Bay 12 Games Forum

Well, throwing "aqua vitae" at the goblins might be a good thing. It's flammable after all. A booze flow feeding an "aqua vitae" squirt gun, maybe with a torch secured to below the squirt gun. Nice for fortress defense.

I think that this is a fine idea - better than the "invisible baby snatcher" and the "invisible goblin raider" modality of sneak attacks. However, it ought to be implemented much later in the game after realistic tunneling behavior is implemented. Digging a tunnel - at least for invaders - under hostile fire - ought not be a trivial task:

• Tunneling needs to be implemented with the modality of permanent underground terrain - for example, at least impassable rock seams.
• Shoring of the invasion tunnel should be required, forcing the cutting of wood. Passage through an invasion tunnel of many soldiers ought to be limited. For example, if invaders dislodged the shoring while passing through the tunnel - always a possibility with clumsy trolls - the entire tunnel system should collapse on their heads.
• Dwarves ought to be able to fire catapults at shallow tunnels and force them to collapse.
• Metal walls ought to be impassable to any creature short of a fire-breathing dragon, a balrog, an epic level spellcaster or the possessor of a major artifact, or a hidden fun creature from the hidden fun place.
• Perhaps there could be depth or length restrictions on invasion tunnels.

Tunneling ought to be limited, slow, and balanced.

I agree with everyone's suggestions.

The positive side of "more active" nobles should also be emphasized:
*there are some bad ones, but some good ones too, most are in the middle; and most know the reason why they're still alive and allowed to be a noble is because the commoners don't hate them so much that they get together and overthrow them;
*they can call for help if the fortress is threatened, and it will probably come;
*they're skilled fighters, can organize the fortress defense, rather than relying on a militia, and their guards can help defend the fortress; primarily, the nobility should be a military caste, rather than a caste of rich parasites (of course, there are exceptions);
*assuming they're kept happy, they're perfectly content to let the commoners run the show; mayorial elections and managerial decisions still go on as always, common criminals are sent to the cages, chains, or the hammerer by the Sheriff's court.
*sometimes they might be motivated to start a metallurgical industry, expand Dwarven vintnery or explore the under-ground river, or even go hunting for hidden fun stuff;

Another dynamic that I would propose is that only the fortress guard can be used as soldiers with real weapons (of course, individual dwarves can fight, and defend themselves) until a noble arrives and militarily organizes the fortress. The fortress guard should be the stereotypical "band of peasants with torches, hoes, and pitchforks" led by a sheriff, who could be a minor swordsman; they should behave much as a squad of dwarven soldiers does now--run around scattered, return to the mess hall if hungry... they shouldn't be able to bear real arms, except for the few hunters, just farm implements or tools

When the noble arrives, he organizes the Dwarven Militia, which can turn dwarves--with drill, weapons, armor, lots of physical training, and plenty of time, into several squads of fine soldiers, able to face down even a great and numerous host of goblins.

This would be the nobility I'd like to see.

The hereditary nobility, as it currently stands, doesn't act like a "nobility" should. For instance, their deaths have no consequences, most of their demands can be ignored, they are unguarded, except if the player assigns a guard to them, they do not excessively tax the yeomanry or the peasantry, don't deflower dwarven peasant damsels who catch their eye (angering their families, perhaps even inciting a revolt), don't have friends who can bail them out of nearly any situation, regardless of the law, don't try to really order or micromanage their subjects, or pull truly idiotic stunts like only a hereditary nobility is capable of.

Introducing enhanced noble dynamics would be a great and fun addition to Dwarf Fortress. It would add an enemy within the fortress, rather than an annoyance to be disposed of through convenient accident.

