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Messages - Rysith

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46
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: Siege Frequency
« on: December 31, 2010, 03:25:55 pm »
Are you sure about the once a year thing?
I remember an orc mod in 40d which was basically a raw set and those bastards would siege you more or less every season from your first winter onwards regardless of wealth or population size.


But yeah, usally you just have to mod in new civs and regen a world.

The Orc mod had only one Orc civilization, but came early, so the sieges started before you were really ready for them and continued as you tried to recover from them. The one/year/civ is approximately correct, and seems to hold in DF2010 as well. I'm not sure if the Dig Deeper mod maintained the single Orc civ, or if they added multiple civs. I suspect not, since I found in testing the Orc mod that more than one Orc civ was really excessive.

Just produce more wealth, and more goblins should show up


This is unfortunately untrue. The number of siegers seems to be random but generally increasing, up to five squads of 16 (80 invaders + mounts), and have much more to do with how many previous sieges you have had than wealth or anything like that.

Spoiler: off topic (click to show/hide)

47
DF Gameplay Questions / Re: save game Q
« on: December 31, 2010, 03:06:54 pm »
To expand on what ext0l said...
In response to the nemesis unit failures and such, recent versions of DF (both 40d and DF2010) keep all of their active files in a temporary directory, and only write back to the main one when you actively save. Thus, there won't be any permanent effect on your game other than needing to re-play from your last save.

48
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: Apartment Block Designs?
« on: December 29, 2010, 02:13:26 pm »
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

It's a variant on the "whirlpool" housing from the bedroom design page, and fits 24 apartments into an easily-tileable 24x24 block

49
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: What's your siege strategy?
« on: December 29, 2010, 02:43:46 am »
Step 1: Locate enemies
Step 2: Send military to enemies
Step 3: Melt dropped armor, dump other stuff.

Replace step 2 with "wait patiently for enemies to move to the fortress entrance, so that step 3 doesn't take forever" and you have mine.

50
Dear Urist McClothier,
  Although I know that you aren't really a people person, and you are correct that the soon-to-be water cistern is a nice, large, empty room where you can get away from the sound of your fellow dwarves, it is not an appropriate place for you take your break.

Regards,
Your Overseer

51
Thank you to whoever drew my name. Your gift is, in fact, full of stars, and will go nicely with all of the other things around that confirm me as a total but unrepentant nerd.

52
Creative Projects / Re: Bien's Less Than 500 Meter Starships!
« on: December 19, 2010, 08:45:49 am »
Since when did a modeling thread become a science thread?
Since you admitted that you were trying to make a spaceship that was trying to be realistic, rather than a more space-opera-y battleship-in-space, and then moreso when you started mentioning things like VASIMR.

As a side note, that's an enormous amount of fuel. Remember that most 'realistic' spaceflight is spent drifting, especially since you've got the spinal gun and thus you'll want to be able to approach a target to within firing range[1], engage it, and only then rotate to decelerate. I remember Atomic Rockets (http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/) being a decent resource for working out as many of the realistic space flight issues as you care to (and I also fully support handwaving at least some).

[1] Firing range is going to be dependent on whether it's a beam weapon or a projectile weapon, but is basically defined as the point when the target cannot shift itself enough to avoid a hit in the time that it takes your sensors to find them and then your projectile to reach them. Lasers are a bit more complicated because, although they are faster, they also have focus issues, but the principle is the same as long as you aren't shooting at large and/or low-acceleration things.

53
DF Modding / Re: Siege triggers
« on: December 18, 2010, 06:59:53 pm »
If you want to be besieged at 20 dwarves, use

[PROGRESS_TRIGGER_POPULATION:1]

FYI, the corresponding levels of population to pop-trigger are:

0: most likely will attack instantly
1: 20 dwarves
2: 50 dwarves
3: 80 dwarves
4: 110 dwarves
5: 140 dwarves

Also, I can tell you from creating the Fortress Defense Mod that the PROGRESS_TRIGGER_POP_SIEGE and similar tags will not work without the normal PROGRESS_TRIGGER tags. The PROGRESS_TRIGGER_X_SIEGE tags are used when a civ is capable of launching both ambushes and sieges like goblins; the tag governs when it changes its attack strategy.

