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[celem]

A small band of Gnomes set off from their home to found a new outpost in a rapidly populating world.  Supported by their allies, the Dwarves, Men and Elves they hope to found a bastion of Light against the encroaching Dark.

After consulting the maps of travelers and traders they finally select a spot where The Accidental Jungle meets The Present-Hill of Towers and the decision was settled.  9 brave Gnomes would head into the wilderness and found a new beacon of natural harmony and technological wonder.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The actual biomes I get for this embark are Tropical Coniferous, Tropical Moist Broadleaf and Tropical Shrubland.  The Broadleaf is a wilderness, the other two are Untamed Wilds, all 3 are Hot and all 3 show Clay/Peat/Dirt, V.Deep soil, multi shallow, multi deep. 
This should give me good access to fuel, plants to harvest and later grow and a wide selection of animals worth war training and capable of standing against seiges when armored and trained.  Hopefully enough gems and metals to then move into more exotic constructions.

I've only dabbled with Gnomes thus far, enough to get to grips with the druidic system and basic Tinkering and learn how to build a viable embark, so dont expect loads of automated factories first thing.

Embark Party:
2x 'Beastmaster' Druid 5, Bite 5. - These are responsible for recruiting and training the animal militia.  Bite is a nightmare to train on most regular sentients (apart from Gnomes it turns out, ah well) and is the single most useful skill you can give most animal recruits.
3x 'Mechanics' Mech 5,  Farmer/Mach. Op/Glassmaker 5 - Midgame Artificers with useful side-skills
1x 'Stoneworker' Mason 5, Stonecraft 3, Arch 2 - pretty simple, early trade good
2x 'Minersmiths' Miner 5, W/Asmith 5 - spend the early game digging out the fort and the midgame forging.  I have this pair in almost every DF fort for like 4 years, my hope being that one is the first mood.  Sometimes..
1x 'Woodworker' Lumberjack 5, Carpenter 5 - pretty simple

3x Tigers, 1m 2f - Initial fortress defense, large enough to be longterm viable brawlers.  Couldnt get any bears except honey which is too small and canids are too small to frontline.

Its a masterwork embark (v5, no new humans) so that means 0.34.11 with almost all of Mephs options left as they come.  All the MW races are on, the only FDII race I included is frogmen for their really low siege trigger and they appear to have survived world-gen (they often dont).  Everything else has a fairly healthy population apart from Warlocks who are kinda designed to suck in worldgen, but there are a couple of thousand so they may show.  All the 'Harder X' settings are on, Fear the Night and Animalmen are off. (Animalmen behave oddly with gnomes.  They are hostile and cant be turned/trained/attracted, but your war animals will often ignore them entirely.)

Request a gnome by all means, requesting of specific Animals is possible too I guess.  Be aware that gnomes wont see combat anytime soon and quite possibly never in melee, they just dont roll that way.  Im also not building the time ma-jigger, it looks and sounds cool but scares the snot out of me, and to judge from the posts i've read it kinda scares (or at least worries) the guy who wrote it.

Gnomed:
Meph - Minersmith
Indigo - Beastmaster
Senshuken - Mech/Mach. Op

[Meph]

Posting to watch.

A request: It has become the norm for MasterworkDF forts to add ☼ to the title, to let people know that its using this mod. ☼Messiahblazes☼ - Gnome Community Fort, for example.

Best of luck with the gnomes, there are not nearly enough forts with them.

I would also like to request the minersmith gnome, 'Meph'. And I can tell you that Warlocks will never show up, since they do not have any active seasons. They are actually the most pacifistic of races, they never attack anyone.

[celem]

@Meph: Gladly, will try and fix up the symbol, its alt-15 iirc? Got it.

After an arduous trek through steamy forest and tropical shrubland the intrepid pioneers finally reach their destination at the heart of the world's southern jungles.  Settling their loads at last they gaze around at their surroundings and take stock of their supplies before swinging into action...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The intrepid gnomes brought a range of supplies with them to the fledgling outpost of Messiahblazes.  Some strawberries for food, some seeds to provide shadowleaf for oil, ropereed for cloth.  Only a small amount of alcohol as most Gnomes do not need to drink, but it minimises rushing to the river when trying to setup an initial camp



The situation on arrival.  The northern part of the map is shrubland, the southwest broadleaf and the southeast coniferous.

The gnomes quickly set to work, digging out some storage and planting the food crops that need to go in as early as possible.  It wont be enough, sooner or later some kind of fishing will need to be implemented but it ties someone up too early for now. The lumberjack knocks down a few trees ready for the Beastmasters to designate shrines, while the aforementioned feral druids scout the area for wildlife worth drafting to the glory of Messiahblazes.  A trio of jaguars coming out of the broadleaf forest to the southwest are quickly dismissed, it's the one mid savagery biome and they are not Giant, therefore maybe a dwarf's weight at adulthood.  The river winding from the shrubland into the coniferous forest however turns up a trio of saltwater crocs and 4 Hippos, all of which are viable candidates being generaly angry and heavy.  The crocs get huge and grow fast, the Hippos take a more sedate 5 years to mature fully but become 1.5tonne tanks.  With these species in their sights, the Beastmasters direct scurrying Gnomes to setup some shrines.

