with the caravan killed it but they left with fear. Kept a bunch of things outside. I would grab them but I don't want to keep my fort open for undead assualt.

   I dug out 72 new bedrooms. Now they need to be smoothed and furnished. Also built a huge throne room off to the side. I'm not going to get a king but I did it for fun. Probably not smoothing that. have 8 out of 10 full sets of iron armor forged. Ill have two squads of five. 1 as melee and one as ranged. 3 dwarfs have died of failed moods. All of them so far have not gone berserk luckily.

   5+ undead eagles have come in and pestered my masons building walls outside. No one got hurt except some bruised muscles and a bruised liver. I got all the migrant waves safely inside. I think thats it.

[flabort]

OK, so I finally finished. This fortress is my submission, by the way. I didn't have to abandon, and my fort failed to crumble to it's end. Total time is ~10 hours, give or take 5 or so minutes. All my previous journals are here, plus a new one. You finally get pics of my picks, and I get to brag that I survived.

Spoiler: Day One (click to show/hide)

900 PM, March 1st
Seems the Moist Oceans cover most of this world. Lots of little islands and fjords and bays. Couldn't find a place where the ocean itself was terrifying, but I did find a terrifying haunted embark intescting the ocean. Bah, not nearly as hard as I was looking for, but OK. Going with an old fashioned 6x6 size embark space, with 26/36 tiles being ocean. The Forest of Slime, a haunted Taiga, is the other biome, taking up the remaining 10 tiles.

Blah, blah, blah, warnings about large areas, salt water, and aquifiers. Embark. Bring lots of food, lots of wood, lots of drink, and 7 picks.

Great, the whole of the ocean here is frozen. Unexpected, but useful. Everone mines, let's get under the ocean, ASAP.

915
And... it would seem once you dig some stairs through ice, when they meet the ground they don't continue. Groan... fortunately, a quick check reveals only albatrosses and crabs currently inhabit the map.

Enough space dug to build mason's shop. mason no longer mining. Need doors, ASAP, incase this ocean ever thaws.

Carpenter off mining, starting to make stockpiles for everything. Wood and food, mostly. Furniture, too.

930
3 quantum stockpiles set up. Setting the carpenter back to hauling and mining.

YES! The dwarves brought in the anvil. I could care less about the bags of sand. Umm... why did I embark with 80+ bags sand again?

Raven corpses on map. sigh.

Yay for water buffalos!  9 dead ravens dead again.

940
Of course, there's the reanimation thing. "The partial raven skeleton slams into an obstacle!" And "This is a raven corpse skeleton". Today I also discover that pudding stone looks like a bed in a wall.

950
Wagon forbidden to prevent more hauling. Turtling now. I think my mason is a lost cause, he's trapped outside.
 
1000
A very thirsty and unhappy dwarf streaks through recently unlocked doors, weilding a recently unforbidden axe obtained from the wagon. Cerol wipes sweat off his brow, and locks the series of 16 doors behind himself.

1008
Summer arives. My food and drink industry starts. I strike bloodstone (the green/speckled rock, not anything bleeding). The only two undead remaining are one of my water buffalos (the bull, not the cow), and a crab. The wb cow and sea otters killed all the others.

1015
3 dwarves take breaks. Two are asleep. The ocean melts, finally, taking the dead bull under. Seems an 8x2 hall full of doors CAN keep out an ocean.

1020
Another wave of raven corpses arives. Too bad there's no sign of any entrance to the dwarven halls, haha!

1025
I knew I forgot about something. Migrants arive. Darn. Where will I put them, how will I get them into the fortress? Or will I let them all die? Two fisherdwarves, a dyer, and a carpenter. NONE of which are useful except as maybe more planters/harvesters/haulers. IF I can get them inside.

I reclaim the wagon, and set up a carpenter's shop outside. unsuspend it once or twice, and deconstruct the wagon. A corkscrew and a pipe section later, and I enable mechanics.

1030
Save for the night. Time spent so far: 1 hour 30 minutes.

Spoiler: Day 2 (click to show/hide)

1240 "PM", March 2nd
I use my last wagon log to make a wooden training axe. Duh. Should have known that would work.

The remaining water bufalo, who is still on the surface, is surounded on all sides, N, NE, E, SE, S, SW, W, and NW, as well as the tile it's in, by raven corpses. BRAINS.

