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[Tezcatli]

Diary of Lawec Abankizest - 21st Slate 257

Elves! Elves from Thiliri Lidava (which, I'm told, means 'The Shores of Romance' it's no wonder many Dwarves think the Elves are all sissy tree-huggers). Sava proposed to craft some bone bolts for me crossbow, so Ilral had no reason but to lift the ban on me hunting (providing I was always armed, did not go towards the magma pool, and kept a shield with me at all times) so there I was, hunting mountain goats when suddenly I stumbled into a pair of Elves leading donkeys and horses. They stared down at me, not saying a word until I introduced myself. Turning their noses up in an irritating way, they told me their names were Nine Cironovinena and Mafi Yiceomo. They had learnt from a Dwarven caravan that we were out here and wanted to trade, so I led them back to the fortress.

That's when things went a bit...interesting.

Ilral was the first one to come out and greet them, directing them to out depot where they could unload. She then ordered the rest of us to bring out the small cache of crafts that Sava had been making throughout winter, as well as the narrow clothes and weapons of several kobolds that had been poking around Niltosed. That's when Hetros went...insane. Upon seeing the Elves, he threw down the scepter he was carrying and bellowed something incomprehensible. He charged towards the Elves, but Jurvana tackled him down and managed to drag him into the fortress where she locked him in his room. I don't know what his anger towards the traders was about, but it provided an interesting scene at any rate and gave us all a hearty, if surprised, laugh, except for the Elves, who were quite pale.

After that show, trading went on as normal, Sava bought some barrels of that weak Elven booze, good for when you don't have strong Dwarves booze but don't want water I suppose. We got a shock when Ilral ordered him to buy a particularly ferocious-looking grizzly bear! I don't know what plans she has for it, but it's in a cage at the entrance for the moment.

After the Elves had left, Hetros was freed. He was visibly angry about the entire experience, and kept muttering to himself. I tried to cheer him up, and I think I managed to, to some degree.

Soon after the Elves' departure, we got some migrants! Word from the caravan must've reached Nibeshsolon and more came to join us. Ilral was, to put it lightly, ecstatic. She insisted on greeting each one personally, by the end of the count we had had 16 more Dwarves join us, one of them, a farmer named 'Fortis', stood out quite a lot, considering his unnatural height.



With the influx of Dwarves, our farm is finally up. Six of the migrants agreed to tend to the lot, growing plump helmet for food and booze, and pig tail for cloth. Most of the other migrants have been put to their respective jobs, or made to work as miners or masons. Ilral has also had new, larger rooms cut out down below, she claims the noisy and cramped quarters we currently have are 'grossly inadequate'. The current bedrooms are to be made into a large meeting hall.

28th Slate 257

After months of pestering, Ilral has finally given in to Rice's demands for the floors to be smoothed. Haspen, Rice, and one of the new migrants (a stoneworker I'm told) have been put to work smoothing all of the floors and walls. With our growing population, Ilral decided it would be important that she spend as little time bookkeeping as possible, and has appointed Solon Katthirreg, a grouchy skill-less Dwarf, to the role of bookkeeper. The question of someone to keep the order also arouse, and, surprise, surprise, Jurvana has been appointed 'Sherriff'. It's amazing what sucking up to authority will do... In other news, Hetros has been routinely disappearing during the day, and won't talk of where he's going. Maybe I should follow him?

[Lawec]

Haha
Great update

[Tezcatli]

14th Hematite 257

The sun was beginning to creep above the eastern horizon when the caravan was spotted. Having heard of the new Dwarven outpost, Human merchants from Joddoanthath, 'The Defended Confederations', had made a slight detour to include Niltosed on their route.

The fortress itself was a hive of activity. Rice and Haspen were still smoothing out the walls and floor, Haspen grumbling while Rice whistled merrily. Lawec had been banned from hunting once again following a very close encounter with a fire imp. A miller by the name of Goden Erithastod had been struck with some kind of insanity, spending the past few weeks in the craftsdwarf workshop shouting for rough gems, despite being continuously told that they didn't have any rough gems. Ilral had ordered a copper vein to the west mined out, despite the fact it was still too dangerous to use the magma pool. Hetros had borrowed taken Haspen's pick while the former was engraving, and would disappear during the day, Jurvana had been hard at work knocking up beds for the migrants, and Solon the bookkeeper had had an office carved out for her.

With all this happening, the last thing anyone had expected were a troop of Human traders, along with a representative from the Merchant's Guild to turn up at their depot. With no crafts to sell due to Goden's overtaking of the crafts workshop, they had nothing but some spare barrels to sell. Ilral went to meet the Guild Representative, Goto Ulorope, but he insisted on dealing with no one else but the broker, so Sava was forced to lead him to his office, where the two discussed the various goods they each needed. Ilral refused to address Goto for the rest of his stay.

