I don't really fort. I just set up a portal beside the mountain for corpse runs and if I ever manage to find silver I move it to where I'm mining and build a small shed around it to let me dry out If the place I portaled from was raining.

Haven't really used the ooze bombs, I'll have to give em a try.

Might be a good Idea to try non-parry shields until I can get good parry shields for the zone. Serpent isn't likely that soon though as they seem to have reduced leviathan? spawns. Or maybe it's just my seed. I've spent all the chiton I've found upgrading my abyssal dagger, so not enough to build a harpoon yet.

Spear might not be a bad idea either, lets you attack before they get too close, but on a mountainside there might be a lot of issues b/c you can't really aim your melee attacks up and down.