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[Shonai_Dweller]

Okay, so my military campaign against the nearby goblin civ was going pretty well, until I got too cocky and decided that attacking a dark fortress with a reported population of "~10" was going to be a breeze.

Well, one of the parts of the report was that a squad "clashed with seventy six trolls" in the dark fortress.

Today I learned: Trolls do NOT count towards the reported population.

Funny thing is, after several dwarves got killed, 2 escaped (and returned), and the rest got imprisoned, the population increased to "~30".

The population is the number of historical figures at the site, but a recent update allowed non-histfigs to fight as well. The population counter increased because the trolls that killed somebody became historical figures.

No, the population is the civilized population (for which trolls don't count). You wouldn't get 10,000 historical figures at a dark fortress, your PC would die.

I've noticed the population does change sometimes after visiting a site though (both up and down), even if you don't fight anyone. I think it must update based on the visiting dorf's latest information.

[bloop_bleep]

I was referring to the civilization-screen population number (i.e. the "~10" and "~30" that latias1290 mentioned.)

[escondida]

Been trying to raze a nearby Dark Pits with a population of 10 for a while; the squad keeps going, finding nothing, and then leaving. I suppose the remaining goblins have wised up and hide when the axedwarves show up.

The pointless war with the elves continues unabated (I wish *I* could send out diplomats, because they won't bother). The humans continue to waste my time with endless petitions for citizenship. One even had the temerity to petition for citizenship after nearly killing my trained hydra (apparently, my fort was its first encounter with dwarves; I checked, and it is not an enemy of my civ), which I keep chained in a citizens-only artifact vault beneath the Great Library; needless to say, he didn't leave the map alive.

The caverns have been suspiciously quiet since the last batch of forgotten beasts went down. A smattering of troglodytes and sundry other ordinary fauna walk into my cage traps each month, but no more FBs for the last couple of years.

The king can never have enough floodgates; apparently, nobody ever taught him that a raising bridge can do everything a floodgate can but more safely.

[Jazz Cat]

A couple of Kobold thieves snuck into my fort. I was gonna just let them grab some shinies and leave, since I didn't have a military set up yet, and they didn't seem like they'd be too much of a threat. But then I caught one of them skulking around my booze stockpile, which is simply unforgivable.

So I look through my citizens (all thirteen of them, yay) to see if anyone has any military skills. Hey, what do you know, my miller happens to be a competent axedwarf! So I put her in a one-dwarf squad, fiddle around with the equipment for a bit trying to assign her an axe, and in the meantime tell my woodcutter to go drop his axe in the stockpile so my military can use it.

Then I send her after the booze thieves. As expected, she totally wastes them. But then...

That's funny, I think to myself. What's the battle-axe doing in this stockpile?

It turns out she never even picked it up. She struck down her adversaries bare-handed: She strangled one to death and gouged out the other's eyes until his skull split into gore.

So, yeah. She's getting a couple of statues commissioned in her honor.

[bloop_bleep]

-snip-

Kobolds are extremely wimpy and a couple dwarves with no fighting skill whatsoever can destroy them no problem.

Next time one of them comes, you might as well just put 10 random dwarves in a squad, order them to kill it, and then disband the squad.

[Raikaria]

-snip-

Kobolds are extremely wimpy and a couple dwarves with no fighting skill whatsoever can destroy them no problem.

Next time one of them comes, you might as well just put 10 random dwarves in a squad, order them to kill it, and then disband the squad.

Guard Dogs suffice too. They'll also detect any Snatchers.

Anyway; I had the biggest Seige yet. At least 38 Goblins and 6 trolls; and a Beak Dog Recruit that apparently; according to my Legends viewer; led the attack.

Started the battle by shooting from my towers. Killed a few goblins with my initial volley of limited metal ammunition; before I did quite a lot of damage with a hail of bones. Bruises; cuts; even the odd shot to the eye. Not many casulties from when I started to fire bone ammunition, but the massive swarm of Goblins were injured and broken up. It also gave time for some Goblins to be captured by my traps scattered around.

Then I moved my squad of 5 Hammerdwarves and a Human Swordsman to the gate; and opened it; letting the Goblins wander in. They actually arrived surprisingly close together to each other; I hoped they'd be more stagged.

Still; at the end of the battle; the entire invasion force was either dead or captured. I lost a single Hammerdwarf in the melee; with two others having minor injuries which have been attended to.

With my Magma Forge online, I'm able to start making more steel [I was running a bit low on wood for charcoal] so I'm increasing the squad's size to 8 now; and I'll get it up to 10 with more steel made, or visitors who join for Soldering. I also have to find a fitting way to execute the captives. There's a good 12 of them. I'm split on if I should melt down the Goblinite and turn it into bolts or keep some of it. Especially stuff like a Silver Whip. Silver's good for Blunts and Whips; while lightsabers; are Blunt.

==

Speaking of excecutions; the two Goblins and an Ettin in my maze were killed by me releaseing a swarm of about 13 Crundles on them. The Goblins were overwhelmed; and the Ettin survived but had many cuts and died a couple of months later. Weirdly; he wasn't leaving trails of blood or anything. He just... died. Due to Crundles.

Upon further inspection; the cause of death is listed as Infection. The Crundle that is credited the kill? Called Tradeflower.

===

Also; caught some Dralthas. I mined out a large clay area and am breeding them. I have 4 Draltha and 3 calves now. They should supply me with quite a lot of meat and bones.

