Bay 12 Games Forum

5-9-14: I have updated this reference with more types of "errors".

For the purposes of this post, creature variations were culled from the list - only the base creatures are included.
Some of the below behaviours may be "as intended" - dragons being immortal, elementmen being unbreedable, etc


Thanks to Vattic for the info on immortals and pets - http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=136374.msg5115622#msg5115622

I am currently working on putting together a small D&D-flavored mod (based on 3.5ed), which I will "release" if it stands up to my own scrutiny. It is not going to be any major world-changing badass overhaul like Masterwork or Genesis. Most of the mechanics - and animal-type critters - will be good old DF ones.

What I'm looking to add:
- all 7 major races
- 3+ evil minor races
- a relatively small number of D&D animal-types
- a few of the larger/nastier D&D critters as megabeasts
- race-specific SKILL_LEARN_RATES, attributes, personality traits, and weapons



In D&D, all the "major races" more or less get along most of the time - regional wars etc. notwithstanding. Dwarves and gnomes may not particularly LIKE half-orcs, but they usually tolerate them (or at least they usually aren't kill-on-sight).

So there will be two major divisions of races:

1. The "major races" - humans, dwarves, elves, half-elves, gnomes, halflings, and half-orcs. None of these will be "babysnatchers", aka auto-hostile. If I make all of them playable, picking any race among them should give you the benefit of being able to trade with at least most of the others.

2. The "minor races" - goblinoids (goblins, hobgoblins, bugbears, possibly all in one entity, or even just castes of one "umbrella" creature), orcs, and gnolls. These will be the "babysnatchers", aka automatically and permanently hostile to all major races. I am open to suggestions for other and/or replacement races here.


NOTES AND CAVEATS
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(1)

Obviously DF doesn't allow exact duplication of many D&D traits/attributes/etc.
I have done my best to approximate where possible - for instance, dwarves have a high average DISEASE_RESISTANCE, as I believe that's what the syndrome tag RESISTABLE checks, to simulate having "+2 poison resistance"
Other attribute approximations:

D&D Attribute -> DF Attribute(s)
STR -> STRENGTH
CON -> ENDURANCE + TOUGHNESS
DEX -> AGILITY
INT -> ANALYTICAL_ABILITY + MEMORY
WIS -> INTUITION + PATIENCE
CHA -> SOCIAL_AWARENESS + EMPATHY

So, for instance, dwarves would have:



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(2)

I will try to vary major races' ethics enough to cause at least occasional conflict, though this may require stepping out of D&D lore a bit, as most civilized races at least have a pseudo-compatible worldview with each other (e.g. eating other sapients and wearing their arse as a hat is generally a no-no), and wars in D&D lore are generally more regional/political than racial. Not much I can do about that afaik.

One other possibility is making each creature a CASTE within an "umbrella" creature. Problem with that, of course, being that they will then be able to interbreed (e.g. a halfling and a gnome marry and give birth to a half-orc), and they will all have access to the same ENTITY-related weapons, reactions etc., eliminating much of the variety.

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(3)

Drow/duergar/svirfneblin/etc are neat. But I don't think underground civs work like I'd need them to, to do them justice. I could just make them underground INTELLIGENT LARGE_ROAMING critters, but then they wouldn't have weapons, armor etc.

Or I could make them like current underground civs, where you'll run into one band of them somewhere in the caverns and then never see them again.

Or I could just ignore them and wait for a more fleshed out version of underground civs in a future DF.

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(4)

As D&D is quite magical and multi-planar and DF is... not, I will probably not be adding many celestial/infernal creatures - solars, glabrezus and the like - whose abilities are primarily magickish. I would be more interested in doing infernals, but I can't really replace clowns outright, so...

I will add a few here and there if they're fairly low-magic - barghests (in their 'taur form - head of goblin, body of wolf), ettercaps (spidery webslinging humanoids with poisonous bites), hippogriffs (horse-eagles) and such.

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(5)

My experience with D&D is limited to playing the Baldur's Gate and NWN series, though I do have here a copy of the Player's Handbook, and this as a guide to critters. I openly welcome criticism, ideas, etc. from people more knowledgeable with the source material. And people more experienced at modding DF. And just people in general really.









(On a somewhat unrelated note, I finally figured out how to make creatures more hard-headed, to hopefully eliminate some of the "oh no, the cat head-bumped him and it shattered his skull, forced the skull into the brain and tore his brain!"

So I'll be doing that too.)