Show Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.

Topics - Dwaref

Pages: [1]

DF Bug Reports / [40d11] Thief frozen in time.

« on: March 23, 2010, 10:09:51 am »

Over there to the side is the Dwarf thief frozen in time, and my thirsty, hungry, drowsy Lizardmen plebes afraid of it. This is the only way inside to the fort area, and the lot of them would have died in this neverending loop had i not discovered it.
I never had problems with thieves up until now. Raw-like their civ is the same as kobolds.
Sending the military over to kill him solved the problem.

Savegame available.

DF Bug Reports / [40d] Ghost seed won't be found! Dig Deeper mod.

« on: December 07, 2009, 09:37:37 am »

I've had this problem before, i would think it has been reported before, but i'm not sure. Didn't show up in the list of reported bugs.

I got a screen full of spammed job cancellations.
<Dwarfname> cancels plant seeds: needs <plantname> seed.

When i look in the Stocks screen i got exactly one seed left of the beforementioned type.
However, i cannot view it, nor zoom to it. I suspect it is simply not there, and that the Stocks screen is to blame.

The job manager though is convinced that it exists and sends out dwarves to PLANT THAT DAMN SEED, who then freak out when they cannot find it.

DF Bug Reports / [40d11] NVM a feature <Dwarves wear raw-restricted items!!!>

« on: June 10, 2009, 08:05:56 pm »

I run a race of lizardmen. I banned all clothing from their raws, so they can't produce any clothing, only armor.

They're the same size as humans, and share the same items. I just had a meeting with humans(they sieged me, i killed them), and BAM, my lizards get and wear human clothing!

I thought this stuff wasn't supposed to happen! Is it?

DF Suggestions / Skill/task/tool revamp

« on: June 08, 2009, 07:09:20 pm »

I think the skill system at large needs an overhaul.

Swung tools such as axes should have a speed and impact power per swing, depending on the dwarf's strength and the object's weight. The length of the haft should also have an impact for the final swing. A longer haft would demand space and swings slower. In combat, a longer axe's blow is easier to dodge, harder to defend with, but it packs more of a punch.
Tensile strength of the wood would also need to be taken into account, so that if you were ambushed when in the woods, and parried a chop from a goblin axeman with your haft, then your haft would need to be replaced, or eventually become splintered when you resume your work cutting trees.
The edge and hardness of the blade would also need to be taken into account. It would be nice if you could craft blunted swords and axes to use for inferior tasks. Say things like sparring, cutting through roots etc.

I am not an advocate of a 'skill system' that is all-encompassing. I prefer to divide up task execution between tools, dwarf 'stats' and 'knowhow'(skill).

Things such as the swing rate of an axe, the force per swing, the effective cutting power in the force, the fatigue suffered per swing and the accuracy of each swing, should be based solely on generic dwarf statistics, such as strength, coordination, toughness etc.
As well as the axe properties of course.
In the end given a tool and a dwarf, you get a list of possible manoeuvers the combo can execute.

The manoeuvers should be statted by:
force(low to high)
precision(low to high)
mode of delivery(stabbing, swinging, levering)
impact area/impact form(2x2[blunt], 2x1[edged], 1x1[pointed])
swing rate(fast to slow)
fatigue cost(two different axes who perform equal in terms of force/area/swingrate, can still have different weight)

So, a cobbler's hammer-needs (low force, high precision, swinging, small blunt impact area, fast swing rate, low fatigue cost), would require a small cobbler's hammer, and would himself need to have high precision, but not much in terms of strength or fatigue.
Say a dwarf who has need for an axe to cut roots in order to uproot a stump, would require(high force, low precision, swinging, large edged impact area, slow swing rate, high fatigue cost), and need to be strong and durable himself.
Possibly the axe could have a mattock-head also like a pulaski, which would act as(high force, low precision, levering, large edged impact area, slow swing rate, high fatigue cost), to uproot the stump or root in question.

Now to tasks. Tasks should require a number of manoeuvers, which is in turn matched to the dwarf in question. Each task should also have a required 'knowhow' to execute it.

The 'knowhow' should not just speed up the task, or halt it. It should be normal stuff you have problems with in everyday life!