1250
These eyballs are starting to creep me out. FPS at 70, or thereabouts. the dead buffalo hauled himself out of the ocean.

OK, I'm giving up on the migrants. Back below ground.

1254
Ocean freezes. I guess the migrants can spend whatever time they have hauling corpses and refuse to the middle of the sea.

100 PM
Carpenter migrant dead. 3/4 dead, infact.

105
Autumn arives. I'm trying to figure out a way pastthe aquifiers.

110
I get an anouncement that the last migrant has been missing for a week. I also run out of wood below ground.

120
Don't want to admit it, but I dug through theice again to collect some wood from up top. Now my dorfs are running around like idiots from harmless zombie crabs. And oh, there's one less of them.

That's it. Making sure the remaining 5 are all inside. Yes. Locking the doors.

More migrants, instantly attacked. No point in saving them.

135
All the dorfs are upset. I must build slabs and dining rooms to apease them.

140
No! Don't go on break! we need all the dorf power we can get!

And now ghosts and a caravan. Hopefully the liason just leaves. Go. Now.

Melancoly takes it's first victim. My brewer.

145
Winter arives.

155
A miner was found dehydrated. I guess he was the insane one. Hope they move the body to the stockpile for such things before he reanimates.
And my expidition leader is tantruming.

200
Save and quit. Let's take some time to recover our morale before continuing. Time spent so far: 2 hours 50 minutes.

Spoiler: Day 3 (click to show/hide)

1035 AM March 3rd
The dorfs don't seem to want to do any work. They just keep rearanging the quantum food pile. And the farmer wants to attend a meeting with the mason.

The ghost was put to rest, slabs do work. Meanwhile, the farmer's mood has gone up to "fine", but he still wants that meeting. FPS at 65 and holding.

1050
Taking the beds out of the dormitory and giving each dorf his own room. In an effort to improve moods. Also, thiefs are stealing stuff from dead migrants, like steel crossbows, iron bolts, and llama wool quivers.

1055
Spring has arived, I survived a whole year. In just over 3 hours. The dining room and seperate bedrooms seems to have worked. Just to be on the safe side, though, I am making a statue garden.

1100
I still have a ghost in my fort. Darn, more slabs need doing. And I've run out of barrels to brew drinks in. I'll be making pots later, but I don't have the dorfpower to yet.

1105
Ghost put to rest. My first 3x3 memorial hall is full, the second is started. No statues made for the garden yet, lazy mason.

1111
Migrants. I may or may not be able to get them inside this time. Yes, flee from the crabs. Get to the burrow.

AH! I forgot about the water buffalo waiting at the doors. Locked again.

1117-19 phone call, from dad. Brother's surgery is going well, they're removing his apendix.

1120
Enough ranger migrants to form a marksdorf squad. They're cleaning up, sort of. And the other 21 migrants are hauling the bodies to the sea. Yay?!

1127
What does light blue on the wounds screen mean? The dead water buffalo is showing that on it's upper spine.

1130
All the undead are out of my doors, trying to clear the dropped armors and stuff out to close them again.

1135
Most of the migrants were saved this time around. I got them through the doors. I've locked them again, knowing there's still at least one soul out there, but the raven corpses were closer then he.

1140
A dorf just threw a door across the room to be my statue garden. She's tantruming, alright. And recently lost a sibling, yikes. That's what I'm hoping doesn't happen to me...

1147
Elves arive to trade. Yeah, you and what dorfs? There's a single dorf (that I know of) up top, able to do anything of the sort. I don't even have a depot. And the guy's being chased by raven skeletons.

Also? A kobold ambush shows up. Good thing I'm under the ocean.

1150
Oh, did I mention the elves brought horses, and a giant eagle? Yeah, I hope they stay put, where they are, on the ocean, so that SOMETHING doesn't reanimate when it dies. Wait, too late. They're being chased to shore now. RUN, FOREST LOVER, RUN!

1157
It is now summer. The elves are dead, but the caged animals seem to be imune to undead attacks.

1200
Saving. There are lots and lots, of blinky red down arrows. A lot of those dorfs had families that were slaughtered above trying to get the rest below ground. Now I need wood again. Time to look for the caverns?

