Bay 12 Games Forum

Quote from: Owlbread on October 08, 2012, 06:52:02 pm

Quote from: GreatWyrmGold on October 08, 2012, 05:25:02 pm

Quote from: Owlbread on October 08, 2012, 09:41:58 am

Quote from: GreatWyrmGold on October 07, 2012, 06:45:51 pm

I was mostly trying to point out that using the fun of Oregon trail to "prove" that a caravan-following-system would be fun for DF doesn't work.

But I think we could work out a caravan-following-system for DF that would be fun. What would it have to be like to be fun?

Not distracting me from my fortress? That would be a good start.

Adventure mode escorting could be fun.

It certainly wouldn't distract you from your fortress. How would it?

Which, escorting in AM or following in DM?

To be honest, my idea of caravan following would work a lot more like adventure mode. I wouldn't even call it following, I'd say guiding. But either, really. How would either distract you?

But surely the problem isn't caused by people in modern, western countries having too many weans, it's people in countries like India and the like who have are poorly educated and have vast amounts of children en masse. How on earth are you going to stop them from having so many kids? Given that some of these countries, like Mali and Somalia, can barely enforce the rule of law?

Quote from: Owlbread on October 08, 2012, 11:39:36 am

But surely once things are more stable in the USA, there will be plenty of time for space programs?

The USA is stable, hence why it is important to both combat climate change and fund the space program right now. The sooner we get material returns from space exploration the better. Earth only has so much to offer us, no matter how well we conserve.

But isn't America currently riddled with economic hardship?

How about looking at this differently:



Maybe in adventure mode you can choose to lead an expedition team to a suitable place. As you do, there's options being opened up in Dwarf Mode to embark with these expeditions.

Otherwise, you'll have to do with play now-type of embarks.

That way, you have some choices, yet if you really want a very specific place to go to you'll have to look it up in adventure mode, and your succes as adventurer will allow for the quality of the embark.

I thought about that, but my concern was that it forces people who really want a specific site to use the journey/adventure expedition system.

Quote from: Cruxador on October 08, 2012, 02:35:44 am

Quote from: Kogan Loloklam on October 08, 2012, 12:24:56 am

Did Toady ever mention about people being not willing to slaughter incapacitated foes? I recall running from battle and not escalating conflict, but nothing about sympathy or mercy, or squemishness.

Sympathy and mercy don't sound like the sort of things that Toady would add.

I still think that should affect all things except dwarves and goblins.

Just because the playerbase has people in it who are truly merciless and terrible does not mean that Dwarves themselves are planned to be merciless and terrible.

I think political discussions on internet forums suffer when they become embroiled in such irritating jargon as Godwin's Law, Strawmanning, Cherry Picking, Trolling, Flame War and the like. I think if you actually refer to what these phrases mean - rather than saying "Dude you're strawmanning me quit it", how's about "your argument is fallacious because you're misrepresenting my position". My concern is that if you keep using the expression "strawmanning" you're going to end up with people who don't know what that word means and it will become corrupted and used for other inappropriate purposes, rather like the words "fascist" and "communist" for "totalitarian" and so on.

George Orwell's fifth rule: "(v) Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent."

Quote from: Roflcopter5000 on October 07, 2012, 05:30:10 pm

So... I don't think guiding the Caravan would have to be boring at all.

Oregon trail is an entire game built around essentially doing exactly that, and it was a blast.

Oregon Trail was a game about travel. Dwarf Fortress is not. I'm not a student of recreational theory, but time-consuming things that distract from a game's main activity tend to by less fun.

Dwarf Fortress is a fantasy world simulator. It incorporates many genres of games - RTS/city builder, roguelike adventure, I don't see why we can't incorporate a game about travel into the mix. And anyone who plays adventure mode will tell you that you do a hell of a lot of travelling. The OP also clearly stated that you wouldn't have to do it if you didn't want to.