|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 10, 2015 13:06:16 GMT -5
Got bored of the current fort. It had a lot of giant creatures, but none of them are actively hostile. The giant keas are more a nuisance than active killers, and combined with next to zero invaders, it was complete and utter boredom.
Tried embarking on savage badlands, and I was met with the same boredom with some challenges. Since the biome was purely badlands, aside from a river there were no trees or plants. Preparing for a journey instead of embarking immediately was tried for the first time, and I must say that the option is really useful - a template could be saved, so I can already assign the expedition party of what job they have, so I'll be using that on future playthroughs.
Since there were no trees, I had to bring some logs of my own to make beds. It had bituminous coal, and flux... but the metal I found was only copper... so I pretty much had to rely on caravans to make steel.
Not that the fort lasted too long. No interesting animals. Then the first year passed and a weregiraffe killed nearly all my dwarves before morphing back to a goblin.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 11, 2015 12:44:34 GMT -5
Somewhat amusing. Certain shelled animals, like the giant armadillo or giant turtle, instead of fighting or fleeing, will instead retreat into their shell.
When that happens, you can build a cage trap underneath them, and they won't move as builders set the trap up, and once it's done they will then be caged, enabling them to be trained/butchered.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 11, 2015 18:09:14 GMT -5
New fort, in the middle of three biomes. Tropical savanna, tropical shrubland, and tropical grassland... so pretty much similar biomes in the end. All savage, so I'm hoping for interesting creatures.
They still have rhinos. Kinda lame since I got tired of them last fort, but meat is meat. Giant insects, not really great for pets and breeding, as most of their lifespan is about one year. Giant slugs, one year as well, but a fair amount of meat. Gross.
Hoping for an egg layer.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 12, 2015 10:14:38 GMT -5
So far on the current area I'm finding a ton of marble once I hit stone. Like so far I'm doing some exploratory mining instead of hollowing a floor one by one, and it's a big depth of marble, which can function as flux. On the other hand, there's a fair amount of tetrahedrite, which can be smelted to copper, and a chance for silver. Finding some iron ore, but not by much. Not really a lot, so even with a ton of flux I really can't mass produce steel so I'll have to be careful in it's use. Train metalsmith with copper first before producing steel weapons to provide the best chance for masterpiece quality. Luckily traded some steel equipment from the dwarven caravan, which is enough for a one-man squad to start things off.
Still, I got a ton of marble, and even if it's used as flux due to the small supply of iron I might as well permit the use of the stone for masonry and stone crafting. Marble blocks for everything. Deconstructed the starting buildings, floored the area with marble blocks and rebuilt the workshops with marble. Living quarters are in a soil layer, and floored with marble blocks, and soon marble walls using more blocks. The bed, however, is wood. Figured out how to use ramps and the caravan can now head to the bottom instead of having a depot near the entrance... mostly due to there being no large enough hill to carve an entrance. There's raised bridges on ground level. When the lever is pulled they go down and seal up the downstairs and ramps.
And the first spring migrants is always chaos. Once you get a large enough base where most tasks are already covered, you can be like "meh, haul all the junk in the fort first, I'll think of what job to assign you later"... but when it's the first spring migrant wave and all of a sudden you go from 13 dwarves to 38, plus children, you're pretty much scrambling setting up buildings and assigning jobs. And nearly all the time you get the useless dwarves; lye maker (useful for soap and potash, but not really big on the totem pole of importance), hunters (where setting up cage traps or telling your military to attack is usually safer), gelders (aside from catsplosions, there's really not a lot of importance in castration... like seriously, grand master gelder? How much animal privates do you need to get that much experience on it?
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 12, 2015 11:41:07 GMT -5
Caught some giant tortoises. They're not the giant version of the animal though, as those are called gigantic tortoises. In other words, they give low value products when processed in the butcher and tanner, as well as eggs. On the other hand, butchering does provide shells which are somewhat rare items sometimes requested in strange moods, plus they can give a decent amount of meat.
They don't lay a lot of eggs, but breeding several should make up for it. They'll be the egg-laying industry for now until a better animal wanders into the area.
|
|
Push R Truth
Patti Mayonnaise
Unique and Special Snowflake, and a pants-less heathen.
Perpetually Constipated
Posts: 39,292
|
Post by Push R Truth on Oct 12, 2015 12:08:27 GMT -5
I wonder... shouldn't there be a giant version? So you could in theory have Giant Gigantic Tortoises?
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 12, 2015 13:13:47 GMT -5
Giant is the normal sized version. Exotic, but the savage biome version is called gigantic instead of giant. The giant ones still give a fair amount of meat.
