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[Hetairos]

Watching for awesome.

You did this with your first fort? I've lost count of all my forts, and still haven't managed to muster a real military (mostly because I only just figured out how to run a proper smithing method). After this fort reading, I'm planning to delve deeper with my 8 legendary weapon masters. Goblins got boring when Dumed defeated a vile force of darkness by launching a snatcher into the leader with his hammer.

I remember back when I was starting the fort I was amazed I could keep the dwarves fed. There were some booze shortages, though... And I still run into issues with dwarves not equipping things they should.

Good luck with your invasion. One thing I feel I should add is that clowns almost completely disregard armour. I've seen them chew through masterwork steel with ease, and if the demon is a blob, or anything else capable of only blunt attacks, its tremendous mass can and will smash a dwarf into the opposite side of the hallway with half of his bones broken. Blobs made of flimsy materials like ash murder everyone in close combat, but can be destroyed with 2-3 bolts. And everything is much less powerful if its legs are destroyed, making it fall over.

Also, have you considered moving this to the DF Community Games & Stories board?

Actually I did back when I started it, and I guess it could be a good idea, but I can't see a "move topic" option anywhere... could you help me?

If you are weaponizing mine-carts I suggest this DF thread from the paradox OT forums.  http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?390202-Dwarf-Fortress-Main-Thread/page223

Blue Emu did some real work on a mine-cart death machine. See the downside to loading things into a minecart is that it takes time, and you thus have to reload, whereas if you use a fluid like water (can't use magma cuz it is too dense) the mine-cart is loaded instantly. By using impulse ramps to accelerate the mine cart to its terminal velocity, and thus also the water inside of it, he was able to create a weapon that obliterates pretty much anything you put in front of it. It has a range of more than 60 tiles or so, IIRC. It also reloads incredibly quickly, and with the 5 or so barrels his version had it was capable of sustaining a virtually constant flow of water out of the barrel.

It is quite complicated, and takes a lot of resources and an infinite supply of water, but if you have enough water on hand I would strongly suggest you use it. 

It's impressive. And powerful. And very, very dwarfy.

However it's huge, complex and requires power. I need to be able to fit my new defences deep underground, and into a fort which was never intended to house anything like that. I also don't understand repeaters. I do have some water I can use, and I might try to design something running on impulse ramps alone, so the only problem would be resupplying water. Since I would only need to fire the cannon occasionally, reloading time isn't a huge issue.


I checked the world in Legends mode to get the long-awaited FB descriptions, and looked around with Legends Viewer. It seems the Legends mode isn't exactly reliable, unless that's because I messed up the past by running the fix/dead-units DFHack command. One thing I noticed was a bronze colossus destroying small clothes and bolts in Wirejade. By melting. Years after its death. And the fortress has never been visited by any bronze colossi.

A recurring topic in the engravings in the fort were a few creatures: the dragon Slakga Jadeglows the Warmth of Gold, two cheetahs - One Trammelappear and Tuco Singleflag, and a leopard called Slibtu Auburnpuzzling. The dragon killed 14 elves from the neighbouring civ, The Water of Youths, and was killed by one of them in 83. One attacked an elf in 33. Tuco and Slibtu haven't done anything besides dying of old age. Why do my dwarves regard this as a memorable event I have no idea. All are depicted settling in the Lavender Hills, the biome in which the fort is situated. I can understand that nothing else has ever happened there, but still...

Anyway, here are the beasts!



Radavi's killcount is broken and shows only 22 dwarves, whereas it caused the deaths of many more. The demise of the Captain of the Guard, Sakzul, is for example misattributed to a beast called Emxa. For the record, Radavi was killed by a tick devil called Fatesank the Skulls-Plagues of Dust.



If anyone wants to use them in the art contest thread, feel free to do it.

I regret to inform everyone there most likely will be no updates at least until mid-July, since I'll be abroad, and far away from DF. Just so you know the thread isn't dead. Huge thanks to everyone who posted here.

[Hommit]

And the single most important thing in this update is me finally figuring out how to properly stockpile worn out clothing thanks to a thread here. It's now all going to a special stockpile set to be a refuse pile with no types of actual refuse allowed. It's vanishing at a positively surprising rate. Selling it all to caravans was quite tedious. I used to give out hundreds of thousands ☼ of used garments. Now I have a chance of getting rid of all the totems and crafts that have accumulated over the course of the past few decades.

Hmm, somehow i can't make this to work. refuse pile, i tried all disabled, enabled clothing type, enabled goods/armor with or without quality types - still no-no. why? 

[Deepblade]

Do you still have some refuse enabled?

[Loud Whispers]

I believe that kicking through fortifications was discovered before by Loud Whispers in Silentthunders. Though in that case it was a creature flying over them after being shot with a crossbow bolt. It works the same way, I think.

