"You have been struck down." - Dwarf Fortress Adventure stories

[mostly_harmless]

One thing though ... how does the world generate its history before you create your first character/fortress?

Not quite sure I understand the question. It generates the world, continents, elevations, metals, rivers, vegetation, etc. Then starts to populate the world from year 1 onwards with civilisations and mythical beasts and historical figures. Those can interact with each other as the history is generated. Civilisations spread (hamlets and cities are founded in different years) and get to war with each other. You can set what year you want to start in or just interrupt the world generation process at any time. The whole world and history generation of a huge world on a slow PC can take several minutes.

Young worlds (year 5) tend to have more mythical creatures still alive and less civilisation spread. This leads to a limited number of save hamlets to spend the night in and lots of undisturbed wilderness with dragons, ogres and stuff.
Old worlds (year 1050) mostly have their mythical creatures killed already and the recent history is more governed by civ-civ relations. It can happen, that a particular lucky goblin civ has wiped out all human civs on the map. If you start as an adventurer on that world, you will see a lot of empty hamlets.
All the generated history is stored and can be revealed bit by bit by the player as he speaks to people and looks at engravings and pieces of art.

mh

[mostly_harmless]

I have re-activated Harmless "Girlishbridge" the explorer in the hamlet of Sweetnessfingers.
He grabs his belongings (bag with souvenirs) and cannot persuade any of the civilians at Sweetnessfingers to join him.

So, all by himself the plan is to attempt again a trip to the central fort and have a few fort guards join the party.

The lord is not very welcoming and also quite poor. No treasures lying around.
I relieve him of three of his guard (two swords and a mace) and continue onwards. Due south.

Some more hamlets and then the fortress Candlestilled, just east of Freesquashes. The lord there is rich again, judging by the stuff that he has lying around. Also his maternal grandmother inspuz married Mistrum Sparklehips in y51. Did one of the Harmless adventurers not met someone called Sparklehips before? Not sure.
(Ha! Would be interesting to put all those family information into on of those genealogy softwares to see how they link together. )

I spend the night with the good people of Soarfinds, the kingdoms southernmost hamlet.

[mostly_harmless]

The next morning we visit the southern fortress of Zealthrone inhabited by a lady with various children and no treasure.
Noticing, how I run out of rations, I decide to shop at Freesquashes. (I carry the money from my drowned companion).

I part with 50coins for 5 portions of prepared rhino liver at the local goblin trader in Freesquashes. He also has a "hungry head" quest for me, but I have still so much to explore. Onwards!

I visit some more hamlets and then spend the night in Gleamedprairie.

The plan is to start early and head west. I will follow the main road as I need to cross a few rivers and bridges should be the safer option for my companions.

[mostly_harmless]

Crossing one of the bridge, my party marvels at the deep canyon the river comes from:


Travelling further along the main road towards the western part of the kingdom, I get yanked out of the fast travel screen by this:

*Gulp*

[mostly_harmless]

And that could be the reason why I felt uneasy:


Hah! Easy.


The skull as a souvenir and the heart for eating later.

Onwards.... Visiting the remaining hamlets in the west ...
and that's it. As the night comes I rest in Oliveshoveled.
All settlements on the map have been properly identified.
Here the travels of Harmless Girlishbridge up to now:

Now, what to do?
Switch to questing? Or travel to foreign parts?

mh

[mostly_harmless]

I have decided to quickly help the villagers and accepted a quest to kill a local outlaw, Xem Relievedcovered.
I find his nearby camp without problems and face the first outlaw.

Now, we will make this super-careful. Companions to the front, please!

As we charge forward, Xem comes into view. She is a Bow-Outlaw, so beware flying arrows!


Well done! The first outlaw is dead. Two more have shown up though.


4 vs. 2. My swordsman has a bit of a problem there. But the two outlaws even more!

Ony Xem visible now. Lets quickly cover that ground!

Well, she gets two more shot in, doing some damage, before I strike her down. Deadly whip!


Any more outlaws around? Lets make a quick sweep of the area.

Nope. While I loot the coins and useful equipment off those dead outlaws, my swordsman dies of his wounds. I grab his coins well. Equipment-wise I have a hard time compromising between speed and protection. I also grab Xem's bow and arrows and fire them all, improving my archer skills. I also throw away my old clothes, improving my throwing skills. You never know.

Lets report the death of Xem and replenish the ranks.
mh

[mostly_harmless]

Grabbing two keep guards from Echoentrances. Talking to a lot of people, including the local lord and Obler Creamshoveled, the "holy clam". Can't snigger at that openly as he is also a scary Spearman!

Anyway, there is apparently a goblin vampire by the name of Ago Floodedevil in the town. Lets seek him out next.
On my way I buy two gems, as they relieve me of some of the gazillion of coins I drag around with me.

Asking my way to the general import store, I finally find the creature and let my party file into the room.
And here we go:


That was rather quick:

Lets grab some of his stuff as a souvenir and to sell it to the merchant right next door.

After this the plan is to grab another companion due to my increased fame and take on the next quest?

Unless people here want me to do something else. Like visiting the volcano.

mh

[NobleHelium]

I also throw away my old clothes, improving my throwing skills. You never know.

I think the combat is the best part of this game so I definitely want to see more of that. Also, it looked like your Swordsman was going to be paralyzed from the lower body down, so I doubt he would have been much use to you alive anyway. You can't dismiss companions, can you?

[mostly_harmless]

No, you cannot dismiss companions. And yes, that swordsman had serious problems. He actually suffocated because of his paralysis/wounds.

mh

[sunrise089]

Is there any consequences to taking companions (I know there isn't to taking treasure)? Does time in Adventure mode basically stand still, so the guards and soldiers you're taking away aren't needed anyways? If you retire and let time run will taking away all of the troops make anything bad happen to the kingdom?

Remind me how you knew what hamlets to go name. Does the map come pre-filled in? So are there no more hamlets to the south or west, just wilderness?

I find the combat mechanics often hilarious, especially throwing. The Wiki had a log to the effect of

You throw water.
The elephant has been struck down.