Claspsprinkles, Part 1

Just a disclaimer: As a change of pace I'm using the Eater Blog to record my participation in a collaborative video game experiment for a few days, so expect the next couple of posts to be about video game nonsense lingo. My sincerest apologies for this interruption of normal blog life.

My friends have wrangled me into a social experiment involving the game Dwarf Fortress. The idea was inspired by those brave individuals involved with managing the outpost known as Boatmurdered (which was constantly beset by rampaging elephants). So we had to try this for ourselves.

I inherited the fortress known as 'Claspsprinkles' to find that the first two years have not been kind to our poor little simulated dwarfs. Everywhere I look there are scenes of death. There are dwarf corpses heaped carelessly in piles, scattered bones, and one count of disorderly conduct against a donkey, though it would seem that the offender has also gone off and died somewhere.

I also found the remains of a dwarf at the bottom of a pond that was supposedly someone very important--- so who is behind the mysterious drowning? My money is on that upstart Sheriff John, who's gone around claiming all the fortress chairs for himself.

Other observations: There's no military, except for the 'Dragoon' and a Wrestler, and so not much to stop enemies if they came in force. However, it looks like there's a gaggle of peasants sitting on idle that are about to be recruited.

There are two entrances that will need to be fortified. Entrance #1 is in good shape, as there are doors that can be locked on the outside, and behind the doors a nice lobby with some traps and fortifications. I think the initial builder's idea was to turn this room into a shooting gallery. Now all we need are dwarfs that know how to hold crossbows.

Entrance #2 is the bigger problem. It's sitting wide open for wagons to roll into the trade depot, but will need some form of protection. One is . I think we'll need a moat and drawbridge to protect this entrance.

Kudos to James for setting picking a nice location for our fortress experiment, as well as directing the growth in the first year. Also, a special nod to John, for keeping the fortress alive during the bloodshed and starvation of Year Two.

Hopefully, Year Three will be just as exciting.