Examples:
Knowing how to chop at a tree so the axe does not get stuck.
Knowing how to cut a tree so it falls away from you: Urist Mcswinger has been struck down by a falling tree!
Knowing how to stand not to hit yourself in the foot when you swing at the roots at your feet to remove the stump.

If you are unqualified and cutting down a tree, any of these things could happen. Special 'squads' of all professions should be able to distribute this advice. So every dwarf need not be on crutches in order to learn how to remove a stump.
HOWEVER, dwarf personality traits such as recklessness or disrespect for authority or society would even if they knew the skills be liable to chop up their feet. Incidents such as this would be great if they in time modified dwarf personality traits. In a squad of ten woodcutters, a reckless dwarf has withnessed four comrades in various states of inebtitude botch up and hit either themselves or others with the axe. One died of the gangrene later, one hobbles on crutches and is currently a leatherworker, and the other two display missing fingers and toes sometimes. The reckless dwarf's personality has in time shifted to be more cautious.
Still, given grief when the goblins make off with his son and plenty of alcohol in his system he may slip up and strike himself in the calf. If he had not only liked his dwarven wine so much, he could have avoided this disaster since his comrades also had alcohol-related accidents! Dominant traits shouldn't easily be adapted by exposure to its faults.

Tasks in themselves could have different requirements. Cutting roots or digging through soil could require a crude implement.
Cutting through rock or wood would require sharper, more durable implements that would need to be replaced often.

Light and short-hafted tools would be required for precision-work with a low workload. Let's say how cloth-working would require pins and needles. Leather-working is a step above and would require precise short sturdy pins and sharper tools, and demand some power. Stone detailing would require equally precise short but still sturdier tools and have a higher power still.
The more power an activity demands, the sturdier the implements need to be. You can't cut wood with a wooden axe.

Tasks of low precision but a high work load could be hacking away roots to up-root a stump. There is no penalty to hacking it to pieces. It could be done with a sturdy long-hafted and dull axe given enough time, given it's sturdy enough.

A dwarf should be able to use any tools available to him!
A task to harvest edible roots would be a task requiring a medium amount of precision and force.
Harvesting roots could use a low-precision axe which would ruin every other root, or it could use a low-force hammer and chisel and demand extra time expenditure.

This thread was inspired by all of the other ones, i'm hoping to gradually make a more coherent suggestion that spans the whole of DF.

DF Bug Reports / [40d11] Invaders half-hearted, break and run without fighting.

« on: June 01, 2009, 03:30:49 pm »

I just had a group of elves attack my settlement. They were provoked form hiding and shot a tame Cow to death with a flurry of arrows! After that they were undecided what to do. One of them shot at one of my fishermen a few times you can see a pair of misses and one hit in the upper screen, and gave him a brown wound in his lower arm.
Above-screen is a total of 14 additional shafts scattered above the site where they shot at the cow and the fishers. So they could shoot. But they later wouldn't. Relevant to this story is that even though i didnt kill that many of them, there were around 10 bow-elves in the initial group.
The cow and fleeing fishers dealt with, they just milled around, the whole group moving one square every once in a while.

Since all my lizardmen(innate swim, dam block 2, natural attacks, speed of 1200) are hunters(with plate) and have trained wrestling to 'wrestler'(except cripples, seen as recruits), i recruit everyone and order them stationed outside.

Well outside, all gathered and accounted for i order them over to the elves. I expect a bloodbath here.

The assigned group leader, however has fallen asleep.
I lose time, then i lose more time when half the sub-squad leaders also have gone away to do other things.
Anyway: Only three champion wrestlers, decent armor/shield/sword-users rush them in an act of suicidal insubordination. Note though that elves are almost twice as fast as my lizardmen by the raws: speed 700 vs 1200.

The fastest lizardman to get there by like a dozen squares has one elf shoot at him as he closes in, without wounding him. A meager amount of fire compared to the cow. The champ had max 1 arrow going at him at a time compared to the cow's 4 to 6.