Spoiler: Day 4 (click to show/hide)

Thoughts: I need to make an entryway that can be accessed during all seasons, but that is safe to go through. Also, that is not safe for invaders to go through. I'm thinking a Grinder. I saw a very efficient minecart design that I think I have an improvement on (maybe). If the original design fit a minecart into 1/4 of the tiles, I think I can put one in 1/3 of them. Of course, I need either wood or coal to do so. Metal is no problem, this haunted biome is just chock full of iron and copper. The fuel to make it is... nonexistent, it seems.
For interests note, it's at this point, at 715 PM, march 4th, that I've looked up Trap Design on the wiki. At 735, I have absorbed the information on the page.

740 PM, March 4th
Load game, try to remember what I was doing. Oh, yeah. Either going up or going down. Well, I don't think I can impliment my design yet, so down it is. There's a thin gap between the two aquifiers, so I have a tunnel through it. I designate some stairs to send a miner down to find the caverns, and hope that the passive reanimation doesn't reach down there. Sonic the Hedgehog, in his game Adventure 2:Battle, summed it up nicely in the first level with "Guess what lies ahead, only one way to find out."

742
The merchants will be leaving soon. What merchants? *sees one surviving elf* Oh. Uh oh. Well, he's being mobbed anyways. No problem.

745
He's "embarked". Too bad he's a bit too unconsious to actually go anywhere. To report the death of his fellows to anyone. A "Fisherdwarf" is mining my tunnels to find the caverns, finding lots of various rocks and-

748
You have discovered an expansive cavern deep underground. Too bad revealing it didn't create any anouncements of finding fuel! Time to dig a tree farm.

755
No signs of cavern life yet, but the oceans thawed, dumping 50+ corpses and body parts into the sea. Surprisingly still in the patterns they had while they were stockpiled. Easy to seal off the stairs where they breached the caverns, and spores have already drifted up, so I should expect trees, soon. The fisherdwarf became a miner, yippee!

Considering the death around here, how is my leader still only a dabbling consoler?

800
expanding my mason and crafts workshops. Making stone stockpiles, too. Population at 19, FPS at ~70.

Aparently the thawing of the oceans caused some undead to fall and die. Not the flying ones, but the ones at my gates for sure.

... I have some names showing up as memorialized, but no slabs engraved. I didn't bury them, so what's up? The names seem elvish, perhaps their civ found out somehow anyways and memorialized them.

811
I see fuel! Near the north edge of the shore, there's some lignite. Aditionally, some migrants arive. At the south edge. On an islet. Surounded by mist, with no way to the submerged fort. Flying zombies are closing in. Seems to be a single farmer, that's it. Her husband came here in the last migrant wave, and died a swordsdorf with no sword.

816
Wait, I was mistaken. There he is, it's not a 1 dorf wave. I was thinking of a different peasent. Let the hauling job cancellation spam begin! (wood stockpile on the shore, lots of trees marked cut down, spare training axes up top)

821
Kill the left hand! Escape the edge of the map! Dead migrant, dead migrant, dead migrant. Darn. 1 dead, 2 dead, famer dead, ranger dead.

825
One of the dorfs that arived, a potter, killed a raven, before even claiming his axe. And he's a competent axedorf. Yay?

Also, I found Konvudthar Enorrodum, Konvudthar Enorrodum's corpse. I believe this is what happens when a water buffalo has died twice or more and comes back again.

833
There are orcas on my map. "KILLER" whales. Please don't die and reanimate. Found another ghost in the halls. Missed the start of a mood, but I see it clearly now. A farmer, claimed a crafts shop. claimed one stone and started.

840
I have a bauxite earing. In a haunted area where I couldn't trade it away even if I artifacts could be.

842 Game momentarily froze. My best guess, the ocean froze. Yup. If any mirgrants from this wave had survived, they'd be getting in about now.

Also, the reason my tree farms weren't being built fast enough is my miners thought they were also haulers. Wrong.

845
Kobold ambush. Meh. And another. Hmm.

850
Get those rocks and gems out of my tree farm! Also, still no cavern life on the 'U' tab. I can't be that lucky... Somehow I missed summer and autumn ariving, too. It's almost winter.

900
Don't know why it didn't show up before, but profane mist has arived on the map. Wonder what it does? It dissapeared at the biome's edge, but then another immediately popped up. Doesn't do anything to the undead, and leaves nothing behind. So...? FPS was at 80 when I glanced at it, and it immediately dropped to 70, as if to say, "Oh, silly me, I'm only supposed to boil when you're NOT watching the pot". Then went to 65 for good measure.

My cat is clawing my legs. And purring.

