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[Rumrusher]

There are, yeah. Including also tunneling and sapping, ladders and siege towers to go over the walls, and siege weapons to destroy them. But it's all a long ways off.

I found a neat way to circumvent it and annoy the player into coming outside; interactions that don't require line of sight to target, and thus can apply effects to your dwarves from anywhere on the map as long as the source creature lives! You can make the dwarves slowly go insane or become progressively sicker! Diabolical!

figured one way the game already does that was just cause the fps to deplete with the ever growing number of pathfinding checks and invaders just showing up? like what the cavern dwellers do.

[KristoffPL]

Some months ago I noted that the soundtrack DLC on steam only contains low quality mp3 files, whereas the bandcamp release has FLAC files available. The recently released Adventure Mode soundtrack DLC has the opposite problem - it includes the chonky, gigabyte-sized uncompressed WAVs (which I feel is waaaay overkill for a soundtrack release IMO but of course so much better than just MP3s still).
Is there a chance that the original soundtrack will get the WAVs too, or that both of the releases will get FLAC files? I imagine the former would be better, as it would unify the releases, and it's fairly easy for anyone to convert WAVs to FLAC themselves.

[Toady One]

With regards to the new forums, are you planning on just updating bay12forums.com to use https (i.e. https://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php), or are you planning on moving the forums so that they are under bay12games.com (e.g. http://www.bay12games.com/smf/index.php or http://www.bay12games.com/forums/index.php) in order to take advantage of the fact that bay12games.com is already set up to use https?  If the latter, Is there anything that'll be done to avoid breaking links on other websites (I know you can just have the main page of the old forums redirect to the new forums, but can the server be set up so that, if someone tries to directly access a specific post on the old forums, it'll automatically redirect them to the same post on the new forums)?

I think we're going to set up https for bay12forums.com.  The urls should remain unchanged.

Is Dwarf Fortress officially now just Dwarf Fortress or is it still officially Slaves to Armok God of Blood Chapter II: Dwarf Fortress, or is the latter just for the free ASCII version?

Will you ever publish any more crayon art? Do you ever bust the crayons out when conceptualising new features, creatures or objects?

Inarius: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8536658#msg8536658
Silverwing235: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8536661#msg8536661
PatrikLundell: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8536732#msg8536732

Dwarf Fortress is increasingly official for all versions, yeah.  The free version is also using it.  But the readme still uses the Armok title.  I know CRPG Addict uses title screen, documentation, and box cover, something like that, and picks the winner 2 out of 3 to handle inconsistencies.  We don't have a box cover, so right now it's a 50-50 tie.

We never used crayon for concepts.  We had those tablets, which are just pencil or ink.

hmm having now thought about this if premium adv mode is getting a soundtrack is the classic build of adv mode going to stay silent or is there going to be like a toadyone original adv mode classic track for that also?

To add a suggestion onto this, it might be fun to add lo-fi chiptune versions of the songs to classic. Understandable if that might be too much work.

Rumrusher (op): http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8537185#msg8537185

I'm not planning to make any more music myself at this point.  There's a lot of regular work to do.

Are there plans to implement schisms / civil wars as part of the villains arc? It would make sense that parts of the kingdom may rebel against a usurper. It may also help prevent snowballing in worldgen. It would also be interesting if the different sides had opposing preferences, like blue vs red clothing or cow symbols vs eagle symbols, different religious sects...

Rumrusher: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8537039#msg8537039
TranquilRiverGiant (op): http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8537057#msg8537057
Rumrusher: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8537148#msg8537148

Doing full breaks (or merges) or civilizations has always been held back by the entity code, and was going to be part of the entity rewrite stuff - which is now going to be done in smaller pieces.  We have coups as an official villain plot, and schisms as a planned religious feature, and the old insurrections as mentioned.  There are lots of things pointing this way, but the main work to be done involves just allowing entity structures to be more flexible.

Did you get any nice presents?

I did!  I got a knit frog with a knit sweater.  Otherwise it was a low key birthday focused on food ha ha.

The adventure mode OST is fire (my complements to the chefs), but I checked the raws and didn't find any tokens for it. It looks like the playing logic is hardcoded (due to the dynamic mixing), will we be able to add our own music and sounds to adventure mode eventually?

What cues certain music tracks to play in Fortress mode?  I know the song “Vile Force of Darkness” plays when a siege arrives, but when, for example, does “Death Spiral” get triggered?  Will there be similar cues in adventure?

DPh Kraken (op): http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8538013#msg8538013

Yeah, we're waiting for the work to settle down before we come up with a raw format.  The adventure music is not yet complete - right now it just plays songs randomly, and we're going to set up cues.  The fortress mode cues are all in the existing raw files that DPh Kraken linked.  I don't recall exactly, but the death spiral event relates to a number and/or percentage of citizen/resident deaths in a short period of time.