He then plows into the main group of elves, gets entangled and cuts them up with his plain copper training sword. The other two follow suit.
During this whole encounter, i was sure i'd have a couple less champions to order around, but believe it or not, all the elves seem to flee my soldiers. After closing to melee, just one or two bowmen shot anything at all against them, and the wrestlers accompanying them just scatter. A pair of scattered shafts that were not fired at the cow, the fishermen, or the first advancing champion can be seen. There is some mild splatter by the entrance which implies someone else was hit and wounded in the gathered mass by the entrance, but it was nothing big.

The mess you see here, it was caused by three soldiers. And the killed mess is a small amount of a first attacking group. Mid-fight another group attacked, but they fled the scene quickly. There must have been 20-30 mounted elves, and they failed to wound any one of my three guys to even a light gray level.

What gives? We are in a terror/vengeance relationship, have been since i started on this map. Elves, dwarves, kobolds and goblins attack regularly(dwarves are really only duplicated kobolds, lizardmen took all the default dwarfy stuff).

I keep a log what people died from in the unit list by changing their profession after death. Even though elves attack as frequent or more frequently than goblins, goblins stand for 3/4ths of all deaths by invaders.

This stuff has been quite consistent over time, the last pair of elven ambushes havent killed anyone, and has done nothing but to present horse-meat for the butchers, and worthless bloody gear for me to sell to caravans or for lizardman to purchase.

DF Suggestions / Tool for patterned designations wanted.

« on: May 26, 2009, 02:14:05 pm »

Below is an image of my exploration shafts. I use these to look for clusters of gems etcetera.
They're a pain to 'd'esignate though. Either i place each manually, or i mark a large area, and then using 'x' remove bands horizontally and vertically until i get the shape i want.
For all this, all it amounted to was some platinium.

I'm thinking that you should be able to specify a pattern in the designation menu. Let's say you specify an area first(X,Y), and then mark within that area which areas are affected by the designation. The default 'd'esignation area should be a 1x1 square, which is marked.

It'd look like:
X

My pattern in such a system(where 'o's are unmarked) would look like:
Xoo
ooo
ooo

So if you marked up a 2*4 area with the default pattern it'd look like:
XXXX
XXXX

With mine:
XooXooXooXoo
oooooooooooo
oooooooooooo
XooXooXooXoo
oooooooooooo
oooooooooooo

It'd be a powerful tool for the otherwise laborsome designating of repetitive patterns.
Using it, you could also place up/down staircase designations by pattern, and make exploratory shafts downwards for any distance with minimal effort, after you've placed a down staircade by pattern at the top.

DF Bug Reports / [40d11] F/D duplicate in inventory for duplicate items. Same item?

« on: May 25, 2009, 08:14:45 pm »

~~Forbid and Dump ordering affects items that look the same in a unit's inventory.~~

I am designating held equipment for dumping for my wrestlers, and one guy has a mountain goat leather armor one in his right hand, and the other in his left.
When i forbid or dump any one of them, the order extends to his other one.

I checked if the same thing applied to other items in other wrestlers, but it did not duplicate. While the items i did find did not seem to differ in terms of name, they did differ in terms of which kinds of splattered goo was on them.
About now i'm thinking that the problem items exact duplicity and 'bugged' nature may not be coincidence.

Now I'm thinking that PROBABLY what has happened is that my wrestler has grabbed ONE item SEPARATELY with both hands, and won the item. This way the SAME item is referenced from the two entirely separate item entries in the inventory menu.

It would be better if the item displayed:

mountain goat leather armor, Multigrasp

rather than:

mountain goat leather armor, Right hand
mountain goat leather armor, Left hand

It gives the illusion that there are more items in the character's possession than there really is.

DF Bug Reports / 40d10 Refuse orders don't update tasks. Also, forbid orders, in/out revamp etc.

« on: March 24, 2009, 08:17:07 pm »

