Let's Play Dwarf Fortress: Syndrome Conundrum

[Internet Kraken]

Chapter 119: From the journal of Stinthad Kekimtobul

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1st Moonstone, 1060, Early Winter

You know what's nice? Ever since we cleared out all the forgotten beasts here, there haven't been anymore. Maybe we drove them off for good. Maybe that lake really was all they cared about it, and now that we've drained it there isn't any reason for them to come here anymore. Or maybe we've just been lucky. Probably the later.

Anyways, I've decided that all future pump operations shall take place on the beach. Caverns are just too cramped and dangerous. The area will be walled off to keep goblins out when they inevitably come back. It should work just fine.

11th Moonstone, 1060, Late Spring

Oh god damn it.

Our military is falling apart, literally. When soldiers aren't dying their losing limbs on a regular basis. Asmel decided to play hero again and rush ahead of the group. Honestly I don't blame here, since they were just clearing out some cave ogres. They've done that before without a problem. Well apparently they found her lying on the ground in a daze while an ogre munched on her left arm. So now we have another soldier missing a limb. Just great.

Speaking of wounded soldiers, Mesca is stilling rotting away in the hospital. It's weird, seems like Root recovered way faster than he did. I'm sure he'll be fine though. Unless someone doesn't feed him. Silent Thunder is off partying or something, but Smiles is still on call so I'm not sure why she hasn't been feeding him. Oh well, she's probably going to do it soon. No way could our staff be so incompetent as to actually let a dwarf starve to death in plain sight.

16th Moonstone, 1060, Early Winter

Silent Thunder finally got around to meeting with the merchants, right when they were getting ready to leave to. I'd complain about her taking so long, but after nearly killing her due to a locked door I feel inclined to give her as much time off as she needs.

The merchants brought along many valuable metals as I had requested. By buying them we have significantly boosted the diversity of metal available in the fort. Always good to have more shiny stuff lying around. It was expensive, but money isn't much of an issue for us at this point.

The merchants didn't enjoy as large as a profit as I usually allow them, but they seemed satisfied none the less. In order to pay for this all I had to lower the amount of booze and food we normally purchase, but that shouldn't be a problem. After all, we have tons of food stockpiled.

18th Moonstone, 1060, Early Winter

So I heard a bunch of dwarves running around panicking about a wild elk bird. Normally that wouldn't seem odd but these dwarves were near the surface. Elk birds normally only harass people down in the caverns.

Well one of them somehow worked its way up to the top of the deep roads. I have no idea how it made this far on one of them most frequently traveled paths. Gods know how much work it interrupted on the way.

Fortunately Goden was nearby and managed to avert a potential crisis. The cavern creatures seem to be more aggressively lately. First Kevlar Eater was devoured by ooze pods, then cave ogres tore off Asmel's arm, and now a rogue elk bird infiltrated our fortress. Something weird is going on.

19th Moonstone, 1060, Early Winter

WHAT?!?

HOW?!? SILENT THUNDER IS STANDING RIGHT FUCKING THERE!! HOW DO YOU NOT NOTICE THE STARVING PATIENT RIGHT ACROSS THE ROOM!?? God, this is just infuriating and depressing. Silent Thunder should know better than this. Anyone with an inkling of common sense should know better than- wait, what the hell is that sound?

...wow, those are big.

Spoiler: Giant Lion Info

Kraken's notes: Picture a lion. Now make that lion eight times bigger. That's what a giant lion is. It's not so much giant as "holy fuck that thing is huge and it's about to tear off my face". And that's what it will do to most dwarves since it's so massive. Even soldiers can get mauled by these things, especially when they are traveling in groups. Of course, being made of squishy flesh they're rather easy to cut apart, but don't let that fool you into thinking they're not a threat.

Fortunately, giant lions are one of the creatures you can use to your advantage. Capture one in a cage trap and you can turn it into a loyal pet. In addition to being used as pets, humans will also use them as war mounts if they happen to be available. Just in case you thought a giant lion alone wasn't bad enough. Now picture one being ridden by a soldier manly enough to tame it.