As for egglaying, I captured all 7 tortoises; 5 males, two females. 3 males were butchered, and the remaining ones were pastured and chained next to nest boxes in hopes of breeding a tame generation. One female has laid eggs, while the other... is still hiding in her shell.
Also, rhinos keep walking into cage traps. Whenever a herd shows up in the map, nearly all of them get caged. Due to quickly setting up an aboveground farm... well, farms, three different crops; one can be turned to thread (then cloth), one can be brewed to the second best quality booze, and the other can be processed to flour, I'm pretty much set in food production near the start of year three.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 12, 2015 14:10:00 GMT -5
Huh. Giant tortoise eggs hatched in two months since the mother claimed the next box to lay eggs. Thought it'd take two seasons, but ah well.
Six eggs, and half of the litter was born semi-wild and the other half trained. Two among the group received training to tame status, and they're opposite genders. Turtle industry established.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 12, 2015 17:54:21 GMT -5
Huh. It really does seem that giant tortoise eggs hatch in one season. Good to know. While it doesn't produce as much eggs as the giant monitor lizards, it's certainly a lot more reliable.
Elves haven't shown up yet in this run. Pretty sure I embarked near an elven location. Ah well.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 12, 2015 18:31:31 GMT -5
So far, 15 giant tortoise hatchlings have been born. Half of them are tame, and the other half are soon to be once the trainer finally decides to do some training on them. Plan to keep 4 females and 3 males for breeding purposes. The rest will be butchered, and more or less future offspring will be the same. Gotta wait a year until they reach adulthood, though can wait a little more until they reach full size.
The fat of all future offspring will provide a ton of soap; probably enough to make a room made out of it. Though currently even if I butcher all the current available tortoises they still got nothing on the fat provided by all the rhinos I keep capturing.
Also, current bedroom design seems to save a lot of space compared to my old layout. f*** privacy. Privacy is for elves. Each dwarf is assigned a 3x3 space, which in fairness has marble block floors. They get a cabinet, bed, and marble statue (for room value increase). No walls, each 3x3 space is next to each other, and most of the bedrooms are in the main hub, near the workplaces but far enough for no noise. Those working close to the surface also has the same living arrangements, only closer to the surface.
Children get no beds. SLEEP ON THE FLOOR, FREELOADERS.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 13, 2015 9:21:22 GMT -5
Still a month before some of the hatchlings reach adult size and become egg-layers. And so far the first generation tortoise mother has been laying fertilized eggs, just moments after the previous eggs hatch. So yeah, this gonna be booming once the second-gen tortoises become adults.
Stuffing up all the excess hatchlings in one cage space. It takes a year for one to become an adult, but five years to reach full size. I'm not really in danger of low food supply, so I might just wait for them to fatten up a bit. Like seriously the year ain't over and two herds of rhinoceros have been caught. Giant vermin such as lice, ticks, snails, and slugs also boost up the supplies, and they're pretty much set to be immediately butchered as their lifespan is only one year. Farms are all up and running to provide crops for brewing, cooking, flour-making, and cloth production.
All is well for basic everyday supplies. Ore on the other hand, is really below average. Making do with what I have; basically small amounts of copper and iron, and by extension a tiny amount of steel. Getting my metals via trade; metal bars and low-quality metal items to be melted down to more bars.
Still a ton of marble several levels down. Like I hollowed out one whole level and about 80 percent of the stone is marble. Due to that, pretty much all furniture and architecture is a nice, white marble. Old forts usually have a variety of stone but current one is a nice, uniform color.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 13, 2015 9:47:49 GMT -5
Interesting. One of the giant birds in the area is the giant wren. Compared to the giant birds in the previous fort, the giant kea, sparrow, and horned owl, their lifespan is smaller but they have a slightly better egg laying amount; twice the other birds and equal to the giant tortoise. I'll keep the male I caught and hope to catch a female to set up a breeding program as well.
Plus, unlike the three giant bird species I encountered previously, they're fairly docile and don't interfere with aboveground workers.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 13, 2015 10:02:53 GMT -5
Well, complete and utter chaos just happened. As I was building a reservoir for a well (which seems to always happen), that dwarves hollowing out the two-level reservoir caused a cave in and that caused a hole several z-levels deep. Which is one heck of a problem as it was below the living hub; destroying a kitchen, tanner's workshop, underground farm, the cage which held 7 excess tortoises for future butchering, as well as destroying three different stockpiles - it basically just deactivates the stockpiles, scattering things all over the ground.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 13, 2015 13:09:29 GMT -5
Tortoises are now adults, and they've immediately laid eggs. First gen tortoises are off to the butcher.