[celem]

6th Granite: The hippos show no interest in our Beastmaster's valiant attempt to recruit them, we have little standing with nature still thus far so thats possibly a factor.  The other druid heads south to try his luck with the crocs but gets no response from them at all, though they have wandered across the river by this point.  In frustration one of the shrines is moved to intercept the jaguars moving up from the SW, the Beastmaster establishes contact but fails to tame them, close.  My guys need some practice and we need more standing with nature, hopefully this will come as we get kudos for keeping our 3 tigers and pair of horses in good condition.  The druids resolve to keep an eye out for further wildlife, hopefully some smaller and easier to train species to practice on and establish some standing with the local fauna.

17th Slate: The initial stockpile and basic workshop rooms have been dug.  Meph and his colleague scythe through the thick soil layers predicted by the geologists.  Having cut some basic storage they drive a vertical stair into rock and begin to layout living accomodations.  The geology of the site is varied and comes as a relief to gnomes concerned about supplies with a wealth of resources available straight off.  The soil layers top-bottom run: fire clay, sand, clay, peat.  Then 3 levels of shale, 7 of marble, where we clip a couple of galena veins and finally Gneiss, where the miners stop and begin to hollow living space.  Meph considers stopping in the marble for higher room values but pushes through to leave it free for the miners. 

Despite this decision he then immediately strikes hematite ore as he cuts the dining hall.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Good work Meph!  The Mechanics have been picking plants for something to do, now we have the promise of a fledgling metal industry for them to work with in 1 quick mineshaft.

Lets hope the rest of the crew were as productive while you single-handedly find us silver, iron and flux along with every soil-type i could have asked for...


Picking daises is hard work y'all.  The mech/hippies wandered about, mainly trampling the surrounding areas before taking a huge handful of strawberries each and then having a nap in the hot tropical sun.

I prod the druids awake long enough to ask the situation on the animal-front.  Apparently the crocs and hippos left having resoloutely ignored them, the jaguars were awkward and also skulked off.  A Moa blitzed through but was too quick to get ahead of and would likely have ignored us.  They did at least war-train the Tigers and hadn't been completely useless.  Current population: 3 Giant louse.  Big, but too short-lived to be of any use to me and no bite.  I tell them to keep checking in and return to congratulate Meph who is actually being useful.  He is instructed to continue with the bedroom deck and keep me uptodate on the ores he finds as I get our basic industries arranged.  The gits on the surface nap on, mechanics are glorified haulers till I get my mitts on a bunch of stone and some metal for them to tinker with.

Natural Karma:999

[Meph]

Yeah, I am useful.

Hope it stays that way, and I dont walk into some machine and get encrusted on a table or wall.

[celem]

6th Malachite: Work has proceeded apace on the development of the little band.  The workshops are in and furniture is being deployed to the dining hall/dormitory, we can finally get the gnomes in out of the scorching sun...the muddy pools in the northern shrubland have already gone as summer arrives.  The individual rooms have not been started yet, Meph and his buddy, now passing Master Miner status were redirected to cut a few secondary stockpile spaces in the sand layer and then to cut through the primary vertical shaft right above the rock. 

They broke the staircase and replaced it with a stairfoot then drove a short corridor seal-able by bridge into a hall destined to hold the warbeasts.  Another short corridor beyond leads a downstair that then leads back across the level below to rejoin the main stairshaft.  This adds a not inconsiderable journey between the accomodation and surface but allows us a redoubt if the stair is breached at the surface. 

For added possibilities we also cut an internal trap corridor opposite the beastroom that wends its way around across 2 z-levels to empty out onto the beasts anyway.  If invaders reach the stair and the beasts are loose they will engage directly, or close that room and the invaders will be softened by traps before the animals go to town.  Thats the plan anyway.

Speaking of animals I break off from admiring the new defensive work and the chunks of compacted peat cut loose by Meph as he completed it, to take a look at the surface situation.

Here likewise events are proceeding in an acceptable fashion.  Still no surface wall to protect our vulnerable stairhead and farms, but the Druids have thrown up another half-dozen shrines to make it easier to track the beasts ranging across the area.  A trio of coyotes dropped into the Wilderness BrdLeaf at the start of summer and the Beastmasters managed to lure two in, a breeding pair which have swiftly progressed from Trained to Tame thanks to the Gnomes fairly encyclopedic familiarity with every species their civ encounters.  These were directly followed by Giant Moths in the same area which scorned our advances, then a conga of Giant Grasshoppers from the Shrubland did likewise.  Finally as Malachite started a group of cobras arrived and promptly scattered across the map, by much job canceling and repositioning of druids between shrines we finally snagged three of those.  One male and two female.

