Bay 12 Games Forum

Develop the ability to store energy?

Skim through help to see if/how we'll get more dwarves.

Go left!
Also...aww, I wanted to be from Pong...

or perhaps they steal a corpse, and misc body parts and make a Frankendwarf.

Ignoring that Frankenstein's methods were more alchemical, the moody dwarf would be Frankebdwarf. And I think it'd be more like Urist McFrankenstein. Etymology aside...

Back in medieval times, surgical knowledge was kinda nonexistent. Barbers would function as surgeons due to their possession of sharp blades.

Sure, butchers are more used to live results being bad, but they can extract brains while leaving an intact skull and avoid contamination of intestines so they're edible. There's overlap.

And if a dwarf gets medical skills from the ordeal, it should result in the artifact being a still-living dwarf refashioned into a tool...

It's not stupid if your skull is as thick as most dwarves'!

Besides, it's not like cutting a tree clumsily is a death sentence. It's just a chance that you'll get bonked in the head with a tree branch, plus a lower chance that the tree will hit you with the trunk.

Gah! My reply!

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Neonivek: Tell me, how does healing magic work IRL? Frauds take your money and leave town before you wise up.

Magic doesn't exist in real life and Simulation doesn't nessisarily refer to real life circumstances. It means that the game is first and formost a simulation in otherwords it is trying to simulate something.

When a simulation includes effects that can only be decribed as "Gamey" then you are taking the game outside it simulation aspects. The key is to allow a game to have balance while at the same time allowing that balance to be organic. Giving healing magic its own unique flaws is a very game idea but not a very good simulation idea because there is no reason why it should be that way.

Since magic doesn't exist, we can make it pretty much anything we like. I'm not saying it should be random, like you imply I think later, but it should have (logical) costs. It all boils down to how magic works. Does it inexplicably break both entropy and TAANSTAFL? If not, it counts as balance.

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In DF, we can and probably should make healing magic balanced against not having it, ie mundane healing

That is looking too close to the picture and being unable to see the entire thing. The first and foremost image you should have is for the whole game and balance healing magic as it is in respect the everything else.

If healing magic completely topples mundane healing then all that means is that it completely topples mundane forms of healing and you do not need it anymore. No different then not needing fishermen because there is no water.

There are a few big differences. Fishing can be done in the cavern waters, which can be found anywhere, and doesn't break the game. This is beside the important part.
We evidently have different views. I think there should be multiple viable options for anything. You don't. I'm unlikely to convince you to change your mind and you sure won't change mine.

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This is low fantasy, and having a few dwarves who can easily patch up any dwarves who didn't die within minutes of getting injured(and, if deployed into the field, many or most of those) would ruin both the low fantasy and the grittiness of DF, IMHO

Your statement however was that Low Fantasy was the sheer number of people who have magic. This arguement would make sense in my "It is about how important magic is to the setting" however in this case it is not.

So "Low Fantasy" is irrelevant. So let us rewrite this

"having a few dwarves who can easily patch up any dwarves who didn't die within minutes of getting injured(and, if deployed into the field, many or most of those) would ruin the grittiness of DF, IMHO"

The Grittyness of the setting is still contained and is no different then if you had legendary doctors capable of curing and wounded individual, remember this is also an "Epic" game and thus legendary life saving doctors are perfectly in its perview. The key to battles is that people are going to be killed, maimed, and injured. Something that doesn't change.

The difference? Suddenly only instadeath things have a chance of permanently hurting dwarves with the right tactics. It might not be easy, but nothing in DF is so that's hardly a discouragement.

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Make a high fantasy mod

Mod arguement, instantly invalid

Hey, I wanna kill aliens. Have Toady add them! No saying it's best left to a mod, that's invalid!
I'm saying that if you want a higher fantasy than DF, you'll be able to make a mod, just like with every other setting difference. Must DF make every setting in one?

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If there's only one good choice, there's less of a game

Choice is not a possitive or negative in it of itself, nor is the limitation or expansion of choice. There are plenty of instances within dwarf fortress where there really is "One good choice" and where the strategic decisions are dictated to you because of circumstance.

There are times when there are obvious bad choices, like flooding your fortress or making an unarmoured militia. That's not what I'm talking about. There should be multiple options. A game without choices is a movie you need to press a button to advance, and a game with only one good choice (or series of choices) is barely better. Again, though, I'm not going to convince you and you won't convince me, so we might as well drop this issue.

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If healing magic is overly easy, say if it just takes a day of dorftime, it would make doctors less useful than beekeepers

Yes but why is that a bad thing? There are professions even more useless then Beekeeping in the game already. Should we, for example, require dwarves eat cheese to live in order to give the Cheese makers a job?

Cheese makers are very useful, just not for a fortress. Doctors would also still be very useful, just not to a fortress supplied by a magicial expert in the art of curative arts.

