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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 16, 2016 3:17:27 GMT -5
I dunno. I suppose I'll abandon fort by the end of the current in-game year if no interesting animals on the surface show up.
Actually, yeah. Abandoning fort. Time for a new fort, and perhaps the next one will be more interesting. Some of the rust in setting up a fort is going away, but I won't be moving to the next version just yet. Maybe two, maybe three more forts that I'll consider boring or end in a blaze of insanity before stepping up to bar brawls and giant elephants.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 16, 2016 4:10:52 GMT -5
New embark. No aquifer, savage area, tropical swamp... or was it marsh... and tropical shrubland. More or less a flat area above ground. Deep soil. Shallow metal, and flux stone. Doubtful, but somewhat hoping that the shallow metal is an iron ore, and the flux stone is close to surface.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 16, 2016 9:02:08 GMT -5
So, first autumn of the fort, time to take some stock.
Five levels of proabably nothing but soil. Northeast corner of the map is a one level hill, so there's some stone.
Six levels below ground level seems to be all limestone. Flux stone, yeah! ...no sign of the shallow metal yet, though. Had done some teeny excavating of floors seven to ten, and from the looks of things it's still all limestone and clusters of gems. Somewhat expected things, but in general my aim for this fort is a lowered focus on smelting metals. For most part, I'll forge the weapons and armors required by melting down whatever can be acquired via caravan trade.
Like last time, set up the militia commander with a patchwork of armor from the dwarven caravan. Weapon-wise, just for fun he's using a large dagger taken from a filthy kobold thief who died due to alligators. Another thief died from my commander who was the woodcutter at the time of the killing.
Did I say alligators? Cause I got alligators. Yeah-uh! Had quickly set up an animal trap line near the river, and it's bringing forth a decent bounty of animals.
Two alligators, two giant otters, and two giraffes. A pair for each species, and a breeding pair at that! With regards to the giraffe, using some editing on the files I removed the need for them to graze so that they won't starve to death.
A bit cheaty, but when you consider non-grazers don't need to eat or be stuck in a pasture so that they'll survive, the grazer quality in animals doesn't really do anything. Like really, it would be nice if both grazers and non-grazers can be fed by animal trainers instead of what they currently are now.
Anyway, not even a year and I'd say it's pretty fortunate to get some exotic animals that can be bred.
A honey badger sometimes wanders into the map, but being honey badgers they try to attack my dwarves - almost always the already armed militia commander. A lone badger can only do so much, in the end.
edit: scratch that. Seems like grazers can't be edited away. Oh well, giraffe meat meals, here we come... Shame, since apparently giraffes can be trained for war. The image of a bloodthirsty giraffe is highly amusing.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 16, 2016 13:41:59 GMT -5
Shallow metal my ass. Found the metal somewhere around the 15th to 19th floor below the surface. Tetrahedrite, so copper and a chance for silver when smelted. So much for the abundance of flux stone; like seriously several levels seem to be nothing but limestone.
On the bright side, this provides a very uniform look to the fort. Limestone blocks on nearly everything, with the exception of the beds. Deconstructed several workshops and rebuilt them with limestone blocks.
Anyways, not in a real hurry with smelting the tetrahedrite. Going with the plan to get pretty much all the metal the fort will need to forge weapons via trade. It'll be slow going, but it seems possible to me. Heck, if I can do this, I can be less choosy in choosing a location for future forts.
Of course, there's still a matter of trade. For most part, a lot of the metal the fort will end up using will be from weapons and armor acquired through the human and dwarf caravan (obviously, the tree huggers are out since they don't have any metal on them). To acquire those trade goods, I need to trade with a lack of metal products, and the ones that do get traded are non-weapons grade metals reforged to other pricier goods.
On previous forts, I was able to buy out a lot of caravan content via iron trap components. Of course, doing so now can't really happen. First things first, the limestone. Got three stonecraftsdwarves making craft items and musical instruments. They've done enough to produce some high quality goods, but in the end the price I get off them won't be enough to get supplies from the elf, human, and dwarf caravans. A few drops in the bucket.
Tried trading booze. Surprisingly, they don't fetch a large price. At all. I feel that if one wants to aim solely for an alcohol industry for trade for the entire year, they'd need a large population composed of half farmers and half brewers. 'course you'll also need a sizable population to make containers for the booze as well.
