Ben Harris
LightNews LightNews
banner
bjh21.me.uk
Ben Harris
@bjh21.me.uk
4 followers 1 following 140 posts
[bridged from https://wandering.shop/@bjh21 on the fediverse by https://fed.brid.gy/ ]
Posts Replies Media Videos
bjh21.me.uk
The new version of #dwarffortress hasn't yet delivered one of the new, scarier sieges, but we're expecting a (small) one soon, and the dwarves are slowly getting prepared...

https://youtube.com/live/IXQbvKsIzAY

[edit: guess who forgot to post this at the start of the stream!]
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We are looking at the equipment of a member of The Oceanic Calm, who has some iron chain leggings, two gauntlets, two high boots, an iron shield, a steel spear, and an oaken crossbow.
November 10, 2025 at 12:22 AM
bjh21.me.uk
#dwarffortress 53.02 is out, and apparently has new siege mechanics. Let's see how Keskalokil copes!

https://youtube.com/live/VezQ3vdR4Xk
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We are looking at a settings screen, which has items like "Invaders can break constructed walls" and "Invaders can dig natural walls". All of these are set to "Yes".
November 7, 2025 at 10:32 PM
bjh21.me.uk
On Friday's #dwarffortress stream, I got the first immigrants in years of game time. Join me while I try to get them organised:

https://youtube.com/live/Y-RFuQ2lBh4
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We're looking at the unit list, which shows ten dwarves, most of whom either picking up equipment or with no job. The dwarves have a variety of normal dwarven occupations like engraver and gem setter. There are no doctors visible at all.
November 2, 2025 at 9:41 PM
bjh21.me.uk
My #dwarffortress game seems to be settling down a bit. Not sure if it's in a good way yet.

https://youtube.com/live/UxuUiFACh2A
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We are looking at a list of cancelled jobs, most of which are caused by agitated wildlife.
October 31, 2025 at 10:27 PM
bjh21.me.uk
I'm a little worried that my #dwarffortress game may be converging on some kind of steady state. But to be honest that would be a nice problem to have. Stream here:

https://youtube.com/live/u-0PXaROsRM
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. Everything is calm, albeit covered in dead goblins, railways, old armour, ravens, etc.
October 26, 2025 at 9:51 PM
bjh21.me.uk
Gratuitous Saturday repair content: this knife's handle had split from vigorous use, so I tried a whipping using wet cotton string. Now that it's dried and the cotton has shrunk, the blade seems quite firmly fixed in place.
A photo of a ceramic-bladed knife, looking at the joint between the blade and the handle. If you look closely, you can see that there are two cracks in the handle along the blunt edge of the blade, so that if you try to cut with it the blade will just move up in the handle. Or it would were it not for the whipping in the background. A long view of the knife from the previous picture. About a centimetre from the blade, the handle is bound up with white cotton string over a length of about a centimetre. It looks quite neat from this side if I do say so myself. A close-up of the other side of the knife handle. The whipping consists of 9 turns of string. The ends of the string have been pulled underneath the whipping, leaving a slightly unsightly bulge.
October 25, 2025 at 1:19 PM
bjh21.me.uk
I looked for HaSeul's most recent single on Qobuz. Wondered why the title was missing. Remembered that elsewhere I'd seen it starting with a less-that sign. They didn't, did they? Oh dear. How embarrassing.
A screenshot of a search result from qobuz.com. It lists four "Albums". The first two are "Fragile Eyes" by HaSeul and "Plastic Candy" by HaSeul. The third is also by HaSeul, but there's a blank space where the title should be. A screenshot of the Firefox developer tools showing the DOM inspector. In the middle of the screenshot is what appears to be an element called "love" with an attribute called "poison". A close-up of the text '<love poison=""></love>'.
October 25, 2025 at 12:55 PM
bjh21.me.uk
In #dwarffortress, I'm trying to reduce the number of goblins on the map by humane (dwarvene?) means. And also improving people's bedrooms.

https://youtube.com/live/h6fg-n3USkM
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We are looking at a list of bedrooms, most of which are assigned to dwarves.
October 24, 2025 at 9:22 PM
bjh21.me.uk
In #dwarffortress, it's the start of autumn, so I'm expecting a dwarven caravan and probably a goblin siege. I hope I'm properly prepared.

https://youtube.com/live/3kUoB5HgOuQ
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We are looking at a goblin cage made of tin. It's one of a group of goblin cages, some of which are still waiting to be built.
October 19, 2025 at 9:01 PM
bjh21.me.uk
In #dwarffortress, I think it's time I rationalised my cage traps, and maybe let the goblins out. Carefully, of course.

https://youtube.com/live/24TBJWAKGpU
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We are looking at a cage trap which has three cages on it, all containing goblins.
October 17, 2025 at 9:17 PM
bjh21.me.uk
In #dwarffortress, I'm trying to keep the gradually declining number of dwarves reasonably happy. And also stopping the giant hamsters taking over.

https://youtube.com/live/yz1uD1NMnZU
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We are looking at a weapon trap that's full of silver mauls.
October 12, 2025 at 8:32 PM
bjh21.me.uk
In my #dwarffortress we dealt with the last goblin invasion with no loss of dwarven life. The swimming pool did kill someone though. So let's try not to let that happen again.

