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[Paulus Fahlstrom]

Journal of Paulus Fahlstrom, undated.

Well, it's about time I take a little breather here. We were so anxious to get here and anxious to begin digging that that's about all I've done so far. We've gotten several exploratory shafts dug though and I hope we come across the entrance to this supposed fabled kingdom soon. Still, the area is nice enough, as long as you don't go outside. Not much of an issue for me lately.

The others are also busy doing their respective work and I don't see too much of them to be honest. They're keeping us safe and well fed. I'm mostly here for the riches and to see if I can find some of the ancient armors to see if what they say about their craftsdwarfship is true. Rumor has it they found a special method of treating their steel. Some sort of tempering process that makes it better than normal steel. It's possible that if I could find a sample I might be able to experiment with metals and try to duplicate their work. Still, that's just the dream. At least we have our forge up and running now. Good thing too, since Haven's axe got swiped. Filthy buggers.

We'll need more weapons here soon enough. Perhaps I should make myself a warhammer. It's been a little while since I've swung one, but they say you never lose your touch.

I must admit that I'm rather frustrated about the whole bed situation. I specifically brought the wood so that I could sleep someplace comfortable, but what does everyone do? Steal it whenever they darn well feel like. I'd lace it with caltrops if I had any. Haven's in it now, but with him being injured it's best he recover quickly. Being a man down can make a huge difference out here in the wilds.

I saw the trade post that had been set up outside on one of my few forays. Good idea. Why schlep the goods all over the place when we can hawk them from the comfort of our own doorstep. Not that I want to get too comfortable here. It isn't like this is a permanent sort of home.

Well, got to get back to work. Break's about over.

[RPharazon]

JOURNAL OF "RPHARAZON" INODGODEN


1st Granite, 7.

I don't know what the hell the previous overseer's problem was. No wonder we lost a dwarf. The fortress is in the shape of an enormous cross. There's no stockpiles. There's no beds. There's no rooms whatsoever. I can't believe that we lived like this for a year.

I'm never buying rat weed from that shady dealer in the capital again.


5th Granite, 7.

How the hell do we even have a clerk? We have sick dwarves freezing to death, no food sources to speak of, and no stockpiles or workshops at all, and Salmeuk is stuck in his little "Office" next to the sick guy AND the refuse, counting beans like an Obsessive-compulsive 7-year-old.

I'm digging a whole new fortress. It'll give us more of a chance than this monstrosity.


14th Granite, 7.

I think the rocks are looking at me funny. The miners seem to work a bit faster every day. I don't know why we settled on top of a mountain if the only food source is in the valley. I'm creating a passage underground to a harvesting area. I don't think that having our only source of food in a wolf den is very smart.

I think the rocks are talking to me.


15th Granite, 7.

The damn elves are here. I told them to piss off, seized their food, and I laughed as they cried. The miner is gradually going insane. I'm secretly hoping that they die so I can settle here in peace.


2nd Slate, 7.

The main hall is sort of being dug out, everything seems to crawl along at a snail's pace.

So much stone...


17th Slate, 7.

I'm going insane. I can't understand what this book says. The rest of the dwarves are happy and stupid and ecstatic. I have no idea why.

I told them to start work on the project.


25th Slate, 7.

The rest of the dwarves keep running into the hole in the ground that is our fortress with a scared expression on their faces. They mumble something about socks outside guarded by batmen.

Wimps.


5th Felsite, 7.

Migrants! At last! When they came in the door, I didn't ask for their names. Only their professions. We got a brewer (Thank Armok), five peasants, a child, a miner, a mason, a lye maker, a potash maker, two threshers, two fish dissectors, two stonecrafters, two blacksmiths, a ranger, and a woodcutter.

Twenty-one brave souls in all.

I immediately conscripted the lye and potash makers.


9th Felsite, 7.

Armok, the ranger is scary. Already 4 days on the job and he's torn apart two rhesus macaques. He doesn't even seem to be bringing them in to eat. He just beats the shit out of them, drags them around, and then leaves them to die in the cold stone.

I'm giving him two axes.


15th Felsite, 7.