23rd Moonstone, 1060, Early Winter

That went better than expected. I thought those giant lions would catch at least one poor dwarf but thankfully everyone managed to outrun them long enough for the military to arrive. Of course the lions didn't stand up to our trained soldiers. I guess the military isn't completely incompetent. At least, the Immortal Rags aren't.

The merchants have also decided to leave. Probably for the best, as without any more trading to do there's no reason for them to linger. Best to leave now before the goblins show up again. The outpost liaison and human law-giver are still here though. Oddly enough neither of them has tried to meet with me yet. They're just standing at the meeting all, chatting up any dwarves that happen to be hanging out there.

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Fuck this website. Go to post an update, it doesn't load. When it finally does, forums aren't working. When those start working, thread doesn't load. Just let me post my shitty LP Escapist, this part shouldn't take more than a minute.

 

[Aidinthel]

There was a post in the Tech Team user group that one of the servers is offline for maintenance. So if the site seems worse than usual tonight, there's a reason for that.

 

[Engarde]

Wait.....8 times bigger than a lion? Holy crap that's a huge lion. I think I was attacked by a giant panda once... it had both its arms chopped off then bit the head from a dwarf before bleeding to death. Now all we need is giant elephants....or giant carp.

 

[vallorn]

stop putting ypourself down kraken. the LP is brilliant and i eagerly await every update.

also: is the wildlife beginning a takeover of the fort or are your soldiers afflicted with the dumb?

 

[killthenrun1]

Is'nt every drawf afflicted with the dumb?
Also what would you do if some catastrohic event happens?
Would you savescum, stop the lp or start a new one? I am just curious since you have been doing this for over a year. Also that is one huge lion and you did not tame it .

 

[greatorder]

stop putting ypourself down kraken. the LP is brilliant and i eagerly await every update.

also: is the wildlife beginning a takeover of the fort or are your soldiers afflicted with the dumb?

both, I reckon.

probably mainly affected by der dumb.

 

[lupus_amens]

""holy fuck that thing is huge and it's about to tear off my face"."
I don't think they can tear off a dwarfs face, mostly because the paws would be too big to accomplish such a task.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Wait a moment...if eyes can grow back...can arms?

All those in favour, raise...oh...

 

[Johnn Johnston]

I'd be wondering if we could see an update on the fortress itself? I mean, the structure of it and the demographics of the dorfs within.

 

[Thecard]

Is'nt every drawf afflicted with the dumb?
Also what would you do if some catastrohic event happens?
Would you savescum, stop the lp or start a new one? I am just curious since you have been doing this for over a year. Also that is one huge lion and you did not tame it .

Savescum? How? You'd have to make a backup in the data folder, and that isn't something most people usually do. Also, odd that Forgotten Beasts have been replaced with angry cavern dwellers. And that the normal creatures seem to be harder to beat.

 

[DeadDodo]

Savescum? How? You'd have to make a backup in the data folder, and that isn't something most people usually do.

If you use LNP you have the ability to create backups (season/yearly), it's quite a handy way of savescumming, but no real overseer would do such a thing right? *tries to look innocent*

 

[killthenrun1]

No I am sure no good overseer would do that!

 

[Jimmybobjr]

Savescum? How? You'd have to make a backup in the data folder, and that isn't something most people usually do.

If you use LNP you have the ability to create backups (season/yearly), it's quite a handy way of savescumming, but no real overseer would do such a thing right? *tries to look innocent*

The rate of Saving can also be modded in the Init or D_Init files in the core Dwarf Fortress files.

There is also a option of having it back-up each save in its own seperate folder.

 

[Internet Kraken]

Savescum? How? You'd have to make a backup in the data folder, and that isn't something most people usually do.

No you don't. If something happens that you want to undo, you can simply exit out of the game without saving and go back to your last save. There may be no ingame option to do that but simply forcing a crash works fine.

 

[killthenrun1]

But if you do it that way then you are stuck on the bit you last saved on. If you got a syndrome before the game saved then it kicked forcing a crash would just force you to go back before the syndrome hit. So saving the folder would work better.

 

[Thecard]

Cool. Did not know.

 

[StrangeAeon]

Finally got caught up on reading! I can't wait for the inevitable attempts to catch and tame giant lions. After all, they're the divine mortal enemies of giant worms.