As summer climbs towards it's peak the wildlife grows quiet and the gnomes take stock.  A Depot is quickly constructed on the off-chance of catching a human caravan (we need them or dwarves for leather) and a Storage Depot nearby where the valuable oscilliscope is unpacked.  Next up will be finishing the bedrooms and then prospecting the marble layers for iron and gems with the Excavation Site.  Then setting up the telegraph and hooking up with the other Gnomes to call for our caravan.  We decide to keep all of our animals for now, they are pastured over the exposed stair.  The coyotes are not fit for combat, but might serve trained for hunting at a later date and fit with leather as escorts.  Its a very small canine but for now will earn us natures respect.  The cobras likewise may work bodyguard.  They are actually bigger than coyotes at full adult and have a fair paralyze bite.  Most things are bigger than a Gnome, so a lot of wildlife will work for escort and improve our chances.

Natural Karma: 2169

[IndigoFenix]

Nice.  I'll take a druid, named Indigo.

For future reference, it's worth noting that gnomes will bite and scratch as often as they punch or kick, so they don't have as much problems training their bite as other races do.

[celem]

15th Malachite: A group of blue peacocks move in from the southwest.  This sizable group  is common enough that the druids ought have no trouble persuading them across (once I get my natural karma updated.  it seems you need to commune with nature once after load before you can recruit or it doesn't update, i got nasty red messages when trying to recruit straight up).  We will take as many of these as we can get I think and keep them for eggs.

A migrant wave pops in from the West at the same moment, apparently the powers that be didn't think we had enough Gnomepower.  We will get a few hardy souls such as these arriving over the course of this year, but no more beyond this.  To send precious gnome lives into the unknown is unconscionable, we will need to establish our Seismic Telegraph to keep the migrants and caravans rolling after Autumn.

I wander across to the wagon, where they are congregating with a lost look on their faces as we lack a designated meeting hall still.  After a quick introduction on my part they begin to reel off their annotated histories and skills for assignment. 
First up is an aged female Gnome who describes herself as a metalsmith.  A little prodding reveals she is considered 'Great' at Furnace Operation, Weaponsmithing and Metalcrafting.  Now thats what i'm talking about, right?  You I can use!  Next!
5yr old Novice Woodcrafter...  m'kay
A younger male gnome with a little hammer skill and some leatherwork/bowyer.  Not awful
Female Novice Mason, Child Novice Chandler.  Meh, at least the Mason brought a White-handed Gibbon
Female Adequate Gem Setter with some minor unarmed combat skills.
2 more kids, one with nothing other than the ubiquitous novice druid/caretaker that all gnomes have, about as useless as they come.  Perhaps sensing this the crafty little bugger brought a male tiger cub as pet.  The other has Novice Stone Detailing which we can use.

As the introductions end the Beastmasters come jogging back with a pair of peacocks and a pair of peahens that had approached the most southwestern shrine.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

4th Galena: The furniture rolling out is swiftly emplaced to give the little fort a centre and the new-comers are shown around.  Our miner pair led by Meph finish off the individual rooms, we'll probably repurpose one for the manager/archivist.  All the animals apart from the 3 adult war Tigers and the 2 Grazer Horses are re-positioned to the new beasthall where nestboxes will be added for the now fully Tame peahens and the still Trained Cobras.  We wont be able to ever Tame these snakes, but their offspring are another matter, we resolve to breed them.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The fort so far, the surface, stockpiles and workshops.  The living quarters cut by Meph & co can also be seen bottom right in this montage, its quite a few z-levels below the others.  In-between the two levels lies the beasthall and trap-reroute.



The bridges on each level will both be tied to the same lever.  Under normal conditions traffic from the workshops to accommodation will follow the green route, when the alarm is raised and the lever is pulled there is still a valid path between the two, but it now follows the red path.

We also struck a few more minerals while clearing the individual bedrooms, Meph reporting both Graphite and Wolframite deposits in the Gneiss layer before modestly adding that he is now a legendary Miner..

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

You can also here see the issue with your natural affinity when reloading a fort.  The cobra at the top was last session.  If this happens, commune with nature to get it to load up your affinity and as you see, the peacocks joined.  We also get our first masterpiece!!  Its a wooden wheelbarrow.

[celem]

9th Galena: Giant Flies.  They ignore us.  One of the Beastmasters (our Expedition Leader) has taken to calling himself Indigo.  He wanders out to try the insects, even though few bugs live long enough for our purposes, but they show no interest.  Insects seem particularly tricky.

