Bloodline:Oceanside Year 6

Part of the succession game: Bloodline:Oceanside

Save File: oceanside_207.zip

Prelude

The Journal of Oceanside, as directed by hmxmoss, Ranger of Oceanside, year 206.

Four years ago, Andrew Ryan approached me with a strange look in his eye; he asked me to take lead in architecting his underwater glass fortress. While the dream of such a dwarfhome is incredible, the practicality leaves much to be desired; I took on the task, halfheartedly, and was relieved to be done with that.

And yet... Ryan has come to me to once again lead development of his fortress. It seems rather soon for him to be coming to me again when there are so many capable dwarfs about... my last count was over ninety. Still, Ryan had that look in his eye – that unstable look – where ya just couldn't consider saying, "No."

Fortunately, our situation now is much better than it had been four years ago. We have a large stash of booze and an even larger stockpile of tasty roasts. A large amount of wealth in tradable goods means we won't lack when merchants show up at our door. The military could be a bit stronger and larger, and there are some job efficiency issues all around, but nothing that I can't handle given time.

Still... I'd rather be out hunting and chopping wood. ..... I miss my dogs. ..... Why did Ryan pick me again? ..... Just for fun, I think I'll sneak some roaches into Ryan's dining room later.

Granite

An elven caravan showed up today. They're never really welcome, since they have little we want. Of course, we also have little they want, which they make a point of reminding us every five minutes. It's annoying enough that I really want to show them the sharp edge of my axe, but Ryan said that wouldn't be polite.

Good on him, though, to trade for all the booze they had; it will keep us well supplied. The elves traded the drink, along with a few scraps of cloth and thread, for a pile of dirty goblin bloomers. They seemed very excited about that acquisition, and I could tell that the chief flower-hugging elf was itching for me to ask him the cause for their excitement. I kept my mouth shut and left the depot: I didn't want to know.

Leaving Ryan and the elves behind, I went to look at the "project". A large pumping platform, yet so far, only one long glass room was built. And it leaked. I asked some of the nearby working dwarfs, but they just pointed at one another. Some days, I swear, I wish I just kept my mouth shut. Or filled with ale.

Looking over the existing room and the pumping platform, I began planning the next section to pump out. If everything went well, I hoped to pump out three new sections before the end of the year.

Slate

With a few dozen screw-pumps in place, we began evacuating water today. It takes a lot of power to make this work, but thanks to our immense wind farm, we have power to spare... for now. I've got masons running down below the pumps, laying down floor tiles and wall sections of smooth, green glass blocks. It's really amazing work... I haven't the slightest clue how it all holds together, but I suppose that's why they are masons and I'm not.

With the pumps running and the masons slowly piecing together the glass room, I took a bit of time this week to survey and example our workforce. What I found was astounding. Of nearly 100 dwarfs, little more than one-fifth was ever doing work. There are, of course, the nobles and children who do nothing. The royal and fortress guards do little, but I don't dare get rid of them for fear of the nobles' complaints; besides, the guard would refuse to change jobs anyway.

But there is a large contingent of dwarfs at any time that are sleeping, eating, drinking, "on break", partying, or simply standing around searching for nose gold: twice as many as those working. When I finally tallied and looked at the overall numbers, it was no surprise to me why the glass fortress had developed as little as it had.

This needs to be handled. This needs attention. ..... Next month.

Felsite

I took another survey of the population, finding out what tasks each dwarf has been asked to do, and how often they actually do those tasks. As with my previous survey, I found a lot of time is spent partying and going on break, but I think many of my fellow dwarfs are too specialized. They have been assigned tasks that, quite often, don't need to be done... and yet, they've not been assigned any secondary tasks.

And so many dwarfs doing nothing but moving stuff around! Or, at least, that is what they're supposed to be doing. But since there are enough inefficiencies in the work force, there are too many haulers to things to be hauled.