Okay, i started a fort out-of-doors. Since i want the dwarves to clean the butcher shops(avoid cluttering), i allow them to gather refuse from outside.
Then suddenly they start hauling ass all over the map, where some troglodytes/batmen are killing critters.
Initially there was three dead bats which i tracked down from the stocks menu.
At this point i don't wish to forbid the bat remains, since it seems like a hassle to do manually. Also i'm sure that there will be more bats and critters killed in due time.
I decide to take a different sort of action, and go into the refuse orders menu. So, initially i forbade only non-economic refuse to be gathered(i.e. chunks, remains etc i should think). The remainder was to be dumped, which wasn't a problem since i don't have a dump. They should leave the stuff alone then, right?
No dice. They still even after being recruited so they'd forget about it, went for those remains.
Still going back there, i forbid ALL refuse hauling. Cancelling orders, not helping. They still go back.
What follows are 15 minutes of skirmishes with troglodytes, recruiting and tantrums. The dwarves only lived since they're really modded into lizardmen, but this should have small impact on the problem at hand.
Long story short, none of those who set out to get the bats, ever got to them before facing a monster and fleeing/being recruited, kicking ass, and forgetting about it.
After all the batmen and troglodytes were dead though, they still craved and hunted down those bat remains. So, after all this time, the first of four of my starting seven reaches his prize...

Aaaand, decides he doesn't really want it, since the refuse orders forbid gathering bat remains.

Seems to me that this thing is unintended, and would swiftly have killed of a normal player's dwarves, if he did not manually forbid these remains, or manually forbade his dwarves to gather refuse in the labors menu.
It'd be nice if new refuse orders looped through all tasks/items at hand and modified them accordingly.

Also, I'd like to make a complaint about forbidding 'ammo'. I think it's great for bolts, but not other weapons. Maybe you could make an item-check to see if the item is a projectile?
The code as it stands does not only forbid crossbow bolts lost on the map or stuck in critters, but also stuck-in spears and probably also pick-axes and any other weapon capable of sticking.
As i don't like crossbows my hunters use wooden spears(modded, add [RANGED:SPEAR:BOLT]) in hunting, and they're frequently hunting with {forbidden} weapons. As soon as they lose grip of them, they have to be reclaimed to be used again. Spears frequently get stuck-in, and are mostly successfully retrieved by the hunter. It's however not unusual for a hunter to lose the weapon, gladly leaving the forbidden item behind.
Even if the hunter is equipped with two of them, and there are spare ones at home, they are lost at an alarming pace. I had one hunter attacking a deer, and lost both spears to stuckins, and the animal made off with them, hunter in tow.

I'd like to see this whole indoor/outdoor thing revamped as well. It'd be nice if we had some form of zone called 'living space' or something like that. It would replace in/out-space, with respects to moving refuse and seeking refuge. This would mean that you could choose to ask dwarves to clean out-door butcher shops without running off to collect critter remains killed by hostile creatures.
Or for that matter, uninhabited indoor spaces would also not be cleaned if it's not neccecary. Say cat-killed cave spiders deep into the mining tunnels etc. Or trog-killed cave spiders.

This recruiting business is also sketchy. It'd be nice if a forbidden process in action told concerned dwarves about it, so they could stop. Hunting, fishing and hauling in particular are actions you have to frequently stop by recruiting.

DF Suggestions / Sparring, weapon skills and the military, hunting overhaul.

« on: September 30, 2008, 11:12:34 am »

You can get dwarves to become legendary weapon users without becoming heroes or champions if you don't spar them. I got a legendary hunter that wrestled critters yesterday.
When i put him sparring, he became an elite wrestler and then a champion in one punch.
When i drafted him, he did not show any signs of becoming elite/champ.
If he had thrown a punch against an enemy while drafted, maybe he'd become elite/champ. I don't know.

What i do know, is that this is pretty wonky. This hunter never became elite or a champion when fighting animals. Presumably he wouldn't have become if he had fought a goblin who ambushed him either.
If this hunter would get these statuses from normal drafted combat, then i could ruin a perfectly good hunter just by drafting him as an emergency backup. Never to hunt again.
If this hunter would NOT gain these statuses from fighting, but only from sparring ; then why spar at all?

Sparring is hazardous as it is, not because it'll injure your dwarves, but because you could leave them sparring a bit too long and lose a perfectly good legendary craftsdwarf to become a soldier by mistake.

In addition to the current dangers of sparring, I would rather not find a back-door to creating legendary super-soldiers that can draft, undraft and work and fight equally well. Just train a swordsdwarf to legendary combat skill by using him to hunt, and making sure he never touches a sparring room.
No other class is possibly as much in danger of becoming hero-ranked soldiers as hunters assuming they rank from drafted combat, and i think we need to patch this potential backdoor/pitfall as well as enforce some sort of consistency between ranks and professions.
High weapon skills should equal high military rank, especially if this rank is enforced(which it is, you can't unrank dwarves). If high weapon skills are allowed without high military rank like in the case of hunters, then you should be able to train weapon skills in alternative ways besides hunting, that won't spoil a dwarf.