11th Galena: The Mechanics suggest we begin prospecting for ores using the oscilloscope.  This is not something I'm familiar with but agree to a test.  They quickly designate a single spot as an Excavation Site.  These require nothing to build, just a spot thats tidied up and designated.  Then any Gnome simply brings the scope to the site to scan the nearby rock.  That simple.  We only have 1 scope right now but we designate scanning points for each stone layer and I order scans of the highest shale layer below the beasthall and the bottom-most marble layer immediately above the living spaces.

The results were quite astounding.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The first Shale layer proved much as expected.  We already knew there was Saltpeter, Amethyst and Kaolinite in the area from the tunnels cut for the lower half of the beasthall trap-divert, so this helped confirm the accuracy of the device.  The Marble layer scanned revealed a wealth of goodies that impressed me in it's detail, we shall definately be plundering those layers in the near future.

  We did not continue scanning for now, but this bodes well for mining efforts with minimal fumbling in the dark.  Perhaps a second scope would be in order eventually.  For now the Gnomes designate out a cistern for wells and a future Hospital, running to the river to drink is becoming too time-consuming with the new sub-surface works.  Strangely Indigo insisted on performing the scans, I expected a Mechanic to take the job, but apparently it has to do with natural senses as much as technical know-how and anyone can work it after a fashion.  Mystical stuff, cant argue with the results.

[Senshuken]

What is the Gnomish opposite of a druid? Because I want to be gnomed as the ideological opposite of the tree huggers. I assume it has something to do with engineering.

I would rather be male if at all possible. Name Senshuken.

[celem]

11th Limestone: Our chief Tinkerer/Machine Operator has identified himself as Senshuken, he's a morose little fellow who specialises in making the gadgetry our fort will need and running high-tech machinery.  He promptly decides that the proposed cistern is inadequate, lying as it does above the break in the stair in the soil layers.  Ideally we want water down in the habitation section, so he designs a method of draining the small local river into a deep cistern.  Meph and his buddy are dispatched to dig it, while Indigo heads across a quickly constructed narrow wooden bridge to reach a pack of Giant Hyenas that appear in the Northeast.

Everything rather happens at once here, Meph strikes the first cavern layer while cutting the drain down to the cistern, we just missed it with the main stair, its only 2 levels into the rock.  He quickly sends for the Mason to wall up the exposed stair he has sliced straight through the cavern, though not before a nimble Nith slips into the fortress.  The Giant Hyenas meanwhile drift just out of Indigo's range and head for the little bridge he used to get to the NE. 

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Theres a second Nith in the cavern, wasnt quite as fast as the Masons, i momentarily drafted everyone who would listen for the seal.
And thats not a druid trying to charm those Giant Hyenas.  It needs to be one of the 2 skilled guys but I dont have a manager yet so I strip the labour from everyone else.  This is a migrant I missed, children also ignore me, I need a manager ASAP.

Someone....Senshuken is looking shifty... has put cage traps on the bridge and the lead male steps right into it.  The rest of the pack freeze on the bank, not reacting in the least as a Gnome scurries up to empty the trap and rearm it.  They are too wary to fall for it again however, so Indigo moves his Shrine right down behind them and tries to convert.  They are a challenge, but our new reputation with nature helps and we sway one.  A bloodbath ensues as it is butchered by the rest of the pack, who otherwise dont move.  Disgusted, Indigo abandons the attempt, the Hyenas are still stuck by the bridge and we only got 1, a male from the traps. but we will work that out in a moment, something is happening over by the fort...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The traps on narrow bridges are a favorite trick of mine for animal snagging, didnt expect them to freeze like that after the lead went in.  Also forgot that converting an animal will often leave it hostile to its former pack, so trapping them in a clump like that and running the shrine was messy and futile, it converted as it was actually Indigo this time, but instantly died, the job takes too long and gets 1 animal per time so i would probably end up with 1 crippled last-hyena-standing if I set Repeat.  I had to apply the 'recruit animals' job a couple of times and cancel it until Indigo picked it up and not a child, profiling my workshops will help a lot.

Theres blood on the stairs, it looks like Tiger blood.  The Nith from the first cavern has made it to the soil layers as the cistern shaft that led to the breach bypasses the beasthall, and then chewed on a war Tiger for a bit before it could react.  Moments before it pulped the brazen cavern critter some Gnome hauled the massive beast back to it's pasture. 

So theres an anxious Nith in the stockpiles, Indigo swiftly sets up an indoor Shrine and talks it down (without LoS across z-levels), it is added to the menagerie in the beasthall.  (where Indigo also notes the new pasture is not set to train animals which explains the decay of conditioning on our cobras, this is rectified).  He also spots a new Tiger Cub at the surface stair-head and moves in down to the more protected beasthall.  The nest boxes go in and all 3 female cobras claim and lay a trio of eggs, a peahen takes the fourth.  All are allowed to sit.