Quite accurate, with one change (that I know of): PROGRESS_TRIGGER 0 means that the trigger is ignored, not instant.

I forget what the exact values for trade (exported wealth) and production (created wealth) are, other than that production maps to the name of the record keeper (record keeper -> hoardmaster, I believe), and that first trade trigger is at just over 1000 exported wealth.

54
General Discussion / Re: Bay12 Commune - For Realz
« on: December 08, 2010, 11:05:30 pm »
I'd say "In as a shareholder", except that I'm already out of college and with a job (that I quite enjoy), so unless it happened to land in the SF Bay Area I'd be unlikely to actually be able to join it.

55
General Discussion / Re: Bay12 Secret Santa Thread: Sign up!
« on: November 16, 2010, 10:03:10 am »
Currently waffling... need to check on postage for a specific kind of package.

In case it's relevant... USPS has a very nice "media rate" for books and such.

56
General Discussion / Re: Bay12 Secret Santa Thread: Sign up!
« on: November 16, 2010, 02:18:44 am »
This does seem fun. I'll sign up, and someone will get something that they will hopefully enjoy.

57
Creative Projects / Re: Hard Science Planets!
« on: November 14, 2010, 06:06:43 pm »
Wouldn't the most realistic hard planet be

"Iso122

Planet is composed mostly of plagioclase feldspar, cumulate rock, and various silicates and contains a molten iron/nickel core. It lacks an atmosphere and and no longer generates a magnetic field powerful enough to shield it from solar winds. Several deposits of rare elements have been discovered in its crust but no organic molecules have ever been discovered. Surface temps fluctuate between 745K and 120K.  "

Considering that most planets are just hunks of rock without much interesting on them.

You'd be surprised. That sounds like a planet fairly close to a star (of which, of course, there are some), but surprisingly quickly you get out to the point where the surfaces are mostly ices (water ice 'close' to the star, then carbon dioxide and methane, and then other gasses) rather than rock, since their atmospheres (or what would have been their atmospheres) freezes to the surface when you aren't talking about the habitable band. Additionally, carbon is reasonably common throughout the universe, as is water, and so it doesn't seem unreasonable to have some kind of self-reproducing stuff on planets that do form within the habitable zone, along with some reasonably basic similarities to earth life (For example, some sort of solar energy harvesting organism, some way to regulate internal environment such as either ectothermic behaviors or endothermy, and some sort of food chain - why bother gathering energy yourself when there are all these concentrations of stored energy around? Heads or distributed nervous systems in larger animals are also reasonably likely, because nerve length between sensory organs and the brain is directly proportional to reaction time).

Now, we can argue about the probabilities of planets that can sustain life as we know it, but from what we've observed thus far we have 1/8 planets that will support life in our own solar system (and 1/4 non-gaseous planets), and as we refine our observations of other stars we are seeing that stars with planets aren't uncommon, and that 8 is a bit high but not abnormally so. But that in and of itself can be balanced by the fact that we're looking for the interesting planets, and the ones with life (or the potential for life) are the interesting ones: For every Brahe II, Aurora, or Chasm there may be tens or hundreds of Iso122s, but that still leaves a lot of garden worlds around.

As balance, though, I'll contribute Brahe IV (yes, I made a whole solar system: one star, eleven planets and one asteroid belt. Brahe IV is the third most habitable, by the numbers), phrased as the colonization feasibility report made by the Dyson upon arrival in the system.