As the Human wagons rolled into the depot, two kobold thieves were spotted, but managed to escape, furious with both Goto and the failure to kill the kobolds, Ilral stalked into her office. The Humans left not longer after they arrived, there not being much to trade for. Sava was able to negotiate the selling of eight barrels for two copper picks, much in need with the influx of migrants and the general growth of the fortress. Leaving with Sava's assurances that there would be more to trade next year, the caravan took off.

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Diary of Ilral Arakrovod - 4th Galena 257

FIRE! The treacherous fire imps have set fire to the forest to try and smoke us out!



We had just carved out some new workshops for our developing clothing and fishing industries and I had ordered Jurvana to get us some more lumber. She returned within seconds crying that the entire forest was on fire. Not even a minute later, that damned Goden who has been threatening people away from the craftsdwarf workshop jumped out into the corridor, babbling insanely and throwing his clothes around! The enemy clearly has a strong grip on the weaker minds within Niltosed; but we shall never succumb! The need for a military is becoming clearer and clearer, as well as a strong defence. Hetros has put up some stone-fall traps within the entrance hall, but if our enemy can burn an entire forest down and send a miller insane, we may need more.


I don't know if it really was the fire imps who caused the fire, but it provided a nice show for the Dwarves at any rate .

EDIT: Yep, it was the fire imps, they attacked some horses, and set fire to the trees.

[Tezcatli]

Diary of Fortis Shorastesesh - 16th Limestone 257

Once again the forests have burned... My heart aches at seeing glorious trees burnt down, it seems no matter where I go, the trees are wounded. It is a wasteland outside, there are many trees left, yes, but these are burnt, devoid of sacred life. The Dwarves I am living amongst for the moment do not seem to care for their deaths, more worried about where they will get good wood from now. The leader here (the Druid if you will) a certain Ilral, has gone rather insane. She has sworn that anyone who goes near the magma pool will be thrown into jail (which jail? There isn't one) or even killed. Furthermore she has ordered a wall built outside to protect us. She has had a chamber carved out to store the wood away from possible fire (as well as succumbing to the Sherriff Jurvana's demands for a personal dining room). Speaking of insane, Goden Erithastod, the miller who went insane has starved himself to death. Ilral has forbidden his burial within the fortress, so several Dwarves cut out a small niche in the mountain outside and put him inside a stone coffin. Such strange customs...

9th Sandstone 257

A Dwarven caravan has arrived, selling mostly booze. We traded stone crafts and cloth for barrels of ale, beer and rum, as well as an iron anvil. I'm told there is an Elven caravan in Spring, I may be able to get a ride to a Forest Retreat from them. A peasant was suddenly struck with seemingly-random inspiration, and - despite having no masonry skills - crafted an exquisite throne from phyllite, engraving on the back an image of their King, a Bembul Sibrekonul. Strangely, he named Kurolrurast, which I believe means 'The Embraced Guise'.  Upon seeing the throne, Ilral was overjoyed, upon seeing the back, she frowned and ordered the peasant back to work. Nonetheless, she has placed the throne in her study.

There is a bear in the corridor. Ilral has had a grizzly bear chained (I say chained, but it's more tied, considering the poor creature is restrained with a pig-tail cloth rope) at the entrance corridor, to 'ward off attackers', despite Hetros' stone-fall traps. I protested at this chaining but she ignored me, telling me that height didn't give me authority.

[shadowclasper]

Journal of Hetros
BLOODY ELVES! Some of the tallun's came through a few days ago, they locked me in my room, but THEY'LL see. I'll just have to begin work on a trap for'em.... hmmmmmmmmm... I really need to ask Ilral if she'll have a tunnel made towards the magma pipe. if done right, we won't even breach the side. Then later we can put some iron bars in the tunnel to prevent anything nasty from coming through, wait until the magma pipe has no more fire beasts above ground, and dig down to open it up. That way nothing will be able to get into the fortress, but we'll have magma powered forges and no more need for the wood except to make beds for our selves.

I also suggested that we get a second bear at the first opportunity, preferably one of the opposite sex. I have a thought for a trap using them... let's see how goblins like a horde of ravenous BEARS flooding out of a side gate if they invade.

Also, we need to make a second entrance hall. One that'll hold the trade post and also be more easily defended. Then we can seal up out current one.

I'll present my design to Ilral in the morning.

