Bay 12 Games Forum

What's the current status on bringing back square tilesets to the ASCII graphics mode, or other tileset resolutions beyond the standard vertical rectangle?

Quote from: SamBucher on November 26, 2022, 12:44:27 pm

The Dwarf Fortress development page mentions "automatons and magical prostheses" as part of Myth&Magic. These features seems innocent on the surface level, but actually raise a lot of question (hopefully not too many to answer):
1. Are the prostheses only for limbs, or will there be ones for every organ?
2. How will prostheses fair in comparison to the original body part?
3. Will there be magical prosthetics that give the user magic powers?
4. Will it be possible to:
4,1. attach a prosthetic in addition to a being's natural body parts? Imagine a craftsdwarf having 4 arms, 2 natural and 2 artificial, increasing work speed.
4,2. replace a healthy body part with a prosthetic one?
4,3. mix and match parts (replace a dwarf's legs with prosthetic arms)?
5. How much of a dwarf's body can be replaced until he is considered an automaton?
6. Will automatons be able to take roles of nobility?
7. Will there be automaton models besides the standard humanoid worker?
8. What will be the upkeep costs of an automaton (I presume they won't need food and alcohol)?
9. Will you be able to have an automaton-exclusive fortress or play as an automaton in adventure mode?
10. Will it be possible for one to achieve immortality not via necromancy, but by replacing aging flesh with machinery/putting one's soul into an automaton body?[/color]
Thank you in advance!

Not Toady, but:

1. Probably; prostheses will have to be coded to be able to act as stand-ins for body parts and their functions (eg, GRASP), so why not the other functions as well?

2. Definitely would vary from world-to-world, and situation to situation. Some prostheses will be crude peg-legs and hook hands (pretty much all worlds will have this I imagine), others will be magical automail arms, others may be literally fully living organic replacements, or even be improvements over the original.

3. Definitely, in some worlds; prosthetics would be some sort of item/equipment/body part blend, and all of these are going to have potential to be magical.

4. I wouldn't be surprised if all of these were possible, given that lots of weird body transformation stuff is planned anyway.

5. May depend on the world. I'd guess it would be whenever their thought body part is replaced, and/or their soul is lost/replaced. What's the difference between a "flesh automaton" and a "normal person"? It's all fuzzy, just words.

6. Probably, depending on what "automaton" means, and may vary. Some may be mindless servants that can't act without orders from their creator, others may be freely willed beings. This answer goes for question 9 as well.

7. Absolutely; there's no way this game of all things will have hardcoded automaton models, especially in an update that aims to procedurally generate entire races. I guarantee that automatons will be treated in the code much like normal creatures are, but with relevant differences like different materials for their body parts, and different sustenance requirements etc (in many ways, a Bronze Colossus could be considered an "automaton" already, just uncontrollable and impossible to create).

8. Will vary from world to world without a doubt. Some will require absolutely nothing, some will require sacrifices of the best crops to the god of metal every full moon, others will be fueled by flesh & blood and will seek it out on their own accord, others will require the concentration/mana of their creator... And of course, some may need food.

10. Almost certainly, in some worlds. I expect there will be many of ways to achieve immortality, and many of them revolving around putting one's soul into something that doesn't age. Note that not all worlds may even have a such thing as souls at all (eg, the "zero magic" worlds).

Thank you for your response. It was rather narrow minded of me to think of automatons as just regular robots. I didn't even consider them being made out of flesh or other non-metal, non-mechanical materials. Also, your response to question 7 made me think of dwarves constructing a bronze colossus to protect their fortress. The mental image of a pair of those guarding the main entrance, unmoving statues, until a threat arrives, is really cool.