User:Jellyfishgreen

Poemcrafter of A DF Night Before Christmas Proud mastermind of "Paintrag" in v0.23.

my dwarves be dancing

If you could read my mind love
What a tale my thoughts could tell
Just like an old time movie
'Bout a ghost from a wishing well
In a castle dark,
Or a fortress strong
With chains upon my feet -- Gordon Lightfoot.

The idea pile

1. legendary miners in sieging armies? Countertunneling, as in WW1
2. Shipyard (workshop) longships, oars from the carpenter
3. rail road = metal bar + wood sleepers; carts can convert to rail carts for ore haulers/wagons for reduced travel energy cost

Fortress 1: Ratman Island

A few notes on my current fortress, "PlaitTorches", set on a volcanic tropical island with an existing cave system crawling with ratmen. Thus, Ratman Island, Sept 2008-. Version '40d.

1. So I've set up home in a sandy hill above a magma vent. Down deep there's a layer of obsidian, and I realized that if I site all the noble rooms there, I have smoothable and highly valued walls, and an excuse to mine out all that obsidian for furniture and trade goods and swords. If there's an accident, the noble rooms will be flooded with magma. So, win-win all around.
2. Used the Full Plate+Shield+Wrestling training system. Quickly my Sheriff became an Elite then Legendary wrestler, and the cleansing of the ratman cave system was a non-climax as his wrestler squad was not significantly challenged. No dwarf deaths. We have, however, lost about 5 dwarves since introducing edged-weapon training.
3. Planning use of the surface magma vent was scrapped when we found a hidden subsurface pool. Magma furnaces working great, lots of glass production, lots of obsidian, but ore is rare. We were glad to find two copper veins but import everything else. Once the Mayor demanded Brass; I melted two zinc cages for alloy but a crazy dwarf nipped in and made hanging Zinc rings on his artifact out of my precious reclaimed bar...
4. Draining one vent into another to create a small magma-fall is inadvisable. I don't know if it counts as overflow but small 1-deep waves of lava formed on the surface and rippled around. Eventually some washed up on the wrong shore, burning down a kiln and we lost a craftdwarf. We reclaimed the vent with two controlled water floods, one to seal the magma-fall and one to counteract the waves by damping the furnace area.
5. More successful was our dining-room waterfall. Windmill-driven pumps bring seawater up 3 levels to an existing (saltwater) pond system; a manual pump brings it up one more level before dropping it into the dining room where grates lead to the ocean-return drain. The floor is permanently damp but the dwarves are permanently enriched.
6. Surprisingly we do have contact with the Dwarven civilization for trade (it's an island) but no other, and little wildlife except turtles and snailmen. Lots of trees for the taking, though, and no Elf retribution.
7. A titan showed up in our fourth year; I activated the military once its intentions were clear. It chased a craftdwarf then killed a peasant holding her baby, trapped by a channel. Combined wrestlers and marksdwarves brought it down seconds later. The baby survived, Very Unhappy.
8. 4th year stats: Pop.95. 5 Artifacts, mostly Crafts (obsidian + obsidian amulets etc). 8 Guards, half legendary.
9. Constructed a ten-tile-wide pattern of a Fat Crescent moon, "the symbol of the local dwarven government", in white rock and green glass on the flat tidal shelf. My first megaproject.
10. About the fifth year I got tired of glassmaking and abandoned the fortress. I now realize I should have changed glassmaking (and sandbagging) to be the principal industry, and created a megaproject of a five-story dwarf statue in green glass blocks and obsidian (with a clear glass beard) on a floating platform in the ocean. Maybe I'll reclaim and try that. Also "Orange Ruffy" - obsidian columns to the bottom of the ocean.

Fortress 2: Mistytowers

This one's on a mountain spur just where it meets the forest. Pleasing features include the spur mainly made out of limestone and bauxite, and a small hill made of magnetite! Naturally, steel production is now our most significant industry. No coal or magma so I've got the Charcoal task on Repeat and a constant stream of lumber to the stockpile. Year 3, pop 41, 2 babies, 2 goblin ambushes, 3 civs trading, wild horses.

1. Founding civ is "The Friendly Tourists". My offshoot, looking for trouble, is "The Armored Toe-Tours". :)
2. Borrowing part of a lovely "cathedral" design found on the DFMA for the main living quarters.
3. First goblin ambush was dealt quite efficiently by the Masked Dwarven Wrestling Squad. Second ambush took out a puppy and a wardog before their owner (a quickly drafted woodcutter) showed up, quite upset. She beheaded one and be-halved another; I presume it was therapeutic. I assigned her a new pet wardog as additional happy thoughts. Poor gal loves her dogs for their loyalty.
4. Unfortunately the woodcutter was caught and killed in a third ambush before the military could arrive. She was one of the founding 7, too.

• Steel, steel, more steel, and carving part of the mountain spur into a limestone tower 20 squares a side. Still compensating for loss of woodcutter(s) and wondering how many ambushes it takes to make a siege. Setting up ballistas and steel spikes in anticipation of fun.