One dwarf told me he was a wood crafter. A wood crafter? He sat around all day drinking wine and snacking on quarry leaf roasts since we don't make wood crafts. Considering our need for enormous amounts of fuel, and the typical dwarven requirement for large stockpiles of barrels and bins, we need to reserve all the wood for those tasks. This guy hadn't made a single wood craft since he'd got here, and I certainly wasn't going to have him make any on my watch. I told him to go learn the art of glassmaking, since that is our need.

There were other things wrong, too. A dwarf with gemstone experience relegated to hauling things about the fortress, while a dwarf with no skills was trying to tell the difference between a gemstone and a dumb rock. Three carpenters is (at least) one too many. Two cook's apprentices who never cook because our master cook is certifiably awesome. A bowyer who doesn't make any crossbows. And so on... I've started some reassignments, but looking at efficiency here is a full-time project. I need a drink...

... and I found a dozen of them partying again. That's it! After this beer... and this ale... and one more beer... I'm nailing up a sign disallowing all parties until further notice.

Hematite

The new glass chamber was finished early: floors down and the last wall in place. Huzzah! The builders still need to put the roof on, but that will be a piece of roast macaque biscuits compared to the main chamber. And they made it watertight this time... including the previous chamber! Now this is how things get done...

...until today. Scouts reported several squads of goblins have been sighted and are heading towards Oceanside. Initial reports indicate approximately 40 goblins, including three or four elites and champions. I put out the call to gather everyone inside and began rousing the troops.

I suppose I should have taken that "How to Command the Military" seminar offered several years ago, because without saying anything, they took off; they started running south along the beach for no apparent reason. After gathering my wits, I yelled out at them, "Your post is in here!" It took a while for that command to register, apparently: one too many bonks to the head without a helmet. Finally, they obeyed and started running back to the gate.

It was still a dangerous situation, as two squads of goblins were also approaching the main entrance. I waited as long as I could before I gave the command to raise the gate, but in the end I had to hope our slow-witted champions would make in inside just before it closed. (And that the goblin hammerlord also on approach would remain outside.) The plan mostly worked: all but Tôsedcatten, one of our wrestling champions, made it inside.

Reminded of a vulnerable access ramp, I sent the rest of the troops off to guard that breach while I put my ear to the gate and my eye to an arrow slit to discern any sign of Tôsedcatten's fate.

Hammerlord: *snorts* Foolishh sstuntted darf... I will kkrushh you likke ttyrtul...
Tôsedcatten: Foul puss-gob, you are no match for... *points* praise Armok, is that a starling!?!?
Hammerlord: *turns* Ssttarling? I sseee no ssttarlingz...
Tôsedcatten: *runs*

Tôsedcatten would seem to be more clever than I imagined. She ran for the breach to meet up with her squad there. The goblins chased her, arrows flying, but she evaded them all. And at the breach, our military stood ground ready to defend the fort.

The accounts I've received are confused as to what actually happened. Some say the wrestlers got excited and took the fight outside. While I'd prefer the foul gobs never see the inside of our dwarfhome, the wrestlers took the fight out of range of our spearhandlers and the crossbow. The latter eventually got involved but would have been more effective from the start if the wrestlers had stayed where I put them.

Still, we won! The wrestlers inflicted so much damage that the gobs ran and lost the desire to fight. I saw little point in chasing them down, and I didn't want to risk the troops more than necessary. I told them to take a break and have a few ales while the rest of us began to clean up the mess. And what a mess... goblin and dwarf blood everywhere, even on some of the nice, green glass. I'll have to ask someone to get out here with a bucket and brush and clean them off or else Andrew Ryan will have a seizure.

Interestingly, I was told that the final estimate of goblins that had approached the fortress was closer to eighty, not forty. We faced at least double our initial estimates. While the other dwarfs saw this as a good sign – that we could defend ourselves against a horde – I only began to wonder if this was just an initial test, to check our defenses. With so many goblins surviving to fight another day, it would only be a matter of time before they returned.

