I think the odds of finishing by next weekend are medium-to-low, but will keep trying!
Here's a report on Hamlet Nisgaksebshos Rath Disuth, "Frostmires the Temple of Nightmares" up through year 5!
First, there was some pre-embark dfhackery, mostly to increase the challenge available for embarking. Two things were done.
1. Make it rain dwarf blood. There was no evil weather anywhere in this world!
df.global.world.interaction_instances.all[0].anon_1 = 48
df.global.world.interaction_instances.all[1].anon_1 = 48
df.global.world.interaction_instances.all[2].anon_1 = 48
2. Tweak elevations and biome locations so there's a playable biome near the evil mountains, because what Fun would things be without undead and freakish weather?
for ii = 4,8 do
for jj = 0,3 do
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].biome[ii][jj] = 7;
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation[ii][jj] = 149
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation2[ii][jj] = 149
end
end
for ii = 5,7 do
for jj = 1,3 do
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation[ii][jj] = 141
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation2[ii][jj] = 141
end
end
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation[4][3] = 141
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation2[4][3] = 141
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation[8][3] = 141
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation2[8][3] = 141
for jj = 2, 5 do
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].biome[6][jj] = 0
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation[6][jj] = 134
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation2[6][jj] = 134
end
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].biome[6][2] = 7
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].biome[5][5] = 0
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].biome[7][5] = 0
for ii = 4,8 do
for jj = 4,6 do
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation[ii][jj] = 134
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].elevation2[ii][jj] = 134
end
end
for jj = 3, 6 do
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].rivers_vertical.active[6][jj] = 1
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].rivers_vertical.elevation[6][jj] = 134
end
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].rivers_vertical.x_min[6][3] = 21
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].rivers_vertical.x_max[6][3] = 24
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].rivers_vertical.x_min[6][4] = 16
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].rivers_vertical.x_max[6][4] = 19
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].rivers_vertical.x_min[6][5] = 27
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].rivers_vertical.x_max[6][5] = 30
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].rivers_vertical.x_min[6][6] = 30
df.global.world.world_data.region_details[0].rivers_vertical.x_max[6][6] = 33
df.global.world.world_data.geo_biomes[6].layers[1].mat_index = 258
Here's the location:
And here's the result when we arrive at our shiny, new (freezing, hellish) 3x5 home! The whole embark, including the stream, is frozen year-round, which is going to cause no end of headaches throughout the game.
Embark: 01-01-100We dig a tiny hole in the ground and hastily begin felling trees. A foremost concern is to quarry a couple stones from the nearby hillside, along with a few pieces of coal!
We'll need a stone door before something nasty comes along!
Frantically, supplies are carried underground. On the mountainsides all around us, it is snowing dwarf frozen blood!
Time to get REAL used to the following cancellation message, because it's going to keep happening for the rest of the game: (and not just for turkey pasturing)
Leaving a mining pit open to undead attack sounds like a bad idea, so a double-slit aquifer piercing is attempted. On 4-9-100, it succeeds! We are through the aquifer!
(Though we could have probably gone around it through the mountain areas.)
Early-summer: 4-15-100: Dark Gnome Corpses show up, a lot of them! Our run of good luck is over, but thankfully we have access to stone and coal for trap-making!
Just after that, we pierced the roof of the first cavern layer and got it floored over, fast! (Oops! That was the second cavern! Apparently we missed the first one entirely.)
5-14-100: The gnomes wander off and we sneak out to dig out and roof over small areas for a refuse pile and surface farm plots. Now we have year-round agricultural production, which simplifies planning!
Year 1 Report 01-01-101: 18 dwarves, 15 adults and 3 children, make up the Worshipful Nooses at Nisgaksebshos Rath Disuth, the Temple of Nightmares. We have built a small, self-sufficient fort, with bedrooms, kitchen, farming and workshops. We've hauled up magma for a glass furnace and smelter, and magma for a forge is being carried up the stairs.
At this point the fortress begins a cowardice-based strategy for survival when walled in by evil biomes. All access is blocked by walls, doors and bridges, with a generous helping of cage traps at the few available entrances.
3-22-101: A
ninja turtle stealth weretortoise is screaming across the map, tearing dark gnomes limb from limb! Wow! And it was an elf. Crazy.
