Written by Amy Wilson

My husband and I decided to try out Dwarf Fortress after all the hype about it. We have just gotten into the second year with our fortress, and the most entertaining thing has been one of our dwarfs, Dumed.

We initially pronounced this with the accent on the 2nd syllable, Du-MED. But after watching him in action for a season or two, we changed it to Doomed.

He was our building designer guy originally, and at first, we didn’t need him for much. So when we needed someone to crank out a few mechanisms for us, we drafted him as our Mechanic. Then we finally got our Still up and running, and he wasn’t doing much, so we made him our interim Brewer until some immigrants arrived. Then it was time to start building our trade road and a bridge over the outside and underground rivers. Suddenly, we needed him for everything.

Dumed was in high demand and had all kinds of tasks backed up, but was still operating at his previous “I’m on summer vacation and don’t need to do anything” level of ambition. He was On Break. Then he had to get some water. And man, was that walking through the hallways tough work. Better sit down for a bite to eat before ya get light-headed. Everyone else was working at a breakneck pace to ready the fortress for winter. But not him. We were Doomed.

After 2 trips to the well (don’t have any ale since he can’t work up the energy to spend a few minutes in the Still), a lunch break, 2 other breaks where he sat around in his room admiring his Fine Door, and a nice long nap, he finally decided to get to work on that underground bridge. He grabbed a rock from the stockpile and headed towards the bridge, playing leapfrog with all the kittens in the hallways along the way. Almost there, he gets winded. Whew! That has to have been at least 2 rooms and a small stretch of hallway that he’s navigated so far. Don’t wanna overdo it. Gotta take another break. So he drops the rock IN THE DOORWAY leading to the underground river, PROPPING THE DOOR OPEN. Immediately, we get across the bottom of the screen, “UNDERGROUND RIVER STARTS TO OVERFLOW”. No kidding. Luckily, when the floodwaters swept down on our poor Doomed fortress, they pushed the rock a few squares forward and out of the doorway, allowing the door to close and stop the raging waters.

Eventually the waters receded, and now we have a sapling growing in our hallway.

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