Sadly, we lost two dwarfs in the fight. Ofskel, a miner, just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Tôsedcatten took out seven of the gobs in the battle on the beach, but it would appear she also took the worst of it, falling before they ran. We will remember her with honor at a feast tonight. Also of note is Tunaran, another wrestler, who singlehandedly killed eleven gobs! Maybe I'll ask jdarksun to make him a medal.

The damned fortress guard never showed up. Pissers.

Malachite

Cleanup continues on the beach and just inside the breach. Scrubbing blood, moving bodies, picking up loose clothing and other items. It'll take a while, but it will be clean again. Meanwhile, I've also got the masons back to putting on the roof I had asked for before the siege started last month.

It would seem that some of the dwarfs have become tired of Andrew Ryan's regular "sweat of your brow" speech, and his constant yelling, "Work! Work! Work!" while he spent most of his time trading with merchants and stinkin' elves. He was voted out of office, and Endok Cattenbardum was voted in as mayor. I suspect most dwarfs just want a lower stress level around here, and Ryan's constant supervision wasn't helping.

Personally, I didn't care one way or the other. If you work, you get booze, and whatever else you say or do is not my business. In any case, since Endok was now mayor, I took the keys to the mayor's suite from Ryan and gave them to Endok. Ryan grumbled and was none too happy. I told the miners to dig another office for Ryan, as he'd still need to deal with merchants and the various liaisons who came to visit.

The young glassworker, Fathlar, got into a strange mood at some point and stopped talking to everyone. He grabbed a bunch of items and shut himself up in the leatherworks. A couple weeks later he finished, seeming as normal as ever, except that he had created something amazing. Kosoththak Shukarallas, he calls it: "Palacelock the Tall Seas". It's a cow leather vest that Ryan estimates is worth $108,000!

He handed it to me and went back to glassmaking as if nothing had happened. Truly, it is a fine vest, but it'll have to go into storage for the time being, as I have other tasks to get done.

Galena

I am continuing the process of organization here at Oceanside, trying to create a balance of workers and haulers and the corresponding tasks so everyone has something to do; hopefully, when this reorg is complete, Oceanside will be an efficient machine without the stressful weardown that Ryan's order seems to impose.

I've reduced the number of cook's apprentices and carpenters, and they and the bowyer are now part of my construction team. They will all begin learning the trades of mason, mechanic and architect. I've extended some of those tasks to other dwarfs already doing some, but not all, of them. This triple assignment, I believe, will make for efficient construction of screw-pumps and floors and walls: the primary needs for building the glass behemoth. I'm trying to draft as many construction dwarfs as I can without compromising other necessary tasks.

I thought to cut back on wood cutters and haulers, but we really need a constant supply of wood. Since we haven't found magma in this region, we need the wood for fuel. And we need a lot of fuel: making glass, smelting ore, crafting iron armor and weapons... Not to mention the regular need for wooden bins and barrels. We'll see how things work out for a while before any further reassignments.

Limestone

The rest of the journal is written in a different hand.

The Journal of Oceanside, as continued by Thobiden, Woodcutter of Oceanside, year 206.

Y'know... I liked hmxmoss as a friend, and he knew how to cut a tree down right quick, but when it comes to runnin' the military, he was as dumb as an obsidian block. Poor fool thot himself a fighter, but he died quicker than a carp will pull ya underriver.

See, he was out greetin' the latest caravan, a group of dwarfs pullin' wagons full of good things. And then those greasy, filthy gobs came back... The same ones that come attacked us few months ago, plus their buds. hmxmoss was all puffed up by his win over that last siege, so he thot "No problem!" and thinks he can do it agin.

He started off right, calls everydwarf inside. Even some of the visitin' dwarfs got inside the main gate... but there were those just standin' on it, and hmxmoss don' want to hurt their feelings or somethin'. So now he starts tryin' to defend both the main gate and that hole in the ground over near our purty glass hallway. And we didn' have the dwarfs for that... his promise to beef up the troops had nothin' to it so far. So here 'swhere it starts to go all wrong.

