Bay 12 Games Forum

If it shows up in the building materials screen, it's fair play for building materials.

I'm fairly nice to my dwarves, honestly. Yes, I have the Nobles-Only Atom Smashing Bedroom Of Horror(tm), but nobles aren't real dwarves.

I know the "Wizard" lurks off in the coding, waiting to be activated, and Toady's hinted at it a few times, but what *should* happen when it rolls around eventually?

My thoughts:

- It should be artifact based. Artifact crafts might trigger leadership based magics, such as an artifact crown being worn by a noble would give bonuses to an aspect of the fort's group dynamic (arguments are less likely to break out, efficiency is sped up, etc.), while an artifact weapon might be an instant kill against a certain type of major beast. An artifact piece of armor could give it's wearer legendary fighting status, etc.

- Artifacts could be "cursed" randomly... the aforementioned artifact crown would give bonuses to efficiency at the cost of driving the wearer insane after awhile, and since it could only be activated by nobility, the noble's demands would get increasingly erratic and bizarre. OR, it could summon ghosts or spirits, which aren't anything that could harm or be harmed, they just appear occasionally and terrify a few dwarves at a time and give unhappy thoughts. Sometimes, the curse could be absolutely drastic and turn the wearer into a powerful enemy, possessed by a demon or something, take up arms and start slaughtering unwary dwarves.*

- As for the Wizards, maybe they aren't villains. Maybe they actually are like Gandalf, possibly appearing and offering your fortress a mission, sort of an expanded nobility demand. "Produce 30 Iron Plate Armors by the time I return from my travels," and if successful, he'll grant your fortress a boon of some sort. Maybe he could turn all those bituminous coals into diamonds, just this once, etc.

- Or maybe they ARE evil. Unlike FBs, HFS and megabeasts, they sit on the edge of the map and launch waves of goblin raiders at you. Or maybe he'll be key to the undead rising. If he takes over your fortress, he'll turn it into a Dark Fortress and you have to reclaim it in Fortress Mode.

- I think that inherently dwarves aren't a magic race, although they are often presented as the Craftsmen of the Gods in mythology. The elves, meanwhile, might use some minor spells to "improve" their caravans... and this could maybe make elves less annoying and more fun. They start bringing gold bars and jewels, but only SOME of them are real, and you can't tell until you've actually bought them. The fake ones turn into *ashen goblets* or something once you actually pack them into storage. Maybe the goods revert AFTER they've left the premises, so that if you've started encrusting your furniture with glamour gems, and they leave, it reverts to an *ashen goblet* that is now lodged in your new door in a freakish manner.

- And here's where zombies come in.








*This could also be a deviation into an "evil twin" sort of DF: if your dwarves decide to listen to the possessed leader, they could challenge the Mountainhomes for power, perhaps even recruiting some of the "dark" races like kobolds and goblins on a case by case basis. It would be a long and arduous battle, but it could happen, although this is presumably after the Military Arc is complete.

Not even to my first summer yet and cougars from above, crocodiles from below.

My civ symbol is a flask. I think that sums up the entire game in one succinct image.

The doods broke into the cavern from above, and immediately they noticed something dreadful: endless giant spider webs, all over the space. At first there was some excitement in the ranks, as among the giant spider webs were also diamonds, rubies and natural silver, but they weren't sure what to do. As they returned to the surface to plan their next move, a swarm of naked mole dogs jumped into the tunnel behind them and started infesting the lower levels of the new fortress with amazing swiftness.

It was decided, rather wisely, to wall up the cavern until a military could be built to assist any mining efforts in the tunnel. On the way down, the naked mole dogs could be seen flitting in and out of the tunnels, like the Aliens in that movie, "Mary Poppins". The dwarves went insane with terror. Some locked themselves in their bedrooms, others huddles in the well room for safety, while the naked mole dogs raided the food storage facilities and glutted on plump helmet biscuits.

Using every last ounce of fortitude, the mechanic built some traps in an upstairs corridor, and the dwarves waited in subzero temperatures outside, clutching steamy mugs of heated dwarven ale, waiting for the extermination to begin.

*snap*

*snap*

*snap*

They returned downstairs to clean up the little bits of naked mole dog, walled up the caverns, and went back to their dwarvenly duties.

Meanwhile, the spores of mysterious underground mushrooms had started to sprout all over the fortress, colonizing the structure. The dwarves examined them, found some to be edible, and some to be useful for construction. They had cheated death in the horrors of the caverns, and had come out of it with some interesting discoveries, waiting for their next move.

I always use ----anus. Right now I'm running Hermitanus. It's a thing I do.

My theory is that the elves have a "kosher" way of killing trees, some sort of ritual they perform that makes it okay to their deities. Elves can kill as many trees as they like, they reason, because they're not barbarians, according to their cultural imperatives.

Hypocrisy is not really hypocrisy when there's a rationale to it, depressingly.