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[PetGreySquirrel]

The dwarfs may have run out because the wagon is a default meeting area.
Did you make a meeting area zone inside the room?

yeah, meeting area, pen, dump zone  were all crammed into the room. (Dump zone was to try to get items inside fast, but didn't have much chance to try that, because I forbid everything before much made it in to prevent hauling attempts.)

[delphonso]

I have dwarves stick around meeting zones even after deleted or disabled for a moment - usually finishing their socializing routine or whatever they were doing. Not long, but maybe long enough to get evil rain on them...

[PetGreySquirrel]

I have dwarves stick around meeting zones even after deleted or disabled for a moment - usually finishing their socializing routine or whatever they were doing. Not long, but maybe long enough to get evil rain on them...

Yeah, I'm still not sure what was up, but, they're dead now. So is the first caravan. So is the first migrant wave. Both arrived during the rain. I'm not sure there's been a break in it since it started, but, the 4 dwarves who made it inside are still alive. Butchered the horses (there was nowhere for them to graze anyway) and rushed to the caverns, where we built a well several levels above an underground lake.
One of the migrants was a legendary metalcrafter from my previous fort, sad to see him die to the rain.
I am not sure how, exactly, I will be able to get the migrants or caravans inside in one piece. I'm open to suggestions, since, I can't even build a canopy with this ceaseless rain. Is there some way I can open a map edge underground for them, that they would actually use?

The migrants did accomplish one good thing -- they got one of the copper axes under the roof before they all died, so, we can cut the underground trees now.

For now... I'll open an space near the edge and hope they can get inside before the rains get them... A ramp right to the last tiles and all underground from there should help, I hope.

[delphonso]

You can dig tunnels from the far edge to some central corridor or defensive area - I'd recommend figuring out a way to seal these, as the weather should kill basically any invaders who come by. You might get lucky with a migrant wave spawning right near a tunnel and dodging into it instead of taking any of the rain. Obviously decontamination will also be necessary.

Traders are more likely to do this - as they will only take the path which is accessible by your depot. unfortunately they still need to be on the surface (but dwarven caravans sometimes leave through caverns, if accessible.) Meaning, if you dig a tunnel from the surface to a depot, they should appear right at the edge of the map near the tunnel and go right in.

[PetGreySquirrel]

You can dig tunnels from the far edge to some central corridor or defensive area - I'd recommend figuring out a way to seal these, as the weather should kill basically any invaders who come by. You might get lucky with a migrant wave spawning right near a tunnel and dodging into it instead of taking any of the rain. Obviously decontamination will also be necessary.

Traders are more likely to do this - as they will only take the path which is accessible by your depot. unfortunately they still need to be on the surface (but dwarven caravans sometimes leave through caverns, if accessible.) Meaning, if you dig a tunnel from the surface to a depot, they should appear right at the edge of the map near the tunnel and go right in.

Yeah, controlling the spawn point for the caravan, at least, shouldn't be too hard. I have no idea how I'm going to deal with the migrants issue, will just have to survive until I get lucky and a few make it through I guess.

Progress has been made! The last migranr wave brought us 20 new dwarves! more importantly, some of them made it to the gates without being killed by the blue mucous raining from the skies!
I don't know how they managed it, exactly, but I feel it's notable that all the survivors were from a previous fort, and are at least "Adequate" level dodgers.
Of course, the ever-expanding pile of corpses they have to wade through to get to the gates left the less hardened of them pretty... unwell... Most of the fort seems to be holding together, but, several red arrows have already appeared. Understandable, really. We've only now got enough labourers to be able to make and engrave slabs for all the dead, and the combination of ghosts and corpses in the quarantine area (where I check migrants for lethal goo before I approve them into the fort proper) certainly isn't helping... hopefully, once I get more set up and can rig water and magma cleaning rigs for the area, it will get a bit better. (water to rinse the goo and such away, magma to deal with the bodies, and misc. items we have to leave behind)

[Eric Blank]

Started in an evil forest biome, next to a normal mountain, on a volcano and a brook right next to each other. Have had twenty plus dwarves die various horrible deaths. Forty still kicking around. I've got a corpse smasher probably should have set up the fort in the mountain instead of the evil forests. Yeah, not a great plan there.