Food is good. A single cook can make easy meals quickly, and with all the easy meals piling up experience is gained very fast. High quality food, even with easy meals, fetch a great price. Hell, I remember some lavish meals where one meal can buy out a large chunk of a big caravan. In the end, this'll probably be the backbone, though it'll take a lot of work. Plants via farming, and unlike making it into booze the plants used for cooking won't leave seeds. Meat, of course, has its place, but it can be a long term investment with breeding. Lots of animals to breed, and each of them has to wait a bit since butchering them after just hatching won't net a lot of meat. Eggs are good, but once again you need a lot of egg laying animals since one female would only lay a set every three months or so. Some animals can be milked, but dwarves aren't too keen on using liquids for cooking most of the time, and turning the milk into cheese is another step to take up some time. For milking, sows are good since they're not grazers. Get a lot of sows, cage them up, and milk them and turn them into cheese.
Clothing is also very profitable. Plant cloth is the easiest to make since it's easier to keep a big supply of plants that can be produced into threads. Silk can be time consuming, and dangerous if you're going for giant cave spider silk - though that's the most expensive cloth... not counting candy, obviously. Yarn can be acquired by shearing, but with my aversion to grazing animals I usually don't focus much on them. You can get yarn from the hairs of several animals, but only three types of animals have hair than can be used to make yarn cloth.
Aside from that, one can also dye cloth. A skilled dyer and weaver can really boost the price of the cloth up, and even more so when you take into account the skill of the clothier making the clothing. Dye can be found in some plants, so they have to be processed via milling. Milling can be done in a quern, which is slow. If you want speed, a millstone is the way to go, but you'll need a know-how of machinery and waterwheels for that.
Leather is another one for clothesmaking. More or less a byproduct of butchering several types of animals. They don't cost as much as cloth, but they can still fetch a decent price. Of course, all clothing can also be worn by the members of the fort, so there's that.
Of course, in the end, cloth, leather, silk, yarn and threads are a common item in human and dwarf caravans. Once you get the ball rolling, you can get thread and cloth from them and get the clothier and leatherworker make money for the fort.
All in all, it's really not that hard to get a fort running without having to dig out metal ore... just as long as the fort isn't in danger. Gotta wait until the metalsmith gets enough skill and supply to arm the militia, but until then, my small militia will be armed with whatever the caravans can supply them with.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 17, 2016 0:32:36 GMT -5
Yee-haw. Lucky for me and my fort, a hill titan attacked. Okay, that isn't exactly lucky, but the circumstances of the attack is incredibly so.
On one corner, is the hill titan Stror Ugokatan Tomsusmuga, or Stror Rainymoths the Submerged Hawk. He's a towering feathered bristleworm, with huge wings and shoots webs. On my corner is the lone militia commander Bim Avuzad/Minesun, wearing newly forged iron armor and armed with a large iron dagger taken from a kobold thief.
The deck is stacked against Bim, considering that Stror flies, which can make targeting him a real problem if the fight is in the surface, since he can just run to the skies to avoid melee, and he can also shoot webs. Webs immobilize dwarves, leaving them completely vulnerable to getting their heads torn off with no way to stop it.
Then the fortune comes. All the dorfs I got are more or less underground, and I station Bim down on the first blow below the surface. During this Stror is just wrecking the war dogs I got stationed in the surface. They've fought honey badgers, but they're no chance against a hill titan. Stror rampages in the surface for a while before trying to enter the fort.
I almost had a headache when I realized that some dwarves were hanging around where Bim was stationed. I forgot the corridor was designated as a meeting area, and I haven't set a burrow yet for them to stay in during attacks. Still, it all turns out to be a lucky break.
Stror shoots his webs at the civilian dwarves, and Bim manages to be away from the large area of web shot out. Bim moves in for the kill... and somehow all the unwebbed civilians help out in the melee, punching and kicking the titan while Bim stabs and cuts the titan until it's dead. Stror in his part is unable to fight the mass of dwarves. Since he's a corridor he can't just fly up and escape, and there are too many dwarves, with one stabbing and cutting until Stror's brain is hit. Bim has won.
Amazingly, aside from dead war dogs no one is unhurt. The butcher is ready to process the dead titan, and the fort can sleep safe at night knowing that they've faced their first trial in this land and won.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 17, 2016 0:46:28 GMT -5
End results. 159 units of hill titan meat, 26 units of hill titan brain, 13 units of heart, and 80 units of intestine. No fat, sadly.
In terms of value, no matter how famous or powerful titans and forgotten beasts are, their meat byproducts have no multiplier values. Like stuff like elephant meat can possibly cost more due to value multipliers. Megabeasts like dragons have the highest butchering multiplier. As for Stror, aside from the low value of meat, he's pretty average sized for a hill titan, so if a meal were made from his byproducts, the high costs will be due to the cook's skill and the amount of meat there is.