===

Edit: Update on the Beastie in my lv 3 Cavern made of Cryoline; I have summized; through it fighting a pack of Rutherers, that it's venomous vapours are of a particually nasty type. The group of 4 Rutherers split up and ran away. Two got killed in combat quickly. The other two left trails of blood. One of them was killed by the beast. The fourth had blood oozing from all over it's body; and died very shortly before the FB could turn around and kill it. The only actual attack this Rutherer sustained was a kick to the foot.

The fact that being caught in the 'venom' of this beast seems to cause something as large as a Rutherer to bleed out and die incredibly quickly makes me very unwilling to try and clear out this Rock-Beast from my lv 3 cavern.

At the same time; it also makes me want to weaponize it somehow as a near-indestructible biological weapon.

Oh; and it show no injuries from it's encounter with some Magma crabs which spat at it multiple times.

I think I've found my excecutioner. I just need to capture it and put it to use without killing my fort. I have some tame GCS...

[Hiarhu]

I just had a giant serpent forgotten beast slip past my defenses and into the fort. My military was only eight strong and clad in scrap from the undead sieges but they were raid hardened. I set them at the entrance up from the caverns hoping to guard the masons who were quickly trying to erect a wall. No such luck as soon as they were in place the beast was upon them.

It was a vicious fight but in the end my dwarves stood victorious and all eight alive. I ordered the militia to their beachside training area to assess the damage, there  I saw that three of my militia were now down to one hand each, one losing his entire right arm. Better than losing the entire fort. I let them do their thing and got to cleaning up the fort. A few moments later I get a message that one of the wounded has been found dead, badly crushed.

 See, in my haste to make sure my military was still useful I forgot that since they were last training in that area I had installed a one tile trash chute to an atom smasher nearby. Turns out it was one space outside the training area, just within dodging distance. On the bright side, I can bury the hand now at least, it was previously scheduled for the chute.

[KittyTac]

Preparing to smoosh an elven caravan into paste using a cave-in. Sadly, they got away before I could finish it.

[MantisMan]

I got the current versions of DF, Dwarf Therapist, DF Hack, and Picturefort/Quickfort up and running. I'm in year 2-ish, with a population of 64 dwarves, plenty of resources to make steel, and my metalworker became a legendary armoursmith from a mood. All in all, it's a very nice situation. The cavern is a dangerous place, but I've just been accepting all the Monster Slayer applicants who applied, reasoning that they'll keep the cave crocodile and giant olm populations under control.

Unfortunately, I'm still in the process of building the overhanging floor to my surface yard wall, and my military consists of three marksdwarves with leather armour, iron chain mail, and bone helms / greaves. I'm still working on making the low boots and bone gauntlets. Also, they're stuck with wooden bolts still.

I just got a visitor. A weretortoise. It's standing right outside my drawbridge (not hooked up to a lever yet, so it's just a regular bridge), and my squad are moving things in stockpiles or constructing a building. Their xbow skills are 10, 5, and 5.

I don't want to lose them, but I don't want the spreading werebeast infection to burn through my fort.

The game's paused right now, while I go delay the inevitable.

Will wooden bolts be enough to kill the werebeast before they get into melee range? Will it be able to bite through their armour? Will the lack of foot and hand armour be a major oversight? Will the iron chain be really helpful?

[Eric Blank]

Werebeasts are pretty big, so wooden bolts might not have the penetration power to cause serious injuries. Iron chain mail should stop most attacks, but it will be able to bite through bone gear quickly. And yes, leaving the hands and feet vulnerable will probably result in them getting bit. Three marksdwarves isnt gonna cut it

My strategy to contain werebeasts is to lock up anyone that had anything to do with the fighting in melee range, and wait for a month to see which ones turn.

[ShinQuickMan]

Yeesh, all these years of relying soley on rock blocks for constructions, when I could've also been using clay boulders this whole time! That's what I get for making assumptions on the ceramic industry.

[Magistrum]

Somewhat related, three years in a new embark I finally got steel and an armorer, find out that high boots are foreign  to my civ.

Now conflicted, because I got such nice brick wall around my site, but my military will be unstylish.

[thvaz]

Six years into a fortress, breached all three levels of underground and got to the magma sea...and not a single forgotten beast so far.

[MantisMan]

Luckily, the weretortoise ended up tiring itself out while slaughtering my farm of surface animals. I mobbed it with my military after it started passing out from exhaustion.

I think there was only one casualty, an unfortunate dwarf who happened to be on the surface when the beast came. She ended up being one of the dwarves I conscripted. She, along with her baby, died.

Then, a few minutes later in real time, a giant attacked. I played the same strategy of getting all my dwarves underground, massing my military around the underground corner (I had some cace traps this time), and rushing out to attack once it tired itself out.

I'm honestly surprised I still have any living farm animals on the surface at this point. I'll probably have to keep any breeding animals I actually want to keep alive (like dogs, for the military supplement) underground.

Luckily, I've got my overhang floor set up on my surface wall, and my bridge is set up to a lever in the dining room, so I'm well on my way to a functioning fort.

Should I equip my military with iron gear in the meantime, or try to jump straight to steel?

[blueturtle1134]

You all might know that I use this site exclusively for the forum games. I suck at Dwarf Fortress. This is only my second fort.

Once again I built up military way, way too slowly. Zombie siege arrived first winter. Two zombies came. I had zero defenses.


I've lost a fort.