Landborne crundle that got shot through a pillar of fortifications with many bolts. Probably wasn't the first case of it, but it still was funny as hell.

How many Dwarves are still alive there? It seems that in every update Dwarves have been casually bursting into flames. Can't be good for the health I imagine.

[Hommit]

Do you still have some refuse enabled?

tried both
they move there nothing or some corpses from siege

also from wiki:

Also note that if you allow bins to be used on your refuse pile, damaged clothing will be stored in it, allowing for more efficient use of your pile.

not! working. wtf?

[Hetairos]

How many Dwarves are still alive there? It seems that in every update Dwarves have been casually bursting into flames. Can't be good for the health I imagine.

As of 9th Granite, 158 there are 241 living dwarves in the fort. The population fell below 200 at its lowest point, and has been steadily rebuilding ever since. However, much time will pass before it reaches pre-Radavi levels.

And the single most important thing in this update is me finally figuring out how to properly stockpile worn out clothing thanks to a thread here. It's now all going to a special stockpile set to be a refuse pile with no types of actual refuse allowed. It's vanishing at a positively surprising rate. Selling it all to caravans was quite tedious. I used to give out hundreds of thousands ☼ of used garments. Now I have a chance of getting rid of all the totems and crafts that have accumulated over the course of the past few decades.

Hmm, somehow i can't make this to work. refuse pile, i tried all disabled, enabled clothing type, enabled goods/armor with or without quality types - still no-no. why? 

Because it's tricky as hell. You have to:
• enable armor, footwear, headwear, handwear and legwear under Finished Goods. Disable metal or dwarves may try hauling pieces of armour there.
• enable all non-armour clothing items under Armor. I'm not sure how does the Usable/Unusable setting work - leave both options on.
• enable Refuse, but forbid all kinds of it.

The fortress which once couldn't even bring all its worn out clothes to the trade depot now can barely see a pair of used pants in the hallway. I can provide screenshots of the stockpile settings in case my instructions aren't clear enough.


Between this post and the last one, at least 4 new FBs arrived. One spews deadly dust and forced me to lock away the entire third cavern level.

First giant eagle chicks hatched some time ago and the first batch has recently reached adulthood.

After a lot of number-crunching with pencil and paper (yes, I actually sketch out the bigger/more complex projects before I try to implement them) I have a rudimentary design of a powerless semi-automatic water-based railcannon, and possibly even a powered full-auto version. Provided everything works the way I think it does, of course. If the answer is "yes", it might even work with magma... It seems to good to be true, and it probably is, however only experiments will tell the truth. There is ‼science‼ to be done!

I renew my request for an explanation of how to change a thread's name and move it. Help a forum noob!

[Hommit]

• enable armor, footwear, headwear, handwear and legwear under Finished Goods. Disable metal or dwarves may try hauling pieces of armour there.
• enable all non-armour clothing items under Armor. I'm not sure how does the Usable/Unusable setting work - leave both options on.
• enable Refuse, but forbid all kinds of it.

hmmm...
at first, that didnt work
then i enabled all under armor, but disabled "metal" category. seems to work...

fake-edit: not really, there is still occasional not rotten clothing
maybe, it is required to have another pile to somehow take good items first?

edit2: enabling armor, footwear, etc under refuse does nothing, adding same under goods and armor still brings wrong items

[Loud Whispers]

I renew my request for an explanation of how to change a thread's name and move it. Help a forum noob!

Edit the original post's title to change the thread title of the entire thread, bottom left of the thread's page there is the option to move the topic.

[Melzer]

This is pretty interesting. I can't believe it's your first fort.

[Hetairos]

• enable armor, footwear, headwear, handwear and legwear under Finished Goods. Disable metal or dwarves may try hauling pieces of armour there.
• enable all non-armour clothing items under Armor. I'm not sure how does the Usable/Unusable setting work - leave both options on.
• enable Refuse, but forbid all kinds of it.

hmmm...
at first, that didnt work
then i enabled all under armor, but disabled "metal" category. seems to work...

fake-edit: not really, there is still occasional not rotten clothing
maybe, it is required to have another pile to somehow take good items first?

edit2: enabling armor, footwear, etc under refuse does nothing, adding same under goods and armor still brings wrong items

Oh, yeah. I never had any unused undamaged clothing lying around, it was all almost immediately claimed by dwarves, so that issue never was never my concern. Unfortunately, I don't know how to keep the dwarves from bringing good clothes there. At least I think they won't be destroyed or damaged.

I renew my request for an explanation of how to change a thread's name and move it. Help a forum noob!

Edit the original post's title to change the thread title of the entire thread, bottom left of the thread's page there is the option to move the topic.

Now that's an elusive button. Thank you very much!

This is pretty interesting. I can't believe it's your first fort.

To be honest, neither can I. I guess it would be more obvious if I showed its layout. It's basically a pile of random rectangles dug out whenever they were needed, and some larger architectural projects slapped on the top.

