[IronBeer]

This game is brutal. So far food and water are my biggest concerns (desite having huge, active farms).
Any way to stockpile water during winter, when the rivers and lake freeze?

Dig an aqueduct and route water to an underground cistern. Dwarves feel better drinking from a well, but they don't *need* one.

More importantly tho, all dwarves are alcoholics. Water is a drink of last resort; dwarves will start to get grumpy and work increasingly slowly in the absence of booze. Also, under normal circumstances, water is only used for bathing and cleaning wounds.

[deathfun]

This game is brutal. So far food and water are my biggest concerns (desite having huge, active farms).
Any way to stockpile water during winter, when the rivers and lake freeze?

Dig an aqueduct and route water to an underground cistern. Dwarves feel better drinking from a well, but they don't *need* one.

More importantly tho, all dwarves are alcoholics. Water is a drink of last resort; dwarves will start to get grumpy and work increasingly slowly in the absence of booze. Also, under normal circumstances, water is only used for bathing and cleaning wounds.

They're not unlike humans in that regards!

[TwentyPercentCooler]

This game is brutal. So far food and water are my biggest concerns (desite having huge, active farms).
Any way to stockpile water during winter, when the rivers and lake freeze?

Easy! Stick to warm climates. 

Nah, I had the same problems, though. But if you take turkeys and/or chickens, you either get tons of eggs, or a birdsplosion. Unlike catsplosions, nobody cares if you butcher and eat the birds.

I almost wish I could lock my doors to the stupid @#$%ing migrants. I swear they always show up right when I've just finished properly housing the last wave. I get excited about being able to build things other than bedroom furniture...NOPE. So far, I've only been attacked by kobolds that promptly managed to get their skulls caved in by my hammerdwarf and their bones made into crossbow bolts. Dwarves don't play around.

[Gortef]

I got Patriot a new body, another ladydwarf smithmistress who's just about as skilled as Gortina.

Ooh nice. We'll double the effort and quadruble the results.

[Patriot]

woo, new body, and i got boobies now!

Thanks oh great and wonderful master!

[IronBeer]

Update time. This is a big one, so I'll be breaking it into two posts. Also, without giving anything away just yet, there is a decision regarding the fort's future that must be made. I will leave it to y'all.

First off, our current roster (regarding actual forumites):
Polpolion- Miner/Administration
Scourge (of Ages)- Tanner
(Cmdr) DeeJay- Mechanic/Brewer
Mongoose- Farmer/Carpenter
Scotty- Miner/Gemworker
Trashman- Head physician/chemist
Wat(isname)- Weaponsmithing/Engineering
Kobar(44)- Axefighter
Apollo- Craftsdwarf
Patriot- Armorer/Mason RePatriot- Smithmistress
(SpardaSon) Dante- Axedwarf
(NGTM-1R) Night- Expendable soapmaker
redsniper- Stonecrafter
(FireSpawn) Spark- Glassmaker
Ghostavo- Miner
Dekker- Siege Engineer
deathfun- Suturer/wound dresser
pecenipicek- Weaponsmith
Gortina- Smithmistress
Pred- Axedwarf


The oldest of Wallbones' babies has just matured into a Child. Dwarven children aren't much better than babies, but they can help out a little bit around the fort, mostly by harvesting crops.


I set the smiths a-working to make some metal armor and weapons for our melee squad. Well-crafted copper gear should be at least passably good.


Damnit. Meng Dishgears, canine hero who killed a kobold thief, has succumbed to infection. I *knew* there was something bad about that beast's blood. Our dwarves are unaffected because they washed the tainted blood off, but dogs aren't quite smart enough to do that.


I notice a cloud of miasma following another dog around, and get a little curious. Oh, miasma manifests as a thick purple cloud in-game, and indicates a really bad smell, usually coming from rot. Yes, this rot can come from necrotic tissue as well as decaying corpses.


Argh, just as I feared. Well, nothing much I can do about it, since animal healthcare is pretty much non-functional at the moment. This dog might get better on her own, but I wouldn't count on it. Infections are currently waaay OP- if certain body parts get infected (like fingernails, yes really) they can't be operated on and the infection will eventually kill the patient.


Night likes her helms. So much so that Wallbones is forbidden to export any. No skin off my nose, though the helms *would* fetch a nice price in trades.


Oho! Scotty's got a big idea for something.


Scotty's a miner, so it makes sense that his potential artifact would involve stone somehow.


He's managed to get all his materials together. Let's give it a few moments and see what he comes up with.


Boss. Another kickass furniture piece to put into the common area!


I have no idea who Ushat Copperlords is, but apparently he's got a thing for giant hares. Ushat must be a historical figure of some importance or fascination to Scotty. If anybody's interested, as always I'm willing to investigate the connection.


Night had been complaining for a while about not having a "proper mayor's quarters", so I spent a good amount of time and effort to put together the first really nice suite in Wallbones. The walls and floors have been smoothed then engraved, thus all the decorations.