Code: [Select]

          .....
.......   .   .
...T...B...   .B.
.......   .   .
          .....
T=Trade Post
B=Draw bridge, raises towards the inside
.=hall way. The one that forms the arrow wall would be at least 15 feet wide (3 tiles), thus the need for the bridges rather than doors, raising them towards the inside would also create walls, we can later channel out moats underneath them to prevent anything particularly strong from breaking them. Bridges would be 15'x10' (3x2 tiles) or 15'x15'(3x3 tiles), with later moats of 15'x5' (3x1 tiles) or 15'x10' (3x2 tiles) respectively.

The best part of this design is that we can make it at our leisure, possibly facing AWAY from the magma pipe, so that we do not need to worry about the fire beasts when we finally decide to make a road away from it that the trade caravans made walk across.

What I WON'T tell her majesty, since I'm not sure she would approve, is of my secret project... oooooh yes. we'll see how those elven gits like being dropped into the depths!

Speaking of elven gits... I'm supicious of this Fortis character... he was shuddering when he heard the trees burning... very... elfy... and that beard... I'm sure I saw it had hooks in it that hung off his ears... speaking of which, while I can't be sure, I'm almost certain I saw a point on them under his hair... I'll keep a close eye on him, and if necessary, we'll see about hooking up his door to a lever in my room, and locking it from there.

[Tezcatli]

Diary of Ilral Arokrovod - 4th Opal 257

More migrants! Six more migrants arrived, bringing our population up to 28! More rooms will have to be carved out, but with the extra picks and hands that'll be easy work.  We also received a cook, so a kitchen has been set up and we can finally have some more luxurious meals. Our cloth industry is booming, and we're cranking out cloth by the dozen. When the Elves and Humans arrive we'll have much to sell.

In terms of the Enemy, we are well-prepared. Hetros' traps and the bear defend out entrance, and the wall is well under construction, with a moat to be added. Speaking of Hetros, he came to me with a plan to harness the magma without the Enemy knowing. It's an interesting proposal, but for the moment I have my own plans to destroy our great opponent. The moment the wall is finished, we can start on 'Project House Arrest'. I spoke through with Jurvana about it and she vehemently approved of it. Another of his ideas was to breed bears, I'll keep that in mind when the Elves return. He also presented some plans for a new, easily-defendable trade depot. With my project and the wall, there's too much to do at the moment, but once we have the labour we can build it. He's a solid type Hetros, a good head and beard on his shoulders. I don't know what his problem with Elves are, but a solid type nonetheless.

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Diary of Rice Muthkatorrun -  1st Granite 258

2 years at Niltosed. Ilral organized a party at the meeting hall that lasted through the night from the 28th Obsidian till today. Quite a surprise, she's been paranoid as hell since the great forest fire. Still, it was a hell of a party, the booze flowed freely (by which I mean, we emptied several barrels onto the floor) and by the end our beards were all soaked in alcohol, as well as the meeting hall. Ilral, despite having drunk more whiskey than five Dwarves altogether, and apparently not being able to take her drink like a hardy Dwarf (much like Fortis, who didn't drink all that much) tried to give a speech on our accomplishments; the completion of the moat and wall defending us from the fire imps, the trading, there really wasn't all that much to note. I felt quite irritated that she didn't mention mine and Haspen's glorious smoothing of the entire fortress, but considering she fell backwards onto the floor a few moments after the speech, I can't blame her too harshly.


The current layout of Niltosed as of 1st Granite 258. The fortress is to the south. Now in layers with PoI!

[shadowclasper]

Erm... just south of the trade post... is that a breach in the wall?! O_O or just an unsmoothable dirt wall?

[Tezcatli]

It's an unsmoothable rock wall, when I was digging the trade depot niche, I made a mistake, but I stopped the miners in time. I'll replace it with a constructed wall, make it look better.

[shadowclasper]

coolio. Anyway. If we dig right back we can put the main trade hall plan down south :3 with the entire mountain separating that entrance from the magma and also no bloody trees to burn down causing smoke and chaos. We can bring expand the wall a bit to include the majority of the forest and thus have an impenetrable supply of wood as long as we make it a restricted area after the expanded wall is built, that'll keep dwarves from walking around outside and trampling down saplings and make it so that the area keeps growing plenty of wood ^^

just tossing ideas out :3

edit: If we expand the eastern hallway until it is directly south of the magma pipe, we can make a huge tunnel from top to bottom of the map, and create a truly massive magma smelting, forging, kilning and glassmaking. The wood can be used exclusively for ash and carpentry

[Tezcatli]

Maybe, but the depot would then be far away from the fortress, which'll increase hauling time massively. Maybe in the side of the mountain, facing the river. A kind of forest reserve is something I'm sure Fortis would be up to doing.