If you're still taking names, I'd also loved to be dwarfed.

 

[Internet Kraken]

Chapter 120: From the journal of Stinthad Kekimtobul

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10th Opal, 1060, Mid-Winter

So Liaison Stillwinds finally got around to meeting with me. Not sure what was keeping her so long. Maybe she was having a discussion with the human Law-giver about something.

It was the standard fare. She said I was doing well, had a nice fort, should stop getting some many people killed, yadda yadda yadda. Then we got around to setting trade agreements. I decided to request a lot of metals again. Can't hurt to get more of it, right?

She told me that the capital is in desperate need of splints for some reason. Maybe the war isn't going very well. It's hard to figure out exactly what is going on back there.

So the meeting went very well. I don't think the capital is aware of how badly the goblins are screwing us over on a regular basis, and I see no reason to tell them. All that would do is make people stop coming to Reveredtour, and that would be terrible! We need more migrants. In fact, I've been working on a travel brochure to encourage people back in the capital to move here. Unfortunately I can't draw well, and neither can anyone else in this fort. Lost in the Void is the only one with good art skills, but he keeps insisting on drawing an "accurate representation of Reveredtour". This means every picture has at least one corpse in it.

13th Opal, 1060, Mid-Winter

I really don't get why the human Law-giver keeps showing up when all she does is complement the fort and then leave. I mean, it's nice that she says these things but it just doesn't seem worth the trip. She could send a letter or something. Then I wouldn't have to worry about her getting killed by goblins or monsters.

Anyways, I've been working on figuring out pumps some more and...uh...

...yeah I have no clue what I was supposed to be accomplishing here. I think I read the directions wrong.

17th Opal, 1060, Mid-Winter

Today is a proud day for Reveredtour. After a great amount of work, it is finally complete. Our beautiful tunnel tube road is officially finished!

I'm so happy; this is finally starting to feel like a proper fort. The road stretches all the way from the fort to the edge of our territory. Now the merchants have a proper road to follow rather than just randomly wander through the wasteland. And it isn't completely covered in blood and grime. I figured as soon as it was finished the military was going to kill an elephant on top of it or something.

Oh yes, I talked to Silent Thunder about the death of Archont. It wasn't really her fault. She assumed that Smiles had remembered to feed all the patients. I'm not going to harp on Smiles too much for this since I think she's learned her lesson. The official word I gave to the rest of the fort is that Archont passed away due to illness. No point in telling them what really happened, we have enough trouble getting people to get medical treatment as is.

21st Opal, 1060, Mid-Winter

Hooray! We finally got some more migrants! I was beginning to worry that people we're taking those silly rumor about Reveredtour being an inhospitable hell hole seriously. That's just ridiculous. Reveredtour is a duchy; it deserves more credit than that.

Average sized group, so we should be able to find a job for all them rather quickly. There are a lot of openings in the military. These migrants aren't Reveredtour's only new residents though.

Commander Root came back from the crypt carrying a new baby girl in her hands. Apparently she gave birth down there. While fighting zombie trogs.

Little Rhian is a perfectly healthy baby girl though, so I suppose it doesn't matter where she was born.

28th Opal, 1060, Mid-Winter

So pretty much all of the migrants had no useful skills whatsoever. That's okay, honestly I was expecting that. Luckily for them, everybody is useful when they're conscripted!

They're all going to be soldiers. We need to fill in the gaps of our military. Sure they have no combat skills whatsoever, but I'm sure Commanders Root and Gonzo20 can whip them into shape. The only exception to this is Lupus Amens.

He gets to be a healer, as he actually has some developed medical skills. He says he was a respected doctor back in the capital, but figured he could put his skills to better use here. He's certainly right about that. He's our new chief medical dwarf. Silent Thunder is perfectly willingly to step down from that position, as she knows his skills exceed hers.

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Finally got some more migrants, which means the military finally got some new cannon fodder. Most of you are probably going to get killed but if even one of you becomes a decent soldier it will have been worth it. It's not like I need migrants for anything else right now.

 

[Jaser]

Hooray! I'm on a suicide squad! This is the best birthday ever!

 

[Aidinthel]

The Chief Medical Dwarf is "quite susceptible to disease". Yeah that sounds about right.