I've run out of plump helmet spawn. Probly the large farm's fault. Cat's on the keyboard.

910
How long have I played so far? Including wiki time. 6 hours... 40 minutes. Also, finding wonderful lignite everywhere now, even in my bedrooms. Do'h.

912
Bituminous coal, finally.

913- 916
break to feed kitty cat. Grab myself some juice, too. Obviously forgot to pause, as I spy migrants with my little eye. They are instantly set upon by the last wave and a ghost. The ghost doesn't hurt them, though.

927
I spot a rabbit trailing it's guts behind it. 2 tiles of ~, that move when it does and don't show up on the loo'k' screen. Bleck, undead are gross.

Still only have 5 beds, for 19 dorfs. Plus the migrants battling undead with training axes up above. But they could make beds if they weren't spamming my anouncements. The ones down here can't.

931
A migrant jeweler becomes possesed. Fun. With a capital F, because I don't even have a workshop for him below, not to mention above. Possesion, though, so no worry. I'd have lost him anyways.

I have enough statues, already! Stop the production!
Oh, and the garden is complete.

935
Kobold ambush. yawn. These ones engaged some undead. Oh, and another ambush. And a dorfen caravan. Agh, I wish, I wish, I wish I had a depot.

Jeweler cancels strange mood: dead.

More kobolds. And another ambush. These ones brought cross bows, impressive. But a dead leader means they ran off again.

AHH! Run away from the rabbit gaurding the axe! it's guts are spilling out, it must be dangerous![/sarcasm]

940
time to set up space for forges, I think I have enough lignite. For now. I go to find a dorf who's throwing a tantrum, but he aparently died. must've been a migrant. Four still out there.

Found more lignite while mining the forge space. Yay! Fuel abounds, just not vertically. Still no cavern life? Well, I'm still not unsealing that cap. Some trees in the farm are mature enough to cut now. YAY!

The earing made earlier? it's creator is now making masterwork pots. Good.

950
I struck gold. In pursuit of coal. Save and quit. Time spent total: 7 hours, 20 minutes. Time remaining: 2 hours, 40 minutes.

Spoiler: Day 5 (click to show/hide)

 825 PM, March 8
After a couple days without access to my computer (but full of profitable overtime pay), I resume. I check on the slab industry, and there's still slabs to engrave. Darn.

I get a reminder that there's a migrant or two still on the surface when one's woodcutting is interupted by a rotting albatross. Yeah, basically only flying zombies here. And once I started looking, rediculous amounts of coal and iron.

833
A migrant Ranger throws a tantrum. And goes to sleep. At the same time. Fitful night? :p I also designate stockpiles for fuel/metal, raw fuel, and metal ores. Most dorfs instantly start hauling.

Those merchants leave after not helping with the undead problem. One migrant comes across a whole lot of bodies. Probably attacked him. The reports say he's hammering corpses to redeath with the pommel of the training axe he's using.

843
Another ghost put to rest. whew. wonder how many are left unslabbed? Obviously the topside is migrant free again, as the Ranger has been missing a week. Reports say he took a punch in the head that tore through the brain.

846
The dorf I'm trying to get to work the metalworks is sleeping. His thoughts say he "slept in the grass recently", which, since there is no way to the surface, I assume means "slept in cave moss".

Also, a farmer was possessed. No, wait. Gave birth to a girl. Huh, was I ever wrong.

And now the smith is harvesting plants!

Oh, well, I struck brimstone. Which I assume I can't make into fuel. Despite how well sulphur burns.

851
After activating architecture, he's now making the forges. Now I need a mason. Who shows up really, really promptly.

I need fuel to make fuel, which means I need wood. The tree farm is working well, but no-one will chop. So I check, and no-one's assigned to. Do'h, that explains all. So I set a dorf to do it.

858 - 904 Go out to help clean up some. Leave game paused.

905
Set some charcoal to be made. Tree farm no longer has any trees in it, just sapplings. So... success?

907
Get sick of dorfs going on break. Don't do anything about it.

910
Charcoal made. I expect to be making coke soon.

Yup. The option just became avalible.

Also, another ghost apears. I don't think the elves and kobolds will rise as ghosts, but I start engraving slabs for them, too, just in case. Wait, kobolds?

Yup. One kobold on the dead/missing screen is named Tluprursnus, Kobold Master Thief. "Tlusprursnus (Engrave Memorial)" is an option at the crafts shop.

