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kobblefort · 11 months

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Rushsly: Final Preparations

Even if the "endgame" spoilers don't start in this episode, they are going to be talked about at length from this point on.

This is your last warning: if you want to find out what's at the very bottom of the world for yourself, do not read beyond this point until you have.

There are other valid reasons not to read this Let's Play, such as "thinking the author is a narcissistic maniac who spends more time trying to do bootleg therapy on themself than the actual game," or "being a bit weirded out by the whole kobold thing," or "just not wanting to read a novel-length stream-of-consciousness psychodramatic diatribe that is sometimes vaguely about a digital ant-farm." But I care far more about preserving the wonders of this game for the people who enjoy it than I ever will about appealing to the particularities of anyone who is already inclined to dislike me or my work, so one more time, endgame spoilers are just one click away here. If you want to see the bottom yourself, you should dig to the bottom yourself. If you like playing the game, I think it is something worth doing at least once. This will be my first time playing this content, but not my first time seeing it, and I kind of wish it was. Spoilers under the cut.

I guess I should apologize for how I ended the last episode. I had been feeling very weird and worked myself up acting like nothing had ever gone right for me. I'm feeling better now. I played a bit of the new Zelda game like everyone else - well actually I played it a bit before it released too, because I think Nintendo is evil and that pirating their games, even leaked ones, is ontologically good - that I refuse to financially support them by buying their products firsthand, even if I must get kind of a shitty 15-24fps version of the experience. I make no argument that their games are not good and fun and well-designed but I think many of their corporate practices are basically inexcusable, litigating a man into lifelong indentured servitude is some shit a pastor would make up a story about the devil doing, having a crack team of prosecutors called "Nintendo Ninjas" isn't cute or funny, it is inexcusably vile bullshit that speaks volumes about what kind of world we've built ourselves to live in, where our modern myths and fables are Intellectual Properties and Trademarks. I have been making lots of contraptions, none that particularly measure up to what you might have seen on the internet - some of them embarrassingly being made obsolete by the game's own built-in schematics just minutes after I finished devising them. I have also not been barbecuing the koroks or shooting them with lasers or blasting them off on rockets or anything like that. They are cute and funny little dudes and I have no particular interest in seeing them suffer. I read an article a while ago about how phenomena like the widespread Korok crucifixions are caused by the same sort of psychological response as how you kind of just want to bite things that are obscenely cute, because our human brains don't really know how to deal with the feeling of "this thing is too cute." At least, I imagine they have to be similar responses going on there.

Kerrik Perplexnightmares appears in the first cavern layer - clearly named by the ratfolk. It almost brings a smile to my face to think of it mauling the rat-bastards that so frequently besiege us, but just as soon it brings a frown to think about how its "deadly dust" might be able to slip through our fortifications. Fiva is also still fucking around on the second cavern layer, apparently still seriously wounded from its battle with the ant people; speaking of which, checking the "Creatures>Others" tab displays none of them, but none of them appear under "Dead/Missing" either. Whether they went back into hiding for another ambush, fled the caverns beneath Rushsly entirely, or were so thoroughly dismembered that whatever remains of them would not be recognizable as ever belonging to a sentient being is currently unknown, though the second option seems most likely and the third seems least likely. They did appear from the western-most edge of the second cavern, they could have just as easily left that way.

Its ability to stand and ability to grasp are apparently "somewhat impaired", and funnily enough, checking the "Treatment" tab lets us know that it needs diagnosis and a crutch. The only way the kobbles are giving the poor lobster bastard a crutch is by mauling it with one. Rushsly has truly become a violent fort, and I'll need to start designating a third military squadron as soon as this last window into the final cavern layer is completed. Which, in the tireless toil of kobble industry, it is.

We can see most all of it besides the northeastern corner, and still not a fucking trace of magma. If it does exist, it will be at the very bottom of the world.

Our newest crop of migrants brought with them quite a lot of kobbles who were already adequate in some form of fighting or another, if not competent or even accomplished. With 211 steel bars in reserve, and a whopping 1475 iron bars and 61 bricks of coke (not the kind that makes you scheme to start a massive Wal-Mart return-scam scheme that spans four states, lasts for six years and results in a net profit of over 868,000 dollars - the cool kind) in case we run through that, outfitting them is only a question of time, not resources. And yes, Kody wanted to call them "The Frigid Knots." Go ahead, make your furry porn jokes. But for what it's worth? I'm anti-knot. I'm anti basically any "animal style genitalia" besides hyena girls with huge dicks or like, shark furries with double dicks, but they should still be recognizably human. I guess maybe a little frond here or a little flaring there is fine but I don't know, don't get carried away man. Like you know when you see one of those artists who just draws dicks as little red or pink triangles? I can't stand that. And hell while we're at it, no feral shit for me either. I'm in this furry shit for definitively humanoid bitches with some animal aesthetics I'm not trying to jack off to an actual dog dick, that's gross to me. I'm not a cop but I'm allowed to be grossed out. Us old bastards call that "squicked." I'm allowed to be squicked. You can go back over my earlier posts for evidence of my arguably "weirder" fetishes if you want but I'm not going to give a shit because weird is subjective and I think you can obviously tell just from this paragraph alone that I'm kind of unconcerned with joining any sort of larger consensus on "normality." I've got my own "normality" going on and it works for me. I am incredibly normal: I am, after all, the average of all my traits.

