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[ImagoDeo]

--

"Six years," whispered Kivish, clutching her crossbow tightly.

"Aye, lass," Dodòk, breathing a sigh of regret. "I still miss Kib occasionally... every time I see that engraving in the King's Hall..."

Kivish knew the engraving well. It was one of the last marks Kib Rìtharùshrir Ustuthkurik Nirkún had left on Valefortress' floors before Iru Soakmoist, the terrible webspinning stegosaurid from the depths, had paralyzed him in sticky webs and killed him with a single kick to the head. The engraving showed Dodòk herself hugging two flounder, a loving reminder of the fishing trip she had taken with Kib not long before they settled in Valefortress together.

A tear trickled slowly down Dodòk's cheek. She glanced up and saw the look in Kivish's eye. After a long moment, she said, "...you know, they say... they say it's still down there." Kivish gasped. "Oh, yes. In the old magma works. There's an excavation beneath the reservoir that used to service the magma forges. We have the battery and the pump, now, to dredge magma up to the fortress level, but back when Iru attacked, the smiths had to make a long trek down to smelt the ore and forge the swords. They were still working when they heard the battle cries from below. Then everything went silent..." She paused and shuddered. "I don't want to talk about this any more."

Kivish got the rest of the story from old Goden Zimkeltun. "I heard the story from the Duchess," she said, taking a swig of strawberry wine from a hip flask. "When everything went quiet, one of the smiths looked down the staircase and saw the beasty eating the remains of someone's pet cat. It didn't take more than two and two to make four - so they threw an iron floor over the staircase and prayed to Dakas it would hold. And it did - it has, these long five years," she finished, glancing down the hallway. "Take the magma pump access staircase if you want to get down there faster," she said. "I need to get to that party with Tosid and Atír. We're celebrating eighteen years of mining history here in Sebsúrgeshud." With that, she wandered off, ignoring the look in Kivish's pretty aquamarine eyes.

Kivish cornered Tosid Desiskol later with a proposition. Tosid hesitated when she finished.

"I know you're the new militia commander, and you've been practicing your marksmanship and all, but are you sure you have the authority to...?"

"Yes," Kivish answered the old dwarf quickly. I have to sound convincing, she thought, or she'll never go along with it. "I spoke with the Duchess yesterday and she told me I can ask for mining designations when I want them for a military purpose."

"But there's nothing down by the old magma forges, except..." Kivish saw her beginning to understand. Tosid chewed her cheek nervously.

Kivish decided to be more honest. "Look, Tosid, I'm doing this as a favor for Dodòk. You don't have to take any responsibility if things go wrong."

"Are you sure?" Tosid asked. "Mayor Rinalkilrud blamed Kadôl, the siege operator, for not building the ballista parts, even though it was Ral who should've-"

"Do I look like some useless noble?"

Tosid was still chewing on her cheek. "Well, no, but..."

"Yes or no."

"...okay." Tosid hefted her pick and trudged toward the staircase. She called back over her shoulder before heading down by the magma pumps. "You should get Kadôl to carve you some murder holes. I'm no good at engraving, and you remember the amazing job he did on that bracelet a few years ago," she said.

Kivish nodded and went to find Kadôl.

--

This is it, she thought as she descended by the magma pump stack one level at a time. I'm actually going to do this...

Then she stopped thinking about it. She knew if she did she could never actually go through with the task. She managed to avoid the mental roadblock until she got to the last staircase before the old magma works. The huge empty room that used to hold all of Sebsúrgeshud's metal wealth stared at her with its pointless vastness, daring her to wonder if her own future was as empty. The inward-dented iron floor in the corner also held her gaze for a few moments. It looked so strong, she wondered what kind of terrific force could possibly beat it in so powerfully. No, she thought, and stepped down the last few staircases.

The tiny room into which she stepped was cramped and stuffy. It was very close to the old magma reservoir, though just above the third cavern layer's largest lake system. She had studied the miners' maps very closely before telling Tosid where to dig. And she could see that Kadôl had done his work well: a clearly designed set of fortifications met her eager gaze. Beyond them was nothing but blackness.

Kivish was disappointed. According to the smiths, Iru had not stopped trying to get through the iron floor for several months following its rampage, and--

CLANG!!!

She jumped. Her crossbow fell from her grasp and clattered noisily on the rough stone floor. The metal smashing sound had come from the iron floor above!

Shuddering, Kivish bent over to pick up her crossbow.

When she stood up again, she found herself gazing straight into the huge, lidless, aqua eye of Iru Lafooci. Its glow filled the tight space and for a moment she was mesmerized, filled with terror and awe.

Then everything blurred.