The traders took off, scared by the gobs (and there were a whole lot of 'em!) – darn smart since some of their partners got caught by the gobs in an ambush. So hmxmoss finally closes the gate, but see... it didn' matter. The gobs were headin' straight for the breach – they seen it last time and knew they could get in.

I think now hmxmoss knew his mistake... He gave me this journal for Oceanside and says to hang on to it 'til he gets back – he gonna go help with the defense. Big mistake. He thot the breach would limit the gobs and give us a huge win, but the way he done things, it worked other way 'round.

Our champeen wrestlers got out there first and took out some gobs, but those gobs brung lots of bows this time, and our boys came crawlin' back down the hole with arrows pokin' out their chest. And our one fellow with a crossbow was no match for a half-dozen of theirs; he went down, too, 'n one of our spears.

And so did hmxmoss. I had to stay close, to record what I saw, and the look on his face as the gobs flooded in was sad. He knew, only just before he died, how stupid he was. And so he died. While one squad of gobs run off earlier, there was no stoppin' the other two squads, and I was certain I would get killed next.

Lucky for me, the guard heard the noise and came running up from behind, leapin' into the piles of gobs without fear. And it worked... I dunno if the gobs were just tired, or scared, or thot more dwarf guards be coming soon, but they left. I might say we won if we didn' just lose a dozen dwarfs or so, and some dogs, and hmxmoss himself. Stupid bastard...

Seein' as how I have the journal for Oceanside, other dwarfs are now lookin' at me to make some decisions. I don' want to do it, but I suspect Ryan will choose another dwarf to lead at year end, so I do what I can for right now.

And the first thing to do is remove that law of hmxmoss against parties. We need things to make us happier right now, as most of the dwarfs are rather upset at our losses. Some dwarfs are throwing tantrums – even Andrew Ryan, who I thot was supposed to be cool under pressure. Apparently not.

One child even went bezerk yesterday, tryin' to stab everydwarf else with a kitchen spoon. I would have suggested givin' the kid a nice dog meat roast (freshly made!), but the guard reacted too much force and just killed the kid. Like that is supposed to make everydwarf feel better?

The epitath of hmxmoss:

Sandstone

In addition to tryin' to clean up and fix up this place, my first act as temp actin' director was to order that breach be sealed. hmxmoss was a moron not to do it earlier.

Some migrants came walkin' up to the fort as if this was the best place to be right now... I don' know how they could ignore the trash and bodies and bones and blood about everywhere, but they did. When they started tellin' me their work, I told them to shut up and head to the barracks. "Welcome! You're the army. Congratulations!" Seein' as our military was wiped out, we needed a new military, and these migrants were goin' to be it. Sad that there was only eight of 'em, but it a start.

Endok, the mayor elected after the first attack by those damned gobs, threw a tantrum and attacked Andrew Ryan. Damn messed up Ryan's arm. Ryan went off to rest in his room, while Endok went to live in a cage. In jail. The guards helped him there. Endok whines a lot now, but I don' have to see him as long as I don' go down to the jail. (From what I hear, Endok punched two cows on the way to his cage, so they made his stay longer...)

And speakin' of whiners, Godendodók has been whinin' nonstop since the last goblin attack. She threw some sort of tantrum in the statue garden a while back – I didn' see it – and hit someone. Punched the Baroness Consort in the ear, I hear. I think the Consort reacted and stuck a fork in Godendodók's chest, 'cause Godendodók isn't breathin' too well now. Now she just lies in the middle of the garden with her injuries, whinin' constantly, and so no dwarf wants to help her to bed, or give her food or water. Pathetic.