As for the tunnel, that was pretty much the same idea I was thinking of doing after you mentioned it, but only a narrow tunnel, a wide tunnel will definitely allow more magma through, and therefore more smelting.

[Tezcatli]

Diary of Sava Kekimkadol - 29th Granite 258

The Elves are back, and Hetros is locked in the dining room (something which caused much grumbling from anybody who wanted to eat). I don't really mind all that much, his ranting about how the Elves should be destroyed got older than the world the first time, and at this stage is pretty much dying from old age. With all the cloth we've been making I negotiated the purchase - at Ilral's constant demanding - of a wolf, as well as a few barrels of Elven booze. They didn't have much else (except, ironically, cloth) so we left the trading at that.

Ilral has ordered the construction of a new trade depot and the deconstruction of the current one the moment the Elves leave. When Rice asked her why we needed a new depot, she gave a rousing speech on the need for a way to defend traders form the 'great enemy'. I don't think that the fire imps will ever stray all the way into our fortress, they tend to stay in the magma, but go figure.

7th Slate 258

More migrants, 19 more! We've got 47 dwarves now, not bad for two years work. Ilral has picked five of them and formed a military squad which she calls 'The Blockaded Paints' strange name for a rabble of peasants but it's true we'll need some kind of military in case of attacks. Unfortunately, this means more work for all of us. More bedrooms need to be sorted out, the new depot is still unfinished, and now Ilral wants a special training barracks for the Blockaded Paints. Hetros, who apparently came up with the idea, has been put in charge of overseeing the depot's construction, while Jurvana struts around ordering everyone around in every other matter, except when Ilral is there, of course.

15th Slate 258

The new trade depot room has been carved out, we're clearing the rocks out as I write this. Rice has someone managed to convince Haspen and two other engravers to help him smooth the depot's walls and floors, he does seem rather obsessed about smoothing things. The wolf has been chained to the wall in the entrance chamber, (with a pig tail rope! Will that even hold?) so if an intruder gets past the moat, the grizzly bear and the multiple stone-fall traps, it'll need to contend with a wolf.

With so many more people, Ilral has ordered that the corridors be enlarged. Rice has complained that this'll mean breaking down the smooth walls, and more smoothing for him and his engraving team. Ilral ignored him. This'll also mean that Hetros will need to make more stone-fall traps, so that'll keep him toiling in his mechanic's workshop.

2nd Felsite 258

Someone was irritated by the sun yesterday, an consequence of spending too long underground, Ilral, however, instantly suspected an enemy plot, and had the meeting hall moved outside. I really don't see how that'll help defend us, but at least the saner among us will realise that it'll stop cave adaptation. The old meeting hall is to be converted to cloth and goods storage. I received a nasty shock when a newly-arrived migrant literally threw me out of my craftsdwarf workshop as I carved some crafts. I complained to Ilral, but she didn't seem to care. The Dwarf is refusing to move, bellowing for gems instead. He's also refusing to acknowledge that we don't have any gems.

5th Felsite 258

FIRE! The forest is on fire again! Ilral was raving about 'the enemy', but Lawec went up to the pipe and spied on the imps, he said there were several charred groundhog corpses, suggesting the imps had attacked some groundhogs and set the forest on fire once again. Charred land again...

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Diary of Fortis Shorastesesh - 24th Felsite 258

I didn't leave with the caravan. After much reflection I decided I should stay, to help these Dwarves learn to respect nature, and to help the land recover from the flames of cruelty that have swept it twice now. I've also, to my great surprise, made several friends amongst these short people. In a bid to help save the trees, I suggested to Ilral that we make a forest preserve, where the trees will be able to grow, free from Dwarven and Imp-related deaths. The mechanic Hetros was present at the time, and eyeing me suspiciously, he demanded to know why I wanted to make this reserve. Trying to think like a Dwarf, I told them that it would help grow our lumber stockpiles, nature spirits forgive me for saying so.


I swear the fortress is cursed, every time a Dwarf gets possessed and wants gems, the forest is suddenly on fire. ^^

[Lawec]

Can we get a screenie of the relationships between the named dorfs again?

[Tezcatli]

Instead of time-consuming screenies, allow me to offer you this wonderfully confusing diagram!

[Lawec]

It's actually not confusing at all
Thanks man 
I was wondering, could my character perhaps get one of the female migrants as a wife?
Just lock them up in a room for some time, and Lawec will stroke her beard in no time

[Tezcatli]

Sure thing! Any preference for personality or job?