The mine shaft that will lead us to glorious adamantite starts right here, just outside The Curled Pepper, but it won't start going too deep without some serious fortifications and a contingency plan in case we dig right into the final layer instead of hitting an adamantite vein. I have a plan for safely digging out the adamantite - as safely as one can dig out adamantite anyway - but before that step can begin, I want steel hatch covers and a backup set of steel doors in place. Though I'm completely prepared for Rushsly to fall on an emotional level, I would like that to simply not happen - being able to retire the fort once I feel I've had as much fun with it as I'm going to have would be a blessing. And what do we have to lose, should I carelessly fuck up?

Well, for starters, I haven't even begun on Dralas' Beast Slayer quarters lol fuck whoops!! Not that he's discontent with his four-tile chamber in the awkward set of bedrooms that I have been going out of my way to show because I hate them. And what sort of things go on in Dralas' life? Well, of his many passing acquaintances, being not even particularly close to other members of his squadron, he has made a friend:

Gatr Leagueknowing - Maybe he should know a better fucking game, LOL!!! Why are you playing an RTS where you only get to control one guy!?! Sorry - the Holy Fish of the Goldenrod Creed, who leads ceremonies in the Pale Chapel, actually has many friends, perhaps as a result of his liturgical duties, but...

He himself only considers Dralas a "passing acquaintance." Ouch

But there's not too much time to ponder the minutiae of kobbles' social lives - a third Forgotten Beast appears, this one joining Fiva on the second cavern layer. Wow, an eyeless lizard and an eyeless lobster. They're so similar I'm a bit worried they're going to fuck instead of fight.

But no lol obviously they fight. They fight hard, they fight fast, and then it's over. One must wonder how it would have turned out if Fiva managed to recover from its scuffle with the ant people, but that's not what happened. Ancoji Necroshafts the Fated (holy shit) escapes with a single bruise on its rear right foot. Fiva is the one I made that badass little intro graphic for, isn't it? Sorry to see you go out like that, Fiva, though I wonder if this might be a little more honorable than getting sniped through some fortifications by a kobble who doesn't even care about doing the deed. The 462-year-old lizard scratches right through the lobster's brain and it's all over.

All the way up top-side I notice these rabbit merchants and their guard have just been... stuck chilling in the trade depot for at least a month after their supposed departure. I pull up and then pull down the drawbridge to try and reset their pathfinding, I run dfhack fix/stuck-merchants a couple times, no dice. Also right after doing that I find out you're not actually supposed to run fix/stuck-merchants when you have merchants on the map, but ahh whoops I dunno, live and learn I guess. I should really read command descriptions before I make assumptions based on their name but to be fair like when merchants are stuck on your screen it really feels like that's what the command "fix/stuck-merchants" is for, how would I even actually know if merchants are stuck off my map? Well I really don't know what to do about that. It would be funny to just fucking kill them but they're cute little bunny people and I need to be minimizing the amount of enemies I have at any given time if I want to survive the dig for adamantite.

We commission Agcu Riu: "the Fall of Beaks" for Dralas' bedroom. It doesn't look like we'll be able to find aluminum any time soon, but one with iron walls, billon floors and a gold "welcome mat" seems more than well-appointed enough.

Our Hammer Lord On decides to name her shield "The Confusing Famine." I kind of wish she'd grown attached to a steel one instead, but I suppose the tools you're comfortable with are always better than the more expensive, flashier ones. Right? Well I don't know because steel is literally stronger than iron, but oh well. This is the second object a soldier has named, after Ace Steel's steel battleaxe "Styletongues." Looks like things are going well for them, and they'll soon have company in their barracks: even though no training orders have actually been given yet, some members of The Frigid Knots have already grown antsy enough to pick out their weapons and armor.

Quite a few masterworks have been created in the new batch of weapons, and checking who made them makes me realize that Orml really ought to be appointed to the military: she's a legendary fighter, legendary observer, and master spearbold after all. The Frigid Knots will do well to have a master among them to learn from; it should hopefully bring the less skilled of the group up to speed a bit faster.

Ancoji has been sitting perfectly still this whole time after finishing off Fiva. Up on the first cavern layer, Kerrik just slowly swims around. Menacingly... as menacingly as a giant frog can get.

Training finally begins for TFK.