--

Dodòk cheered loudest, clapped longest, and cried hardest when Kivish, exhausted by fear and firing her crossbow, staggered up the stairs into the dining hall and shouted the news of Iru's death. So young! they said. Only seventeen, and she had already killed a Forgotten Beast! Oh, yes, tales would be told of this young grand master marksdwarf. Tales would be told...

--

Spoiler: Kivish (click to show/hide)

OOC: I have no idea how she got spatter on her. See the next spoiler for a picture of the battlefield.

Spoiler: Iru and its death (click to show/hide)

[VerdantSF]

That's some sweet revenge for what happened to poor Kib.  Well done, Kivish!

[ImagoDeo]

Yeah, and Kivish has already racked up a second FB kill. Another webspinner stegosaurid in my adamantine mine, dealth with via the same method. I need to put Kivish into a gym program though - she's too fat.

[Splint]

Vir, a green glass hourglass, has been made and put on display in Teduk's Fine Goods, Savageford branch. The humans really did save that glassmaker's life! Wasn't anything fancy, but still, the effort was a worthy one to make such a geometrically flawless marvel.

The Stolen God's rampage ended with a mixture of vicious war cougar and wolf packs being obliterated, along with numerous beak wolves; that spear slew so many, including the war leader, that it almost single... pointedly I guess, routed the siege, leaving a huge patch of blood and vomit that thanks to my excess workers is now being cleaned up efficiently so the bodies may be processed for training ammo.If i can remember to lever link the front gate next time I'll be able to greet aggressors with a hail of salvaged iron bodkin  and bone bolts (a goblin band was ripped to shreds by the beak wolves and likely contributed to routing the enemy before they were drowned by the beak wolves' numbers.)

I am so building a monument to that spear.

[Don Blake]

So Ceilingscorch got its first Syndrome causing beast (I think!  It has noxious secretions).  It pathed up towards my fortress, and was rudely interrupted by a woodcutter who swung an axe into its chest, and then shoved it into the water.  Now it's down there merrily boiling away in its its own fumes and interrupting every dwarf who passes by.  Trying to engineer some way to drain part of underground lake and force the Forgotten Beast into a killing chamber.

[Don Blake]

While the Drain the Lake plan is still in the initial stages, we go to Plan A- Death From Above.  In this plan, we drop ferocious creatures on the Forgotten Beast's head, from a great height.  We're starting with a captured enemy Giant Olm, and a semi-wild echidna.

Why the Echidna?  *shrug* I dunno, it's a control group, let's say.

[VerdantSF]

Relicshield, pop. 161, Early Spring of 341 (Year 90)

Atis the vampire languished in prison for 7 years before an appropriate sentence was decided on.  While some dwarves pointed out that she would be perfect for the position of bookkeeper and manager, the family of the vampire's victim, Morul Anguishedpages, saw nothing less than death as a satisfactory punishment.  As one of the largest families of the fortress, second only to the Channeltree clan, there was little hope for a merciful outcome.  The current mayor, Mosus II, had married into the Anguishedpages family and thus recused herself from the decision.  Dishmab Shootwondered-Vesselbrain, heiress to the throne, made the final judgment and carried out the sentence with the artifact lead mace, Drumseer.  The fact that the victim was only a child sealed Atis's fate.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[Don Blake]

So the Olm landed directly on the Forgotten Beast, but both failed to take any damage from the fall.  The Echidna missed and died on impact.  Next up, a Giant Rat and a bunch of War Dogs.

And yes, I realize that in trying to kill a giant raccoon by dropping dogs on it, I've become the villain in some sort of I-Phone game, and I'm okay with that.

[Splint]

A small group of orcish archers attempted to slip into the fortress and ran into the young now swordlord, Zas. With only a bull and a motley group some off-duty Mantis squad marksdwarves who fired a few token bolts as return fire, Zas slew five out of six of the orcs, plus a snatcher. While he didn't take sole credit for the victory, as the few quarrels that the Mantises let fly threw some of the orcs off balance as they dodged them and the enemy leader seemed to have a genuine hatred of leatherwing bats (one of which flew by the fight and got killed by a bow beaing smashed into its skull) and cows, the fact remains that he dodged or blocked a dozen arrows and either bisected or decapitated the lot of them.

For his valorous service to Savageford in effectively destroying a group of ranged enemies twice his size and outnumbering him, he has been promoted to Corporal of the Savageford Militia.

Now orc swordsmen have reared their ugly heads. Time for the swordsdwarves to prove their skills in a blade-to-blade clash!

[VerdantSF]

With only a bull and a motley group some off-duty Mantis squad marksdwarves who fired a few token bolts as return fire, Zas slew five out of six of the orcs, plus a snatcher.

Is Mantis just a name for the squad, or are they a special type of unit in Masterwork?  If the former, what's the story behind the name?