Do doors play different sounds when they're opened in adventure mode, depending on the material the doors are made out of?

Interesting if true.  But if the answer to that question is "yes", do "soap doors" specifically have their own sound effect?

And if the answer to that question is also "yes" ... then "why?"  And then where did you even get the sound?!

Did you and/or someone else actually try to make a door out of actual soap, just like smooshed together, and then have Three-Toe open it, while Putnam sat and recorded it with a directional mic?  Because I'd have mad respect for that.

Ha ha, Parker Bert did the sound effects for adventure mode.  I have literally no idea how they did them, but there are lots of them and they are cool.  We did get a bit carried away with materials.

Would it be possible to consider the return of ASCII creature graphics in future versions?
and the multi-view implemented in ASCII somehow.

Doorkeeper: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8537962#msg8537962

Could an option be added to character creation (maybe in a debug section?) to force change the random indexes in graphics files? Talking about 'CONDITION_RANDOM_PART_INDEX', some UI that shows the ID and a number field clamped to go from 1 to whatever the max was set to. It would make creating highly customizable modded races way way nicer, for example I could let players pick a preferred clothing color option, or pick tail color and type, wing color, etc.

I want to do an appearance customizer (as in many games) at some point which should cover everything.

I'm a big fan of AD&D's Underdark, and I think Dwarf Fortress does a fantastic job generating cavern layouts and featuring a subterranean ecology that rivals what is described in TSR's books. Currently, subterranean animal people in DF serve a similar role to D&D's Kuo-toa; With the upcoming map-rewrite, do you plan to include exclusively subterranean civilizations that might fulfill the roles similar to dark elves or dark dwarves? If so, would these be distinct races, or would they simply be elven and dwarven civilizations whose inhabitants possess malevolent personality traits (like goblins do)?

DPh Kraken: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8537737#msg8537737
Egan_BW: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8537747#msg8537747

Ha ha, DPh Kraken encouraging me to add an [INCORRUPTIBLE] tag to gorlaks.  The map+entity rewrite stuff was finally going to get us to better underground civs.  A lot is missing to make it work.  We want gorlaks to work, we want underground animal people to work, including things like ant people which have never worked and which could be really interesting with their own cave layouts and more proper caste usage and such.

I noticed some portraits are inconsistent with the world sprites for dwarves - usually this is seen in hair color. Is it just that shades like "saffron" are yet to get dwarf portraits & will in the future, or is the system intended to work by approximating an array of in-text hair colors to, say, a single off-white?

We're hoping to get to the full palettes yeah, but they take time.  The hair is especially inconsistent yeah, I might be sitting on a fix for that which will at least line it up with the portraits.  I'm always one step behind the artists, especially for beta.

Any news on the Mac version?

Doorkeeper: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8537962#msg8537962

Will there ever be modding support for implementing things like firedamp? Blackdamp, whitedamp, etc?
More to the point, is the mining mechanic in its current iteration "finished"?

    Firedamp is any flammable gas found in coal mines, typically coalbed methane.
    It is particularly found in areas where the coal is bituminous.
    The gas accumulates in pockets in the coal and adjacent strata and when they are penetrated the release can trigger explosions.
    Historically, if such a pocket was highly pressurized, it was termed a "bag of foulness".

Basically, support for letting gas spawn and then linger. Custom gas evaporates very quickly, which is problematic for certain modding endeavors.

Goody towers lean close to something approaching a natural mining hazard, but obviously they are very much their own thing.

I could understand maybe wanting to shrug off adding in better gas simulation support until way off in the far future. Like, I get that.

Nothing's ever finished, and the map rewrite stuff, now coming in piecemeal, is supposed to make the underground more interesting.  Dunno if there'll be natural mining changes specifically.

Are there any plans to fully overhaul the small scale layered creature sprites in the future, with the new capabilities that came with procedural portraits?  (missing body parts, palletization, etc)

Additionally, I've noticed that NPCs never wear any headwear except for masks and face veils and never wear loincloths or thongs.
This is new since the steam release and I assume it was intentionally added to reduce clutter but it is a bit odd and makes kobolds always have bad thoughts for having no pants.
If this is changed I think kobolds should be given sandals too, to make them not get bad thoughts for having no footwear.

Yeah, it's on the list, and a lot of the palettized art is already done.

I don't recall a headwear change.  The PLAINS entity has all the types there, including the pants ones as well.  And dwarves have loincloths listed.  Are things not spawning correctly?

I wonder if it is possible in theory to send a squad of dwarves in a mission outside my fort to demand or raid an enemy village and being able to join them in combat when I un-retire an adventurer or if I create a new adventurer in the target village and help them defend against the squad that is on the way.

