From the journal of Redstone
1st Granite, 1052
Well it has been a year since we have gotten here and we have a good home carved out for ourselves. Master Silvercoin came to me today and said that I would be leading the fort for a year, me of all dwarves. Well at any rate I’ll have to get hopping. I have to work on the defenses, get the forges running and try to organize the stockpiles a bit better.
Early-Spring, 1052
Halted farming work outside and dug out a new farm room to plant plump helmets in. We were almost out of alcohol and all the brew able plants had been turned into meals instead. Our warriors reported heavy fighting by the river so I’ve ordered that passageway sealed off. I’ve also had a chamber dug out for producing rock blocks and other things out of obsidian. Hell, looking around dwarves are literally tripping over themselves trying to get things done, Silvercoin tried to many things at once. I would love to tell them to take it easy but they’re gonna have to work just as hard to get what we really need done.
Mid-Spring, 1052
High elven traders have arrived and I sent Silvercoin and what goods we have to trade with them. Looking at the report we made a good haul getting much needed alcohol and plants to brew along with two iron anvils. Now that the current crisis has passed and we can take a small breather and slow down a bit.
A little later we got a massive immigrant wave that came in, no less than 25 new dwarves and their pets. Oi are we ever going to be busy.
Bronzebeard suddenly went funny in the head recently, skipping around, and took over the forge. He took the last bronze bar and some uncut rock crystal and made a shield. Don’t know what that was about but he seems to know a lot more about making armor than he did before.
Late-Spring, 1052
Work on making stone blocks is underway so we can make proper walls. A grate is being installed near the river so we should have fresh water and fish soon. When I have the time I’ll get cage traps set up and breach the river again to catch the river dwellers. I would like to get a grate up for the magma but we don’t have any magma safe materials so that will have to wait.
Early-Summer, 1052
Success! We now have fresh water and should beable to fish now. I’m also beginning some exploratory mining in the hopes of finding metals.
The human caravan has arrived with a… hobgoblin representative. Eh who am I to judge. The dyansauri caravan was spotted in the distance to, I’ll wait till they arrive to do any trading.
Traded for some food and wood from both caravans. Now to proceed with keeping this fort going straight, another courtyard is going up soon.
Mid-Summer, 1052
I’ve slowly began to realize that we don’t have any stone layers that will house any iron ore. Granted we haven’t dug up every bit of rock within our boundaries but the stone does not lie. Maybe if we were to hit that special metal that is said to be around here but alas we have more important things to do so the exploration will be called off for now so that we can expand the fort proper. More rooms will need to be prepped for living and we still haven’t reorganized most of the stockpiles. Looks like we’ll have to hope to get iron or steel from the caravans.
Early-August, 1052
Stockpiles are mostly sorted out now and finishing touches on the outer courtyard are nearly complete. Plenty of rooms have been dug out and doors put on those that are occupied. Our two newest recruits are now marksdwarves, not very good ones but marksdwarves none the less. Unfortunately no one really has any practical armor so that will hopefully be remedied soon enough.
Mid-August, 1052
Dwarven traders have arrived and Silvercoin is currently trading with them. I already told him to order wood, various metal bars, and some stone guardians. We’ll see what he brings back from the current caravan.
Not good news. The traders hardly brought anything this year, all we got were some metals and fuel with a few cave lobsters as well. Rather disappointing so I had Silvercoin give the traders a few bins of mugs and crafts to hopefully stimulate more wagons next year. On the other hand we finally have some metals that can safely be submerged in magma.
Late-August, 1052
Success! We have successfully diverted magma towards the funnels for the forges and the iron grate should keep any creatures from climbing out of the magma. Now we just have to wait for the funnels to fill which may take a long time. My next project is to work on the defenses a bit more. We need some more cage traps to warn us of enemies and weapon traps to take them down, obsidian weapons should do nicely.
Well we’ve had a migrant group 8 strong join us today. I’ve started working on the tombs while the craftsdwarves finish with the current job order of crafts before they can work on the obsidian weapons.
Great now Pinehands is acting weird, he took over one of the craftshops and is slowing production down. He’s just dragging stuff to the shop all giddy and whatnot.
Early-Winter, 1052
Well Pinehands finally came out of the shop carrying a lovely pine scepter. I its nice enough to present to the queen if she ever comes here. Again it seems that Pinehands knows more about wood shaping than before, what’s with these weird moods?
A frost giant caravan was spotted in the distance along with some thieves freaking out people collecting wood. I’m putting the military on standby.
Well the caravan ran into a zombie moose pack but thankfully they were up to putting them back to death. We traded for some meat and ice wolf leather.
Late-Winter, 1052
Well we have some weapon traps and a few more cage traps set up now. I’m thinking of beginning the project of capturing the cave dwellers but I may just leave that to someone else.
Marblehand gave birth to the first child of the fortress, a beautiful baby girl. The future of this fort is looking more and more promising with the prospect of children.
We held a small party to celebrate having magma powered forge works up and running, the funnels are still filling but they are at a useable height.
I’ve set the engravers to smooth out the bedroom level.
Well the end of my term has come and I must bid this position goodbye. I’ve had a lot of fun seeing this fort flourish under my guidance but now it must pass on.
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The dwarven caravan will be bringing some of those golems and some crystal bar stuff, I suggest the next person should get them. Overall the fort is stable, surprisingly quiet with only 1 kobold thief showing up the entire time. The farms could use some work and I've got some bone armor being made for the military so they have something at least. Anyway the magma buildings are finally up! Thing is theres no sedimentary layers, didn't knowtice that till after I had done a bit of exploratory digging and rechecked the embarking screen. If you see some walls constructed underground don't deconstruct them, they are most likely underneight the bridges and may get goblins in them if the bridges go up with them on them. Also the sheirif or whatever he is called still needs to be choosen and a fort guard set up, I have 4 recruits sitting in the finished goods pile for this reason for the next person to work with. The next person may want to work on mass produccing stone blocks and replacing everything (including walls) with the blocks since the majority of the stuff is out of rough obsidian. Other than that I have added a few notes around the fort.
Saves forthcoming.