(One of my cobras has gone to Tame, so this is a species Gnomes can master by default, I just didnt have the zone flag on.  There are species they cant auto-tame and must breed, but its fairly serious exotics that are absent from the civ's lands.)

Natural Karma: 15,719 - I lost a 9,000 chunk for the Hyena since it was mine when it died, but I didnt butcher it at least.  The animals we have picked up from the wild are worth in general much more than those we embarked with and caring for them is getting us respect, the Nith is an exotic little fellow and I suspect is doing us much good.  If you ever want an accurate breakdown of how your natural affinity is working then run commune with nature at a shrine and watch your dfhack console window.

[celem]

16th Limestone: Widening the bridge worked, the Hyenas now have a path other than where they saw their friend just get trapped.  Stepping daintily round the first trap they hit the second, despite every Hyena seeing this every single one falls in one after another, with convenient waits between for Gnomes to re-arm.  So we got them all, 3 males, 2 females.  Cage-caught so need to be basic trained before i can release them for full training.  They wont eat any of the food I have.  Fishing begins.

1st Sandstone: Another new Tiger Cub!

10th Sandstone: Migrants have arrived! A male Chemist and female Carpenter bring our total to 21.

16th Sandstone: Light the forges!  Burning a single log for a bumpstart we then start turning compact peat found during the excavation of the beasthall into coke, a screwpress is constructed closer to the peat layer to allow us to continue using this for fuel.  Once a steady supply begins to trickle in galena and hematite ores start to run through the smelter.  Slag builds up as waste impurities are removed from the desired metals and the furnace operator suggests building a Slag Pit to process the waste.  We decide against it for now.  Gnomes can process slag to sand at a slag pit, but we have sand available and the build-up is slow...for now.

28th Sandstone: A troop of capuchin monkeys are swarming the surface stair-head, kept at bay only by the Tigers pastured there.  The bolder ones are darting in to try and steal items, one makes a break for the map-edge with my heavy bronze piston.  Now as a Gnome, item theft is fine.  I get credit with nature for it like I had traded the item to the forest, but that piston was an essential part of the Seismic Telegraph needed to bring our caravan and any future migrants.  *sigh*  We put up a forge beside the smelter and prepare to cast a new piston.  Meanwhile the capuchins are scattered by a trio of Giant Cheetahs who cruise through South to North.  Indigo manages to get into their path and recruits a breeding pair.  The horses have a foal, the dingos have pups.  Animals everywhere!  A stop is put to new recruits for the moment unless something too good to pass arrives.  We need to get all these new predators broken in, there are 5 Giant Hyenas and now a pair of Giant Cheetahs, none of them like strawberries.  It's time to get some Gnomes on fishing duty or risk having Gnomes on 'feeding' duty, an adult Gnome masses 2% that of an adult Giant Hyena, and the Cheetahs aint exactly much lighter (both species break half a ton).

Keeping them caged long term is not an option as it will penalise our efforts to gain natures respect, so I try to hurry the fishermen.  The capuchins return and one bites a war Tiger who tears it in half.  A cunning Gnome seizes the brutalised monkey and butchers it to train the Hyenas and Cheetahs.  Another monkey promptly steals the meat...

If you will excuse me, I must see to this, it's getting out of hand, time for a wall....

Natural Karma: 14,779 (a pair of Hyenas waiting for fish to be trained are costing me 30k between them for being caged)

[celem]

6th Timber: Seems Indigo didnt get the message about more animals, he picked up the last of the Giant Cheetahs before it left the map, we add it to the growing tribe.  Meanwhile plans are being laid for a Tinker's workshop with accompanying Gadgeteer and possibly some clockwork/mechanical workshops.  Senshuken is directing the miners as we speak to cut enough space for the various industries.  They are perusing that survey report we generated of the lowest Marble layer, I think they are intrigued by the collapsed brick to the SouthEast along with any relics or treasure it might hold.  The cistern is complete, all that remains is a floodgate for potential future use incase it needs draining and to floor the parts of the drain running through soil to prevent saplings blocking the waterflow.  Spores from the cavern-growing species have already made their way up into the soil levels, the non-combatant horses are moved from the surface as the beasthall becomes graze-able.

13th Timber: Still struggling to feed the carnivores, fishing is slowly picking up as the spare Gnomes assigned to it develop rudimentary skill.  More complaints from those living mainly on the surface about some kind of walls for our encampment, more complaints about slag in the forges.  Slag walls, there, shut up.  Iron piston is forged to replace the stolen one, Seismic Telegraph under construction.

15th Timber: Snatcher!  A succubus thief hit a cage trying to cross the river, will hang onto it for now while I decide what to do.  As a sentient nature wont care if it's caged.  Another swiftly follows to make a pair of caged thieves.

