New fortress in 40.16. Still on a learning curve; this fort's objectives are to learn more about the military (managed to get a decent military up and running in the last fortress, but want to make sure it wasn't a fluke), raids and sieges (only had titans and FBs so far), glass industry (think I've got ceramics down fairly well, and glass is more useful overall), traps (related to the desire to see some raids), and dfhack/workflow (starting to work this out, but I had problems with stoneware/fire clay in my last fort, and I think shearing, milking and the like will still be problems for me).
Embark pros and cons
+ Volcano
- No clay
+ Sand
- No coal (fairly usual for volcano embarks, right?)
+ Reasonable amount of metal ore
- Surface is not greatly useful; the north face in particular is very nearly a sheer drop
+ Local wildlife looks profitable: the ostriches, in particular, will be worth capturing and domesticating (not something I know about, but I'll mug up on it)
- Fairly dry region, though it does rain occasionally
- No surface water
- Prospectors report a 13 z-level aquifer!
+ Turns out the aquifer's horizontal extent is fairly small, so that it only covers a small part of the map. I may use this as a safe zone to experiment with breaching.
- Prospectors report that the caverns are way, way, way down: about 120 z-levels from the embark wagon
- Kobolds, goblins and elves nearby
+ Kobolds, goblins and elves nearby
+ Other dwarves nearby = no more instant monarchs!
So far, I have managed to get a very basic agricultural sector up and running: plump helmets for brewing, and currently importing foodstuffs from any passing traders. I will be happier once I've got cheesemaking going, and those turkeys and sheep need breeding up for slaughter. Sheep are easily my favourite animal in DF: with minimal management, one can obtain wool and cheese in revenue, and leather, meat and bones on retirement of the capital. What's not to like?
But the grazing animals won't be able to come indoors unless either we build walls around their current pasture area or (more preferably) breach the caverns. This will take a while.
A shortage of bags for sand has meant it is necessary to get cloth going quickly; currently we have thread being dyed and I need to assign some dwarves to weaving and tailoring duties. With any luck we can have a decent supply of bags coming through shortly. There are some bags, so I have workflow currently ordering a level of 5-10 bags of sand, 50-75 green glass blocks and 15-20 green glass pots. It is to be hoped that this means I can push construction projects out at a reasonable pace.