The New RegimeOur first year progressed well. We have made great stride in securing our land, preparing our food safety, and setting up the backbone of our storage industry. Now that our second year has come, it is time to begin building our military strength. Today, we assessed our skills with hammer and axe, and assigned almost all able bodied dwarves to active duty.
Since we have twenty three dwarves, we decided to create two squads, one using hammers and one using axes. We do not have the axes or hammers, but that will be remedied shortly as we have put in orders for axes, hammers and shields.. These two squads will trade off training each month. Once more souls arrive, we shall stagger our training again.
The First Axes will be led by Moldath “Nix” Sobrilikot, and the First Hammers by Ral Cusilatham. I shall be but a grunt in Nix’s squad, as we are running our military and our industry based on skill. To make sure the fortress is well staffed, we have split our labors up with each squad containing members that can do any needed work.
12th Granite, 6An elven caravan has arrived. We have nothing of value to trade them, and our bridge is not yet complete. We shall see what happens.
15th Granite, 6Once the elves unpacked they had a few fruits we have not gathered yet. We traded away the cages we had left over from the dwarven caravan to obtain some of these items. Variety in booze is key to a strong military!
19th Granite, 6More migrants have come from the mountainhome. We gained 20 more souls. It appears we need to put two more squads into training. Cog Taguzkikrost shall lead the second hammers, while Athel Rigothlular shall lead the second Axes. We put in orders for more hammers and axes, and we will continue to fell trees to fuel our forges.
28th Slate, 6We have completed most of the bridges in the moat channel. The final links are being added to our new lever room. Once this is complete, we shall begin the process of flooding the moat. A second barracks was also completed, giving squads ample space to train. Training also goes well, as can be seen from our current jobs:
SummerOur miners are busy breaking down the levees to the rivers and preparing water channels underneath our new island. Our metalsmiths and furnace operators continue to toil in the heat, creating our weapons of war.
16th Hematite, 6A human caravan turned up. This should be quite interesting.
19th Hematite, 6We ended up trading some of those spiked balls for a bunch of food and drink, and a bit of thread and cloth.
21st Hematite, 6By Armok, another 12 migrants have come to our fortress. We are going to suspend adding more to the ranks after we fill the fourth squad for now. We need to get them armored first. Our training goes well and weapons and shields are complete, however fully armoring our dwarves is requiring intensive mining, deforestation, and smelting.
1st Malachite, 6We just had our first baby dwarf! Imush Reggaroth gave birth to a baby boy, Cerol Endokroth. The Boy’s father is Adil Urrithid. The couple arrived to our fortress last fall, so I think they had the bun in the oven when they arrived. At this point we have one baby and a handful of immigrant children. I am glad our last liaison took our message of limiting underage immigrants seriously.
14th Malachite, 6Our moat is ready to flood. It is time to open the floodgates!
19th Malachite, 6The moat is functional!
25th Malachite, 6Our miners found some native platinum after digging out a hematite seam!
In order to help streamline our industry we have also laid out a new plan for the workshops, located directly above our storage area. The old plot was many floors away, and was quite haphazard. The carpenters were still above ground!
The new layout will be much closer to storage and allow for customized stockpiles for each shop if needed:
26th Malachite, 6Shorast Toradobok has been taken by a mood. He proceeded to run to a metalsmith’s forge, then grabbed some iron bars, and began making something. After nearly a week he made Etolamnek, and heirloom iron chain. It is an iron chain, encircled with bands of iron. Well, at least this is better than the toy axe. Perhaps we will use it in a well at some point.
AutumnOur industry is in full swing. Our militia squads are training. After finding some seams of bituminous coal and more iron ores, our armorsmiths are honing their crafts. In order to start standardizing and improving efficiency, we have laid out a new workshop floor.
15th Limestone, 6Our Liaison has arrived again. It is Ineth Bubnuserith this year. The caravan from Abenerib has also arrived. We will begin hauling our goods up to meet them.
Our goods posted to trade came in at 39,192U. We traded for all their food, drink, meat, plants, bars, leather, cloth, thread, and a variety of other random items we have not taken time to produce. A very good year for trading. Here is the request from the mountainhome for next year:
After review of the depot, we also decided it was time to begin improving our fortifications and traffic patterns. We nearly missed the last caravan due to hauling those giant corkscrews along a winding path. By build walls, of solid slate, and connecting our depot entrance to the main stairwell, we’ve cut the hauling distance to a third of the previous trek. We also have a much stronger entrance.
14th Sandstone, 6Yet another wave of migrants came, 10 this time. This will help shore up our labor and speed up completion of the initial wave of armoring. We have begun designating bituminous coal seams for strip mining to try and remedy our constantly dwindling charcoal supplies. Trading a single piece or charcoal for 9 coke nuggets is fantastic, and we cannot ignore it.
The workshops are coming along nicely:
21st Timber, 6Morul Isramiden was taken by a mood. The soap maker took over the metalsmith’s forge. He ran about gathering up iron bars, some cut indigo tourmalines, and some logs. Some six days later she came out with an heirloom iron breastplate, decorated in wood and gems, with an image of a gem. I have added it to my uniform, as such a fine piece of armor should have a place in our combat ready ranks.
WinterAs our fortress met to plan for the end of the year, and interesting idea was proposed: Since we have been so focused on industry for almost two years, perhaps it was time to upgrade our dormitories to actual bedrooms. There was some disagreement, until it was pointed out that the digging of the rooms could also be used to identify more minerals for use in the war effort. This mollified the warhawks amongst the fortress, and we designated a massive ten story complex that could in theory hold some 200 dwarven souls, using the following rough outline:
Eventually the central shaft will be completely dug out save bridges to balconies around the rooms. This may be adjusted, as there are safety concerns with this.
17th Obsidian, 6While digging the starter shafts for the 8th floor of the new bedroom complex, we breached a large cavern:
This obviously complicates our bedroom plans. Luckily our masons have been consistently toiling away, shaping raw stone into blocks. Using these blocks we quickly built walls to provide some barrier to the caves until we can assess a proper entrance. Completing the bedrooms will take a bit longer than planned!
Year End ReportOverall, it has been a mostly dull but very productive year. Our stocks of food and drink are good. Our dwarves are training up into their squads adequately, our industry is producing what we need.
A tour of the fort as it stands may be the best way to show the current state.
At ground level we have a new depot, our bridges are all complete, and our new island is defensible from ground attacks if needed:
The first underground level has our farm, hospital and seed stores, plus the offices of the manager and bookkeeper:
The next floor down holds our future water channels, in case we need to divert some of the river for other uses. These channels are controlled by two double drawbridges.
Nine floors lower is our workshop complex. The intervening floors have the old workshop space and various dug out sections of mineral veins.
Below the workshops, the stockpiles:
Below the stocks, the kitchen, food storage, dining room, and dorms:
The next floor holds the levers controlling the river gates:
Further below that is the planned three floors for a grand dining room, the ten floors of housing, and the cavern breach. I will show a few of the walled cavern levels:
On the arms and armor front:
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Topic: Skullsguild :: A Martial Pursuit (Community Fort) (Read 7071 times)