Winter, 126
9th Moonstone, 126Interesting. It appears our site is located on top of an even older site. I'll definitely have to check it out.Wasps have archeology similar to the other masterwork races. Just build an Archeologist's Study
18th Moonstone, 126
Our archeologists and smelter are hard at work. All sorts of things can be found in the ruins. For now we found a really nice looking mithril set of armor. With a bit of reshaping, it can be used by our troops. I wonder if the people living here were elves or dwarves.
And if they left other, left benign stuff behind them...
Also, we have started smelting the sphalerite. The results were a ton of slag and some zinc. Now we can make metal cement.To make metal cement, you need a metal bar and a block of worthless cement. Go to the Wood Pulper and press "make X cement" (zinc in our case). You will get two metal cement blocks, which you can use along with worthless cement at the Cement Worker. Metal cements are generally more expensive than vanilla "fine cement and worthless cement", but individually not as expensive as a metal crafted object
Wasps don't have access to the ore processor. As a result, yields from metals are lower than usual and produce a lot of slag. You can dispose slag at the smelter, with a chance to get either some low value metals or concrete blocks. Wasps also can't make steel.
3rd Obsidian, 126We built a Hive Caller. Once we have enough souls, we can use it to summon mighty beasts!Hive Callers are used to summon random creatures and make Red Wasp Hives. To build one, you need a hive, a cage and a mechanism
To summon a creature, you need three souls as a reagent (beware, wasps are not warlocks: souls must be used immediately, otherwise they wither). You get a random waspen animal, or if you're lucky a Giant Cave Spider or a Giant Desert Scorpion. The animals are always tame.
You can gather a red wasp swarm by using some worthless cement blocks and a red wasp colony (made in the Fleshwarper's Lab). Red Wasp Hives are rather unique pets. You can use them defensively, as they have a blister causing interaction and are relatively cheap and hard to kill on one hit, or if you wait for 6 months, to produce a unique drink (waspen beer) from their remains. Also, you can make cheap Thralls out of a red wasp colony and a hapless slave.
Also, we finally have a dining room. Booze will also start coming soon.
16th Obsidian
Slaughtered a few creatures (the Green Weaver, the Sparrow Killer and the female Great Cockroack, as it had give birth to twin females and was no longer needed). Now we have enough souls to use the Hive Caller and enough meat to make some more Artificial Blood
And we've got a female slugsnake. Not bad.Creatures summoned that way don't show up in the animal screen until you reload the game, and then show up as "not tame". There's no way that I know of to counter this bug.
Finally, we have butchered the organic armor. The other wasps say it should be about as hard as iron. It should do, for now, though we can already outfit our soldiers with the findings from the ruins. At least we know that the next soldier to come will already have proper gear.
1st Granite, 127
A new year dawns. According to tradition, I now have to step down from leadership, but I want to see at least one of my eggs hatch and become a Hivemind Wasp proper. I'll keep the power of about one week, and then I'll make room for another overseer. I've already ordered an orcish child to be sent to the Infectory and I made enough artificial blood for it to survive the "operation". Now I only need to wait for the egg to hatch.
4th Granite, 127
The egg has hatched and the barrels with the blood are here. Now it's time to begin the operation.Larvae are the second stage in a wasp's life. They have razor sharp teeth and infect people through their bite. Their bite also causes profuse bleeding, so only goblin sized creatures and above can survive a larva's attack. They die on the first bite, however, so beware. Make it count.
To use the infectory, you need to pasture a larva and a "slave" in the workshop. You also need three barrels of artificial blood, made by 4 meat piece each at the Fleshwarper's Lab. There are two different reaction depending on whether the larva is fertilized or not, so be careful. Once you do so, the larva will disappear and the slave will transform into the appropriate caste.
(Here I would write a description of the infecting process, but it would probably be too gory and disturbing, even by bay12 standards. Even worse, I'm not a native English speaker so for all I know I could be writing the next Plan 9 From Outer Space instead. Suffice to say it involves primitive blood transfusion and the larva chewing its way to the inside of the unlucky orcish child, then popping out.)
The new larva popped out of the now dead orc. It was pitch black and covered in blood. It was also quite small, even for a worker. I probably should have used a mature orc instead, but what's done is done.
"Welcome to the world, my child", Than402 said.
"I am your mother, Than the 402nd, and this is Spawnedflies, your home."
The new wasp spat some blood and then spoke:
"Who am I?"
"Your name shall be Hia Fortressfungal. I see you are quite small, but don't worry. You'll be a perfectly fit worker in about a year or so. You shall be put to work like everyone else after that time has passed, but until then feel free to explore the hive. Meet the other wasps. See the work."
"Yes... mother. Explore the hive. Meet the other wasps. See the work. Just give me some time to get used to my new body."
Than climbed back up. She was feeling quite proud. The industries were running, the wasps were happy, well fed and had their own beds and the livestock were multiplying. Soon more migrants would come, bringing soldiers and more creatures with them. It won't be long before the whole area bows down to the Hivemind Wasps and to Spawnedflies.Okay, I believe I covered the basics on how to build and develop a successful hive. The hive will now be played as a succession fort with Rex Invictus being next in line. If someone has any questions, just ask here or on the mod's thread.
Also, I "stole" 4 days worth of time from the next year and cheated a bit to have the eggs hatch quickly, but I believe explaining a good part of their reproduction was important
here's the save file
http://dffd.bay12games.com/file.php?id=10603