I will however argue that high skill = military rank. And thus the problem lies in setting caps on skill so peasants don't blunder into it, or install safeguards so that the correct military rank is put on everyone who crosses the skill threshold.

So my first suggestion is that all military should also be allowed to hunt, as well as use stealth in combat. Goblins do it, kobolds do it, why should our military not know how to 'hunt' enemies. As well as animals for that matter. In most cultures warriors act as hunters during peaceful times.

You could set a third option in the military screen. 'On duty', 'Standing down' and 'Hunting'. The 'Hunting' option would work exactly like how a hunter would act if his sole labor was set as hunter. Minus all the other stuff that civilians do ofc. No harvesting, dragging owned items or moving items to depot etc.

Hunters already are allowed to carry the same weapons and armor as soldiers, so it will be a small step. Also, we can get competent individuals to hunt. If we can set squads to hunt and improve the stealth code a bit so all unstealth when one is spotted, we can get hunting-teams, and further be able to improve creatures! We will thus be able to make elephants bloodthirsty again. Most killed hunters aren't used to fighting, and if we train them they are likely to become elite soldiers who won't hunt! This is a problem and needs to be dealt with.

As it stands predators mangle inept dwarves while nonpredators unconditionally flee.
Yesterday i withnessed a dwarf run several laps around the map fighting a horse with a yellow spine-wound that crawled and attempted to flee. The dwarf was exhausted, but his hammerskills and poor-quality crossbow couldn't even touch that horse.

Also as a sidenote, dwarves shouldn't be able to outrun horses even if they're 'agile'.

Second suggestion is that i am requesting an ability to set a soldier-switch in the 'm'ilitary menu.
It would mean that the tagged dwarf will normally stop recieving all experience for combat skills to put them over the elite limit. That way you could put civilians to spar all weapon skills, armor skills and shield skills up to the 'Accomplished' level without worrying that they'll turn soldier. Professional soldiers would be manually soldier-marked and be allowed to progress to hero status.
I, for one, would think that'd rock.

We would remove the issue with every dwarf being assigned the 'hunting' labor and carrying around a crossbow, when all game is depleted. All hunters would be a type of soldier that won't perform ordinary tasks.

I still advocate for civilian weapons, minor weapons like daggers, brass knuckles etc, but also improvised weapons in the form of tools.
These would be reduced in power like how the crossbow butt is to the hammer, and how the pick is to the spear. Example tools would be knives, hand-hammers, hatchets etc. Tools of the trade.

DF Suggestions / Reduced life span of creatures ; lower worldspin

« on: September 27, 2008, 07:55:12 am »

We're pretty often talking about such as bloodlines, birth defects etc etc.

However, dwarves just live too damned long - kids are pretty much just a novelty, and we rely wholeheartedly on immigration to fill up vacancies in the fortress.
I'd like to see my dwarves be born, grow up to then slowly die of old age, and their children take their place.

Therefore i'd like to suggest that each season counts as two years in-game. That way a dwarf who is '50' years old will have lived through around 6 in-game years, and will die in another 12(max age 150:170). Also maybe an option to get bad relations with the mountainhome so they'll stop sending idiots to harass(join) me.
It can be justified in just assuming that the world has an eight times slower spin-rate than our earth. A season CAN take more time than a quarter-year does for us.

Children would grow up from being infants in half a season, and children will become adults after two years. This should be tweaked somewhat. Say that dwarves grow to children after '4' years, and that they become adults in say '32'. That is half a year VS 4 years. With an average dwarf life of 20 'years' maybe it'd be a good age.
Another more attractive option would be to introduce another age group 'youth' - that way we wouldn't have 12-year old dwarves drafted into the militia, but 'youths' from age 12 to maybe age 20 that will perform tasks, but with substantial stat penalties maybe.
NOTE: also tired of the super-mighty children who slaughter intruders by the boatload(better stats than most dwarves) when all they do is hang around the meeting hall with the nobles.