https://youtube.com/live/L2u64F42qKw
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. At the bottom of the screen is a large walled-in room full of water and featuring a large number of dead goblins. The total dwarven population is 30.
October 10, 2025 at 9:37 PM
bjh21.me.uk
I learned that the Korean for "grapefruit" is '자몽' (jamong), wondered a bit about etymology, and now I'm lost in a twisty maze of cirtus fruit, all different, and have 14 Wikipedia and Wiktionary tabs open.
October 10, 2025 at 9:54 AM
bjh21.me.uk
In #dwarffortress, the goblins killed rather too many of my dwarves in the last siege. But at least my ravens are doing well.

https://youtube.com/live/6-dA_jGk9Xk
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We're looking at the generally rather messy ground level. Under the cursor, we're told that there's a Stray Raven (+Trained+), a Stray Raven (Tame), a Stray Raven Hatchling (Tame), a Nest Box, and some Dense bentgrass. On the other hand, the dwarven population is now 31.
October 5, 2025 at 8:53 PM
bjh21.me.uk
My #dwarffortress is running out of dwarves, but no-one has died for months, which is probably an improvement.

https://youtube.com/live/ksY3D5og-gw
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We're at ground level and it's quite messy as usual. The small pool by the west river now has a ledge along it that is in some way significant.
October 3, 2025 at 9:24 PM
bjh21.me.uk
As goblins continue to reduce the ranks of my dwarves in #dwarffortress I think I may need to cautiously start bringing them back to work.

https://youtube.com/live/lHr2oSASyZU
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We are looking at the work details configuration and have selected a detail whose symbol is "=X". Its tasks include Stone Hauling, Wood Hauling, Item Hauling, Burial, etc.
September 28, 2025 at 9:02 PM
bjh21.me.uk
I'm slowly running out of dwarves in #dwarffortress, but I'm determined to press on.

https://youtube.com/live/6tQJSnuU3uc
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We are inspecting Asën Zasittagùz. She is 28 years old, and is constructing a building. She is currently carrying some copper bars.
September 26, 2025 at 10:00 PM
bjh21.me.uk
From 2012 to 2024, the University of Cambridge Official Map was a custom PHP application built on top of #openstreetmap data. Now that it's been fully decommissioned and I don't need to worry about lurking hard-coded secrets, I've cleaned up its Git repository and made it public […]
Original post on wandering.shop
wandering.shop
September 26, 2025 at 11:01 AM
bjh21.me.uk
This week I am learning Korean words from the instructions on this cup of instant tteokbokki, which makes a change from K-pop lyrics.

비다 (bida): to be empty
컵 (keop): cup
수스 (soseu): sauce
넣다 (neota): to put
밖 (bakk): outside (n.)
물 (mul): water
섞다 (seokkda) […]

[Original post on wandering.shop]
Some instructions on a cup of tteokbokki. There are pictures and the instructions are written in both Korean and English. There are four steps: 1: 민 컵에 떡과 소스를 넣는다. Put rice cake and sauce to the cup. 2: 컵 밖의 기준선만큼 물을 넣는다. Fill water to the red line outside. 3: 잘 섞은 뒤 뚜껑을 비스듬히 덮는다. Stir well and cover it askew. 4: 전자레인지에서 2분(1000 W), 3분(700 W)간 조리한다. 2min(1000 W) or 3min(700 W) in Microwave.
September 25, 2025 at 1:17 PM
bjh21.me.uk
In tonight's #dwarffortress stream, I hope to stop the dwarves climbing out of the swimming pool before they've learned to swim.

https://youtube.com/live/qMO-2daz24A
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We're just below ground level. There's a new room with ankle-deep water and a drain in the floor.
September 21, 2025 at 9:07 PM
bjh21.me.uk
In the last #dwarffortress stream, we managed to get some goblins to go away by giving them a copper spear. But we didn't get any more dwarves, which is what we were hoping for. Maybe we'll do better tonight...

https://youtube.com/live/Bs00OQX4Ktk
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We are examining a Stray Raven Hatchling (Tame). Its description says, "A small foreboding black bird that feeds on carrion. It is social, very intelligent, and knows how to use tools. He is indefatigable, but he is very weak. He is weak. His feathers are black. His skin is raw umber. His eyes are black.
September 19, 2025 at 9:30 PM
bjh21.me.uk
In #dwarffortress, I'm trying to give the goblins what they asked for, but this is proving harder than expected.

https://youtube.com/live/OW_6cvQo0Mk
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We are examining the mayor, Vabôk Shodukkol. She is doing a "Return Treasure" task, but isn't carrying anything and her most recent thought says "She is terrified while in conflict."
September 14, 2025 at 8:31 PM
bjh21.me.uk
Breeding is apparently working in my #dwarffortress, but not for the dwarves. Jojn me to see what happens next.

https://youtube.com/live/txywbZ14ySA
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. We're at ground level, and a keen eye would spot a small number of red lower-case 'r's, representing raven chicks.
September 12, 2025 at 9:16 PM
bjh21.me.uk
Tonight's #dwarffortress stream is, if everything works, coming to you from Great Yarmouth. Probably with more heckling than usual.

https://youtube.com/live/3EsRQTYpNSE
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress. There are only 42 remaining dwarves, which is a bit worrying.
September 7, 2025 at 8:28 PM
bjh21.me.uk
I spent most of the last session building a goblin trap in #dwarffortress, so of course the goblins have turned up from the other direction. I think I can deal with that, though.

https://youtube.com/live/9_5He0lo8iQ
A screenshot of Dwarf Fortress showing a large dialogue box, which says "The Failed Dungeons wishes to parley in order to avert loss of life. Do you approve this request? [Approve] [Deny]".
September 5, 2025 at 9:31 PM