I can make the unretire (or creation of new adventurer) simulation progress time at the start to be 1 day with DFHack (as the two weeks always are much more time than the travel time to the site). Even with that, would my squad actually reach the site if I could be there with an adventurer waiting? Or the mission are all abstract math behind the scenes and nothing would "physically" happen If I were there observing?

What about If I leave a squad member behind to be the ruler of the new site... I guess he would be there I would be able to find the dwarf?

Eric Blank: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8538352#msg8538352

Hmm, yeah, I have literally no idea what happens to squads on missions when you retire.  If they aren't otherwise handled, they should just continue on their way with the same "army controller" etc., which means they'd do their thing, but most of their things aren't actually programmed in adventure mode, so you wouldn't get to see them do anything zoomed up.  That's all former army arc/current piecemeal stuff, getting to the zoomed in army stuff.  You should be able to find administrators you leave in fort mode, or other occupiers.  Some artifact seekers also hunt for quite a while and might even be findable with the two week calendar.

1. One thing I noticed from the current version of the adventure mode beta is we don't have progress bars for skills anymore like in the old version. Will those eventually be readded?
2. Since priorities are currently in flux regarding what gets implemented next what are the chances in one of the updates following adventure mode's release this year or next that we will be able to purchase houses/plots of land in towns? It was on the old to do list and it would be a nice variation on the base building that existed in the old version with building our own mead halls.
3. Are towns going to get any new kinds of buildings/features/organizations with the town updates? Previously libraries and guilds halls in towns didn't do much and it would be cool to see them have their own little quest types/if possible be joinable factions like mercenary companies are.
4. Will random edible leaves picked from the ground still be worth a small amount of money in trading? Stuff like lettuce and what not. In early versions you could pay for your inn room with lettuce leaves in a quick pinch.

1. Yeah.
2. The priorities are in flux and I don't know the chances.  Finishing the menus and getting the new deity/tutorial stuff in is the current focus.
3. Temples will be the first focus most likely (after shops are fixed), because they relate to the sure additions.
4. Ha ha ha, I haven't changed anything.  That seems like it could afford to be tightened up, but who knows how much that will happen.

Ever since the villains release, there has been an event where a villain can send people to corrupt your dwarves to steal an artifact of yours which is great flavour.
But for some reason it seems to be abnormally common. I'm talking hundreds of historical figures "Claiming from afar" in Legends mode almost the instant it is made for me a lot of the time.

This results in the majority of your guests being thieves, which both means you won't get many regular visitors and you'll need to seal away your artifacts 100% of the time (or disallow visitors).
Or, if you want more regular visitors, just get rid of your artifacts.
I'd guess this would be one of the things looked at when Villains is revisited and it's probably just a side effect of it not being finished right?

Yeah, we postponed villain completion right as heists were being finished so it's not surprising the frequencies are messed up.

Are there any plans to make walls and raised bridges destructible by enemies?
It is ridiculous that a single wall tile or a raised bridge can completely neutralize almost any threat from the outside.
The defense of the fortress is now so simple that it is difficult to lose for fun.

Eric Blank: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8539174#msg8539174
Rumrusher: http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=169696.msg8539291#msg8539291

Some months ago I noted that the soundtrack DLC on steam only contains low quality mp3 files, whereas the bandcamp release has FLAC files available. The recently released Adventure Mode soundtrack DLC has the opposite problem - it includes the chonky, gigabyte-sized uncompressed WAVs (which I feel is waaaay overkill for a soundtrack release IMO but of course so much better than just MP3s still).
Is there a chance that the original soundtrack will get the WAVs too, or that both of the releases will get FLAC files? I imagine the former would be better, as it would unify the releases, and it's fairly easy for anyone to convert WAVs to FLAC themselves.

I'll have to ask Kitfox.  The mp3/flac thing was a condition of the sound people, but if that's out the window then I have no idea what the current conditions are.  I'll get back to you when I hear.

[Xinrai]

I've noticed that during worldgen, there is a huge boom of new sites during the first hundred years or so, after which expansion quiets down, some roads start being made, some crypts/monasteries...

Since worldgen has been made significantly faster now, would it be reasonable to slow down how quickly civilizations expand? I guess I could increase the site cap, but I'd rather have a world that's 500 years and still growing steadily.


Also, one small feature that's been missing since the steam version came out that is really bugging me:
You can't click on gods in the relationship tabs anymore! That's how I found out ages ago that my civ had their own special gods in the first place! Right now it seems like I have to build statues of them or hunt them down in legends mode to find out what appearance they have.

[A_Curious_Cat]

Thanks for the answers, Toady!

[KristoffPL]

Thank you so much Toady!