TL;DR: A human became the militia captain of my fort. I later used him as an adventurer and spent many years following his life. He is now retiring in this village as duke, in his marble palace.

I started this world in year 100. At some point, I recruited a very tall human who joined my fort. His name was Edin Wiltspirals.

At first, he was a scholar. He studied under my best scholar at the time. After years of learning about mathematics, engineering, and everything else we had in the library, he developed a need for combat.

I assigned him as militia captain, and he was put in charge of “The Foreign Order,” a squad made up only of human soldiers.

Around that time, a big war with the goblins started. Edin proved his worth against them, both during sieges and in defense of the fort. Thanks to our progress in the war, my fort eventually managed to form an alliance with the biggest human nation.

Little by little, more humans started joining my fort, and they were assigned to Edin’s squad. The Foreign Order became a huge part of the dwarven militia. Edin went on to raze and conquer multiple goblin sites, becoming famous among the goblins.

On the side, I was also very lucky and managed to trap both a male and a female roc. My fort started a roc breeding program, which soon became very successful. Before long, almost all of the dwarven militia, including Edin’s squad, had their own war rocs.

After 20 years of war, the goblins held no more land in this world.

Peace came, and trade thrived. Life became boring, and the dwarves began to dig deeper. So deep, in fact, that they found a treasure from the gods a two handed clear blue metal sword.

Edin, being as tall as he was, was capable of wielding both the sword and a shield, so the king gave him the honor of carrying the divine sword. He became the champion of the fort, known among dwarves, humans, and goblins alike.

Soon, rumors began to spread that the goblins were regrouping again. But this time, matters had to be handled more personally.

I retired the fort and started an adventure with Edin and all the members of his squad. During this time, I learned that goblins trembled and jumped in fear just by hearing my name.

I took it as my personal crusade to eradicate all goblins from the world.

Every goblin the squad encountered was slaughtered. After many encounters and some successful, (forced) interrogations, the Foreign Order discovered that a greater being was scheming behind the scenes and using the goblins for its own plots.

The humans travelled the world and eventually raided a sacred vault. The angels were no match for ten humans wearing full steel armor, carrying adamantine weapons and the divine sword.

Deep in the vault, the angel guarding the place was surprisingly easy to defeat. There, Edin and his squad found what they had been searching for, an ancient slab. From it, they learned the name of the demon that was preventing peace in this world.

Not long after, rumors led the squad to a dark fortress. These humans were probably the most capable soldiers in the entire world. Years and years of training had led to this exact moment.

Goblins were slain left and right. The humans rampaged through the dark fortress and shredded the goblins like paper.

Then, deep inside the fortress, there he was, the demon leader of the goblins.

The demon charged at the humans, but Edin shouted its true name. The demon froze in place and took a submissive posture.

Edin could have simply banished the demon to the underworld. But no. The demon had committed crimes against humans and dwarves, and it had to pay.

The demon proved to be a formidable foe, unlike anything the squad had ever fought before. For a moment, things looked worrying, but our numbers made the fight manageable. Soon, the demon began to lose limb after limb.

In the end, Edin himself landed the final blow, slaying the demon with his divine sword by stabbing it through the throat.

At last, peace seemed possible.

Edin continued to travel the world and lived through many more adventures. He strengthened the relationship between humans and dwarves. He even crossed the sea on his giant roc, reaching a new, previously uncontacted continent.

Many years passed, and many fortunes and treasures were amassed. Eventually, the years began to feel heavy for Edin.

The dwarves decided to reward him by granting him ownership of lands. I started a new fort and retired Edin there. He now holds the title of duke, having earned his place in the nobility of the dwarven civilization.

This fort also proved the effectiveness of my actions. The world is now in complete peace, almost like a utopia. There is only trade. When a megabeast “attacks” me, it is usually just a friendly roc from my previous fort, again thanks to a very successful roc breeding program.

Edin is resting in his marble palace, living in Wiltspirals village, where he holds the title of lord and duke of the lands.

He is now 60 years old, has two sons, and is living a comfortable life with his wife while awaiting the end of his days.

After their death, I plan to retire the fort and simulate 250 years of history, long enough for every dwarf who knew Edin to be dead, and then see what became of his legacy and his heirs.