I'm designating a tunnel be built from the fortress to the valley down below. I'm hoping to create a small farming plot for when the times are tough. It'll be exposed to the sunlight so we can harvest strawberries and longland grass to make some of that delicious strawberry wine and longland beer. The plants we are harvesting don't seem to want to last more than a year or so. I'm just preparing for that eventuality.


26th Felsite, 7.

One of the farmer/gatherers was taken by a mood today. We don't know what's wrong with her, but she keeps screaming something about an artifact or some nonsense. She kicked out the craftsdwarf making rock instruments. We'll see what comes of this.


30th Felsite, 7.

The crazy lady came out of the workshop screaming something about a forge and how she made one out of wood. Upon closer inspection, it's a cute mini-forge made out of alder. It's decorated with oak and chestnut, and is encircled with bands of alder and rope reed.

Now, if only she used those 5 wood logs for something productive, like making barrels to store booze in.


24th Hematite, 7.

Progress on the fortress is speeding up due to the enormous amounts of dwarves. Sadly, that also means we are boozeless and the only source of water is on the other side of the world's arse.

Haven is still in a coma from having his left hand broken. What a wimp.


3rd Malachite, 7.

A goblin babysnatcher came around today. Too bad we only have one child. It was a fun romp, and one of the wrestlers made a mess of the corpse. On a lighter note, we finally got the dining hall finished. There's more tables in this fortress than there are beds.

There's blood all over the walls.


14th Malachite, 7.

More migrants. Just great. We can barely feed the ones we have now. Luckily they were only 7. And most of them went into the military.

I need a good, long talk to the liaison about these damn migrants. Our agreement was 7, no more. Now they're sending us five times that amount.


7th Galena, 7.

The other dwarves... I think they caught onto my plans. They put me in exile. They didn't like me. Well screw them. They were stupid enough to leave a few seeds in here. I have a little farm plot going on here. I have a little chisel and a well.


10th Galena, 7.

I hear them dropping stuff into that small light hole upstairs. I don't care. I'm fine here. I have all I need.

All I need...


16th Galena, 7.

The contingency plan I created should go into effect right about now...
Maybe it'll have to wait. I seem to have found a cave.

The rocks are talking to me again.


26th Galena, 7.

What the hell? I was woken up today by the sound of a dozen rocks falling into my nice little home.

They'll pay. Oh yes. They will pay.


9th Limestone, 7.

My contingency plan seems to be working. I can hear the others chop at trees aboveground, no doubt for making barrels to fill their insatiable lust for food.

You see, without an overseer, forts always seem to fall into [even more] chaos. I am still contrloling the fort, even though I haven't talked to anyone in a month.

I simply planted an agent into the fort, stealthily making suggestions in the meetings and main hall as to what should be done next. In this way, I am still controlling the fort by proxy.

I just hope that my agent doesn't turn on me before the caravan arrives.


22nd Limestone, 7.

My agent arrived at my place of exile to tell me that the caravan arrived and we received a whole bunch of booze and food. Sadly, there weren't any cats to dump into my home to get rid of the pest infestation, although he would do everything in his power to make sure that I get food supplies when I need them.

The good news is that the fortifications and the caravan road are going according to plan. What a remarkable way of speaking my agent has.



JOURNAL OF "AGENT 01"


15th Sandstone, 7.

The boss is babbling down there. I talked to the rest of the dwarves and we agree on one thing: He's gone insane and will make an artifact. We could just let him die down there, but we'd rather get the artifact. I have a hunch it'll be something stone-related with all the shit he's carving down there.

We're going to open up his tomb.


20th Sandstone, 7.

It looks like the boss has everything he needs but silk cloth.
But we sold it all to the caravan.
I'm assigning the peasants to collect the cave spider threads. They can risk their asses for the boss. Not me.


23th Sandstone, 7.

We finally have silk cloth. I think be boss is psychic or something. He somehow knew that the cloth was ready, even though he was half the fort away.

Maybe I can exploit that.


27th Sandstone, 7.

The boss is finished, thank Armok. He's created a Magnetite Door. Slymirrored, he keeps mumbling. It seems to have an image of dogs carved into it, along with spikes of Birch sticking out of it in weird places. I don't see why he needed the cave spider silk except for the weird cloth decorations he made.

Ah well, back into his tomb he goes.



JOURNAL OF "RPHARAZON" INODGODEN


1st Timber, 7.