Captain of the Guard apparently also necessitates nice quarters, so I whip up an apartment next to the barracks.


With the melee squad properly equipped, I think it's time to go and reveal the remainder of the first cavern layer. I need intel on the whole area so I can block off access points to the outside.


During the course of our explorations, we come across a Cave Crocodile. What do we do with dangerous wildlife? We kill the crap out of it, of course!


Kobar's squad takes down the croc, but Kobar takes some pretty serious injuries in the process. He'll live, though.


A no-name woodcrafter gets an idea for something cool. Can't wait to...


...oh **** me. Of course I started letting dwarves back into the cavern. "Surely there won't be another beast this soon!" Hahahaha no. Rescue as many dwarves as possible, consign the rest to death, you know, typical response. I don't want to play with a poisonous bite.


What the ****, really? Did I burn down an orphanage in a past life? A Titan is essentially the surface equivalent of a Forgotten Beast- randomized attributes, but uniformly dangerous. Some of my most recent migrants still have hunting and fishing enabled, so those bumblers will buy me time to seal off the rest of the fort. Shame they'll have to wind up a Titan snack.


The new bridge system completely locks out the Cobra Beast from below, but traps three citizens in the cavern layer.


At the same time, I have my masons wall off the stairs leading out from the fort. Once again, poisonous bite. Do not want.


Goddamn shame, but better just them than everybody.


Once the fort's all buttoned up, I notice something odd about the melee squad. First is Kobar- despite getting treatment for his upper body injury, he somehow managed to get his eyelid infected. Yes, his eyelid. It got scratched in his fight with the cave croc, and the infection may just kill him- remember what I said about incurable infections? Yeah, I think this is one of them.

Not pictured: Pred. I never noticed, but in the fight against the Antlion Beast, he suffered permanent nerve damage in one of his legs and needs a crutch to get around. He can still fight with his axe and shield on the same arm, he just walks a little slowly.


Start plopping down some of the furniture we've made to improve the quality of life for our newer immigrants.


As I've mentioned before, not much time passes between most of these pictures. Naturally, in the middle of all this chaos, some elves arrive. They'll get torn apart by the Titan. Screw 'em.


Moving the marksdwarf squad into position by the backdoor to try and pincusion the Cobra Beast. I'll be much more attentive with the beast's movement this time, so we should be able to kill it fairly easily.


The beast is currently overshadowed by a pointer, but it's right at the gates. Holy ****, my harebrained scheme might actually work!

Unless you look real closely at the bridge in the corridor. What do you see? That's right- a braindead civilan dwarf running right to the beast. Apparently my melee sqad decided to play as well.


Triple ****nuggets. Yep, I must've done something bad in a previous life. Now we have the Caterpillar Beast, and Kobar's decided to take them both on before his squad can back them up. Shockingly, my archers aren't shooting. Line-of-sight error, perhaps?

Of course, Kobar's squad and the flood of civilans get slaughtered. I should have been more careful with the bridge management.
Kobar has been slain.
Dante has been slain.
Pred has been slain.


Attempting to open up the line of sight, I order my miners to open up the channel to the lower levels. Five internet points if anybody can tell me what I did wrong, and why Wallbones may now be screwed.

Spoiler:

I didn't see that I'd be channeling into a rock wall, rather than into empty space. So, some rock ramps were created, allowing the Cobra Beast into the fortress!

[IronBeer]

Ok, so the marksdwarf squad just got slaughtered. I've just ****ed up. Bad. Civilians are running around panicking everywhere, and at this point I don't think I could actually save the fort by sealing things off.

Dekker has been slain.


As a last ditch defensive measure, I draft all the dwarves with mining skill into a squad. Picks can be formidable weapons in the right hands, and they might be enough to kill the Cobra Beast. But, given how quickly Kobar's squad got torn apart, I'm not hopeful.


This is what chaos looks like. I've lost track of the dead, and many of the miners have already been killed. I think we're screwed, but I'll make sure we go down fighting. Polpolion in particular does a great job- despite having only a pickaxe, he takes on the Caterpillar Beast single-handedly and inflicts terrible, terrible damage. Unfortunately, the Caterpillar Beast is another of the loathsome "bug" monsters, and just. Won't. DIE.


The Cobra Beast (I refuse to use their "real" names) returns to the main backdoor after chasing down some runners. It swiftly kills the rest of the miner squad.

Polpolion has been slain.
Scotty has been slain.
Ghostavo has been slain.


At this point, I begin to lose particular track of when dwarves die. It's obvious the Cobra Beast can't be beaten without plenty of high-quality weapons and strong arms wielding them and we just don't have either anymore. I start just recruiting everybody into wrestler squads to try and kill the Caterpillar Beast. Maybe 30 unarmed dwarves dogpiling it will kill the thing. Oh, the Caterpillar Beast is indeed a threat, but I can at least kill it out of spite. Everybody except Doc Trashman gets called up; maybe, just maybe some dwarves might survive this. I don't even know when everybody died. I'm just gonna start going down the list semi-randomly.