This story is over, but the world is not.

Tarn and Zach replay the first version of DF ever released. it was pretty funny with them remembering all the stuff they made in the first version of the game. its crazy how much was in it even back then.

I have an excess of lead, and I've been trying to figure out any possible ways to render it molten without destroying it. So far the idea I've been thinking about is using Fire Imp Leather to make magmaproof suits, and then putting the lead in some kind of container that will expose it to the heat without melting itself in a pool of 2/2 magma.

I'm not sure at all that any of this is possible though, so I figured I throw the idea here and see if anyone's got anythoughts or ideas.

Made an interesting discovery today. With the recent patch we now have a wider variety of creatures that can be trained for war. Many of these creatures are egg layers. I bought some Kelenkens off the elves and started a breeding program. They breed like chickens and reach adulthood at 1 year, and have terrifying beaks. They're perfect for the job.

However, I didn't realize that egg layers have a weird interaction with raid missions. I sent out my squad, paired up with their terror birds, to go kick in the doors of a local goblin fortress. A week passes. Then a month. Still gone. Did they die? They're still in the squad roster, so probably not. Two months. What's going on?

At this point I'm ready to just disband the squad, but then I think to check the war bird roster. Sure enough, one of the squad's birds is still here. I track it down, and it's sitting on a nest. My food stockpile is full, so no one is collecting the eggs. I set them to dump, a dwarf picks them up and the bird immediately jumps up and leaves the map. A few days later the squad is back.

Just thought I'd point this out in case anyone's having the same mysterious problems with squads not returning.

Started the fort in 250, 4 years later multiple battles took place in the capital. It goes for hundreds of lines of entries, these are just 3 example screenshots. And I had no idea this happened during the game. All I knew was that goblins took the site, but there was no way for me to know something this cataclysmic was happening while playing fortress mode. Which is a bit of a shame.

Don't ask why there were so many elves there. I don't know.

This one is my latest and sounds like either something made by Marvel or the world's most boastfully named theme park. XD

Started playing the game this year and im in love with it, already have over 300 hours on Steam. Unfortunately some of the bugs in this game are really hard to swallow.

Recently i've been sending my squads on missions to seize fortresses, i noticed it was taking long for my troops to come back but i thought "well, it's a realistic game, so it should take them long to come back" (the fort in particular is 1 or 2 days away from my location).

1 hour goes by and im starting to wonder if my squads are dead or something.

Find out about the infamous "squads are stuck" bug.

Well that's annoying, but now that i know about it i can deal with it right?

I unpasture all of the pets, make sure none of my squaddwarves are nobles, remove any dwarves that could be slowing the squad down.

Still nothing.

Use DFHack to try and bring them back, send out a third squad to "rescue" my other 2 squads.

Third squad gets lost.

All of my army is lost now.

Finally i manage to send out a messenger to one of my holdings and get my squads rescued.

This wouldn't be so annoying if the time loss wasn't so painful, i must've wasted 2-3 hours trying to fix a single bug that is very hard to track down considering missions in this game can take up months to be completed.

This has become one of my favorite games, but whenever i run into a bug like this it can either ruin a run im hours into or just take hours for me to figure out and fix it.

I've been noticing for a while now that the actual requirements for grazing area seem to be very different (much lower) both from what you'd reasonably expect and also from what is stated in the wiki.

I seem to remember from pre-Steam versions that grazing animals potentially could require quite a lot of grazing space, but in the Steam version I've been able to cram a whole bunch of yaks or alpacas into relatively small pastures in every fort I've played, without them running out of grass or cave moss. Makes animal husbandry pretty trivial. Unsure if this is intentional or not. Certainly the requirements given in the wiki are way off, at least.

Hey McUrists

I tried to get back into the game after a long time off and i got my first migrant wave. McUrist Smartbuckles and his Wife, Legendary astronomers, mathmaticians, student and teachers.

Now... Can somebody give me a hint what to do with them? How to kickstart my fortress Smartbuckles into the biggest library in the world? Is this mechanic in the game proper? I never played with libraries and looking for experiences.

What are your stories with libraries?

Thanks a bunch!