Those ingrates! They stuffed me back into this house! Luckily, I managed to sneak a bit of iron and wood into my clothes before they knocked me out. With that, I fashioned a pick. I have no intention of escaping...

I must dig deeper.


20th Timber, 7.

Statues. More statues. Engravings. More engravings.
There's this person that keeps coming around. I forgot his name. He seems to be nice though. He keeps dumping food in here. Drinks too, hopefully.

Statues.


13th Moonstone, 7.

The nice person started putting notes on the outside. I think they're things to read. Maybe the other dwarves know what to do with them. He says they're notes to keep me alive. I guess that's nice.

The engravings are talking to me now. Dogs. Doors.


7th Opal, 7.

The nice person came and tried to talk to me about things. He said something about a rock called coal. That's a nice name, isn't it? I told him that there needs to be more statues made out of coal. He told me it was a waste of coal and also flammable.

I don't like him anymore.


20th Opal, 7.

The evil guy dumped an anvil and a bunch of mechanisms and rope in here. I think he wants me to escape so they can kill me. The Dominion of Matching told me that. I also asked The Drip of Vanishing. He told me to trust my door. Of course.

So I built that forge and a smelter. I'll show him who can't escape from a tomb.


27th Opal, 7.

This is my last entry. I give this journal to the evil guy, through the hole in the sky, in hopes that he respects my wishes. I have no intention of leaving. The rocks are here. They help me. I help them. I liberate them in form of statues. I have no intention to be freed either. This will be my tomb. I would appreciate it if you kept throwing food in here.

The rocks are calling.



JOURNAL OF "AGENT 01"


30th Opal, 7.

I found the Boss' journal to the side of the entrance to his tomb/lair. He went mad. I don't blame him. Like true dwarves, we will tend to our exiled and ailing. We have no intention of leaving him to rot in there, so we will do our best to make sure he still has food. I talked to the overseer-in-waiting, and told him about the notes strewn about the fortress.

I do hope he reads them.


4th Obsidian, 7.

A weaver went insane. He didn't go to a workshop, though. That made me realize that we didn't have a Clothier's Shop. Not much use having tons of silk cloth without an actual workshop to make something out of that cloth, now is there?


10th Obsidian, 7.

The batshit weaver finished his artifact. It's a bag. A pig tail bag decorated in pig tail, with hanging rings of pig tail, and coloured blue. On the item is an image of a spear. In pig tail.

I hate weavers.


15th Obsidian, 7.

Today I ran into the hunter. He was carrying a cougar on his back. I asked him how many animals he's killed in the past year. He said that he marked each animal with a notch on the shaft of either of his axes.
There were a lot of notches. He told me there were 183.

I'll be sure to avoid him in the future.


21st Obsidian, 7.

Today I tripped over a child. I thought we only had one, but apparently one of the engravers gave birth a few days ago. I don't know why I didn't get told.

Just another mouth to feed.


28th Obsidian, 7.

In a few days, I'll no longer be the resident Overseer. Although the loss of my boss was tragic, I hope the future overseers will not go crazy like him.
I'm drawing a map of the place for the fortress archives. Hopefully the next overseer actually takes a look at it, and the notes I left lying around.

And so, the second year of Basementstable comes to a close.

-------------

The save is here.
The map is here.

Next overseers, please use the [N]ote function in DF. My little lair is in the top right, in the valley. Do remember that the water in the ponds freeze over in winter.

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

((Um... wow. I thought the pop cap was at 7? Well, so much for that. Unless you want me to sacrifice them all to the chasm. Except the hunter. Him it sounds like we keep to make up for our lost founder.))

[Drunken]

Don't worry if it comes back round to my turn I will simply dismantle the farm plots and the bastards can starve, I guess ill have to find a way to make sure only peoples personal dwarves surivive. I kept an 80 dwarf fortress going without farms a while back and the hunting was nowhere near as good as this one.

Drunkens Journal
*15th Obsidian
I decided to let someone else take control of the fortress as it seems we are going to be here for a long time, I am just a digger and the depleted foodstocks can testify to the inadequacy of my management skills. RPharazon has some ideas which I am happy to let him try.

*5th felsite
Some random dwarves wandering the mountains found us and now they expect us to feed them. Maybe we can persuade them to join up with the next caravan.
I think RPharazon is going a but peculiar I might see if we can get someone else to take charge.