917-919
Quick pause to grab sour cream for my dad. Supper is almost ready.

923
Enough coke to make metals?... yup. Let's get that iron production up. Since my med dorf isn't doing anything useful except hauling right now, he can help at the furnaces.

Spring arives. FPS at 75, on average. So I made it through two years so far, I guess?

The first set of iron bars is complete. Whoohoo! Let's make some mine carts and stuff.

927 - 932
Go get food. Dad's inspired by Chef Ramse's Kitchen Nightmares, meaning all the food is fresh and wholesome. Not a mess. :p

Another dorf gives birth. The child aparently worships four gods, one of which created a werewombat. Cool.

935
I can hear a Ramse Blow-Up from the living room. Resteraunt owner sliding back. Meanwhile, farmers and brewers overproducing. Just like the owner of that "most expensive place in town!! "

938
"Some migrants have arrived, despite the danger". Wow, it recognized that this place is stupid dangerous for migrants. Maybe the fact that there's 53 undead tipped it off?

943
I get a mood. In a migrant. Near no workshops, as they don't get them.

I spot the rabbit again. The one trailing it's guts? Yeah. Still "alive". Undead are scaring haulers into dropping the bodies their carrying before they get to shore, so they will continue to reanimate, but the hunters with the wave are still succesfully getting undead dead enough to push them back to the ocean somewhat.

The snow melts. Ocean still frozen, but for how long?

950
I choke on a piece of potato. I designate some new private dining rooms.

955 I pretty up the public dining hall with more tables and nice statues.

1000
Odds are they won't go to use, but I make some jewlers workshops. Also, now that I have wood, I set some beds to be made.

I finally get a short break in job interuption spam from the migrants. They're still spamming away, but I got a break. Also, there are 67 undead now. Averaging 70 FPS.

1007-1010
Flabort Cancels overseer: interupted by dingo.

Or, pet dog where it doesn't belong. JRTs may as well be dingoes as far as I'm concerned.

After getting him out of my room, I resume. FPS dips down to 58.

1013
Father insists I check facebook, so I log on. I say hello to my mom, who's at the hospital with my brother while he recovers from surgery.

1021
Elves arive with a caravan. Hah!

Uh... Did that waterbuffalo corpse just SHOOT a crab with snow?

1026
It's like a movie. Magical elves vs. the undead. Look, they're even leaving a trail of red and green on the ice behind them.

I run out of platinum nuggets to smelt. At least, of the ones I mined. I smelted them, mostly just for fun.

Summer arives. Another ghost is laid to rest. For some reason, the thought "ponies" drifts across my brain. Ugh, that show is dangerously addicting, I hate that I've started enjoying it.

Why must it be so horrible, and so good at the same time?

Well, I guess that fits the profile of the DF community. Awesome game, horrible minds that seek to weaponize everything.

1034 another ghost put to rest. It's been over two hours, let's keep a close eye on how long I have left. Minus the 15 minutes time spent elsewhere, I've spent 1 hour 50 minutes, leaving 50 minutes left to play. 

1037
Ocean melts. The one elf merchant left was not on it at the time. There was a rediculous number of donkey teeth and undead at the time, though.

This causes many of my coal hunts to be interupted with Damp Stone anouncements, though. Mining just under the shore, after all. FPS averaging 55 at the moment.

1044
Cat decides to eat a piece of bacon I dropped during supper. She's so cute. Also, another ghost shows up. I just can't keep up with these migrants. *sigh*

And another ghost a few seconds later.

I have over 500 drink for 21 dorfs. over 200 plants, 100 seeds, and very little other food.

1050
More migrants. Despite the danger, again. 35 minutes left. Don't think the migrants will stand up to 75 undead.

Finally have beds to start making more bedrooms. Starting with a dormitory.

Darn, a couple doctors in that wave. Well, too bad. I've never needed doctors before. Don't need 'em now.

1100
Dormitory dug. Beds being made. Cat knocking leg off my shelf. I swear I already fed her and.. get off the keyboard.

Hmm. A surgeon is drowning, one from the migrant wave. Also, I only have 25 minutes left. I have my miners having fun on a giant patch of soil to train as many as possible into legends. I mean giant, as I'm expanding my tree farm to triple size, though I won't have time to harvest anything else. 79 undead, FPS in the lower 40s.