Cheesemaking is useful--it multiplies the value of milk and lets it be stored better. It's better than milk, and milk is an easy, free source of food. If doctors are in every way inferior to magical healers, they're just taking up migrants and disk space,

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After all, doctoring requires everything from time to lye to thread to potential labor, and has chances of failure, AND requires four or five skills, AND is rather limited in what it cures

Effort doesn't always equal pay off. Many of the alloys in the game are a waste to make but are only
Cheese makers are very useful, just not for a fortress. Doctors would also still be very useful, just not to a fortress supplied by a magicial expert in the art of curative arts. out of choice. As well once again it would mean that doctors are not helpful for your fortress.

Well, regardless of what you and I think this should be...effort SHOULD pay off, and there SHOULD be multiple choices available. Since we're constructing a magic system, why not make it take these into account?

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The problem isn't an issue of "easier vs. harder," it's about a single thing having the power to save your fort if used and to kill it if not

Then once again we are talking about strategy. Healing becomes useful and thus healing becomes part of the games strategy.
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Being able to save a great dwarf who would have inevitably died should have some cost, or it makes danger one step short of meaningless. "Losing is Fun," not "Magic will solve all of your problems!"

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As well you are seriously overblowing the importance of healing. Healing will not save dwarves in the midst of fighting. It is a aftersiege healing method almost strictly. Unless we are to overblow healing magic to the point where a healer can spam instant heals from a mile away non-stop in bulk... but that is an exageration at best.

Keep reading...

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Imagine if every injured dwarf, from the legendary axedwarf with his arms amputated by a dragon to a hauler whose finger got broken by a flying boot,  could be made very quickly good as new--not crippled, no loss of productivity, no chance of later death from infection or neglect. If you don't see the difference this would make, I'm not sure that we're playing the same game. For me, lots of useful dwarves would have been saved.

It would certainly make a very large difference but not the kind of difference you are thinking of. You will have to send those dwarves out, get them killed against enemy armies, and the game is only going to be getting more deadly.

A lot of this idea of "Lots of survivors" comes from the way the game is currently where sieges are a very safe prospect and where megabeasts are rather simple beasts outside the few super toxic ones.

It is a big difference. Even if every dwarf in combat is either dead or A-OK, which incidentally won't happen, there's plenty of other uses. Oh, boulders are hitting smiths on the head? Set up a new trauma center on the forge level! Problem solved, get back to work! And surely you won't claim that combat doesn't leave wounded and even crippled dwarves?

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Now, since we're Bay12, imagine what happens WHEN we give four or five clerics defensive training and steel armor before sending them into battle alongside the militia.

You would have dead Clerics and then you would have no more healing magic and you would have to rely on your doctors that I hope you kept up with training because they are useful.

As well this relies on the clerics functioning on the same wavelength as Necromancy (as in, instant spammable nonstop magic). If they had to do as much as a touch in the middle of battle that would be a huge risk. Can they just fling their healing? Well I hope they don't get swamped while they are taking cover. Healing isn't going to cure terminal battle disadvantage because you thought your charge was unbeatable because you trained four battle healers.

That.
Is.
Balance.
You're arguing that I'm wrong except in the circumstances that I'm arguing shouldn't exist! You don't get it, do you? WHAT YOU'RE SAYING IS THE ONLY CIRCUMSTANCE IN WHICH MY ARGUMENT AGAINST UNBALANCED MAGIC IS TRUE...IS MY DEFINITION OF UNBALANCED MAGIC!!
Ahem.

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As well five healing mages/clerics? If this is a world where a fortress can throw five clerics with potent healing magic out into the middle of battle... They you deserve every bit of healing magic you obtained.

If you attract one, you can easily attract more. That's assuming that healers can't teach each other, too, like all magic currently can be.

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The soldiers would be healed as they're harmed, and unless healers are given a conspicuous immunity to healing magic, they'll heal each other

The healers probably can heal themselves. Of course given how the game goes it means the cleric is pretty much going to die.

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Imagine an evil biome, but the corpses have metal arms and armor, quite possibly superior to your own.

Actually I have no objection to this. Toady you should make this happen.

Now imagine that you're the zombies. Not very hard, huh?

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Mind you I know what you mean. Except you know what? In this situation the game simply has to be made to recognise that healing magic exists. Healing isn't going to, for example, douse fire off a man.

It could, however, heal the man of burns repeatedly until someone else came to douse the flames, then once more for good measure. Not pleasant, but they'll be none the worse for the wear once they're doused.

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Healing magic shouldn't be the core of your medicine when you get it, but it shouldn't be worthless either

Sure it can be the core of your medicine. The objection of "Mundane magic should be important even with healing magic" is very much based upon "Dwarf Fortress as it is right now" rather then "dwarf fortress as it moves on". If something comes along and outdates a profession because of its sheer might then allow it to. If you embarked on a land where trees give soo much fruit that your fortress will never grow hungry again then just allow it.

You think magic should be at the core of every dwarven fortress? Fine. Your image of DF differs from mine and most others', and your image if dwarves differs from that of most fantasy, but I'm trying to figure out those spots where neither of us will convince the other so we can see them and move on, maturely.

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There should be situations where it's useful and situations where it's wasteful or even harmful.

Certainly but those situations should flow from the fact that it is a simulation informed with balance.