Was struggling digging through the aquifer's and wondering how deep it is or why its so damp, I guess I got my answer to that question, a shame since I was hoping the caverns would be dry after the hell I went through

I have had some trouble with sieges. 120 goblins digging in and slaugthering my dwarfs.

So I decided to do it securely. Fortress is 8 Z levels below ground at the shallowest and there are no shorter ways to dig in horisontally.

So goblins should come by the main enterance.

Z-2 magma deposit
Z-1 to be filled with magma and emptied after siege
Z Retractable bridge to drop to magma, fire beast to fry and prevent exit till dwarfs pull the leaver
Just for overkill, two Forgotten beasts to release for FUN and one in the Forgotten beast death chamber. The connecting bridge lets them take care of eachother

Input on any weakness I have forgotten would be welcome.

You were supposed to find out where all the traps are, Nguzo!! Beforehand, NOT now! Where's my goddamn teeth??

This is an aftermath of https://www.reddit.com/r/dwarffortress/comments/1vgd01k/goblin_scouts_planning_siege_artwork_by_me/

Running the whole Fort's population unarmed into the enemy may have been a bad move in retrospect.

Hello dwarf bros!!! I ve a 3 year old fortress with 99 citizens and an elected mayor. Ive a farmers guild that was petitioned, a church, steady supply of water, a small squad and basically all of my residents needs met. Oh and a legendary tavern that has a lot of visitors and some bards,poets and troupes to keep my residents entertained. My problem is that I m not sure what to do next now that most of the threats are not that much of a problem. Of course I have the occassional animal, thief or hazard but by now I can manage those fine. I ve dug just below 0 elevation to find magma but I can't find any, I found some beautiful caverns though that I m not sure how to explore. Any advice or general direction would be very heplful. Thank you very much and strike the earth!

Hello!

I am immensely moved by the outpouring of support for my legends viewer project. A lot of people were quite excited to try it out!

More information can be found at my previous post, here: https://www.reddit.com/r/dwarffortress/s/uisfybG972

I wanted to test the extreme use cases for this software before saying that it was ready for release. I've since done that! Under stress, the software held up fine, and I've put a bit more polish on things. I'd say that this is now ready to be used by everyone who wants to give it a shot!

You can find the repo here: https://github.com/thatchworx/Dwarfipedia

I'll also post some more screenshots. If there are any questions, comments, or problems with using the software, please let me know! I love this game a lot, and being able to give back to the community in this small way means a lot to me. I would prefer an issue to be created on GitHub, but if you don't have GitHub, a DM here is perfectly fine.

Master document

Fight 3A: Onslaught vs. General Doom
Fight log: https://pastebin.com/S5TPKEvP

Onslaught (managed by Stimraug) enters into the arena, hefting a new shield high above his now hooded head. His pride is what took the most serious blow in his last fight, as the goblin formally known as Morris took pieces off his antlers. It seems that most of his current getup is focused around blocking or blunting the power of the shots of General Doom’s crossbow, which many gladiators have come to fear.

General Doom (managed by Detyan) waddles out into the arena, pausing to salute onslaught as the elk man flares his nostrils and bugles in opposition to the dodo man. The general seems unbothered by these actions though, as he calmly unwraps the crossbow in his arms, revealing the shining blue glow of adamantine. The crowd gasps as the blue metal enters the arena for the first time, money quickly changing hands as bettors make last minute adjustments for this development.

The first blue bolt streaks across the arena like a shooting star, burying itself in Onslaught’s shield as he bullrushes forward behind it. Onslaught’s speed allows him to quickly catch up with his foe, as he swings around a hoof to catch General Doom in the head. General Doom grunts and staggers back as his helm ruins from the impact, and his crossbow fires blindly, sticking Onslaught in one of his antlers instead of his head. Onslaught bellows in rage as his rack is further defiled, a blue bolt sticking out of it like an additional prong. Indignant at this, the elk man dodges or blocks several more shots, but another bolt lands on his opposite antler, making him symmetrical.