I'd like this as an option to play a truly generational fortress(maybe started with as few as two dwarves(and their' offspring)). Earlier i modded in lizardmen to play as, and was cut off from caravans and migrations ; probably because i set some tags wrong.

What i found though, is that i developed a much deeper sense of attachment to my seven lizardmen than i did my dwarves, since dwarves are kind of expendable. We get too many of them, and have no option to really grow some of our own.

In fact, i have it as a regular practice to assign all dwarves who aren't craftsmen into a 'laborer' Custom Job title and assign them by the boatload using dwarven foreman. Two groups of them double as the militia, and take turns doing stuff and training.
Even then, the craftsmen who are left are 'weaponsmith' 'backup weaponsmith' etc etc.
No matter what happens, everyone will be expendable. Without a history, even the starting seven blend in and become 'just another immigrant'.

I think i'll mod the dwarves a bit and try it.
Anyone know how to disable contact with the mountainhome?

DF Suggestions / Realistic Mining Suggestion

« on: September 15, 2008, 09:26:44 pm »

Moria was not built Overnight!
Realistic mining would change one of the fundamental principles of Dwarf Fortress ; that you're eating through solid rock like a mole!
At the moment, smoothing stone is a lot slower than actually mining out the space to be smoothed!

When improvements to the world generation, the introduction of soil and the ability to progress and survive in the outdoors without mining at all took place, we need to make mining itself harder, just as we need to make outdoor farming harder.
The fortress should be the culmination of a long well-played game, not a birthright carved out and trapped in the first year!

Code for cave ins and supports for different kinds of material is requested. A tunnel through sand should be very hard (if not impossible) to maintain. Creating supports could be made similar to smoothing, but would require wood.

Pockets of methane and carbon dioxide and seepage of the same into mined tunnels should be implemented. This would perferably only happen in the proximity of coal.
The effects could spread like miasma, and could seep from pockets of gas through mountain into tunnels like aquified water is currently implemented(albeit with a limited source).
The effects of this gas could be akin to drowning when immersed in water. The effects would perferably be invisible at first and cause winding, unconsciousness and death as the ratio of the deadly gas to air is increaced.
Methane should also be easily flammable and cause horrific explosions when exposed to an open flame or a spark. This can be implemented in a lighting mod, which could provide illumination in the form of torches or lanterns.

Real mining practices like setting fires to heat and soften the rock before mining it should be implemented. Mining should be slowed down considerably. Mining through soil shouldn't be barely twice as fast as mining through rock.

Mining should give rise to all the waste material the space contained in the form of dirt or gravel.
One could discard dirt and gravel by packing them into new, solid spaces, or taking them off-map for dumping.
Implementing the hauling suggestion in the form of lifts, carts, rail, stacking and animals of burden would also be a requirement.

DF Bug Reports / Fortress guard kills criminals! 40c

« on: August 31, 2008, 10:37:01 am »

Okay, this is starting to get on my nerves.
So far the fortress guard has killed four of my criminals.

Just normal dwarves who tantrummed one time too often, and kicked their cat before regaining their senses.

BAM, the fortress guard swarms them and kills them.
They aren't even good fortress guards, i got 48.. sorry 44 dwarves and ordained 4 of them to be the guard. All i asked of them was that they were Novice wrestlers, and got a full set of armor.

They are supposed to imprison these guys right? Or at least issue a beating if one's called for right?

None of these last four kills were issued a beating.
One legendary Bonecrafter was severely beaten to the point that he got a series of wounds, of which two yellows and a red persist today. He was supposedly spared further imprisonment since he is now too injured. For some reason though, he probably survived since he wasn't considered a threat like the cook in the story below.

They murdered my Cook, my Brewer, my Carpenter, and my Mason - all of my dwarves who got some real skill, and who gave something to the community.

They just dog pile them like they were a critter like a groundhog, a kobold or a snatcher!

I know that one of them is issued to take care of the problem, either them or the sheriff. To lock up the offender i mean. I got 7 cages or restraints that are set to be used by dwarven justice, so thats not a problem.