19th Timber: Giant Tigers in the Coniferous forest.  I know I said no more, but its the jumbo version of what I brought for combat, I want these, each weighs more than my entire population combined. Go Indigo, go!

22nd Timber:  Just as Indigo secures my mating pair of Giant Tigers the Dwarven Caravan arrives.  Perfect timing, we need meat and fish for these big guys to take the weight off our stockpiles.  I also want some leather since we will make very little ourselves (i butchered and tanned the monkey that died earlier, but not the hyena, he was mine, however briefly.)  We ran off some random stone crafts earlier in the summer, and another batch is assigned while the Gnomes hastily decide who the broker is.  A pack of Giant weasels enter the map but we ignore them for now.  A kobold thief is also spotted, panics and dents the skin of the nearest Giant Tiger before turning and running for the map edge, persued by a 2 tonne cat and a hail of dwarven bolts.  You never saw a Kob run so fast, he got away with it too, thats one agile kobold. 

The room intended for the Tinkers workshop has been cleared, the miners found the brick vein indicated by the oscilloscope and followed it to unearth several relics and an old chest before squaring off a section for the workshops.  Somehow the Seismic Telegraph ended up here rather than up on the sand layer as intended and the Tinkers workshop then squeezed in beside it, but little else had progressed.  When I questioned Senshuken he replied that he felt the Telegraph would not transmit properly through sand and ought be built on rock.  Fair enough, never occurred to me.  He also mentioned that the drain for the cistern was finished and filling.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

We hit the vein of brick right where the survey suggested and followed it till it died amid a hematite vein.  The cistern is 16 z-levels down and filling rapidly under gravity from the stream above down the walled in stairway cut through the cavern by Meph.

25th Timber: And the deal is struck!  We take a couple of small meat stacks along with plenty of fish from the Dwarves, then as much fur, basic leather, scale and chitinplate as we can afford for our bin of stone junk.  We end up with maybe a bin and a half of leather and no current food emergency which works fine for me.

As the goods are moved below ground the Beastmasters led by Indigo brief me on the animal situation: 
While we have 2 Dingo pups born in captivity both are male so we dont wish to release the 2 parents yet.  Dingos hold little longterm use, being about the same weight as a fully grown Gnome, but we will hold them for now. 
The cobras are still nesting, as are the peahens, we actually picked up a 5th cobra in a cagetrap, we still plan to keep these, they are a bit bigger than Gnomes and have that poison. 
The Nith has fully tamed and is cute, but ultimately not much bigger than us. 
We have our original 3 war Tigers, their two cubs and a pet tiger cub.  Tigers will make good fighters, being some 12-13 times larger than us.  A capuchin fell into a cage at some point as is wandering about the fort tame, he will be sent on his way at some point most likely. 

Then there are 2 female and 3 male Giant Hyenas in various states of training, 1m 2f Giant Cheetahs also trained and then 1m 1f Giant Tiger.  These are our potential super-warbeasts.  Cheetahs are ever the lightest of the big cats, the Giant ones are twice the weight of our Tigers.  The Giant Hyenas weigh 25% more again and are aggressive by nature, they should wartrain easily.  The Giant Tigers are the real gems though.  The largest of all cats these monsters will end up massing around the same as 4 Giant Cheetahs.  An adult Giant Tiger weighs as much as 116 Gnomes and when armored and trained could form a lynchpin of the fort's defense for years to come.

Indigo warns me however that the chances of taming these animals is slim, even for attuned and skilled druids such as himself.  Our goal should be to keep these various Giant guests safe and well-cared for until they can provide us with offspring that we can tame so the parents may be freed.  For the time being however he wartrains the Giant Tigers to sit watch with their diminutive brethren at the stair

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Here you can see the Dwarves arriving to trade, the Giant Weasels are off to the west trying to stay out of the way.  There are signs of an emerging wall but the site appears fairly undefended apart from the 6 or so tonnes of Tiger of various sizes hanging around the staircase.

Winter has arrived.

Natural Karma: 108,279 - 'Complete Harmony'.  These Giant critters must be very precious, keeping them will make me very popular.  But heaven forbid I lose a bunch or accidentaly butcher one.  Anything worth more in 1 direction is worth more in the other too.  A detailed examination of dfhack indicates i lost 50 twice for pets killing capuchins, Giant Hyenas appear to be worth totally bonkers amounts of respect.

[celem]

16th Moonstone: The Seismic Telegraph is finally finished and is fired up, contact is made with the Gnome Halls back home.  Much relief all around.  Caravan and immigrants will flow as normal. 
The cistern has filled and wells are being cut as the Dwarves leave.  We also say goodbye to the 5 adult cobras we collected this year, 4 through shrines and 1 in a cage.  The eggs have hatched and we will raise a generation of native snakes, the adults are gathered at a shrine near the edge of the map and released by one of the children.