[Splint]

With only a bull and a motley group some off-duty Mantis squad marksdwarves who fired a few token bolts as return fire, Zas slew five out of six of the orcs, plus a snatcher.

Is Mantis just a name for the squad, or are they a special type of unit in Masterwork?  If the former, what's the story behind the name?

Just a squad, specifically named The Flaying Mantises, simply because I've been naming my units after various predators both real and fictional (two sword squads are the Cazadors and Ripperjacks, Axedwarves are Wolf Spiders, Hammerdwarves under the squad name of Croak Hounds.) Besides, I couldn't resist making a squad with the name. 

The orcs were routed quite soundly and cleanup has begun; As the home caravan just arrived, the orcs' ill fitting attire and armor, as well as thier metal shields, are going to be used to purchase more furs and metal from the caravan. A sad loss came in the form of one of the animate swords, that had been struck in the enchanted gem driving it. Such a shame to lose such effective allies, but once mages are trained we'll be able to easily field more.

I have to say I'm proud of Col. Ashmon's cazadors; they sliced the orcs up so badly we're finding severed heads two floors up on the gatehouse roof!

[Larix]

The side project has been finished. Nothing spectacular, it was just an exercise in optimising a mechanical adder. The result is pretty neat: a sixteen-bit adder taking up 18x14 tiles including two lines for power input and direction switching and two columns of 16-tile-long wall. In a fully modular design, it'd take 2x13 tiles per bit pair. Maximum power consumption per bit is 24. Power and space requirements include the entire minecart-based power-to-signal conversion, everything's contained on a single level. Of course it can subtract as well and properly displays negative results. The control and display room takes up more space than the actual adder.

One full-size z-level could house a 2800-bit-adder of this basic design, although that'd probably be _slightly_ silly. The biggest problem would be the subtraction and negative-number switches, which would certainly require splitting up the main signal over several relays. Otherwise one would need to link 5600 gear assemblies to a single lever...
It'd also take ~84 000 mechanisms, 8500 ropes, 5600 minecarts, 2800 logs, 2800 display buildings (hatches or doors), about 40 000 link jobs and close to 70 000 power. With an average stone drop rate of 1/4, you'd need to fully excavate eight z-levels just to get enough stone for all the mechanisms.

Oh, forgot to mention: calculation time until display of correct result: ~125 steps (100 of which are the wait time for initial false positives to switch off) in my design, which introduces an extra ~5 steps at one point in order to minimise power and space consumption. To keep this practically-instant calculation for large inputs, a design adjustment would be needed using slightly more power and space, but guaranteeing the fully instantaneous carry calculation for all the bits.

[ImagoDeo]

I want my Duchess to be in a military squad all by herself, but she can't be a militia captain and I can't assign her to a squad and then remove its captain.

If I kill the captain, will I still be able to order the Duchess as a squad all by herself? If so, will a 13-year-old hauler who's enormously fat with no skills to speak of be a great loss to the fortress? Are rhetorical questions really very useful? Am I a Dwarf Fortress player?

Screw it, just answer my first question.

[WanderingKid]

How the f am I expected to get a fully functioning military capable of clearing entire waves of goblins in under two years without using danger rooms?! Especially when I have no native iron ore, and every civvie for the first two waves is needed for some kind of masonry or farming. ESPECIALLY when my most promising military dwarves get wrecked by a giant bat in the caverns on the first year.

I don't usually even start a 'real' military until year three.  Interesting.

May I recommend a somewhat different pattern, and heavier usage of the pause button.

First: With your starting 7 + 2 meager waves, get your infrastructure in place.  Overbuild bedrooms, bathrooms, kitchens, food, farms, boooze, a large stockpile of rock blocks.  Supplies.  Also, plan wall construction.  Not a few.  I mean 2z high with fortification castle levels of walls.  Get corners, stairways, beginning of floors into place.

Next, anyone idle gets a crossbow and a stack of bolts. They hunt.  Why?  More bones, more bolts. Also, bone trade goods from their skulls and leather for moods.  Food too.

That entire first massive of migrants that drop 40+ ppl on you?  Masons. Every last mother's son of them.  You have just inherited the largest donation of slave wall builders known to man.  Build some bridges, dig a few moats.  Get them walls up.  You can be walled up, dug in, well fed, fully farmed, lever linked bridged with an airlocked trade depot before the end of winter.  Use the remaining time to timber/plant strip the surface bare.  Leave nothing out there.  Quantum storage the timber and process the plants.  If possible, build off an area for surface farming within your walls, start planting there as well.  Gotta love a nice booze variety.

From that very stable start, play on.

[ImagoDeo]

What about reanimating/otherwise deadly biomes?

...no, wait, I'm ahead of myself. I'll... cross those bridges when I come to them.

I do use the pause button a lot. It's my favorite tool for examining situations and making sure things happen in proper orders.