[muldrake]

Finally have managed to figure out how to make it out of the early-game. Food and drinks are all in order, the manager was recently elected to mayor, and I've made my first soap. The day is good.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

There is something so great in this game about that moment when your little society is finally able to make soap.  How many games are there where you can you get a feeling of accomplishment for producing soap?  No more infection deaths!  My first soap is usually from rock nuts although I'll make it from anything.

[PetGreySquirrel]

So, we've stabilized a bit. lost a couple more to a forgotten beast with poison vapour, but, the dwarves who've made it inside have at least been able to survive and make a life for themselves in the caverns and nested in the warmth of the valcano and magma sea.

I capped population at 20 for the time being, I'm working on weaponizing the volcano and stopping every season or two to try to get migrants inside has been too distracting... once the mountain has been turned into a flamethrower, and the surface can be cleansed of distracting items, bodies, and the ever-growing stack of eagles that fly onto the map and immediately fall from the skies and die due to the rain, I'll let them try again, I think, but right now we have more important things to worry about than feeding and clothing more dwarves.
Hopefully this next caravan will spawn in the one location that can reach the depot, instead of on the opposite side of the map and immediately dieing... again... I've made the path even more restrictive, to ensure they have ONLY one path now. I hope they take it.

We finally found some of the metal this map was promised to have. Only tetrahedrite has been found so far, but, given the dangers of the surface, and our plans for the volcano, I doubt we'll be fighting weapon-wielding enemies in armour anytime soon, and the copper is sufficient to give us a strong advantage over most cavern denizens. More importantly, thanks to the abundance of magma, we don't need wood to create metal items. Our access to wood is, in all honestly, pretty dire. We're working on re-irrigating the caverns, but, being able to make metal flasks, bins, splints, wheelbarrows, etc. takes a lot of pressure off our dwindling supplies. For the time being, wood is being used almost exclusively for beds, and for ash to make lye for much-needed soap. That forgotten beast left us with over 200 globs of usable tallow, so, we're no longer resorting to butchering puppies for fat, though, their leather is still rather important for the time being.

[HMD Majesty]

Granitebristle has been in interesting Times.  Late last Winter, Our late Captain of the Guard disappeared under strange Circumstances - Legends claims she suffocated - with six Witnesses to her Death swearing they saw Nothing.  No Corpse has been found despite Our best Efforts, and the full Story may never be known.

This Spring, Our first clutch of Giant Tortoise Eggs hatched and We lost one Dwarf to a Cyclops.  The Cyclops then lost to the other thirty-nine Dwarfs.

[PetGreySquirrel]

The volcano has been weaponized successfully! initial testing is underway, and there appears to be no leaks into the fortress. it's not particularly fast, but, I suppose it doesn't have any reason to be, it is magma/lava afterall. Any would-be invaders will certainly have trouble making it through to our gates, at any rate.
This doesn't help with the freakish weather, and we did have to sacrifice a dwarf to finish this project (she was tantruming every season anyway, and far too traumatized by the death of her child to the toxic rain to ever hope to recover anyway... dieing in the magma while breaching the volcano is, likely, the most she could do for us at this point. Her slab is already engraved and placed.)

[Levity]

Breachedrock was prospering, albeit messily. The windmill farm was being constructed incredibly slowly, due to our single mechanic being opposed to sunlight and therefore dragging himself to build the vertical axles, whose harnessed mechanical power will power a pump stack 117 z-tiles long!

But then, a vile force of darkness! Gnomes, dragonoids, goblins; many without weapons! I raised our safety drawbridge, not wanting to test my four Cleavers who had reached Adept level in axe fighting; four of the strongest and fittest dwarves in my fort.

Unfortunately, I had dug a second tertiary stairwell to the corridor below the tree farm, subverting the safety bridge and leading directly to the bedrooms, where all the younglings play... One child lost his life to drakken poison, and I lost two of my axedwarves. Astoundingly, they managed to repel the invaders, the four of them. A makeshift hospital has been setup to tend to the wounded. I believe I have gotten away... lightly, to say the least.

CRITICAL UPDATE: A cyclops is now chasing emus about the surface, while my cave-adapted axedwarves stumble after him dizzily.

CRITICAL UPDATE 2: Building this pump stack is a fresh hell. From now on I'll be digging my forts deeper!

[Quaksna]

Guys, my frog fortress has a serial stinger bumblebee problem. This time, a stray sow was the victim!

If this stinging doesn't stop, I fear fate of our citizens are sealed...

Edit: Also we just finished sanctuary of chocolate, a temple of wisdom.

Edit2: Oh my, another secretive mood after a bumblebee sting. This is definitely an omen.