Still, it's a hill titan nonetheless, and for the fort it's a point of pride that the fort has turned him into a future meal. He's got some leather as well, but like the meat it has no value multiplier. Still, even if the value will be lowered if used instead of higher quality leather, it'll be cool if the leather is used as a component for an artifact.
edit: hm, as it turns out Stror did have some fat in him. Future soap for a cleaner fort!
Also sadly none of the webs seem to be intact after the fight. Webs can be turned into silk after all. Again, no value multiplier for titans, but silk cloth can sometimes be requested in strange moods.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 17, 2016 2:51:52 GMT -5
All the soil terrain in the fort is clay or loam. No sand, which sucks since the mayor is a skilled glassmaker. Due to a small supply of metal, all that charcoal could have been used in a glass furnace, and the guy can make all the giant axe blades made of glass he wants to demand. He likes giant axe blades and picks, which may be tricky due to the lack of metal, so I'll have to set aside some iron or copper bars I got from melting down iron and copper goods from caravans in case he wants those items.
Tempted to off the guy, but I already have him a lot of architect training.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 17, 2016 3:22:28 GMT -5
The second generation of Alligators, the tame ones, have grown up. It takes some more time before they reach full size, but as they are now, and after testing one, sending them to the butcher just after reaching adulthood provides more than enough meat products. So yeah, alligator meals for all. Sending away the females I didn't choose for egg laying as well as the extra males. The nest station isn't full yet, since I'll only choose the big females, since that'll probably lead to equally big offspring.
Also breeding some giant sparrows and giant otters.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 17, 2016 10:15:31 GMT -5
So, got some interesting animals off the tree huggers. Giant armadillo and pangolin - not that spectacular, but still I suppose it's okay. Giant kangaroo, though she's a grazer so she's immediately sent to the butcher. Got a giant king cobra as well. Female, so the fort will get its eggs. Hopefully the next time the tree huggers visit they'll bring a male.
I suppose it's a good thing that I didn't order the militia to kill the diplomat that visited.
As for the military, it's going well. Squad of four, mostly armored with iron, and slowly replacing bits of each armor with steel armor. Maybe two more visits from the dwarven caravan will get them fully armed with steel.
New mayor elected, and no the previous one is still alive. New one likes splints and short swords, which is okay.
As for the baron, lucked out on that one. Carefully monitored every new migrant, and one of the stoneworkers doesn't have any item that is desired, so no mandates from him.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 17, 2016 12:14:19 GMT -5
Also, with regards to trading, the needed industries have been set and even with the lack of metals to use for trading the fort thrives.
Basically, the human caravan that arrived during the summer. The total value of their goods is more or less 150k. The trade goods the fort gave in return for about half that caravan is worth 1.1 million. A large chunk of it is due to the cooking and clothing industry, with a smaller amount from rock crafts and a teeny amount due to alcohol. Lots of iron, copper, and bronze weapons acquired, and they'll be melted down so my weapon and armorsmith can produce better quality items. The blacksmith can also use the metal bars for furniture and other miscellaneous goods, and to train them I melt down inferior quality goods. Note that melting down things won't give all the metal back, so constant trade is required for constant training.
It'll still take a long while for my militia to be armed with master quality goods, especially since steel is only a product that the dwarf caravan has.
Also, I give away so much stuff, and yet I'll still have enough goods to rain upon the dwarf caravan. And, if they continue to be good and have interesting animals for trade, I'll shower the tree huggers with items as well. Though not as much, since the carrying capacity of their caravans isn't as big. One other reason I give away so much for so little is that it keeps the fort clutter free. Aside from the soil layers which is just stairways down, the entire fort is only about four floors big, and not all of them are mined out. Everyone has a job to do, and it'll be a while before the fort is lacking in its current stone and wood supply.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 17, 2016 13:01:18 GMT -5
With regards to the fort, here be a small text summary of it:
Surface: More or less just ramp downwards toward the entrance of the actual fort. Militia trains next to the entrance, to avoid thieves and goblins sneaking in. Also set up are several cage traps. Right now trying to release some of the caught wildlife, like giraffes, to prevent them from going extinct in the area. Somewhat hard since they end up blundering right back into another cage trap.
The area is mostly flat shrubland, though at the start there were a lot of trees. Took a while, but some of the trees are growing back.
One level below the surface is the entrance. Just a tunnel leading further down. Also stationed here are the wood industry buildings. A carpenter and several charcoal makers. No log stockpiles. They're easy to carry enough as it is, and the logs are close by up on the surface. Setting up a stockpile will just hurt the workforce with everyone carrying logs around. A stockpile of empty cages are kept here for easy cage trap reloading.