1105
Dormitory is made. No more sleeping on moss for these dorfs. Unless they want to.

One of the 'blobs' of unmined stone created by miner-pathfinding-AI looks like italy. Meaning like a boot. Huh.

1012
Ocean freezes. Undead pop drops to 60. FPS rises to low 60s.

1015
Apparently caged animals cast in ice still show up in the 'U'nits menu. And can be zoomed to, and while they don't seem to be where they nessesarily were when they froze, zooming to them consistently puts you in the same spots. 10 minutes left.

I... have no idea what to make with all my iron. If I had time to retake the surface, I'd make ludicrous amounts of armor and weapons. But..

1120
Save and quit. I have 5 minutes "left" in my challenge. Time to submit! I'm really happy with the number of dorfs that survived, and how much I managed to do with them. While a more experienced player would have done much better, I'm quite satisfied with my first succesful fortress in an evil biome.

Spoiler: Summary and Pictures (click to show/hide)

Why did I leave 5 minutes? To take pictures, of course!

So, you'll probably wonder what the wagon deployment site looks like now. Just a pile of unused goods and a carpenters shop:

Just down the ramp we have where I dug through the ice during those first cold days. And a pile of wood, provided by several migrant waves of futility. I never got to use that wood.

So a few Zs directly down from there, we have my main entrance. On the south edge of the hall we have my quantum stockpiles and the statue garden. On the north, we have my workshops. 3 stills, 2 kitchens, a carpenters', 6 crafts, and 5 masons shops. You can see 2 rooms filled with slabs, and a third to the north. To the north was also my coal mine.

I needed this next space very early on: My farms. And my tree farm is visible here, too.

In order to get the tree farm working, I dug all the ramps displayed here to pierce the aquifier. I later realized that this was one of the places I'd struck fuel, so you can see more is dug out there.
Once I got under the aquifiers, I just dug down till I found this space. I had it walled in pretty quickly, I think. Though still no creatures are showing up in the Units list from the caverns.

Just in case, I had this space ready. Refuse and corpse stockpiles, which barely got used. The gem workshops on the left never got built, just designated.

Another view of said workshops, we can see my forge area to the left. All the workshops are cluttered with coke, and that pile has 8 bars of iron, and the rest are all coke.

Most of the materials to make it came from this area, under the northmost coast. A lignite vein crosses a bitumous coal vein here. Nothing much left to say about this picture.

Until I got wood in my last year, I only had five beds. For 21 dorfs. Here we can see the space I dug for them, and where they resided ever since first being put there.

But dorfs cannot sleep on just 5 beds. So when I finally could, I made this dormitory and started making more bedrooms, here.

At least every dorf had his or her own dining room, and I had a Great dining hall in the middle here.

Finally, I mentioned that I was expanding the tree farm. Here's a picture of the italy boot blob.

And just because I like it, a picture from a totally different fortress of mine. With a dorf in the middle.


Over my entire fort, I got no forgotten beasts or titans, killed possibly hundreds of migrants, only had 2 births, and made it through 2 and 1/4 years. You may have trouble pathfinding if you abandon and come in with an adventurer. Well, any confusion is caused by my extremely odd ramp use, which I made when I feared I might accidently mine through the aquifier and flood the place. I was going to pump out the ocean, but never had time for that, so I still have the unbuilt parts for several pumps. 

Edit: My save.

[Thatdude]

Well, looks like you beat my death rate Flabort. Not that hard considering where you embarked but the fort does look impressive all things considered. I especially like the dwarf face. Was that done by digging down stairs above the revealed squares?

[flabort]

Yeah, but just a reminder, that IS a different fort, just put the picture there for lulz.
And yes, it is down stairs above the tiles.

Let's see what ratio our deaths were at. 67 dorf deaths and 132 total to... mine was 77 dorfs dead, 337 total dead.
1:1.149 dorf deaths, 1:2.553 total deaths, and 1:4.000 other deaths. 
No, really, counting the deaths that weren't dorfs, I have exactly 4 times as many as you.
I'm impressed that you made an above ground fort, though. It looks fairly nice (and yellow. I didn't check, but was that orthoclase, gold, or some bright wood?).