24th Moonstone: The last of the cobras disappears off the edge of the map, no fighting amongst themselves on the way out, they just wanna leave.  We have 9 young cobra, 3m, 6f which will grow to replace them.  Indigo consults the spirits of nature and assures me this was the right decision.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

26th Moonstone: Need more wood, a large swathe west of the encampment is designated.  The farmer has nothing to plant as the plants are not being eaten fast enough with so few in the fort.  We are not brewing, so the seeds are not available.  We send him picking wild plants to keep busy and give us some variety of seed next year. 

The Giant Weasels are still being a nuisance on the surface.  They seem to want to path right through, or maybe even onto the stair, perhaps they are hungry.  They neither notice the Gnomes nor do the Gnomes care, but they are wary of the massive Tigers and are not actually causing trouble or getting too close.  To be honest i'd take the hit for it if a Giant Tiger sat on a weasel, the capuchin reminded me how much easier life is when you can butcher, even for a moment.
I'm assured by Indigo and the other Druid that the spirits would tolerate some hunting by the Gnomes, our copious current Karma and menagerie of well-tended wild animals would compensate for some kills of wild animals, it's slaughtering tamed or trained creatures that is most abhorrent. 
We resolve to stick to fish for now, and Senshuken and the other Mechanics have been spotted several times huddled in corners talking deeply.  If the mutterings are accurate they toy with the idea of damming the river to install grating and allow secure fishing access.  We need not stoop to wanton slaughter.  When we hunt, it will be Orc and Succubus and Goblin that we butcher.
      
9th Opal: We make wells above the cistern to reduce the traffic to the surface by those not working in the high soil layers.  We are forced to make the chains from iron as we have still not done much mining, Meph and his buddy have been hauling and helping keep the big predators trained like everyone else. 
The children wont haul consistently so we struggle there, but at least even they can tend the Tigers.  And its something to see a 5 year old gnome feeding an adult Giant Tiger a bucket of piranha I can tell you...
         
13th Opal: Senshuken is forced to press peat to drive the forges, he is unhappy about it but I promise him some metal sheeting to tinker with from the fuel he provides.  We just dont have an adult who can be spared.  Meanwhile the Metalsmith migrant from the first wave turns out some masterful iron chains for the wells which should please everyone.

17th Opal: Senshuken narrowly avoids disaster when he is interrupted whilst on his way to reload a cage trap by a succubus thief.  Guy just cant get a break.
Thankfully the bandit runs for it, their large daggers are easily capable of bisecting an unarmoured Gnome but he doesnt make a swing. 
We need to start using our bodyguard animals, which means we need to start forging properly.  The Miners are recovered from whatever odd jobs they had ended up on and refocused. 
The oscilloscope is broken out and a number of readings taken before they dive off in search of hematite, galena and mithril in the marble layers.

26th Opal: Hematite, dead ahead!  This gizmo is awesome, Meph made a beeline for the good stuff and begins to cut back into the vein.  The Gnomes also finally remember to strip the 2 succubus thief prisoners and retrieve 2 daggers for melting.  One is rose gold, the other stygian bronze.
As unbelievable as it may seem, daggers are a two-handed weapon for everyone in the fort and make a very poor-man's zeihander.  Metal better used elsewhere.  We are still loathe to start producing metal sheets for Senshuken to Tinker with, the metal they are made of plays little importance for the most part and it feels like overkill to use our iron.  May end up being lead and silver mechanisms in the guts of our contraptions as we have found no copper as of yet.

2nd Obsidian: As the miners harvest goodies and the smelter churns along trying to process enough to get started a group of 5-6 slugmen sneak up on the fort.  (I thought I had these off).  The Tigers dont take kindly to their intrusion and take off after them, on average the Giants were too slow for a fleeing enemy but several of the war Tigers caught their foes (whom they outmassed by around 800%).
One was brutally dismembered as a Tiger seized it by the arm, tore it off then repeated the trick with it's head.  The other landed a lucky punch and shattered the second Tiger's toe causing it to pass out.  The slug made it about 10 tiles before the 3rd Tiger hit it in the flank and shredded it for a total of 2 kills.
They are tough, but not invulnerable.  Most that engaged that unarmed enemy have bruises and breaks, the one with the damaged toe keeps passing out. Indigo quickly directs the construction of an Animal Care workshop and a Gnome is sent to process some of our Ropereed for thread.  The wounded cats are soon back to full health. 

It's around this moment that Senshuken approaches with a curious little leaf object in his hand, claiming to have found it in a Finished Goods Bin that finally made it back from the Depot after the Autumnal dwarf visit.  Indigo snatches it from him without a word and runs off to build the Advanced Animal Training workshop.  (seriously, when did I get that?  It's pretty crucial and my lack of hauler power left it stuck in the Depot.  That and I forgot to flag bins to be returned after completing my trade so it was tied up till they left.  Keep track of your Goods bins as a Gnome player!  Becomes even more key when you move to Tinkering.)