It shouldn't be balance for balance sake as well it shouldn't be an arbitrary balance made only to make Healing magic a terrible thing. You have to allow people to rake in their rewards.

If everything in the game came at equal negatives then there is no point in developing something. What is the point of developing healing magic if all that is going to happen is the game is going to saw "Yeah sorry, in order to keep the doctors employed your healing spell just caused that dwarf to explode"

Abyss, no, they shouldn't be random. But since DF is, to me, a game, and we can make the magic anything we want...let's keep TAANSTAFL is mind as we consider magic.
That's really all I I'm saying.

Quote from: Neonivek on November 02, 2012, 10:33:37 pm

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The Docs should be a part of the healing god/godess' priesthood. I agree with BoredVirulence (page 2, bottom of), mana should be introduced as a new resource with a low recharge rate. There should also be a few fundemental spells

Honestly I don't think powerful wizards and clerics really have too much of a place in Fortress mode for dwarves.

Nor do I, but I do think that a player who tries should be able to get a few mages, at least.

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At the same time miracles, given by dieties, should be a very miraculous thing and having a person who has a god-given ability to heal the wounded should be treated in game in a similar way it would in most settings where this is not a common occurance. Uttar reverence.

I never pictured magical healing to be common place. Only so much that magical healing shouldn't be diminished simply because it is very useful.

Again, as long as a player can figure out how to get a miracle, I'm fine with that.

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It would be like starting a new fortress and one of your geese happens to lay golden eggs... you go "Awsome!" and then the game prompt comes up and says "Opps sorry those eggs gave you cancer, you die". Sure that would "Balance" the goose but at the same time it is rather cheapened.

Well, if there's a good reason for golden eggs to give you cancer,,,

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So with respect to that... Mana shouldn't be a resource, it isn't something dwarves trade in. It is something outside the bubble of Dwarven society. Thus I think it should remain outside a Player's, playing fortress mode, perception

I don't think DF should use a mana-type resource at all. Better might be some sort of cost, like healing might permanently drain some dwarf of life energy, or you keep owing the Spirit if the Blessed Waters more and more favors...

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This makes sacrifices necessary, and thus wizards far more valuable

I am not sure Dwarves would have a "Court Mage".

Depends on the circumstances and what "Court Mage" means, but pretty much yeah.

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In otherwords I see healing magic as a great and powerful thing

But something you can't bank on.

Agreed, but probably not in the same way as you.

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My view for Dwarf Fortress is that you can play 10 games and each one your fortress can have a completely different advantage, quirk, or disadvantage then the other. Perhaps in one, one of your dwarves was born from the goddess of fire and thus has flame breath as well as protected from all heat. In another perhaps a migrant happens to be an expert in magical healing. Artifacts express this perfectly, each one having different abilities.

Same applies to the enemies.

It should be a more flexible game but one that doesn't try to take things away because they are too good... only recognising when something is too good and seeing what naturally progresses from it. If the enemy started poisoning their weapons so you couldn't heal them, that would be a perfect example of the game recognising what is happening.

I think that a multitude of magics should be available per world, and any that aren't all trying to kill you can be obtained with some work. Other than that, I agree with you.
Note that I don't think magic's rarity counts as balance.

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Let me offer an analogy. Let's replace "healing magic" with "metalworking". I say that there should be some cost so that stone working isn't obsolete for any fortress with a steady supply of metals, maybe needing fuel or risking burns. Your thoughts are mostly analogous to "So what if stone working is worthless? It's not like every fort will have ores!"
Now, what's an analogy for how you see the debate?

Before you start, let me note two things:/
1. I think DF should be a game where there is always a challenge or three which can be overcome, and where you can do pretty much anything in most worlds if you try.
2. I'm going to bed now.

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Where are the wizards? Rare and trapped in their towers

They are creating armies of the dead in order to take over the world.

I suppose that might be their intent, even if not yet realized, but I doubt that a few hundred zombies (who collapse, however temporarily, with a strong blow) could protect a few mages (notable for not being rotten or mindless) from arrows forever. Also, they're mostly building towers and sitting in them, plus sieging the occasional fortress.

The way I do it is that Low Fantasy has "Magic" and stuff but the movers and shakers are strictly non-magical in nature (Like Song of Fire and Ice. Yes there is magic and shapeshifting, but the mundane is what drives the plot... while in Lord of the Rings for example the movers and shakers are magic)

When Demons, Dragons, Vampires, and Necromancers actively affect the course of nations... it is high fantasy.

Demons run a few nations (several goblin and a handful of human), but they're basically like immortal mortal rulers. Necromancers don't do much compared to the potentially thousands-strong armies of mortals, vampires mostly kill people and eventually get driven out, and dragons basically attack and loot places.
Also, I was right when I said we were using different definitions. My definition was based on the availability of magic, your on its effect on the world. Let's try to stick to apples or oranges from now on, please?

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And where has Toady said he wants to move DF to high fantasy?

Read the devs and Threetoe stories.

I've read them. Where does it suggest that magic is supposed to be anything but a powerful but a dangerous, harmful, and/or impractical tool? That's what I'm imagining here.