[Salmeuk]

Looks like my turn, eh?

Just to be clear, are we trying to keep the pop at 7? should I try to kill all but the original 6?

I'll start playing with the intention to kill in mind, so post ASAP if you want those wimpy migrants to live.

[Haven]

Hm... Save a spare, I think. What's our policy on second rounds?

[RPharazon]

The pop cap is broken if you set it to anything under 20. I saw that the pop cap didn't function after the second immigrant wave, so I "Had a talk with the liaison" and set it to 21. It won't go above that number as long as there are less more than 21 dwarves in the fortress.

I say let them live. Having a nice 10-dwarf military and a bunch of dwarven laborers is quite fun.

[Salmeuk]

Oops.

Looks like it may be a bit too late for the immigrants.

Don't worry, I managed to fit it in with the plot, so it's not complete metagaming.

[Salmeuk]

1st Granite - Well, it seems as if RPharazon has finished his time as leader. As it is, I am next in line in this preposterous arrangement of power. If it were up to me, I would lead this group until we found the treasure, but sadly this is not possible. Though my time is limited, I shall do my best to keep this expedition underway.

3rd Granite - Today, as I was walking towards the bone stockpile room, I passed a peasant and weaver. They had come together in the previous migration, and I was suspicious of their intentions then, but never before have I had a concrete reason for the feeling in my gut. They were mumbling about the large pile of gems we've stacked around the staircases nearby.

Come to think of it, there is no reason for the gems to be there, but I guess RP had his intentions. Anyways, they were talking about how the gems would be perfect. They turned the corner, and I couldn't hear the rest, but this sounded very suspicious. Perfect for what? Neither of them was a jeweler, and the gemstones were rather poor quality, so they couldn't have been referring to the gemstones themselves. I suspect that someone has some ulterior motive at play, and is planning something. Whether that person is a simple peasant, an experienced axedwarf, or even inside this fortress does not matter. Something must be done.

6th Granite - I called a meeting today. Inside the bone room. Hopefully, this setting would set the mood for such a gathering.

I invited the original 5 (with Kashyyk dead, of course, as well as RP still in his little shithole, that's the number it came down to), as well as Astesh, the promising hunter. I started off the conversation slow, talking abut stockpiles and numbers, but slowly escalated the speech into population numbers. The attending dwarfs (minus Astesh, who looked slightly bewildered as to why his presence was needed) began to slowly remember our original goal.

All those months of luxury that were bought at the price of laziness had caused them to forget. To forget about the loot, the treasure, the wealth hidden inside this mountain. To forget about the duty to the king. To forget about secrecy, and keeping your mouth shut while flaming drunk. To forget about our mission.

Once this hit, they began to ask what my intentions were. Slightly scared due to my previous profession (let them be), they questioned whether to continue. Whether it was worth it to lose what we already have. I chose to convince them just how much it was worth it.

I grabbed a passing weaver and threw him to the ground, pinning him onto the floor. The bones crunched underneath his light body. He whimpered, but couldn't move, as the stringing of silk does not make one especially strong. I stretched out his arm, and opened his balled-up hand, splaying out his fingers. I placed the tip of the dull knife on his ring finger's nail, slowly applying pressure. I told him to tell the group what he was planning. He asked what this was about, and why I was doing this.

The usual questions.

Using the powerful muscles in my forearm, and putting the weight of my beard into it, I cracked his fingernail and sunk the blade through the tip of his unusually thick finger. He screamed out in anguish, but I quickly pulled the blade back out, and pressed the now slick blade against his thumb's nail. Again, I asked him to explain his plans. Again, he refused. And yet again, I pierced his nail. He then started blabbering about some noble back at the mountainhome who got word of the treasure, and sent out a group of dwarfs to meet up with the migrants. They would then stick with us until we found the treasure, and steal it away in the night. I released him and got up, cleaned my dagger on the trousers, and slid it back into it's concealed sheath. He scurried away, and up the staircase, no doubt screaming about the crazed clerk. Wouldn't matter, as we were leaving soon anyways.