4th Obsidian: A kidnapper has made off with one of the children.  I hope it was one of the useless ones.  Seriously though, must get around to ordering them to stay indoors and make sure none think they are woodcutters or herbalists or something.    And armor so I can deploy these animals, i'm loathe to risk our precious warbeasts when even a thief's dagger can down them right now.

Indigo has been making mystical passes over that leaf thing all morning and then promptly dropped it on the grass by the fledgling slag wall.  Thats our advanced training workshop now apparently, it focuses the minds of beasts to that of the trainer or something.  I nod and smile, all that matters is that he assures me the Giant Hyenas will be war-trainable now, in-fact just about anything would be, and the teaching of the animals could begin.  We'd need to look at some sparring for the Beastmasters in the Spring to give them skills to pass on.  I have Indigo try and summon a bird for news, I would like to see how far off the caravan and next migrant wave is and whether there are any hostiles headed our way, but he is unable to locate one.  Things would be easier if one would just turn up so we could ask it apparently, but theres been no birds since we arrived.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The Weasels still wont leave, they just sit in that trench, they keep causing cancellations on the road there as they are blocking the site.  Since they dont fear my Gnomes i'm tempted to go build cages amongst them, train them and then turf them straight out again through a shrine.  I want them gone, need a bird for intel.

Natural Karma 129,921

[celem]

19th Obsidian: Here comes the Gnome caravan and our liaison!  We do a whip through the job list and pause a lot of more minor activities to free up someone to meet the toffs and a few bodies to get a trade going.
Unfortunately the same soul turns up top of each list.  To get more than a few scraps we will have to pull out something big.  So we want to make some iron crafts, we have the skilled crafter for it not to be too blasphemous a waste.  But she has been working the furnaces all day, is tired and thirsty and is the broker anyway.
An examination of the talents available indicates that not only is she a skilled appraiser after the dwarf trade as well as pretty 'great' at several other conversational skills, nobody else has anything relevant, not a single dabbling persuader.  Its been so crazy here that we don't even know each other yet, so we just have to wait for her.

2nd Granite: Spring arrives and one of our Tame embark Tigers gives birth to a pair of cubs.
4th Granite: Female Giant Hyena Cub!  Born Trained to the level of it's mother this cub will Tame fully if it can be turned before it matures.
6th Granite: 2 more Giant Hyena births, male and female.  Also 3 cobra eggs hatched, which is impressive, since I set the mothers loose some time ago.  Must have left some forbidden eggs.

We meet the 2 diplomats that have arrived and order some metals, including copper and a few specialized gems for the Tinkers to work wonders with.  They both place requests for stuff that we promptly forget. 
Trade just never ends up working out that way, It saves time not to bother, they'll buy what i'm selling.  I usually have so little I have no choice, or so much I couldnt really care less.

Speaking of...

15th Granite: The planets finally align and the lone Gnome who seems to have all the critical jobs right now gets it done.  Unfortunately she was the smelter who made the iron, then forged it as a craft and should then have traded it. 
Unfortunately due to the 'wing-it' nature of the fort right now she was also butcher, fish cleaner, tanner, miller and a number of other things.
The accumulated bin and a half of random stone stuff plus just two iron scabbards (crafts) bought us several bins of cloth, a bunch of thread for stitching up warbeasts a bar of copper, bar of iron, bar of steel, steel pick and iron anvil.
Feel less badly about trading weapons-grade metal since it bought a bar of it's own upgrade and the exhausted broker informed me that we now have 2 bars of Orichalcum along with plenty more slag for another round of walls.

19th Granite: Two more Tiger Cubs

10th Slate: Work is completed on the first suit of adjustable armor for our beasts.  Man that uses a lot of metal. but they are worth keeping alive.
A full suit consists of an adjustable helm, breastplate, greaves and then four boots.  For most of our retinue anyway. 
Gauntlets are forgable but I think only the Nith of my group has hands, and she would make a terrible fighter.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Armoring the animals was done by pasturing them over the animal care workshop (top-center), its also where I healed the wounded Tigers earlier using thread.  Applying a nickname to the animal makes it easier to track and manipulate through the pasture screens and is done at the Advanced Animal Trainer (top-left)

We decide for now to begin by armoring the Tame Tigers, and keep the Trained G.Hyenas and G.Tigers back until the females all birth.  Once we have young we may armor and use the parents for a few years depending on various maturation rates, immature animals cannot be trained for war or taught combat skills, even by Druidic Gnomes and I would hate to be caught in a gap where I dont have anything old enough to scare away foes...  I'm just still anxiously awaiting the pitter-patterthump-clump of tiny GIANT Tiger paws. (They will weigh almost as much as our Adult war Tigers from birth.)