I also didn't expect this small remark to be such a sensation. All this happened more due to luck than anything else.


Not really an update, I'm just posting to show this is still going. There probably won't be anything bigger until August.

I now have 4 FBs stuck in the same place, blocked by trees and rocks in the second cavern layer. The first giant hornbill chicks have hatched. The designs for the sacrificial platform keep failing. I hope a 14 z-level fall on a weapon trap will work. The military is growing, and the commander of the Primitive Daggers is now called Atir Judgewalled the Craterous Meal of Trade. What is this intended to mean I have no clue. The dictionary doesn't even recognise the word "craterous" and suggests "adulterous" as the correct version.

After encountering and overcoming a few obstacles, I believe I am very close to getting the simple semi-automatic water railcannon to work. I managed to make it reload itself successfully once. The second try got the minecart stuck underwater. It's a good thing I had had enough foresight to install floodgates before. Earlier, the minecart had been caught in a loop with an impulse ramp pushing it in one direction and getting pushed back by a normal upward ramp, had flown into the air in a nice arc instead of rolling back to the start, and so on. The design still needs refinement, especially if I want to build a full-auto version.

Is an artifact buckler better than a normal shield?

EDIT:

Nominated! (and vote added)  Hetarios's Wirejade: An Uninvited Gust [SPOILERS] will be eligible to receive votes in August.

BY ARMOK'S BOOZE-SOAKED BEARD

HOLY CARP

Where is this going to end up next, on TVTropes? I swear I hadn't expected this kind of thing to happen when I was halfway through reading Hellcannon and thought "Damn, this game seems too much fun not to try. In the worst case, I'll just fail, right?".

[Grey_Wolf]

Dwarves....sealed off in the caverns...alone, scared, running for their lives, scavenging plump helmets...so Dorfy.

[Hetairos]

I hit a wall in my cannon research. Impulse ramps behave oddly when submerged. Theoretically, I should get 4890 (or 4910, I'm not sure) speed from each one, which would be decreased by 600 from 7/7 water friction. However, the minecart seems to move from ramp to ramp with low, constant speed, until it hits the normal upwards ramp, where it gets caught in an endless loop. Like each impulse ramp added its bonus speed to a 0 and made this the minecart's speed at the moment. Now, this doesn't always happen - I think the cannon reloaded itself correctly at least once - but it's too often to declare it working. Without water everything is working fine, only all I get from that is a minecart going there and back again for no practical reason. I could just use rollers, but I wanted to create a powerless design for greater simplicity, deep underground application, and perhaps magma use. I'm looking into this thread in hope of finding any useful tips. If anyone has any experience with this sort of issue, I'd greatly appreciate some help.


In other news, the sacrificial shaft is finally working. Regular sacrifices to Radavi, the Great Calamity of Wirejade are regularly conducted. It will help me rearrange my livestock a bit. A sample of the shaft's effects below.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The shaft used for furniture disposal was extended to the surface, and a minecart route above the river drops refuse down there. I'm planning to build another one to connect the refuse stockpiles to the west of the fort with this one. I've been running out of space to store corpses recently. Speaking of corpses, the sarcophagus production caught up with the, uh, demand at last.



A superkobold almost killed a smith with his dagger, and was apparently quite skilled with its use. Damn thing seems to be better at stabbing than a spear. I should probably equip some of the wrestler migrants with daggers.



Something is off here.

As it turns out, digging into Hell from a different adamantine spire triggers the "You have discovered an eerie cavern" message again, but not the demonic invasion. I did think the game will shower me with ‼fun‼ once more for a while, though. Hell is becoming an FB zoo, by the way. They are fond of spawning there.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

And this is how tiles near the main wells look like.

No FBs have caused any significant problems lately. I killed two at once with the artifact trap near the forges. On a different occasion I encountered a blood-sucking clear glass quadruped. I wonder if the drained blood was visible inside it. Clear glass behaves weirdly in combat - dog bites can fracture it, bone bolts can chip it, a silver mace glances away. Fortunately, it reacts to adamantine in a predictable way.

I feel that the fort lacks some proper megastructures. Extending the walls to the north gave me quite a lot of space I could use, only that I'm not sure what could I build. So far I'm going to create a new statue garden out of electrum, cobaltite and quartzite, with electrum statues and possibly a minecart-based mist generator, if I manage to engineer one. That still leaves a huge area to utilize. Any suggestions?

[Tirion]

How about an automated swimming pool? To avoid falling-related injuries, bring the water to your dwarves! Hint: equipment and live dwarves can be pushed through anything that lets water flow through it horizontally, but probably not through floor grates and certainly not through pumps.

[TheFlame52]

What, no pile of vomit?

[Loud Whispers]

I always found glass FBs to be of a particularly vicious appearance. Extremely fragile... Extremely sharp.