Had my most entertaining fort in a long time. Ironfog it was named, and indeed there was plenty of limonite to be dug. It was located in a half- heavily forested, half-mountainside, non-evil temperate region.
As early as a few weeks after embarking, I saw job interruption messages caused by a yeti. It had wandered into the fort, and was harassing the cat I had brought along. I had two speardwarves with me, but I had yet to forge any equipment for them. So I drafted the woodcutter into military, and sent him after the monster. He scored a hit to its foot, tearing the muscle, but from there things went downwards. The woodcutter ended up with several overlapping fractures, and a broken skull (not lethally, though). In the end I drafted the unarmed speardwarves into the military as well, hoping that they could save the woodcutter. Indeed, with their adequate Fighter-skill, they managed to punch the yeti unconscious, and went on to repeatedly pound its head, bruising the muscle. The monster had to be dealt with, so the miner too had to be drafted. He took two hits to its head, first time severing the upper spine's nervous tissue, the second time shattering the skull, jamming the skull through the brain and tearing apart the brain. Then it was time for some dabbling with medicine. The woodcutter used a crutch for a while, but eventually healed completely.
It was quite peaceful for some time. I forged iron equipment for a handful of soldiers, as well as many iron spears to train the weaponsmith. They could also be used to arm an emergency militia. A were-wombat appeared, killed a regular wombat, tranformed into a human and escaped.
The weapon/armorsmith went into a non-possession-mood, but required both yarn and silk cloth, neither of which I had any. Very fast I dug down into the cavern layer, and collected my first silk thread ever. Yarn was more problematic, as I had no adult shearable animals, just a baby alpaca. I had never gotten into wool production industry, so I slaughtered to poor alpaca and spun its hair into a thread of yarn, only to find out that only sheared yarn thread could be woven into cloth. It was early summer, so the metalsmith went berserk long before the dwarven caravan arrived. He was the first casualty of Ironfog, stabbed once in the upper leg and once in the head. His resting place is in the center of the catacomb complex.
After that there were a few ambushes, causing some casualties. Digging of the fort continued. This time I put some effort into aesthetics: Ironfog consisted of winding rampways and large, multilevel, non-rectangular halls with pillars and bridges. There was a functioning hospital, prison and workshop area for every industry in addition to a meeting hall, dormitory and dining room.
Two titans appeared in relatively quick succession. The first was some organic webber. It webbed one speardwarf and kicked his head in before being shot and killed by a marksdwarf. The second was a three-eyed scarab that breathed fire. The military engaged it and blocked or dodged every breath of fire, bashing and stabbing it until somebody managed to sever a major artery in the heart. After a few ticks, the beast was dead but the casualties were yet to come. I had expected the fire to spread, so I had cancelled all outdoor designations and forbidden all items that were on fire. The military started to make its way inside, but three of them were too slow and bled to death on the way. The fire engulfed an entire z-level of the map, spreading as a wide ring that turned everything into ashes. The dead were slabbed, as there were no corpses to be found.
I had 10 fully equipped, moderately experienced melee fighters and 7 marksdwarves by the time the first siege arrived. 'Twas the early spring of the sixth year of the fortress. The population count was about 115. The siege was a squad of lashers, led by a crossbowman. So, not much could be done - the siegers worked through the militia with few casualties. I had civilians sealed away with doors, and the siegers remained on the entrance. Every useless dwarf was drafted to grab a spear. About 30 of them charged through the doors, killing just enough invaders to make the rest flee in terror. Something like 15 were killed, and most of the rest were severely injured. A tantrum spiral ensued, dropping the population to about 50. Two waves of migrants helped to grind it to a halt. A new military was recruited, and nobles re-selected. More migrants came, raising the population back to over a hundred.
Not even all of the dead were buried when the second siege came. This time there were three squads of goblins, all of them mounted. The military was even greener than the one before, so it succumbed quite quickly. I hadn't had enough time to repair all of the tantrum-broken doors, so the siegers proceeded to reduce the population to mere three dwarves. Two of them were in prison, a bookkeeper and another dwarf, who were still atoning for their crimes committed during the tantrum spiral. One was a farmer who was hauling something in the hospital, on the lowest level of the fort.
Ironfog is not yet lost. I locked the hospital and prison doors. The farmer has a way out through the hospital well, and I'm going to see if there's any way for him to get his hands to a pick, and maybe some seeds. He could proceed to dig into the prison and release the two prisoners. There's not much hope to any of this, but we'll see. I expect to lose many migrants that are foolish enough to migrate during this. Mayhaps some of them are miners who can dig themselves to safety, or hunters or woodcutters who can make a dent into the invading force.
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Topic: What's going on in your fort? (Read 5965575 times)