As I walked over, the group looked absolutely horrified, but definitely compliant. I told them my plan, and no one objected. They all agreed, even Astesh. Strangely enough, he seemed the most calm out of the group. I could get to like the guy. We all discussed the details, and pointed out the meeting area on a map. We considered getting RP out of his little box, but the agreed that he was too much of a liability to worry about now.

With the plans set, we left the bone room, leaving nothing but a small puddle of blood and a sense of tense horror basking about the morbid crypt.




[Just the intro, will be getting the main portion done tonight, and posting it up tomorrow.]
[Hopefully.]
[Anyone know what might be causing the white bars underneath the pics?]

[Paulus Fahlstrom]

((Nice post. No idea about the white bars. I'm afraid I jumped the gun and thought it was my turn. That's what I get for being excited about this. Sigh. Looks like all that clearing out of stone and construction will go to waste. Unless you want me to use the immigrants as slave labor first... before we off them?))

[Drunken]

I don't care if you kill of migrants or not or how many. Does anyone have any more details on the pop cap thing though? What happens if we set it to 0?

This is definitely not my fort anymore and I am still dissapointed with how easy it is. I think glacier is the way to go for the next one.

Just to clarify why I built the fortress as I did (the complaints from RP were in character and valid but I thought I would mention anyway) I always build those masssive wide cross hallways and make everything in them because then I can design an endgame fortress and not have any of the early game necessities change the layout at all. I like to make districts with different purposes and I like to make everything symetrical and just using the hallways as temporary storage and rooms means you can make the most elaborate entrance hall traps and a 4-z level 80x80 dining room fit for a god right from the start without having to worry about making rooms for utilitarian purpposes. In a 7 dwarf fortress this is pointless but it still serves the RP of my character because he was just a miner looking for treasure.

[Salmeuk]

Looks like the white bars have disappeared.

And on normal fortresses, I play like drunken. Building massive, early-game hallways leads to less trouble later on.

Yea, this is a bit easy, but let's play through at least a few turns more.

[Haven]

I think the whole problem is a lack of wealth. Low pop means an equally slow difficulty ramp. I suggest we have the immigrants work themselves to death making crafts in shrine-pits, to appease the fallen souls of the Ghost Expedition.

[Salmeuk]

13th Granite - With our group organized, we left the fortress today. As we passed by the (now) only entrance, we locked the door behind us. Over the past couple of days, we've systematically walled off the many entrances to this fort, leaving only a single door, which we got a gullible mason to produce a single key for. I would have strangled the whole fort to death, but I suppose this is easier for the rest of my group.

15th Granite - We've arrived at the site of our new hideout. It's down in the valley, displaced from the colder stone of the western hill.

I sent Astesh out to hunt, and designated others to assorted jobs necessary for such a start. I started out a small plot for some wild berries, and set up a butcher's shop next to the face of the cliff, for when Astesh brings in some kills.

17th Slate - After about a month, we've come pretty far. The food problem is solved, and the plots have been set up. The dwarfs that we abandoned in the fortress have almost eaten up all the food, so we shall not have to wait much longer to hear their dying screams.

18th Slate - Litast came running down the hill today, screaming ambush. He said something about goblins, and sure enough, about 6 of them came over the rise soon after. A call to arms was sent out. Haven had been moving stone away from the storerooms, and didn't hear the shouts, from what he told us in his dying breaths. He had just noticed the goblins when they descended upon him, stabbing him multiple times.

With such a gash in his side, it was surprising he could still talk. After watching him pass away, we followed the goblins up to the old entrance to the fortress. Paulus ran up first, just in time to see 2 goblins have their head crushed in as the old stonefall traps were set off. The goblins had killed some stray dogs, and the ones that didn't get crushed were milling around. Paulus rushed ahead and smashed up the goblins with his warhammer, crushing 2 of them in quick succession. I rushed ahead as well, and not ahving time to whip out my dagger, began to strangle the remaining goblin. Paulus rushed over and crushed his head in front of me, spraying blood and brains all over my hands.

With the battle done, we headed back to our new home. the group wanted to bury Haven as soon as possible, but  we hadn't created a mason's shop yet, and we had to keep moving quickly in order to set up some sort of anti-goblin defense.

[Haven]

Owch. So that's two down, I guess. Not bad for the first round. I probably would've just made a panic room in the center with the food stockpiles and hid there, though.