The final shaft is almost ready. A tight security protocol will be enforced whenever any adamantite mining operations are going on. The outer steel doors, inner steel doors, hatch covers on Z-90 and hatch covers on Z-91 will all be sealed for the entire length of time that a mining team is in the shaft. This is to buy a construction team enough time to wall off the shaft entirely if it becomes necessary. As I've already stated, if we break through at the wrong spot, we have a matter of single frames to react accordingly, and two or three miners' lives are, unfortunately, a fair trade to keep the other 100+ kobbles safe from the possibility sudden violent and painful death. In the event that we are not able to seal off the bottom layer for any reason, we will have no choice but to draw up the above-ground and below-ground bridges to cut off access between Rushsly and the greater world entirely. What we find down there could literally doom the entire Dimensions of Portent if we do not immediately take the proper cautions to contain it. Maybe I'm being overdramatic. Maybe I'll wish I was even more dramatic later. All I can know for sure is the general gist of what lies at the bottom of the earth, and how dangerous it can be. -114 is the deepest depth of the pools in the third and final cavern layer. From -115 to -129, anything could happen. Vast and impossible riches guarded by incredible beasts. An ocean of magma to spew forth, a relatively painless and uneventful adamantite-and-diamonds mining experience.

In interest of not taking for-fucking-ever and having the group awkwardly split up, miners will be moved to these admittedly quite shit barracks on -90, and the burrow system will be used to keep them from fucking off all the way up to near the surface until such a time as the final layers are exhausted. The marksbold squad are training hard just below The Curled Pepper, ready as they'll ever be for whatever comes next.

Through me you enter into the city of woes; through me you enter into eternal pain, through me you enter the population of loss. Abandon all hope, you who enter here. "Inferno" is actually very funny for a lot of different reasons, but that quote still goes hard as fuck, you can't not like it. I know this has been kind of a shorter episode, maybe you're glad about that, but this seems like a good place to cut it. I want to have as much room as possible to let whatever might transpire next breathe.

#dwarf fortress #kobblefort #df spoilers

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dogsliampaynedoesntinstagram · 2 years

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Hey, Ralph. I don't really know how to articulate the feelings I have about jkr but you're a sensible person whose views have helped me in the past so here I am. Like I understand people have attachment to her work. But this debate whether spending money on her work is supporting her vs her work isn't hers alone and you can consume media while disagreeing with creator is really frustrating. I wish this insanely popular author didn't play part in questioning my existence and thinking of me as 'misguided woman' so I wouldn't even have to think about this. But she does and I wish could do something to counter her vitriol but at the same time I'm so fucking tired of justifying my being to everyone because living in a transphobic society is hard enough.

Thanks for sending this anon - it's lovely to hear that what I say has helped you make sense of the world.

I'm really sorry that you have to deal with all this bullshit anon. I'm sorry that JKR is so awful. I'm sorry that her work means a lot to people.

I think your last sentence is key to figuring out a way forward. You talk about being frustrated and tired - discussions about JKR seem really negative for you. How about you avoid them? If they're happening here block and unfolllow, block key words. You can have a great impact on how much of this debate you see. How about you see less.

Toni Morrison said: "“The function, the very serious function of racism is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining, over and over again, your reason for being. Somebody says you have no language and you spend twenty years proving that you do. Somebody says your head isn’t shaped properly so you have scientists working on the fact that it is. Somebody says you have no art, so you dredge that up. Somebody says you have no kingdoms, so you dredge that up. None of this is necessary. There will always be one more thing.”

It sounds to me like JKR is distracting you. What if you blocked her every way you could and resolved to put the energy into some project that celebrated trans joy? What would that be? What if you made the energy you spent talking about trans lives proactive rather than reactive.

You won't leave anything important behind if you leave behind discussions about JKR I promise.

One of the strange things about current times is that there's almost an infinite capacity to talk in public about things. It's very easy that by talking about things in public you're changing the terms of how things are talked about in public (often you're not, often you're just setting the agreed terms of disagreement). Or that by changing the way things are talked about in public you change the way people experience the world - there is some ways that it's true, but far more ways that it's not.

If people get something out of talking about JKR that's fine, I'm not advocating that they stop, just that giving up the fantasy that it's doing anything allows who don't enjoy it to stop (as should be rather obvious I get something out of talking about a lot of things on this tumblr, I don't think that it's having a marked impact on the world).

It can also help to give this whole debate less power. I'm not quite sure what is being released right now, but small variations in the financial success of minor Harry Potter events are not going to be the deciding factor in trans lives over the next few years.

Fighting collectively by building a coalition to win meaningful changing to housing and healthcare is far more important than any response to JKR.

There's more I could say anon, but I think my main point is JKR isn't worth any of this and you can put your energy else where.

#I've focused here on what you said #rather than the debate itself #because I think treating it as a minor matter #is one important way of minising JKR's power to distract

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