Scourge has been slain.
DeeJay has been slain.
Mongoose has been slain.


Migrants arrive. I can do nothing for them. The Lyrebird Titan will surely kill them soon.

RePatriot has been slain.
Night has been slain.


The slaughter continues. The Caterpillar Beast begins to slow down, but the Cobra Beast is still going strong, bearing no major injuries.

Spark has been slain.
Wat has been slain.


The Caterpillar Beast is dead, but the Cobra Beast cannot be stopped. There is no longer enough order to try and wall off the fortress from the carnage.

deathfun has been slain.


The numbness begins to set in. A constant flood of announcements declares disrupted item hauling and eating schedules alongside the steady flow of deaths.

redsniper has been slain.
pecenipicek is mortally wounded but managed to escape the slaughter for now.


One-third of the fortress' population lies dead.


And now I know for certain that containment would not work. Too many dwarves are too unhappy. A child has gone berserk.


Before being slain himself by bystanders, the child managed to kill an adult dwarf in about 3 seconds.

pecenipicek succumbs to his wounds.


The beast has begun advancing towards the fortress. There can be no survival now.


I can barely stay focused enough to keep taking screencaps. Equal parts horror and fascination cloud my awareness.

Gortina has been slain.


Scourge has snapped.


Scourge is jumped by all the dogs of Wallbones, but somehow during all this mayhem he managed to deck himself out in copper armor. He manages to kill the entire pack with his bare hands before being taken down by some other panicking civilians.

Scourge has been slain.


The beast is in the living quarters. This doesn't seem real. Just keep taking screencaps- it's the only thing I can do now.


A goblin ambush materializes. They will find no prey here, I fear.


Two-thirds of the fortress lies dead. The remaining dwarves barely cling to sanity.


Ghosts appear, to apparently no purpose. The slaughter continues.

Trashman has been slain.


Against all reason and logic, some no-name migrant managed to construct an artifact. I don't even bother to get the description.


Almost everybody's dead. About half of the survivors are currently insane.


The last sane dwarves persist in the infirmary. Even if the beast does not kill them, they'll surely die from dehydration/starvation eventually.


Except that their wounds aren't as serious as I thought, and they manage to flee the infirmary. There is only one other dwarf left in Wallbones, and he's trapped on the surface, running around naked and talking to himself.


Behold the last dwarf of Wallbones, instants from death. His whole right arm and left leg have been severed, and the Cobra Beast bears down. This is the end.


Except apparently not. Right at that moment, a wave of migrants arrives. I **** you not.


Wallbones' population is now ten assorted filth-covered dwarves on the surface. None of them are miners, so we couldn't get back into the fort even if I wanted to. A careful scanning of the surface revealed an unsurprising fact, and a surprsing fact.
First, there are remains of the elven caravan in various places on the surface. That means a modicum of supplies for these migrants should I choose to use them.
Secondly, the elf caravans somehow managed to kill the Lyrebird Beast, although apparently all the merchants succumbed to their wounds.


What does this mean for us?

Well, it means that I will leave that descision to you! We could potentially re-establish a base and scrape by until a caravan comes around and we secure another pickaxe. All of Wallbones' internal structure is unsafe now, so we'd effectively be starting from scratch in a new location. There's a smidgen of food on the surface, and there's a river available.

So, what's it going to be? Shall Wallbones start over, or will we call our strength broken?

[SpardaSon21]

Let's start over and build a new fortress, with blackjack, and... hookers!

[CommanderDJ]

Omg, after all that, you've gotta keep going! Put my vote in for persisting. If we actually manage to pick ourselves up after this, it would be extremely awesome.

[Mongoose]

Not only that, but you must avenge all of us and kick some giant monster ass!

[TrashMan]

Start over.

And I do reccomed you use the graphics pack. Makes for better screenshots.

[Pred the Penguin]

Wow, what an insane slaughter. Do you figure you can keep the few migrants alive for a fresh start, or will they just be eaten by another roaming monster?

[FireSpawn]

I vote for a new start in a less hostile area...Or at least one that doesn't rain corrosive sludge upon the land.

[deathfun]

Definitely setup a new place with what you've got
That's also a hell lot of purple

[TwentyPercentCooler]

Well, that escalated quickly!

Dear lord, that is both terrifying and hilarious. I got into this a bit late so I don't wanna tell you what to do. I will just be watching with interest no matter what happens. 

[watsisname]

[IT WILL END HORRIBLY, NO DOUBT.]

D:

[Dragon]

Let's not give up. This could be fun.

[redsniper]

Never give up. Never surrender.

[Kobrar44]

Let's not give up. This could be fun.

Thsi is already FUN by DF definition, and we can have FUN lasting a little longer! With all this elven wood, you might succeed.

[watsisname]

I do think it would be awesome... hell, FUN to try to persist with our fallen fortress, but I have no preference.  Repopulating in a region less prone to raining bull**** might be more sane.