Bay 12 Games Forum

I see and use the ‼‼ descriptor on Science a lot where it really doesn't apply, but I think this is one of the times it's appropriate to do so.

So a few seasons ago, I encountered Sosmil, a towering humanoid composed of fire. Beware its thirst for warm blood!(or something, doesn't matter now anyway). Sent one dwarf down to kill it, he did so, and died when the beast exploded, as creatures made of flame are wont to do. All of his flammable stuff burns, and generates smoke for quite some time.

Now things get interesting. Sick of having this cloud of smoke down in the third level access tunnel, I order some walls built around the pile of burning stuff. One of the guys standing in the smoke cloud suddenly develops a severe case of being on fire and promptly melts. This same thing starts happening to everyone who hangs out in the area(only the masons, really).

I take a look, and the walls next to the pile are warm, same as if magma were behind them. Okay.

I space the walls away from the pile and finish them up. In the process, someone sets a rock on the pile, and the smoke abruptly stops. This is likely coincidence, as I checked the pile and there were no more burning items in it. I decide to pour some water on it, to see what happens. Nothing. I drop an alpaca on it. The alpaca is sadly not on fire. I deconstruct everything. Sosmil's flames and body parts are still there, the alpaca is unharmed.

So, what's going on here? Was the smoke itself superheated? Did I somehow "put out" the FB's body parts? Has anyone else done testing with flame FB body parts?

tl;dr: Effing flame body parts, how do they work?

So, Sigun Tickplanks, Militia Commander of Swordworld and total badass finds himself at the front when a vile force of goblin lashers arrive. Being lashers, and there being like eight of them, one of them gets through, tearing up his shoulder and taking off his shield hand. What he does afterward is the stuff of legends.

He sprints through the 1-square tunnel entrance, through the group of lashers. I assume he's doing what any injured dwarf trying to retreat would do: run blindly into danger. I guess that might actually have been what he was doing.

Apparently, about five seconds later, he turns back, I check his status, his shoulder has gone from cut open to dented("I ain't got time to bleed!") and he's hunting down the guy that was chasing him away from the entrance. He cuts him apart and heads back into the fray, and goes to town on the goblins still trying to fight through the entrance. At some point, the goblins decide it isn't worth it, and go to retreat. He can't catch them all, but few of them live.

Fortress life comes out of alert mode, and only now does he head down to the hospital for treatment.

A few ingame days later, a lazyass diagnostician decides to go check him out. As it so happens, he has wolverine'd all of his injuries away except for his hand. But whatever, he's a dwarf. Last I checked, he was carrying around his new shield in the same hand as his axe.

He is incredibly quick to heal.

This topic has been moved to DF Adventure Mode Discussion.

http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=70274.0

I've searched, and not found anything quite like this, so here goes.

As I understand it, titans in the game have a profound effect on their environments, not only for their (usually) immense physical power, but also because their alignment determines the alignment of their home during worldgen. I think this should play out more viscerally in Fortress Mode, especially once the good/evil benign/savage axes are phased out and replaced with spheres or a system similar to the current sphere system for gods. Related to the physical god idea I've seen in the suggestions forums before.

Imagine:

"The Mountain Titan Carvesh Eatenrazors the Hungry Gold of Ravening has come! An immense sauropod made of vomit. It twitches and writhes constantly. All life withers in its presence. Beware its deadly dust!

"The Ocean Titan Okled Pillowflame the Emaciated Litany of Sorrow has come! A centipede with wings made of stretched skin. It has an austere look about it. It murmurs eldritch truths that break the minds of the weak-willed. Beware its fire!

"The Savannah Titan Rigoth Razorspark the Bright Winter of Saving has come! An immense fluffy wambler with external ribs made of jade. It moves about carelessly. All life flourishes in its presence. Beware its deadly blood!

The bolded descriptors are what I have in mind. If a forgotten beast shows up, it's an eldritch horror of (usually) immense strength and deadliness. When a titan shows up, its presence has an effect, positive or negative, on the entire region.

For example, the first one. As it approaches your fortress, shrubs, trees, and farm plots start to spontaneously wither and die. Dwarves already susceptible to disease might waste away, and even the stronger ones might suffer attribute loss. Depending on whether the game treats bacteria as life at some point in the future, it might also prevent infections outright, or make recovery from an infection a certainty, providing a possible upside to trapping it and keeping it alive.

The second one might have its effect only on those near it, or it too might affect the whole region. Perhaps dwarves with low willpower and/or intelligence might spontaneously go mad(insanity-inducing nightmares?). Maybe those that fought it are never really the same, gaining an unhappy thought that never goes away or a long step towards not really caring about anything anymore.

The third one might be the most of a mixed blessing. Its presence speeds the growth of trees and shrubs, but, as above, perhaps infections as well. Those that get infections are royally screwed, even with the other effects of the titan in the area, and they set in much quicker. On the other hand, if it hangs around, dwarves and animals grow and heal faster, perhaps adding physical attributes to everyone or to random individuals.

Other effects could be...
... As it approaches, all water freezes to ice. (All water on the map freezes, dwarves might freeze to death near it)
... In its presence, metal becomes brittle and unworkable. (Non-artifact metal products created while it's around don't have quality modifiers, regardless of who made them, maybe weapons and armor brought to bear against it wear much quicker, once wear is implemented)
... It leads a host of foul undead. (It shows up with a swarm of undead, intact corpses start spontaneously animating)

Again related to the physical god idea, perhaps this could be the form and effect physical gods take if they're implemented, but titans seem to me to just wander, unlike gods not really caring if their presence endangers the little squishy people, and defending itself when they try to drive it away.

How do you usually go about it? Ignore until the intro screen? Randomize until you get something cool? Customize?

I usually either randomize until I get something good or customize.

We know that sometimes, we get Forgotten Beasts with blood that makes Urist McUnlucky's eyes asplode. I know that it's been exploited, in conjunction with the current contaminant behavior, to create fields of poison in front of your fort that attackers (or merchants, whatever) wander through. What if, after killing said forgotten beast, you dumped some of your ammo in a pool of its entertainingly poisonous blood and assigned that ammo to a marksdorf squad or your hunters?

Worst case scenario, the poison does nothing.

Best case scenario, you have a squad of dwarves that have been affected by the poison coating on their ammo shooting at enemies that will then be affected by the poisonous coating on their ammo. So, eyeless marksdwarves shooting at a squad of soon-to-be eyeless gobbos. Not saying it has to be eye asploding venom. Any venom usable this way would do.

Has anyone done anything like this before?

Has it worked?

Since the appropriate forgotten beasts are few and far between, I'd like to politely request that anyone who reads this try to do it and post results. I've yet to encounter an appropriate FB, and the HFS works too quickly for me to properly exploit.

One needs power, one doesn't. Any other differences? One of them goes faster or something?