Brahe IV, orbiting at 1.02 AU with a diameter of 8800km and a significant moon, would ordinarily be seen as an ideal colonization candidate. However, Brahe's low luminance means that Brahe IV has an average surface temperature of -50 C, a surface covered in water ice, and an atmosphere that, while reasonably dense, is essentially devoid of oxygen. Surface gravity is estimated at .7G. Colonization would be possible, but would require a significant investment - heating would be required and a stable supply of oxygen would be needed (though oxygen compounds such as carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide are present in the atmosphere, so gasses would not need to be imported). Although the thickness of the ice and the precise surface composition are unknown, the ice is believed to be no more than one kilometer thick and density measurements indicate that the surface is rocky with a nickel/iron core. Once again, a subterranean colony would likely be the most viable option, likely tunneling through to the surface both for construction materials and to avoid the dangers of melting the surrounding ice through heat-producing activity. Brahe IV is not thought to harbor any native life.

58
Creative Projects / Re: Hard Science Planets!
« on: November 14, 2010, 01:03:08 pm »
Brahe II is a large terrestrial planet that was one of the initial candidates for extrasolar human colonization. Orbiting at just under half an AU from Brahe (a K2-class star just under one third of Sol's luminosity 20.4 light years distant) and massing around three times Earth, and more importantly possessing detectable levels of atmospheric oxygen and water vapor, it was thought to be capable of easily supporting human life without extensive equipment, and the thermonuclear Orion colony ship Dyson was launched with 20,000 colonists aboard to gather more information and, if possible, establish a colony. The total flight time was nearly three hundred years.

On arrival, several aspects of Brahe II that made it less than ideal for colonization were discovered. Brahe II is close enough to its parent star to nearly be tidally locked, experiencing four 720-hour days per year. The high surface gravity (around 1.5 earth) lead to an extremely thick atmosphere (7.5 times earth normal at local sea level), which in turn trapped more radiation from Brahe than previously supposed, causing an average surface temperature of 57.1 Centigrade. The high temperature, coupled with the long days and reasonable hydrographic coverage, causes constant storm systems moving from the hot day side to the cooler night side. The sky is always cloudy, it is rare that it is not raining, and even periods when there are not thunderstorms are uncommon. Despite this, Brahe II has extensive native life, though none of it intelligent. Both the oceans and land are essentially covered with plant-like life, ranging in size from single-celled algae to dense woody land plants up to 10 meters tall. A wide variety of small animals can be found living around the plants, with extensive populations of herbivorous animals less than 50cm in length. All specimens recovered so far have been ectothermic, often possessing significant evaporative cooling areas to maintain body temperature. The lack of larger animals is thought to be attributable to the difficulties of supporting a large body in the higher gravity, and the largest native animals are roughly the size of a large Earth dog. The high plant coverage contributes to the high oxygen partial pressure of 35%, increasing the flammability risk of anything not soaked by the rain and necessitating oxygen-reducing masks at all times. Survey teams report that unassisted movement is difficult, but not impossible, and the Dyson's crew believe that an underground colony (to shield them from the worst of the temperature and weather) would be viable.

59
General Discussion / Re: Mathematics Help Thread
« on: November 09, 2010, 10:42:59 am »
Imagine that you have two dice, one with A sides, and one with B sides.

If you roll both dice, what is the chance that the number gotton from the dice with B sides is greater than the number gotten from the dice with A sides?

I, being a computer science person, would do that with case analysis:

Consider each possible result from the die with B sides
  For each result, compute the probability that the roll on A is lesser. Thus, if you are looking at 3 and A=6, then you have a .5 chance.
  But, since each result is only a possible result, divide by the probability of rolling that result.
  Add the probability of each result being greater than the roll on A, multiplied by the probability of getting that result, to a running total.

now, your running total is your answer.
Spoiler: example (click to show/hide)


60
DF Modding / Re: Editing an embark
« on: November 04, 2010, 09:51:49 am »
No, it's not possible to edit an embark post world gen.

There is the world painter, so you can alter the world that generates, and you can (if you're feeling brave) alter the raws to allow the kind of minerals that you are looking for in more layers (again, pre-worldgen, but it means that you can have, say, magnetite in metamorphic rock), but that won't help you add things like magma pipes to existing embarks.

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