The next floor are just tunnels leading down.
After that is the residential area. No walls! No privacy! Aside from the baron and mayor, each dwarf gets a bed, a cabinet to store old clothes, and a statue for them to admire. Also located is the cafeteria and the hospital, and a cemetery. Nearly every piece of furniture in the area is made from limestone blocks. Mayor and baron's rooms are also located here. One of the furniture stockpiles are located here.
Down below is the first work area. A lot of it is centered around farming and food. Aboveground crops are also grown here, because at the start I designated an area not to be mined, then when the time came I made the miners channel down starting from the surface, and go down until they reached this area. Then I sealed the roof since after the soil hits sunlight it will forever be able to grow underground crops.
Aside from the farm, the still, kitchen, butcher and tanner are located in this floor. Several industries connected to farming, like milling, thread making, etc are also in this area, and stockpiles on things related to those industries. Caged animals are kept here, and some are in pastures where they can make babies and lay eggs. In the fullness of time some of them are butchered.
Lastly is when the fort hits rock. 95% limestone. Mason, craftsdwarf workshops, smelter and forge are located here. Jeweler and clothesmakers as well. Unlike logs, raw stones are heavy so having a stockpile for them close to the stoneworkers is ideal. The trade depot is also in here, making hauling trade goods back and forth from this floor and the one above it very easy.
So far, due to an abundance of stone the miners aren't digging any deeper and are busying themselves hauling nothing but stone. The medical team is also doing the same thing, though they have other hauling duties.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 18, 2016 1:14:29 GMT -5
Oh man.
First things first, a pair of giant lions had wandered in, so I easily caught them and will soon have giant lion cubs. Cubs will take three years to mature, but when they do they can be trained for war.
Now, due to me failing to forbid the eggs from being taken to the stockpile, I haven't gotten new alligator hatchlings since the first gen. Now that I have corrected the stockpile shenanigans, the 12 alligator females have laid eggs. A whopping 205 out of 250 are fertile - basically only two alligators laid duds.
Normally, each unique species can only have a maximum of 50 of their kind for each fort. Once there are 50 running around, females won't become pregnant or lay fertile eggs. On the other hand, fertile eggs don't count as running around yet, so all of them will hatch. After that, the females will then lay only unfertile eggs until the population is culled.
Ya know, I dread the initial explosion of alligators and how much work it'll take, but dammit I'll do it. From the looks of it, the eggs will hatch during the last month of winter, so at least I won't have to worry about migrants or caravans when I'll have the entire fort round up the hatchlings.
They're all third-generation, too, so they'll also be born tame.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 18, 2016 5:47:16 GMT -5
Took about two in game months to cram most of the 205 hatchlings into one cage. Carefully selected 25 females and one male based on their sized description. No weak, no skinny, no normal sized ones. Even the just gigantic ones weren't chosen, only the muscular or fat ones. Once all the hatchlings have become adults I'll slowly butcher away the ones not chosen until fertile eggs can be laid again.
Giant lions have given birth. The cubs will take three years to mature, and for most part I'll keep breeding them until I get an army of giant lions. Aside from that, the giant sparrow, giant aardvark, and giant otters breeding programs are for meat and fat. Also got some honey badgers, breeding them just because.
Also got a male giant cheetah and a female giant leopard. Need to hope the opposite sex of each one shows up, since like the giant lion those two can be trained for war.
Tried breeding a giant tick, but since they only live for a year, the female gave birth to males only so a continued breeding program was impossible.
Caught some giant slugs, but since they don't breed, they've become a meals for my fort. Gross.
Also, giant ticks can be dangerous. One crippled a hauler, and just recently the first wood burner died from another one.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 18, 2016 8:24:07 GMT -5
An ettin came blundering into the area, right into a cage trap.
Now I'm wondering if I should make him into the star of the animal fight club which I haven't set up properly yet. Like, I could probably waste 50 alligators to see who would win.
In fact, how many alligators should I drop down to make it an even match?
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 18, 2016 10:24:08 GMT -5
Trying to figure out the proper layout for a proper arena to the animal fight club.
Like, there's two problems with the pit method. One is that you can only send one creature at a time, and with the ettin a one on one fight will lean heavily on his favor. Two is despite the drop being one level down, it can be enough to give some minor injuries on the one being dropped, leading to the one on the pit taking advantage, making the fight not as exciting.
Rigging cages to open will work, but the problem will be caging the winner again.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 18, 2016 11:27:22 GMT -5
Beautiful. Fight arena has been set.