Suggestions:
* Every noble, upon reaching adulthood is a trained fighter of some sort, and requires armor and weapons, or arrives with weapons if coming to a new fortress;
* Every noble personally arrives with several highly trained guards, rather than relying on the "DM" to designate their own "royal guard"; in the case of nobles born in the fortress, they could recruit and train their own guard.
* If a noble is locked into some room, the guards break down the door. If the noble is drowning, the guards, who are master swimmers, jump in, and haul him out. If the ceiling should collapse, his guards pull out their picks and dig him out of the rubble. If the noble is, say, threatened by his subject dwarves, the dwarves are traitors, and turned over to the Hammerer for disposal.
* The noble gets what he wants. If he wants a room, he sends his vizier (or his guards, if the vizier is ineffective) to summon a miner to dig it out to whatever dimensions He desires. If he wants it engraved, engravers are ordered to engrave his room. If he wants a chest, he sends his servants to take one from a peasant's shop, or failing that, from a peasant's home. If he demands a bed, because he is getting tired, his guards poke the sleeping carpenter with their swords, and order a bed made, and brought to his room. If he wants a new mayor, the old mayor is put on trial for "treason", and Hammered. If the noble is drunk and thinks the goblins besieging the fort are his long-lost hunt companions, he orders the gate opened, and a royal banquet to be thrown for them.
* Instead of having lower morale or designating some random dwarf for a hammering when their demands are not met, the noble ensures their demands are met by sending their guards to, for example, hold the mayor at sword-point, beat the **** out of several masons (or the mason's guild leader), threaten the book-keeper's children, or do something else nasty (especially to highly skilled dwarves) until they get their 10 obsidian statues.
* If, for example, the peasantry is restless or seditious, the noble is from a noble family (and has relatives living elsewhere) knighted by the Dwarf-King, and can request further guards--or even soldiers from the King--serving under the noble's personal command, to encourage the peasantry to comply with their reign.
* If the noble were to die of something other than natural causes or "misadventure", then his relatives in other mountain-homes would be rather upset, and might send parties of warriors to enforce accountability for his death. If those armies were defeated, then the King might get involved, sending several armies to reduce the fortress to a flaming wreck.
* It would be interesting if the user could highlight a noble and hit (o) to (o)verthrow them. Of course, if this occured unsuccessfully, the player might face the hammerer's wrath.
* Of course, if the peasantry were to resist the armies, then that fortress could form the nucleus of a new Dwarven Kingdom, or a Dwarven Republic.

for the heat source for boilers: in addition to magma, wood, and coal, we might want to add pitchblende, already mineable in the game, but not useful as of yet--fill the boiler with water, smelt the pitchblende into bars at the smelter, forge the bars into rods at the metalsmith, and install the pitchblende rods in the boiler. this could provide a way of getting lots of heat in a map without magma. you would only have to replace the pitchblende rods once every few years, probably, while generating a large quantity of steam constantly. what you do with the used rods? good dwarves could throw them into a below ground cistern filled with water, while bad dwarves might cast them into armor to sell to the elven treehuggers, forge bolts out of it for their crossbows and ballistas, or use it for "special" furniture for the rooms of their idling nobles who have given out one too many inconvenient mandates.

it would also add more, how shall we say, possibilities for "fun" into the game, especially when the goblins destroy the river water-pump feeding the boiler, or the dwarves shut the water valve for the boiler conveniently located amid the goblin horde milling outside the fortress walls. in addition, random events could occur, like a crack in the boiler, a rod exploding out of it, or a pump malfunctioning.

for more info, look up pitchblende at wikipedia to see what i'm getting at.

Having your dwarves haul stone out of the mines, piece by piece, when you dig, is kind of annoying, and cleaning up the 500 pieces of clothing and armor after those goblin sieges is also a real transport nightmare. I suggest an alternative to piece-by-piece hauling by dwarves, which would be to use mine cars/mine wagons, hitched to mules, and running on track, to take items to an appropriate stockpiling area (or just dump it into the chasm).

What could be done to implement this might be having mechanics build tracks, and carpenters build the wagons/cars. Horses/mules could be trained and hitched to these wagons. At certain points along the track, the player could build stockpiles adjacent to it, and then an option could come up to link the stockpile to the rail network. Each track-adjacent stockpile could have a selection of items that dwarves could put in, and items that wagons can put in. There even could be a special building built only on the edge of the chasm, which could serve to empty wagons/cars automatically. It could have a selection of items (or some kind of filtered item selection, like XX or X damaged items, or foreign items), that it would accept for auto-chasming.

If horses, mules, or ponies were chosen not to be used, well, you can always have the children taken away from their frolics to push the cars/wagons!