SPINEMACHINE - Asshole Parties

The title says it all, I believe. It seems that these dwarves like to party... Let me rephrase that. It seems that these dwarves ONLY party...

So much so that they no longer worked. They kept drinking and drinking until we were out of Drink! Yet they continued.. all throughout Summer and into a good portion of Autumn. They finally stopped after a Dwarf died of thirst. Let us remember Udib Kiddirzasit the Metalsmith.


Apart from that, the year was pretty quiet. I removed all the slopes that I wanted from the Mountain to increase security. I also moved all the useless stones into dumps and stockpiles. Then I increased the Workshop area to fit each workshop with its own stockpile.

That's all.

SPINEMACHINE - A Rough Start

The first year has passed and already 3 rulers sat in the throne. A rough start, but at least, the last ruler has solved the starvation issues.

And so the fortress is now passed onto me. As I sat my ass on my throne, I immediately started looking at the fortress design. About an hour and half later, here I sit with a few plans of my own. Let's start off by looking at this magnificent little message our dear friend left us:

Moving on... The first task I have decided to take on is getting rid of all the useless "construction" stones lying around or placed in stockpiles. I can achieve this by making a garbage dump. With a dump, I can basically stack items on a single tile, reducing a lot of clutter. Of course, I will keep some of the construction stones available in case I need some emergency walls and shit. I'm not sure yet where I will place this awesome dump, but fuck it, what's the worst that could happen?

My next plan involves adding security. I have decided to remove all the slopes around the mountain which allowed any creature to be able to move upwards to the top of the mountain. As of right now, this is MY mountain. No creature should be able to reach the peak of the mountain. Doing this should ensure that nothing is able to attack from above.

And finally, I want to finish off with some reorganization. For some reason, most of the workshops are placed in a single room with no supplies nearby. This means that the dwarf working at the station must leave his post and go across the fortress to gather any object he may need. I think simply mining out a large room, adding some stockpiles, and then adding some separations will be the best thing to do.

Hopefully, I don't manage to do too much harm to the Fortress.

SPINEMACHINE - Initial findings

It is Mid-summer on the 1st of Malachite, 1051.

The reign of the previous ruler of Spinemachine (henceforth to be known simply as "The Machine", or "Ol' Spiney") has been cut short, due I presume to a painful bout of Ocular Herpes Simplex. Though this is pure speculation, I think it reminds all of us that, like the sun, you shouldn't ever stare directly into a hobo's anus.

So the succession has been passed prematurely down to me, and with it an apparent food crisis. Am I ready to lead these dwarves into the black? To pull them back from the brink of starvation? I have only stepped into the fortress for a few minutes when the sight of anorexic dwarves makes me physically sick, all over myself. I make a promise to myself right then and there that I shall make it my personal quest to fatten these wretches up, and restore their beards to their once glorious sheen.

I begin looking around..

What must a desperate dwarf eat to survive in the Factional Forest? Perhaps the mythical Satinybursts the Tufts of Breakfast truly is made of liquid bacon and scrambled eggs .. Or perhaps we must dine on the abundance of half-finished furniture and crafts left strewn around the dining room:

Also of note are the creative mining plans left for the sub-basement of the fortress:


I can only assume that this is part of the aforementioned water irrigation system, so I shall endeavor to preserve this work for future generations, as our forefathers intended.

But this will all have to wait for now. Food must be found, perhaps we might create a giant underground straw to the neighboring civilizations so as to Drink Their Milkshake.

To be continued..

Dwarft Fortress V: The Ageless Realms, Part XI

15th Timber, 1052, Late Autumn: Assholes of Every Race

The year was mostly uneventful. The farms are now up and runnin and producing edible goods quite consistently. We're brewing a ton of alcohol and managed to slaughter some livestock to keep our meat supply going. We'll send out hunters soon enough, but for now trading seems to do the trick.

We were visited by humans, who were pleasant enough. We were then visited by elves who
happened upon us just as we started razing a nearby forest. They were dicks about it.

Still, wanting to keep relations civil, I agreed to their insane demands. The humans sell us wood for almost nothing, anyway. All those gems we found early on really paid off!

Meanwhile, a couple of dwarves were taken by moods and took over some workshops, but luckily they were able to find what they needed to build their insane things.

We now have a silver floor hatch covered in menacing spikes and a chain made of horse bone. Go figure.

The main upgrade to the arena is finished: a giant crushing wall that covers the entire field. Now, if a creature survives battle, I can pulverize it by lowering a bridge onto it. That should solve my problem from last time! My plan now is to capture Troglodytes with cage traps.

Here's how I'll do it:

The Troglodytes get lured in because of the Horse and walk into a wall of cage traps! Simple, yet efficient!

And while I was getting all this prepped, before I had a chance to open the door to the caverns below, a goblin snuck in from up above!

Damn her! Well, now she'll feel our hundred fists of pain! We've killed far worse than you!

Osta the Goblin:

Show no mercy, men!

Dwarft Fortress V: The Ageless Realms, Part X

1st Slate, 1052, Mid-Spring: A Year Already

A year has gone by and you can hardly recognize the fortress from when it started out. We went from 7 dwarves to 5, to 15 and then 14, and now with this latest influx of migrants we are 36.

What am I going to do with all these mouths to feed?

The obvious solution is to draft an army and wage war on the Troglodytes, but I feel that it wouldn't go in our favor and there might be a lot of blood. Arena matches are a definite must, as soon as I upgrade the arena a bit. I guess, for now, I'll keep them busy cleaning the rocks out of the fortress...