The main room is a 3x3 space. Limestone block walls and floor. No hole in the ceiling, alas. I liked the miasma spewing forth like a chimney of darkness. Anyway, a cage gets set up there, and the participants are stuffed in. The cage is linked to a lever far back in the fort itself. Lever pulled, participants are freed and the rumble happens.
The only way out of there is blocked by a raised bridge. When raised, it functions as a wall to prevent the participants from going out. When the bridge is down, it's basically just a small one-tile corridor leading to the next room.
Another 3x3 room, this one's lined with cage traps. So, when the fight is over, the bridge is lowered. Winner walks out... into a cage trap, sealing him or her again. Cage is set back up in the arena room, other participants are stuffed in, cage is linked to the lever once again, bridge is raised, and the fight continues.
Simply beautiful.
Furthermore, after dealing with some fairly boring creatures like pangolins, weasels, giant slugs and whatnot, new groups native to the area are being shuffled in. Giant dingos (more breeding), anacondas and their giant variants.
Didn't really like the butchering returns of the anaconda and giant anaconda according to the wiki (surprisingly low meat for both), but they were apparently fairly tough, so I pitted them against the ettin Suttu Osnosnungo Slokdesnun...
The anaconda got his head exploded by a kick, while the giant anaconda gets his head caved in. One win for Suttu.
If another pack of giant dingos show up, I'm sending all of them against him next time. Or if another pack of giraffes show up, I'll train them for war! Muhahaha. 'course, I might do 30-50 adult alligators in the future.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 18, 2016 12:40:02 GMT -5
Round two! Blood! Blood! BLOOD! Three trained for war, one giant lion and one giraffe. Will they be able to grab victory against the reigning champion? Alas, they gave it their all, but Suttu came out on top. He's a bit banged up with one of his two heads cut open but I daresay that he'll be fit to fight in a week or two. Next possible challenger, a pack of wild giant dingos who just wandered into the map. Perhaps this time the numbers game will prevail.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 18, 2016 13:46:12 GMT -5
Update: Suttu the ettin's reign has ended. For his third match I pitted him against 9 giant dingos... looking at the long report(41 pages... yeah, I ain't screencapping that), I guess the numbers game got to him, even if the dingos are untrained.
Basically, the dingo pack tore Suttu apart. Suttu fought a bit at first, but I suppose it's hard to fight back when 9 dingos which are almost as big as a bear are grabbing on to you by your teeth. About 35 of the 41 pages had Suttu unable to do anything while the dingos ripped him apart.
In the end, one dingo did the killing blow and got named for killing Suttu. Closed the game already, and can't remember his name, but the translation of it I remember: Wadwounds.
What's next for Wadwound and his pack? Maybe it's time for a fight with the alligators? Considering the size difference, should I do it 9 dingos versus 18 alligators? Wait... looking at it they're almost the same size. 9 vs 9 it is when I play again.
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 19, 2016 7:30:21 GMT -5
It's on like Donkey Kong! or somesuch.
Firstly, the giant dingo that killed Suttu the ettin has been named Stroxzakesmen, or Wadwounds. He and 8 other giant dingos will face off against 9 alligators. Looking at the wiki, the size of a giant dingo and an alligator is close to each other, so I reckoned that it'll be a relatively close fight.
In the end, it was more or less true. I didn't take into account that the giant dingos could be slightly bigger due to being older and closer to their full size compared to the alligators, giving the canines the edge to win the fight.
On the other hand, it wasn't a slaughter like Suttu. The gators fought back, and one dingo did die. The pack itself didn't get out of the fight unscathed, as nearly all of them is pretty badly wounded. Time will tell if they can recover, or if they will succumb to their wounds before the next fight. More war giraffes next time, perhaps.
After the fight, it wasn't only Strox who got given a name by the game. Four more dingos rose to fame;
Rungakiden, or Skunkpaddled (unfortunate name, I guess) Zansonngebar, or Massivelauded Ramulkatga, or Planeprowled and Mivociathathi, or Tapertop
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Post by aka Cthulhu on Jun 19, 2016 9:16:08 GMT -5
Using melting and trading to get metal bars has paid off. Got enough steel to spam orders to craft armor until I get masterwork quality to equip my militia.
Like I'd craft steel breastplates until I get enough for the militia, then I get the smelters to melt down the non-masterwork quality armor and start with mail shirts. Melting doesn't recover all the steel used, but there's no worry since the dwarven trade caravans has more than enough steel products now to the point where my weaponsmith hasn't canceled orders yet due to a lack of steel.
Basically every metal bar the fort has is either melted down from trade goods, or the metal bars are trade goods themselves. The majority of the metal bars are weapons or armor grade metals though, so luxury metals such as gold are less abundant in trade.
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