Life, Death, Afterlife and more Life.
Okay, while we fought all those goblins, I forgot to update you about a couple of babies. But it's cool, because Shlup & Raist had set a reminder for me to update you about them. That reminder came in the form of another baby.
(SPOILER)
Somehow, baby Cuchulainn is already the most foul-mouthed dwarf in Spoonproblems. I was teaching him a new word or two of my own when an all too familiar call came from the fortress entrance. "Get the smurf off me, you smurfing ugly green bastards!"
(SPOILER)
It was foa.She had spotted not just an ambush, but two goblin thieves. Right at the fortress entrance. Laddy didn't make it after his drop, but I knew what I had to do. I ordered the lever pulled, and hoped she'd make it inside somehow. I was not optimistic.
(SPOILER)
Immediately after this, another goblin squad appeared on the map. They had Shorty completely surrounded.
(SPOILER)
This is about one or two seconds later.
(SPOILER)
It was then that I was informed of the third squad. They were spotted by an incoming caravan of human merchants. By my count, that's two human soldiers, two human merchants and at least four goblin warriors. I left the human soldiers to it.
(SPOILER)
RIP, Shorty & foa. You were two dwarves that dramatically improved our fortress and without you it will not be the same.
(SPOILER)
The merchants travelled past the (now much better prepared) cage trap tunnel. Our soldiers stand ready to embark on their hunt, although at this point with no dwarves outside, a rather wise DK advises them to wait for the goblins to walk into the traps. At the moment, the odds are not in our favour. The few goblins that survived the human soldiers are quickly secured, and our newest goblin problem is over. Phew. Oh, and the goblin snatchers were ripped up by our military within the fortress walls.
(SPOILER)
Dear Autumn, please do not send any more goblins our way, kind regards, Loony BoB.
(SPOILER)
I wonder what Xalibar is up to?
(SPOILER)
Xalibar is up to being smurfing awesome, that's what. Take notes, everyone. This is EXACTLY what everyone should do with their enemies. Turn their bones into weapons. Hell yes. I can only hope someday this is added to a weapon trap so that it stabbity-stabs other goblins.
(SPOILER)
Called it.
(SPOILER)
Whee. Today's migrants arrive without issue for a change, and casually walk in to the mines. I quickly recruit edczxcvbnm into our second military squad. Why? Because he's bloody good with a crossbow, and that's a first for us. Well, there's BG-57 who is a novice with one, but he's our only talented weaponsmith. Anyway, edc won't be training or anything just yet as he's just one marksdwarf and there isn't an archery target built. I have, however, established two new barracks areas which will eventually be set up for the Fortress Guard (led by another newcomer, KaiserDragon, who possibly will use the goblin bone spear) and the marksdwarfs respectively. Someone else will have to carry out the final touches in there, but probably only when there are enough people to make the squads useful.
Anyway. We also got Shaibana [Carpenter/Woodcrafter], some guy who insisted he didn't need a name (He's nicknamed by his mates as 'Idnan', so we'll go with that) [Mason/Glazer/Makeshift Wood Burner], McLovin' [Glassmarker/Makeshift Miner], DocFrance [High Master Bone Doctor/High Master Wound Dresser], Jentleness [Bone Setter/Presser/Animal Dissector], Tavrobel [Engraver] and Dr Eddz [Accomplished Suturer/Accomplished Wound Dresser]. At least our medics are populous.
It's probably time I updated you guys on the projects I've set up, now that things are running slightly more smoothly.
(SPOILER)
Here we see the entrance to the fortress. This forces enemies into running through set cage traps should they try to sneak up on dwarfs in positions such as that which foa was in. Sadly, she was in this position while making these walls.
(SPOILER)
I have decided to leave the cage tunnel permanently open for now. If fully prepared, it will stop a minimum of 19 goblins and a maximum of 42 goblins. Maybe 45, I'm sure I put a few cage traps by the stairs, too... But yeah. Obviously it's unlikely we'll get to that, but please, keep building cages. There are only four things wood should be used for in this game, all are important. But, in order of importance, I would say that it goes like this: Cages, Charcoal, Beds, Bins. But obviously - make them all. Don't settle for just one or two. Hopefully woodcutting will eventually not be highly required, though. I strongly suggest my future replacement arrange for a lot of wood to be imported and to trade it in whenever possible. We'll always have easy access to stone. Wood is a different story. Hopefully the underground garden will pay off and we'll have trees that are safe to get to, but they will never grow fast enough to satisfy the potential huge population of dwarfs we may have.
(SPOILER)
Some people collect stamps. Some people collect figurines. I collect goblins.
(SPOILER)
Here is the beginnings of our underground garden. Feel free to expand it as much as you like, so long as you don't dig beneath a lake or something stupid like that.It should stop you from doing such a thing, but yeah, don't do it.
(SPOILER)
Our dwarves have been unhappy lately, so I've decided to smooth all the stone in the dining room so they feel a little better about where they eat. I have also built floors into the hospital and cemetery. The construction of a wall in the cemetery is pretty much done, and it should hopefully be engraved by someone eventually.
(SPOILER)
The barracks expansion, stage one. The two other barracks rooms have since been mined out below this one. It allows for ten soldiers to sleep, and spar a little easier. I've also mined out an area to the right of the barracks. This would be a useful spot to put down a weapon/armor stockpile (I never got around to it). It's even seperated a little so the ammunition can go into the bottom room, which would be ideal for the marksdwarves who will likely use the bottom barracks for training.