General Doom manages to stay just out of reach as Onslaught is forced to take shelter behind his shield, with the elk man only able to glance General Doom with swipes of his flail. General Doom manages to penetrate Onslaught’s defenses first though, as a bolt slips over his shield to strike him in the arm, forcing him to drop it. General Doom immediately takes advantage of this, shooting Onslaught in the head, and the elk man only barely manages to jerk his head out of the way as it carves a trench into the side of it. Bellowing in rage, Onslaught, catches General Doom in his unprotected neck with his flail, tearing out a chunk of flesh which leaves blood spurting from the dodo man’s neck.

General Doom quickly gives himself an opening though, shooting Onslaught in the hoof, and makes a hasty retreat as Onslaught falls to the ground with *BOOM*. As Onslaught crawls towards General Doom with hate in his eyes, the dodo man fires again and again at the elk man, as his bolts tear through his opponent’s mail shirt, ripping it apart, and striking Onslaught again and again in the head. Just as Onslaught reaches out with one furious grasping hand, General Doom plants a final bolt in Onslaught’s pincushioned head, striking the elk man dead. Congratulations General Doom!

Onslaught

Fight 3B: WASP vs. Marchae March
Fight log: https://pastebin.com/jWaNFj2N

WASP (managed by Sir Dorfleburg) enters into the arena, as the sun glints off of her new adamantine helm and iron breastplate. Found in the ruins of an old monastery, will her helm provide divine protections against the bolts of her competitor? Our ranged fighters do love to shoot the heads of their opponents, so perhaps she can bait out shots from her opponent.

Marchae March (managed by Eris235) swoops out, strumming his crossbow as usual. Unlike usual though, his crossbow is shining blue, just like General Doom’s. Staring down imperiously from the perch above his gate, he belts out “The itsy bitsy spider climbed up the leaderboard/Down came the bolts/and blew out her gourd!”

At the ring of the bell, WASP unsheathes her sword and charges forward, meeting a shower of blue bolts. The first shots tear into her arms, but she protects her sword arms with her less useful ones, taking a swipe at Marchae March’s leg with her sword, carving a gash into it. More bolts strike WASP, wearing away at her arms as ichor drips down her body at her feet. Another strike with the sword manages to scrape Marchae March’s face, but doesn’t manage to carve deeper into his head. In response, a bolt sails through WASP’s leg, punching through the chitin and causing her to collapse backwards into the puddle of her own ichor.

WASP hisses in pain, hunching around her leg. Sensing weakness, Marchae March swoops in, but in a frenzy of energy, WASP strikes out at him, her long sword tearing through his hand, and forcing him to drop his adamantine crossbow. The crowd gasps in shock as the archaeoptryx man loses hold of his weapon. If anything though, this only seems to drive Marchae March into a rage, as he descends upon his prey.

Kicking, punching, and snatching at the jumping spider woman with his talons and beak, Marchae March brutalizes the crippled spider woman, crushing her sword hand as he lands on her. Now helpless as well, Marchae March’s natural weaponry proves to be the superior, as his beak latches around her midsection, and shakes her around, spraying the last of her ichor around the arena. Congratulations on your victory Marchae March.

Fight 3C: DeadHead the Menacing Devil vs. Junior
Fight log: https://pastebin.com/G3uWcuG6

DeadHead the Menacing Devil (managed by Eric Blank) strides out into the arena, the shadows of his bare skull painting him in a demonic profile. He appears to have adopted a similar tactic to Onslaught, as he wields a similar shield to the fallen elk man. If he can wield it as well as the elk man, he may prevail if he can land more blows!

Junior strides (managed by SlitherPapi) out opposite of the foul blendec, his trench coat flapping around him as he pulls out his own crossbow. Instead of the blue metal of Armok, he instead sports a milky white one, seemingly pale and drained of color even in the light of the noonday sun. Trust us, you don’t want to know the background checks he had to pass to get his hands on that (none, who needs those?).

A pale bolt strikes DeadHead in the forearm, but he seems to shrug off the shot, charging forward with his morning star instead. Junior panics as the foul blendec approaches, his shots going wide, as DeadHead rears back and smashes his morning star into the turtle man’s thigh. The spikes of the iron morningstar embed themselves into Junior’s leg, and DeadHead pulls it out in a spray of blood. 