Current projects going on right now: building a farm and organizing the hospital.

The hospital is already doing well. Danielle is our resident Chief Medical Dwarf, despite having absolutely no relevant experience whatsoever.

Despite her inexperience, she patched up Kevin quite nicely! His agility is somewhat impaired because of the broken shoulder, but she set things straight! Hopefully, when it comes time for surgery, she'll be just as capable.

The farm project is nearly complete!

Here's what it looks like so far:

The grates will open up onto the caves below, where the water will drain. The tunnel at the top leads to the river, currently frozen, and just to make sure the timing isn't off I haven't built a channel to it yet. I've lost too many fortresses to flooding. We've come too far with this one to have that happen here, too.

Future projects: build a crushing trap for the arena to pulverize surviving monsters, and then build a lure room down below to trap monsters in cages and have them moved to the arena.

I guess I should think about getting some weapons for these dwarves...

Dwarft Fortress V: The Ageless Realms, Part IX

10th Opal, 1051, Mid-Winter: There Will Be Blood (More)

The arena is complete.

Well, maybe not as complete as I would like it, but it is technically functional. Here's what it looks like:


There are two prison chambers that contain cages. The Ogre is in the northern one and the Troglodyte in the southern one. Now, all doors are set to forbidden passage, which technically means people or creatures can only get through if they smash them down.

I don't think Cave Ogres can smash them down.

Anyway, in the control room, there are five levers. Two of them open the cages of each creature respectively, and two others open the doors to the rooms that contain the cages and open out onto the arena floor. It'll be up to the monsters themselves to wander out and maybe duke it out. At this point, I have no idea if they'll actually fight.

The fifth lever opens up a small compartment containing more cage traps, so that when the monters are done killing each other, or if they don't kill each other at all, eventually they may wander in and get trapped once more and I can start the process over.

Let's see how it goes!

ROUND 1: FIGHT!

The Ogre emerged from its cage as the Troglodyte ran out onto the arena floor! The Troglodyte ran at the doors a few times, but the Ogre just sort of sat there... Neither creature attacking the other.

Damn it.


... I don't like the way that Troglodyte is staring at those doors.

I think maybe it hears its brethren calling from down below. There's a whole squad of them just waiting for us:

Now here's the messed-up part. The one that killed Eric earned itself a name!

That's right! It is now infamous! And it bears the scars of battle to prove its superiority!

Damn you, Merrangod! DAMN YOU.

ROUND 2: FIGHT

Okay, well, at least the Cave Ogre is contained. I can just hit the lever and trap it once more. The question now remains, can my dwarves take on a single Troglodyte? It'll be 4 against one, but I have yet to kill one of these things.

All right, here we go. This one is for Bex, Mariko and Eric, whose tragic losses are felt every day...


The Troglodyte makes a break for it! It dashes out the door and the squad is on it in an instant! We unleash our fury with wild abandon, beating the living breath out of it! The thing never stood a chance! We literally tear the thing in two! Blood is evewhere! My god, the carnage!


And no sooner do we kill it does Nicolas run up and grab the thing's upper body. I hope it's to toss it in the refuse pile, but then again he is a tanner...

That only leaves us with...

ROUND 3: FIGHT

Time to take care of the Ogre.

Again, I feel kind of bad for these things. They're blind, slow and stupid, but they'd rip us in half if we gave them half a chance. So here we go. We open the last doors and release the rest of our anger...

The thing tries to run! It smashes into Kevin and Emily, breaking Emily's ankle and Kevin's shoulder as the rest of them pound into it. Bruised all over and bleeding profusely, it makes a break for the rest of the fortress while we give chase!

It stumbles through our furniture and stone stockpiles as even Emily, whose ankle is broken, continues chase! We corner it and continue to give it a fierce beating until it breathes its last...

... Man, that was messy.

Okay. This arena thing merits revision.

Dwarft Fortress V: The Ageless Realms, Part VIII

26th Timber, 1051, Late-Autumn: Oh God, The Blood!

Well, we have one less mouth to feed, at least. While he was out... doing things in the underground caverns, Eric was set upon by some Troglodytes and torn to shreds. Honestly, I have no idea what he was doing down there. My guess was he sought out the Troglodytes to avenge the fallen, but they got the better of him.


So naturally, I sealed the doors and left his body there to rot. We'll build a tomb and get his body once it's complete, but until then, I ain't risking no more dwarves!

Actually, his death wasn't for nothing. While he was down there, he found something... strange. An ancient passageway that led down...


Where could it possibly lead? As far as I can tell, it goes down several levels but I haven't been able to adventure down there just yet. We'll train up a military before trying anything too crazy.

So while all that was happening, we managed to get a Troglodyte in a cage and stick it with the rest. All the dying has distracted me from the pit arena, but I'll get back to that fairly quickly.

Merchants arrived from abroad. I managed to buy some cheese from them and ask them to bring more booze next time around. I also tried to sell them one of the Blind Cave Ogres I'd captured in one of my cages, but when Dee tried to move it it escaped!

I quickly recalled the squad that had earlier pummeled that Giant Olm to death to do the same thing to this Ogre. It was a bloody fight! Even the dogs got in on it!

It was brutal! But in the end, we managed to get it. First, we beat it to unconsciouness, then kept pounding away until there was nothing left.

I almost felt bad for it, but with Eric's recent death still fresh in our minds, our tiny stout fists smashed away with the fury of the mountain itself.

Then we had some cheese.

Oh, and the river's frozen again.