Looking at things, if I seal off the aboveground farm, and connect it to an underground tunnel, I can probably produce more than enough food and booze to cut off the fort from the rest of the world. Like tortoises will provide meat and eggs. Farms provide thread that can be made into cloth, crops that can be cooked, brewed, and turned into flour - and there's enough different crops to avoid dwarves complaining of repetition. The dwarves will be sealed off, and the only way for them to die is from old age. The tortoises would even outlast all of them. Of course, doing something like that would be silly.
Also, got a ton of low value gems. Like even stone crafts would sell more than the finished products of those gems. Got some mid value rough gems in moderate supply, to be kept in storage for strange moods. Caravan does offer some high value cut gems, so I'll get those once again for strange moods. As for the low value ones... I reckon I should cut them anyway then encrust them on furniture. Bling beds for all. Also wondering if blocks could be encrusted so that I can make a well full of bling.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 13, 2015 21:15:16 GMT -5
Oddly enough, aside from the usual werebeast encounters this fort has been relatively peaceful. Like the moment I started embarking on savage biomes there's barely any invading army, while on previous playthroughs on normal biomes there was a goblin siege about twice a year.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 14, 2015 11:05:02 GMT -5
Finished replacing the old bedrooms with masterpiece quality beds and marble cabinets, all encrusted with mid-value gems. Now everyone's happy with their grand bedrooms, with one lucky animal trainer receiving a royal quality one because I accidentally encrusted one cabinet with one of the high-value gems I got off a caravan.
'course, in the future I probably can't do this once the economy system is fixed and reimplemented. For now, I'll let my dwarves bask in glorious living conditions.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 14, 2015 21:35:48 GMT -5
Today in DF cruelty, I am making a tower for dropping off invaders. See, dwarves are against the butchering of living sentient beings, and pets. But butchering, aside from meat, provides bones which can be used for crafting and sometimes artifact creation. So they can't be butchered, but there are ways to get all them bones. One is via getting the target's arms cut off in battle and letting the part rot, though there's only a tiny chance of that. from happening. The other is falling from the great height with such impact... so I built a small tower, and on the 8th floor I designated an empty space to be turned into a pit.
Assign creature to pit, and a dwarf leads a creature them and drops them off. Tried testing it on a rhino I caught, 8 floor drop, but all it did was bruise it and chip a horn. So hmm, well, perhaps it's due to the ground being soft soil. A slight waste, but I'll floor the landing zone with platinum. If that doesn't work, I'll set a weapon trap with serrated steel discs to make the drop into a meat blender and see if that works.
Because dammit, I want my artifacts when a dwarf demands bone be made of giant, or even werebeast bone - not donkey, sheep, or dog bone.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 15, 2015 0:13:59 GMT -5
*sigh* Now I want to replace the beds. Certain underground trees have a different color from the pretty much brown aboveground trees. I haven't hit cavern layer yet, but the dwarf caravan has some logs of underground trees, so I'm tempted to trade them and redo the encrusting of beds.
Aside from that, execution tower has been finished. 16 floors high, as that's the highest aboveground point I can go - unless I adjust the layout of the underground fort a bit so that the fall will be several times higher. 16 level drop to a floor made out of steel bars, instant death so far from the yaks I tested them on. Still, removal of limbs required the assistance of the weapon trap, so aside from a lethal drop it also scatters body parts and blood into the surrounding area.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 15, 2015 7:10:12 GMT -5
Caught some monitor lizard people. As animal people can't be butchered, they're the first humanoids to be test run in the execution tower. On the left-side fall where there's only steel bars, the fall gave some severe injuries, but not death and severed body parts. The next test subject the fall was on the center, where aside from the steel bar floor there's a weapon trapped loaded with the maximum ten large serrated steel discs. Fall was more or less the same impact, but it followed up with the blades which chopped up body parts. Hopefully the cuts are enough to give usable bones to work with once all the organic mess rots away.
As the drops aren't entirely fatal, I shall try setting up another weapon trap that utilizes giant steel axe blades. And just as I finished the tests, a herd of mongoose people blundered into more cage traps. Hooray for guinea pigs.
Also, this is horrifying my dwarves. The landing zone is only a few tiles from the wood furnace, carpenter's workshop, and several farm plots.
|
|
|
Post by aka Cthulhu on Oct 15, 2015 12:42:48 GMT -5
Haven't caught a female giant wren yet. Their flocks seem content enough to hang around in the skies, so they're far away from the grasp of my cage traps.
On the other hand, giant tortoise meat production is fine. As a second breeding species I'm trying out giant lice. They bring a fair amount of meat and fat, but they require a lot more management. As they only have a lifespan of one year, I gotta butcher the old ones immediately after they give birth, unless the new generation doesn't produce a female, and if that happens I'll have to hope that the females of the previous generation churn out some children before they kick the bucket.
|
|