Meanwhile, Ryan got out of bed and went walkin' about all moody, cradlin' his injured arm. Some dwarfs tried to put him back to bed, but there was some evil look 'bout his eyes and everyone backed off. Ryan went out and got various goblin and animal skulls and bones and started puttin' them together in the tannery... scrapin' images into the thing. Some dwarfs told me about his progress and how horrid it was, but I didn' see it until Ryan came runnin' to show me. "Maligned the Dreadful Shove", he calls it: Tongusnir Zevuttomus. It truly is ugly, like the bones of some demon lookin' to do... things. I couldn' say anythin' ... fortunately, Ryan took it somewhere else. I don' care where, as long as I don' have to see it... and it can' see me.

Timber

Someone finally helped Godendodók, but she still is a whineydwarf. At least she's gettin' rest and drink and food, and maybe that will make her feel better. However, with good comes bad, and I hear that the child Momuz went insane. He's runnin' around the fortress babblin' like crazy... well, more so that usual for kids. It's sad, too, 'cause he just reached the age of dwarfhood... he could have been useful.

And Endok's apparently gone mad, too. I guess bein' in a cage for so long put him over the edge. We now have no mayor until the dwarfs decide to hold another vote. I don' think cages are the best idea for prison, so I be switchin' them out for chains to hold prisoners. I think will be less cruel.

However, since Endok already snapped, he's stayin' in the cage. Sorry, man.

Meanwhile, cleanup and sorting isn' done, but much of the ugly mess has been fixed. I thot now is a good time to try and get the dwarfs thinkin' agin of the glass fort and less of past deaths, so I marked off a new section of construction and told those boys to get started.

Moonstone

The Baroness Consort is unhappy because Amostlaz didn' make her some Tin items she requested. I tried to 'splain to her we don' have any Tin! "I don' care, little dwarf!" Little? Geez, what crawled up her arse? Sadly, the guards have to comply and so Amostlaz is now in jail for 50 days. At least it a bit more comfortable now, so hopefully he won' go crazy.

It seems Godendodók was feelin' a bit better today, 'cause she was out of bed and tryin' to drown her sorrows in a barrel of ale. But, of course, as things go that when the guard came along and remembered she punched the consort in the ear last month. Godendodók is now throwing tantrums chained to the wall.

Humans came to visit, but I didn' see any merchants. Was it because we have no mayor? I don' know, but the Baron shared to me the conversation he had with their diplomat...

Diplomat: Greetings, Baron, there is much to discuss...
Baron: Thank you for coming, we are...
Diplomat: It's such a pleasant place you've carved out for yourselves...
Baron: ... um, thanks, but we really should talk about...
Diplomat: It's been an honor. Farewell!
Baron: ... ?

I don' understand humans. Why did they bother comin' by at all?

Now, gobs... I understand them. Pillage and maim, kill and steal... So I wasn' surprised when they showed up agin. Thank Armok I closed up that damn hole along the beach. After I called everyone inside, I shut the gate. While the new recruits are trainin' up nicely, they are no way ready to handle a few squads of gobbos, especially not that group that came with the bows and arrows.

Speakin' of which, our marksdwarfs thought it might be worthwhile tryin' out that bird's nest up over the trade depot. It seems well protected (and I dunno why hmxmoss didn' use it). So I says, "Okay." They got up there and killed a couple gobs in the first squad to come knockin' on our door. The rest of that first squad turned tail and ran.

I called up to see if any more squads were approachin'. Those marksdwarfs peered out south and said to keep the gate closed; yeah, there were two more squads. They were approachin' slower than we thot, because they were chasin' down two dwarf kids who didn' come in as they were told. Argh... I'm gonna have to find some nice ales for those kids' folks as I tell 'em what happened.

After a while, when those damned gobs were "finished" with the kids, they came headin' toward the gate. Our boys on the roof were ready to take aim when a flurry of arrows came flyin' at them. They didn' dodge much, expectin' the fortifications to block the shots. But there musta been some force guidin' those arrows, because they came right through the arrow slits. One dwarf immediately dead, and the other two injured badly and draggin' themselves downstairs. It wasn' a pretty sight.