(SPOILER)
The workshop area. There are no longer any workshops above ground. This means more time hauling items, but it also means happier dwarves and it most certainly means safer dwarves. The stairs going up in the middle of the workshop walls lead to a stone and wood stockpile. The little hall heading to the left has since been expanded to lead to a massive room, which would be ideal for finished goods.
(SPOILER)
I got curious since zobain stalked haunting us and did eventually find his corpse. In the deeps of the river. If someone can think of a way to get him out, go for it!
(SPOILER)
...oh, for the love of... (in case anyone is wondering, a cyclops is a building destroyer and can smash through walls or anything).
(SPOILER)
Nice timing, Manus. The guy must think we have a distinguished guest or something.
(SPOILER)
Oh, maybe we do.He avoided smashing walls and went through the main entrance and got caught by cage trap #1.
(SPOILER)
Our new youngest dwarf! Man, they're popping out like crazy lately.
(SPOILER)
Another!
(SPOILER)
Spring: Goblins. Summer: More goblins. Autumn: Oger. Winter: ???
(SPOILER)
Please live, please live, please live... Oh, he's going to the jeweler's shop. Easy!
(SPOILER)
Bling bling.
(SPOILER)
EVERYONE HAS NICKNAMES. But apparently not Pete for President's parents. I have no idea who these people are and I don't know how to find out without wasting time. So I don't waste time. But whoever you are: Congratulations!
(SPOILER)
Upon looking at the nobles screen, I saw that we now had a bunch of requirements I'd not had time to look into earlier. So welcome to the noble rooms. To the upper left, you have the mayor's bedroom. Below it is the mayor's study/office. Below that is the mayor's dining room. Feel free to make them really fancy. Every square on this floor should realistically be smoothed down at the very least, and perhaps engraved. But for now, just smoothed. Anyway. The nine small rooms above and below the stairwell room are for the other nobles. The rooms on the right are to be kept free until we someday (I'm optimistic here) have a baron sent our way. For now, Psychotic is our mayor, manager, broker and record keeper. In the long run, mayors will be elected so it's anyone's guess. Unless we get a better record keeper than Psy, he should keep that job. Unless we get a better organizer than Psy, he should keep that job, too. And unless somehow we get a bloody awesome appraiser, I think he's gonna keep that job for life, because he's pretty damned good at it. The only other noble we have that requires a room is the captain of the guard, KaiserDragon. So he gets the three rooms just to the right of Psy's bedroom.
(SPOILER)
Winter was clearly our best season ever. Anyway, with Bolivar's creepy attachment to his iron short sword, well, I'm done. This game was just non-stop. I have never had so much to do! I hope the next person who follows up my turn will have a great year.
Things that I did not get done that I wanted to get done:
1. Put tables directly next to every bed in the hospital. I forgot one of them.
2. Set up stockpiles for finished goods, armor, weapons, leather, cloth, etc.
3. Smooth stone. Everywhere!
4. Set up better barracks. Continue to expand the military.
5. Engrave the hell out of the cemetery. RIP.
6. Build floors on the walkways of the dirt levels. The secure underground garden is great, but we really, really don't want trees growing in front of entrances to workshops and whatnot. This will take a lot of time, but in the long run will be worth it.
7. Continue to build bedrooms. The floor below the noble rooms is a good place to continue expanding.
8. Keep going down from the bedrooms and eventually - eventually - you'll find that I've mined a pathway to below the cavern. Keep digging around this floor and the ones below - carefully walling off any cavern access you might accidentally create - and look for a flux stone: Calcite, Chalk, Dolomite, Limestone or Marble. If we can find some of this, we can start making our own steel. Yay!
IMPORTANT: You know how Psy told you to pull the lever? Well, if the cage traps are ready (ie, they have a cage in them, and the cage is not full of some monster) then leave it down if there are people still outside. Pull the lever when civilians are INSIDE. If they are not, rely on the cage traps. HOWEVER. What you really, really need to do is USE THE PANIC (DINING) ROOM! Press 'm' for military, 'a' for alerts, go right twice so you highlight 'Dining Room' and press ENTER to order every civilian to run to the dining room and stay there. Your military will remain active. So: m, a, right, right, enter. Do the same thing again to take away the alert and allow your civilians to go back to work/idling/whatever.
ALSO IMPORTANT: To get your military to kill something, press 's' for squads, 'a' for "The Copper Words" (DK's squad), then follow the instructions carefully (eg. m for move, k for kill). Perhaps more importantly, when the military are no longer needed to be moving or killing, press 's' 'a' 'o' to cancel their order. Otherwise they will spend all eternity trying to kill something they have already killed, or trying to stand in the spot they were told to stand in. They will only return for food/drink. So cancel their order when done so they can return to their training etc.
EDIT: One last thing to my far, far too long post: I just noticed after playing a bit longer on my own time that BG-57 is dead because he violated a mandate of Psychotic's. I don't know if this is just in my playthrough or if this happened before I saved the game or the next person's turn. So now we have no real decent weaponsmith. It may be worth setting up a prison or something. DK & Shlup have also been punished, but obviously they live on.