Year 2 report 01-01-102: 40 dwarves, 10 children. (Hit the 40-dwarf population cap!) Work has begun on a pump stack to bring up the huge amount of magma that will be required to properly honor Ozor.
The aquifer has been pierced in a second location to allow the pump stack through. This was much easier after having already gained access to magma.
We still have not captured a giant cave spider, which will also be needed, so better traps are being planned.
3-12-102.
Pull the lever! This is our first attempt to activate the magma pump stack!
Success! We now have a high-volume magma source. Now to cast a ton of obsidian for construction material! (We'll need around 1000 obsidian blocks for above-ground obsidian casting, even recovering the lower levels after casting to build the upper levels of the forms.)
Year 3 report 01-01-103: The same 40 dwarves have been mining and crafting. Wait, what game is this again? Anyway, we have a ton of materials, and the outer world has gone strangely quiet. It's time to return to the surface and begin to build!
The symbol of our civilization is Two Giant Wombats. Truly epic stuff. The symbol of our local site is a dwarf. Creative choice there, guys!
Almost all effort goes into two goals: building obsidian scaffolding and aboveground pump stack, and creating clear glass. We're taking advantage of the lack of creatures to get that work well underway!
7-2-103: First contact with any kind of invader! Three kobold thieves wander by the construction site! Next time let's leave some cookies or something out for them.
Working in freezing biomes is a lot harder than anticipated! For obsidian casting, we first have to fill each layer with ice, because aboveground water pumping is impossible. So every single block requires two trips by a bucket-laden dwarf. This is going to take forever!
Late fall: We've trapped a giant cave spider! This marks a major milestone for success: webbed cage traps are now a possibility.
12-22-103: The first magma is poured into the form! We can now start recovering blocks used in constructing the forms.
Year 4 report: 01-01-104 Magma pouring of the lower levels has begun, along with an incredibly tedious bucket brigade for water. The other major push is still to make clear glass. We also need an ice machine to give us a better source of ice boulders!
4-2-104: Three more kobold thieves? Where are the cookies? We want them to come back! It's lonely around here, with almost no surface animals, undead or goblins.
4-20-104: Oh sh*t! The Weretortoise Cobi Espoele Nocam Irum has come!
4-21-104: He transformed into a human and left. That was a close call, as several workers were on the surface and our traps are still minimal.
6-18-104: We've trapped a polar bear! This might be part of a great welcoming committee. The elves have also brought us a breeding pair of grizzly bears and a giant black bear.
7-2-104: More kobolds! Three again: This time I'm remembering their names: Fruler, Jrakus, Dragakaplilus. Come back, we have piles of free crap for you to steal and help increase our framerate!
12-17-104: The Forgotten beast Nula Iquilacethutha Obi Imeri has come!
And is promptly collected by the webbed cage traps set up for the occasion!
Year 5 report: 01-01-105:Construction is happening, aided greatly by the extremely low rate of visitors! (Trapping a bunch of undead in a hallway probably helped with that.)
There is a Dark Gnome Corpse left lower arm hanging three z-levels up in a tree branch, kicked up there by a Ninja WereTurtle.
We struck adamantine early in the magma search and though there's only one spire on the map, it was gigantic, producing almost 300 wafers so far. That will come in handy later.
All of the peasants were trained up to level 1 in Mason, and a large stack of bituminous coal was been set aside for their moods. This is starting to pay off, as the early spate of useless craftsdwarf artifacts is starting to give way to glorious coal artifact furniture. (Sadly, you can't set furniture on fire, but it's part of the planned mythology.)
There's still no contact with the goblins, sadly.
FPS is still above 90 most of the time, thankfully. A lot of effort is going into that. Population limit will stay at 40 until there's more than just the utility fortress underneath, which will probably be at least another 5-10 in-game years.
Oh, also, the amount of cave-adapted dwarf vomit on the surface is starting to compete with the blood rain! Yum!
edit: Spoke too soon about the goblins!
They showed up early summer 105, a small siege of two squads. Looks like we have to stop abusing the lack of invaders and set up some actual fortress defense! (To date, 5.25 years in, there's no militia and something like 5 cage traps at the entrance, and that's it.)