While the dwarfs went off to rest, I checked to make sure the gate was locked and told everydwarf to stay inside. This is gonna be a long siege...

Opal

The siege continues. Yes, those damn ugly gobbos are still out there, and we still locked up inside. But we have a year or more of food and booze. We have farms, a well... we can wait them out. We don' have any wood, which means we can't make fuel for the glassworks, but seein' as we can' go out to build the glass rooms, it don' matter anyway.

Godendodók is still flippin' out in prison, and she pulled one chain from the wall and ruined it. (Thankfully, not her own...) Endok is still caged up, which is good, 'cause he's foamin' at the mouth and yells all sorts of nasty things. I wish they just settle down some and be good dwarfs, not whiney like those stupid kobolds.

The Baroness Consort stopped me today and demanded I have some coins made. I nodded politely and went on my way... and then fergot all about her request. I'm wantin' to put her in prison, too, just to not have to hear her stupid demands...

Obsidian

Geez... both Endok and Godendodók died in jail and no one told me. I guess my authority 'round here is runnin' thin. Now that the dwarfs here elected Andrew Ryan as mayor once again, I guess he'll put someone in my spot at month end. Fine. I need a break from this management crap; this was really all hmxmoss fault anyway. Don' blame me...

Ryan was happy, at least for a short while, after getting his mayor job back along with the cushy office and bedroom. Why he back to being miserable again, I don' know, and I don' care. Maybe someone told him his diseased-lookin' totem was stolen by a kob... agin, I don' care, that thing made me want to vomit anyway.

Because the gobs are still outside and we still inside, I decided to experiment with some waterwheels and that aquifer the miners told me about. I thot it might be more efficient and better lookin' than that farm of windmills outside. After bein' put together by the carpenters, it seems to work sometimes, and sometimes not. I should have one of the mechanics look at it, 'cause I don' know what wrong with it.

Near the end, there was little to do excep' wait for the gobbos to get bored. I asked the miners to go exploring the depths some more, while we had time... see if they can' find some nice gemstones or metals.

Summary

Yes, three sieges in one year, and a military too small to handle it. They got lucky the first time and got destroyed the second time around. Only the fortress guard running up to help out at the last minute scared them off. Now, the third siege continues into the next year, as two squads sit outside preventing us from getting real work done.

There were a lot of inefficiencies in the work force, and I tried to deal with some of those, but it could definitely stand some additional work. Also note that for some of the dwarfs, I created a custom title "Construction" -- this implies three jobs enabled: masonry, mechanics, and architecture. This helps excessive task juggling and running back and forth while constructing screw pumps especially, but the glass project in general. The mason/mechanic/architecture jobs go pretty well together.

Here is the status of the fortress at the end of the year.

We are loaded on booze and food, and since we have several farms with some experienced planters, we can continue to produce plenty of food/booze. There are also some cages in the NW area of the workshop section that house several puppies and calfs and stuff that we can butcher if needed. We do have an animal trainer as well (doubles as hauler, though you may need to turn off hauling when you want to train a war dog), so when those puppies grow up (do they need to be out of the cage to do so?) we can make more war dogs.

The main problem we have is wood: we've run out. Sure, there is plenty outside, but there are also two full squads of goblins outside with some deadly accurate bowmen. They hit our three marksdwarfs at a distance, up two z-levels, through fortifications, killing one and wounding the other two. So, without wood, we can't make fuel which we need for smelting, metalworks, and glassworks. Our usual refuse piles are also outside, so we're gonna get some miasma here and there, I expect.

Yes, I got myself killed. I handled the military poorly, and ended up with several dwarfs turned into pincushions. The next player to get migrants (jdarksun?) should pick one... any one... as my replacement. Name him "mattmoss" and we'll pretend he's the brother of "hmxmoss".

Finally, the last gift of hmxmoss to Oceanside, a work mostly complete (but needs a few more totems):