Field Reports of Tannen Rimtarazin, Trusted Lieutenant
12th Hematite, 301With very little wood to spare for crossbows, I approached our weapons technician, The Vamp, to ask whether any of the metal ores we had found were suitable for making springs. She is quite certain that copper or iron springs would work well on a crossbow, but then when I asked how long it would take to begin production she made a basic mistake. She mentioned killing in front of Doc Zaerosz.
Don't let it be said that I shy away from cruelty - when you are working for the right side any act is justified to advance your cause. It just isn't good style to laugh quite like that while you're doing it...
The Doc's eyes lit up as soon as he heard that you could make crossbows from horse bone, and dashed towards our pack beast at full speed, dragging the poor creature off into the tunnels. Within half an hour our resident surgeon and experimentalist had set up a crude set of workshops in the newly carved out bedroom communal area.
and mere hours after that, I was the proud new owner of a pair of still warm horse bone crossbows.
One of them even had a set of decorative spikes along the front made of carved hoof. They really are quite pretty.
One of the mining minions, Istas, got into a violent argument with the Doc over his use of the room. I don't think this will be a serious problem, no dwarven blood was drawn... probably. It's quite hard to tell given the ankle-deep layer of horse gore and pools of spilled tanning ammonia. It seems that Istas had carved out this room fondly imagining it as a peaceful meeting room and pleasant place to eat, a vision that the lab did not fit into very well.
3rd Malachite, 301Rule 56: "
My Legions of Terror will be trained in basic marksmanship. Any who cannot learn to hit a man-sized target at 10 meters will be used for target practice."
The list is not clear on whether I count as part of the Legions of Terror. It is irrelevant though; learning to use weapons that I carry is basic good sense. I have personally boiled some leathers to make armour, and thus protected from danger and the cold, I have gone to practice my marksdwarfship on the local wildlife.
This isn't as difficult as I thought; it looks like I won't be used for target practice anytime soon. I have always been a hammerdwarf at heart, there's something special about the crack of breaking bone heard from up close... these bows are certainly intruiging though.
As I was using the crippled dying ox for target practice, focused fully on the beast's head, a shape ran right in front of my bow. A dwarf! Seven dwarves!
Their leader, a dwarf calling himself DoomPotato, responded very well to finding a crossbow aimed at his face as I shouted to them. He claims to be a professional soldier loyal to the Overlord, a man who has seen enough combat to know that he doesn't want a sliver of horse bone embedded in his head. I'm starting to understand what the list meant when rule 55 referred to deformed mutants and odd-ball psychotics... Nevertheless, if they can be trusted they could be useful.
I immediately split the new arrivals up, telling all the soldiers to make sure the wounded muskox is dead before bringing it in, allowing me to check the other arrivals without interference. Even if they are unarmed and half-dead from the cold, I'm not allowing untrusted dwarves into the fortress where they might cause trouble. They claim to be a liason to the Overlord's smugglers, a jeweller who likes to work with bone, a squad of the Legion, and joy of joys, a weaponsmith. Their references from the Overlord bear his signature and appear to be valid, so this group are lucky, they can enter our fort without being killed.
4th Malachite, 301I take back my earlier statement about this group of idiots being useful. After a whole night wandering about in the icy wilderness, they report that the muskox got away. It had only one working leg, was bleeding, was unconscious, and they let it escape.
HOW CAN THEY POSSIBLY BE SO USELESS!? I will have to think very carefully how to punish this failure. A solid month of patrol duty outside the fort entrance will be a good start.
OOC: I really did think that they'd be able to get the ox. It was standing on the very edge of the map, then turned back. It was a solid 20 tiles from the edge when I sent them after it and moving slowly. Tannen was tired, hungry, thirsty and out of ammo so I thought the new Legionaries ought to have a chance to do something. It didn't work very well. Oops.
The newly dwarfed:
Doompotato
Grue McGee
Imp
The Vamp
Urist the Red
and Doc Zaerosz
Author
Topic: Umomushil - Overlord Compliant Community Fort (Read 16306 times)