So I tried the Masterworks mod as the kobolds, figured I'd like the challenge. Had issues with lack of wood, metals, and the like, but scrape by until the Elven caravan. Figured I could get all of that off the Elves no issue, since I had plenty of value to trade and they had plenty of each to trade with. The problem? I tried to trade spiked wooden balls and promptly got slaughtered by the Elves due to a lack of a military (no metals), and lack of wood (no arching them) . Gotta love forgetting key details when trading with the various races .
Reading this, I just realized why the elves got pissed at me all of a sudden...
My fortress was running low on food and cloth, so naturally I was delighted to see a caravan coming (even if it was elven, I mean, desperate times calls for desperate measures). Hauled all my craft-goods to the depot, and marked all the elves cloth and edible items for trade. However, since my craft-goods were in containers, I think I failed to notice that some wooden items came along (since they were stored in the same containers), because when I tried to trade the elf was like "I will not trade with someone who abuses fine wood in this way".
I was like serious wtf-mode. I mean sure, I tried getting away cheap, but no THAT cheap, and what is all this about wood?
But now I realize what happened... And since they haven't left, I think I'll kill them for insulting my crafts. Yes, that sounds about fair.