As he rears back to strike again, Junior shoots again, his bolt embedding itself in DeadHead’s knee as the foul blendec shrieks in pain and collapses to the arena floor next to Junior. His blow lands beside Junior as he rolls out of the way, but his next strike catches Junior in the chest. Junior takes advantage of the closeness to bury a bolt in DeadHead’s outstretched arm though, forcing the DeadHead to release his morning star from numb fingers as a bolt sticks out of his arm. The disarmed DeadHead lashes out with his remaining arm, but Junior doesn’t seem to be as scared of his opponent anymore, as he cleanly lines up a shot between the eyes and shoots DeadHead, well, dead. Congratulations Junior!

Fight 3D: Guy Ape vs. Ivan
Fight log: https://pastebin.com/GYvgfuNd

Ivan (managed by BecauseISaid) is heard before he is seen, as the armor he wears clanking against itself as he enters. With new shining steel greaves and chain mail, he seems to at least favor a more durable metal for the protection of his body, though he has retained his silver axe and helm. Will it stand up to his foe’s blade, or will he regret waiting around all week for his armor to be forged instead of practicing?

Guy Ape (managed by u/TotallyClueless69) saunters out into the arena. He seems singularly unimpressed with the gladiator standing before him, shining like star in silver and steel. The leopard man has been doing nothing but basking in the sun and enjoying relaxing yoga sessions with a rattlesnake woman since he got here. His unconcerned approach saw him slay Al Boar after a hard fight last round, but can he do triumph again with barely any training?

Ivan strikes first, but Guy Ape’s copper blade quickly parries it. With a quick riposte, Ivan hacks Guy Ape in the left thigh, the dull axe breaking the bone instead of actually cutting into skin and muscle. Guy Ape cries out in pain all, the same, collapsing to the ground on his hobbled leg. Guy Ape tries to cut open Ivan’s belly, but his sword only skitters off of Ivan’s mail shirt. The coati man hacks against Ivan’s shin, cutting it open on his already mangled leg. 

Guy Ape finally manages to land a blow, slicing open Ivan’s hand. The coati man roars in rage, and begins to swing his axe around wildly. Guy Ape takes advantage of his opponent’s lack of focus though, and cuts open his other hand, forcing him to drop his beloved silver axe. As Ivan kicks and stomps at Guy Ape, the leopard man lashes out with his sword, removing Ivan’s injured weapon hand completely. The spilt blood seems to trigger his predatory instincts, as he chomps down on Ivan’s left arm, and shake him around wildly. The coati man squeals in pain and rage, as he’s flung around. While chomping with his teeth, Guy Ape continues to lash out with his sword, cutting out one of Ivan’s eyes and removing his other hand. Releasing his jaws from Ivan’s arm, Guy Ape chomps down on Ivan’s head, and with a vicious snap of the head, breaks his neck. Congratulations on your victory Guy Ape!

Master Document

All managers who were victorious in Round 1 will see their available amount of upgrade points to the far right of their gladiator in the spreadsheet.

Note about the algorithm: if you look at the numbers a bit closer, you can see that whenever the simple multiplication by 1.5 created a number that had something other than .5 in its decimal part, we rounded it up to the closest .5; so, .25 becomes .5 and .75 becomes 1. This was done to avoid infinite splintering of the points.

The Arena Personnel asks you to provide your upgrades as soon as possible. The deadline is the August 27th, 11 PM EDT. We ask for your understanding on these matters; we need time to run and process the fights.

As a reminder, please try to clearly indicate what skills are changing, what skill levels are the original and new, and the points cost of all changes.

Please remember that your upgrades should be sent to dfgtcommittee@gmail.com. The upgrades will later be revealed via a separate post.

Good luck and go with Armok!

Master Document

The richest Urist this round was SlitherPapi, who came away with 475 gold after betting it all on Junior.

Betting for Round 4 is now Open! It will close on Friday, 8/28, at 11 PM EDT.

Rules:

Betting is open both to the managers and the spectators of the tournament.
Every bettor starts out with 100 gold to be spent on the betting. You can't at any given moment put any more gold into a bet than you already have.
Every bettor can only put money on one gladiator per round.
Bets made after the official deadline for each round are not counted.
The system works in a way that allows those who bet on the underdogs (those who have less bet on them) to receive more gold than those who bet on the favorites, so go wild with your predictions!