[HavingPhun]

I finished my 10 hours. I breached hell in the end. My vampire bookeeper was locked up in the first place, he lived. I had some migrants outside that I never let in. Some of them were slaughtered by a kobold ambush. I'll work on a write up tommorow. I will try to upload the save with my dial up. Since thats all I have right now. Can I put it in a zip file? To save a few mbs. Ill also recheck to see how my fps was and upload some pictures. What should I upload them too? tinypic or something? I don't know if I will win anything but it was really fun anyways. My civilian dwarfs killed around 10 demons. My undertrained military killed 2. Ill post again later tomorow.

[flabort]

I don't think it's possible to upload a save any other way then zipped. Or 7z'd (7-zipped), Rar'd, or otherwise compressed. If it is, then color me surprised.
I used photobucket for my pics. If that means you need to sign up, go ahead, and you may need to sign up for DFFD as well, and oh, my save took overnight to upload on a good internet, so it may be rather slow, ESPECIALLY on dial up. Man, it's been so long since I was stuck with dial up trying to load flash games.

[HavingPhun]

I don't think it's possible to upload a save any other way then zipped. Or 7z'd (7-zipped), Rar'd, or otherwise compressed. If it is, then color me surprised.
I used photobucket for my pics. If that means you need to sign up, go ahead, and you may need to sign up for DFFD as well, and oh, my save took overnight to upload on a good internet, so it may be rather slow, ESPECIALLY on dial up. Man, it's been so long since I was stuck with dial up trying to load flash games.

Its 23mb in a zip file. rars seem to work better so i will use those. That will only take a few hours. Its the only internet I can get here except crappy satelite internet. With limited usage that costs alot.

[RockBiterSon]

Well, I'm done. I'm not going to upload a save though: I disqualified myself by going over time. Also there were other issues...
Still, I'll tell you all about the fort.

First I genned a new world:
World Size: smaller
History: short
Number of Civilizations: med
Number of Sites: med
Number of Beasts: med
Natural Savagery: high
Mineral Occurance: sparse

The world's name is Oruborid, the mortified continent, year 125, it is the age of the Dragon and Brush Titan.

At embark I took 4 copper picks, 3 copper battle-axes, three dogs, and three cats (one male and two female each) and the basic default stuff with a wider variety of starting food.
My starting seven were pretty underwhelming attribute wise.
I gave them novice skill in the following:
Miner
Woodcutter x 2
Cook/diagnostician/surgeon/suturer (but he was really not suited to the doctoring job)
Miner/Grower
Grower/Ambusher
Miner/Brewer

Strike the Earth!!

Fort name is Atiroslan, Dyewind.
fps cap at 100
First of all, I dug a 9-tile wide entrance hallway. I was intending to have a epic hallway of traps with 3-tile wide path for the trade caravans to pass through, for now I put a bunch of temporary workshops and stockpiles there. They never did get moved.
An hour and four minutes into play I opened Dwarf Therapist for the first time. Damn, I couldn't resist.
-farms added to the side of the hallway. Tunnel to a pool built for well. Working on a screw pump.
-two migrants arrive. First time I've gotten migrants this early I think.

-I take a break. At this point I've been playing for an hour and ten minutes. fps is steady at 100.

Now something pretty interesting happens.
-First of all Dwarven merchants. I trade excess food, wood, and some empty barrels for leather.
-At the same time a group of wild boars and sows appear on the edge of the map. I send out the military (unequiped and unarmoured, really civilians that I'd just picked) I now have plenty of leather. You guys won't be fighting unarmoured for long.
-ezum Oslandeg, a hunter, claims a leatherworker's shop. I was just about to start making leather armour and a legendary leatherworker is on his way. Perfect. My plans are comming together. Too well.
-ezum needs hides and gems. Or "shine, colour" something like that, which I think is gems. I don't check the wiki.
-Good a time as any to start digging down, as I had planned to do anyway. By the way this site has deep metal and flux, but no shallow metal.
-I realize that I'd just tanned all the hides and ezum probably needs a raw hide. Luckily, those hides walk onto the battlefie- I mean, my front lawn in the form of some wild Yaks.
-I send forth the brave sons of Atiroslan to do battle again, You'll be fighting without armour for the last time, I promise!
-Unbeknownst to me at the time. My promise to the dwarves would be fulfilled for at least one of them...
-Medtob Bubnuskubuk catches up to one of the Yaks and... well, it's not pretty. His nose is crushed, his leg is damaged and so is his lower spine. I call off the chase.
-The Atiroslan First National Hospital is hastily designated (a bed in the middle of the common sleeping area.)
-I wait for the dwarves to haul poor Medtob in, who had been chasing the Yak for some time and was allready Starving and Dehydrated.
-I wait some more.
-I open up DT and designate a couple of peasants as a professional body-haulers.
-I've more or less written off Medtob now, oh wait, someone is hauling him back. Good.
-Meanwhile exploratory mining hasn't uncovered much.
-Right on cue, as if he'd just heard of the failure of the expedition as Medtob was being dragged in, ezum goes mad. He savagely beats a nearby war dog, the military swarms around him and starts pummelling him. He is quickly dispatched. This really is the last time they will fight without armour. But my dreams of masterwork leather armour are dispatched as well.
-Medtob eventually heals up and is able to return to work. He won't be chasing wildlife anytime soon though.
-I strike gold! Several veins of it. I start digging it out, but don't start smelting it yet.
-23 migrants arrive. Probably the most I've ever gotten at a time, especially this early in the game. I haven't done or made anything valuable yet. huh. Well, I'm glad to have them, some of them aren't absolutely dismal in attributes even if their not skilled yet.
-The elves arrive and bring over twenty bins of cloth. I buy none of it. I imagine the disapointed look on that silly long ears' face.