However, since my 4 guards and single sheriff add up to being 5 dwarves, there's a slim chance that the proper dwarf to handle the criminal and restrain him shows up before the 4 others do, and by that time, he's dog food.
I think it's overkill to issue the military against a tantrummer who was only 'starting a fistfight' to get a good thought. There's a difference between tantrumming and berserking! Berserking is not just a slap and a return to moping, but full-out carnage. An irreversable condition in which the dwarf will fight until he drops dead. It's depressing that the guards treat these two states as equals.
Just send out the ordained jailer and let it stop at that. No need to flag the criminal as an enemy.

This isn't the only problem though. Even when a criminal is flagged as an enemy, and is set after BY his jailer - this happens.

The setting is this ; my cook was in the wilderness when he tantrummed. Smacked up some masterless pets. He was probably getting the stuff that the goblins dropped in the goblin ambush earlier. In any case, he was far from the barracks - and thus he wasn't availible to be mobbed by the fortress guard.
A solitary member of the guard sets out to find him ; his jailer.

My cook was very agile, while his pursuer was only agile, and the poor Cook was chased around the map and spamming interrupt messages before he died.

COOK cancels drink ; interrupted by GUARD
GUARD cancels Large Creature Caging ; interrupted by COOK
ad infinitum

Of course the COOK also interrupted every other of my dwarves, they seemed to fear him as if he was some soulless critter like a groundhog or something. The COOK himself only seemed to fear the GUARD after him.

Anyway, after he was caught up with, the GUARD proceeded to pummel him as is part of his MILITARY aspect. He could do no other since his JUSTICE aspect was steadily getting cancelled.
AFTER he's beaten the dwarf into submission, he attempts again to cage him.
GUARD cancels Cage Large Animal ; Target too injured.

And then proceeds to kill him where he lies!

Do note that the Cook had never again performed any sort of aggressive action. He had three disorderly charges(three animals got beaten) that happened long before he was set upon, he had been free of tantrumming and trying his best to return to his dwarvenly existence for a long time. He was steadily trying to return for a drink only to get chased away.

I stress again, that he was NOT insane at the time. I was quite upset at the outcome. All four outcomes, really. When i wasn't watching i could at least imagine that the victims had freaked out somehow. I now realize that they probably wouldn't if they hadn't been beaten beforehand and been pushed over the brink of berserking. However, none of them were set to be beaten.

Long story short, while a good idea in theory, i am officially disbanding my own fortress guard and leaving matters to the sheriff only.
As long as he's a civilian, he shouldn't indiscriminately kill people.

However again, i am troubled by the cancelling of jailings and the hostility-flagging of normal dwarves. It may be that i should start to consider criminals just like insane dwarves and just dismantle the jails if they're never going to be used. Even the sheriff cannot cage such dwarves, they have to be killed or they'll just make life hard for everyone else who avoids them like the plague, even their own jailers.

This is a bit over the top though, around half of my criminals weren't flagged as hostile and killed in cold blood. My bonecarver as described above wasn't flagged hostile, just mashed up and broken. What's interesting is that he had the exact same offenses as my Cook, but the Bonecarver wasn't flagged hostile. I got a jailed murderer who they treated with more care than the Mason got. The Mason was killed for slapping a horse next to the barracks, and then crawlingly attempting to flee the fortress guard as they dogpiled him and killed him.

I also got four other criminals who weren't issued beatings and they're caged up snugly, waiting to be released when they're even more depressed.

DF Bug Reports / drinking from lakes/streams impossible - 'open space' 38c

« on: June 28, 2008, 07:01:49 am »

it's kind of bumming me out when i pick a stream on the map expecting to drink from it, only to realize that while you can fish off it easily enough, you cannot drink from it because it counts as an 'open space'.
that is, while the water level below the stream is 7/7, meaning that it is full to the brim, the next square over it in the Z axis fails to have even a 'floor' or water(compare to a brook), and you simply cannot drink from it.
lakes are not very usable at the moment, and another annoyance is that within a season dry up and don't replenish.

i would make a ramp into these bodies of water, but then i would expect dwarves to stumble around and drown in it instead. i really think adding a water-roof for 7/7 water-squares, like is done on brooks is the most sensible solution.

had a pickless fort die of dehydration even though they had piles of freshly fished turtles.