[PetGreySquirrel]

CRITICAL UPDATE 2: Building this pump stack is a fresh hell. From now on I'll be digging my forts deeper!

Yeah, a big part of me generating worlds with only one cavern layer recently was the annoyance of having to either build 100+ level pump stacks, or build the main body of the fort (or in some cases an entire sub-fort) in the 2nd or 3rd cavern layer if I wanted access to magma without dwarves walking half way to the forge area and giving up to get a drink.
Usually just treating the caverns as your 'surface' level and making a ramp-road 3+ tiles wide down to it seems to help, though. Just remember your entire population will be cave adapted if you do that.

[Eric Blank]

Guys, my frog fortress has a serial stinger bumblebee problem. This time, a stray sow was the victim!

If this stinging doesn't stop, I fear fate of our citizens are sealed...

Edit: Also we just finished sanctuary of chocolate, a temple of wisdom.

Edit2: Oh my, another secretive mood after a bumblebee sting. This is definitely an omen.

They'll be lumpy and sore.

My rutherer got stung by a honey bee.

The dwarves of Golddaggers suffered more casualties recently, while walling off the first caverns. A normally passive cave leviathan spawned on a tile they we're building on and took offense. The beast was put down with great effort, after it had smooshed a woodworker. There was also a giant cave spider issue, which resulted in the deaths of 8 of our finest.

The elven caravan was torn to shreds by undead giant birds. They also were responsible for killing a dwarven merchant on their way to the depot the first autumn and thus ruining our chances to trade at all, but I managed to deconstruct the depot in time to catch some of the goods from the wagon.

[PetGreySquirrel]

I retired Gaterider, the fortress on the evil volcano "The Tower of Immortality" shortly after completing the weaponized volcano. Things stabilized, but, I am in the process of trying to drag this dwarven civilization (The evicerated bolts) back from the edge of extinction, and having 80% of my migrants die almost as soon as they spawn on the map was.... somewhat counterproductive.
Efforts to breathe life into this civ have gone fairly well, though. Unfortunately, we're at war with 2 elven civilizations, and with the other dwarven civilization in this world, so, there is no safe place to embark, really. Regardless, our population is slowly climbing. The old capital has a population of 75, up from 40 or so a few years ago. The only other sites we have are fortresses I've retired. Of them, stakeplunged seems to be doing well for itself, with a listed population on the civ map of ~400 (retired at 200 or so, and many of the migrants to the last 2 forts have been from there.) Even the evil volcano site has shown a general upwards trend, being listed now at ~100 (retired at 30.)

Our new fortress, Berrash "Earthendeaths" has grown rapidly to 124 dwarves over the last 2 years, 46 of which are children, some of whom I hope to raise to adulthood here, and train to be useful to the civilization's survival. We embarked in a swamp in the south-west, far from the elves and opposing dwarves. Our only neighbors seem to be the goblins of "The Hex of Mucus" who sent a "siege" consisting of... 9 goblins. Not very impressive, as far as threats go, but this map only has copper, platinum, and silver, so, our military isn't as well protected from their weapons as I would like. We'll be importing as much iron and steel as we can to remedy this. We're on good terms with the humans, but, our civilization exists only in places well outside their merchant's range of travel, so, we've yet to meet any of them in any of these forts.
This fortress is in The Swamps of Wishing, The site is bisected by a small 4-tile-wide stream, which freezes in autumn, and thaws in mid-spring. This area has a 7 Z-level deep light aquifer in the sandstone layers (which we've taken advantage of to create a near-constant pleasant mist at our main entrance in the cavern layer. Above the aquifer is 2 layers of clay and one of soil, so we've had a fairly easy go at farming here. The influx of legendary metalcrafters, metalsmiths, armourers, and weaponsmiths from previous forts has helped our wealth grow rapidly in a very short time, and while the copper may not make for the best armour, at least it's of the best quality a dwarf could hope for.

I think our next major project will be to try to do some exploratory mining in the layers of aquifer-stone, we've seen some platinum in the sandstone walls, where the aquifer overlaps with the caverns, and I think that alone is enough to motivate the miners to agree too getting a little wet. If we establish proper drainage, it shouldn't be too difficult, it is only a light aquifer afterall. Maybe we'll get lucky and find some iron ore as well, which would certainly help our military out quite a bit, The presence of platinum has me hopeful that we may have some magnetite hidden above our heads...