I take another break. fps at about 70, though I checked it while the elves were still on the map. There are only 3 hours and thirteen hours left, and I hadn't done anything yet. My room-mate suggests a mega-project. I'm going to have to do something big in order to impress all the experienced forumites in the challenge. Not that I'm expecting to beat an underwater fort, or 64 solid gold rooms, but I wanted to put in a good showing. And I've got all this gold just lying about. So begins the tragedy of Atiroslan. Not a tragedy written in blood, but in fail.

The final push. And the disapointment.

-I spend some time thinking of what to do. I'm going to count time spent planning.
-First of all I open up Dwarf Therapist to reasign labours. I want dwarves building, not hauling or making cheese. Big mistake, I spend way too much time fiddling with hauling labours.
-I set aside some dwarves to work on leather armour, and some more to lay traps. I don't want my project to be delayed by goblins. Of course the time I take to do this ends up being wasted, as they don't come, but whatever.
-Design time... I'm going to need some graph paper.
-Done with design. Designating.
 
At this point, disaster strikes!
Windows has found an error and is closing the application. The program is not responding.
NOOOOOOOOOO!!!

An hour and a half's worth of work lost.

[RockBiterSon]

Well, I went on to complete the project. It was a modest project at best, but even after the crash, and after ignoring the time limit, it failed to live up to expectations. I mentioned flux right? Well it's limestone. White. Gold is yellow. I just threw my two most valuable materials together without thinking about the aesthetics. Yellow on White. You can't really make out anything. Plus there were rocks and some yellow sassparite laying on top of it, so you couldn't tell what it was if I did submit it just then. So even though I got the important stuff layed out before hitting the time limit, it looked horrible. By time limit, I mean I started from the last save, got myself to about where I was before the crash (though with less time having passed in-game since I allready had thought everything out once. At this point I'd allready considered myself disqualified and just wanted to see if I could complete it on time.) and then started counting time normally. I ran out of time before my dwarves could finish hauling stone off of the site, or finish smoothing it. So I decided to engrave the area around the design to make the design itself stand out more. Since I'm allready out, might as well go all the way. I'll edit this post with pics once I'm done.

On a brighter note, I did intend to dig further and deeper than I usually do, and I reached my first cavern!

[hermes]

Guess I should add my name to the list of self disqualifications, reason being (aside from breaking the rules) I don't have internet access on computer and even if I did I couldn't finish by the end of today.  Was good fun though, will continue my fort in my own time, and I've enjoyed reading the other reports.  Just have to choose who to vote for!

[Mishrak]

I'm about 7.5 hours in and should wrap things up tonight.  I really just need to let it run unpaused for that time and get my population up and get some exports up so I attract sieges of all types.  The writeup has a lot to be done, but I'll get it in tonight.  It may be in a rough draft form but I'll get it in.

[Mushroo]

I didn't get it done but good luck to those who did!

[Mishrak]

There's still time to finish.  Today is the last day.

[Ruhn]

It's going to be close for me also, only 7 hours complete so far and still in year 1 (of the 2nd fort )

Sorry to hear about the crash, RockBiterSon.  Seems they always happen at the worst times.

Hermes: we may allow late submissions for the runner-up award categories.  Let us know if you find a way to get save uploaded!