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Messages - Jenniretta

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76
DF General Discussion / Re: Why isn't dwarf fortress open-source?
« on: April 02, 2013, 04:42:34 am »
From what I've gathered from the hundreds of times this question has come up, it basically boils down to Dwarf Fortress being Toady and Three-toe's project - they don't want it forked, they don't want contributions, they don't want people insisting that the way so-and-so did it is better or that they should add so-and-so's feature, etc.
By making the source code public, they would invite a lot of criticism, and "suggestions" from other programmers, and be put under pressure to meet other people's visions of what the game should be - if they don't, then a fork of the game could usurp the main branch and strip toady of what is essentially the result of his seemingly endless strange mood (to put it in DF terms).

Basically, this is toady's masterpiece, and he wants it to remain his. Open sourcing it during his lifetime would put that at risk, and while it may not be likely, there is a chance that he could essentially lose everything he's worked so hard to create once other people are free to modify and criticize.

Dwarf Fortress has never been about the money, so arguing that donations would increase is pointless - If it was about money he has had opportunities to monetize the game before. The fact that it is still after all this time based on donations is a testament to his devotion to the dream, regardless of the financial payoff. 

Edit: And I'm saying this as someone who is very much in favour of free software - personally, I would love it if DF were re-licensed under the GPL, and I'm sorta hoping that toady will do something like this in his will, but as long as he's still able to work on it, he has his reasons for keeping the code closed.

77
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: What's going on in your fort?
« on: April 01, 2013, 10:10:15 am »
Quote from: Catsup on April 01, 2013, 09:44:28 am
no way pls dont abandon, most forts do not have iron or access to tin (my fort is one of them as well) just dig down to the candy and make some greaves and mail shirts out of that. Make all the iron you can get into steel and make your lighter armor parts such as gauntlets, helms, and high boots out of steel. Also try to make bismuth bronze instead of normal bronze whenever you can, it saves on tin and results in higher value armor.

start training up some armor smiths, or 1 armor smith and melt down all old armor as his skill increases, theres a melt yield chart on the wiki and some armors actually yield more bars when melted than they were made from, so make those armor types until you can make masterworkers and keep re-melting until all you have is masterworkers.

oh and be very careful dragging the necromancers around, i usually transfer them to a isolated stockpile via cages and put them all in 1 cage, they can revive stuff even if being dragged, which most likely leads to their hauler being killed by the undead and the necromancer running amok inside your fort reviving stuff.

oh yea, and you mentioned you had silver? those make great maces for mace dwarf squads, and are especially effective against the undead due to their blunt damage.

Like I said, in a calmer map, the lack of metals wouldn't be an issue, because I'd be able to trade to make up the difference, but the constant sieges and attacks make actually trading for things difficult. I've found some more copper so I'm going to see if that holds up. The undead aren't prone to using weapons, so even copper may be good enough for most of them save the occasional skeletal water buffalo. Goblins and Elves I'm not too worried about, I've been killing them since the world was flat (started playing before Z-levels were implemented), and I'll prob. keep killing them for as long as DF is around.

Weapons aren't a problem, I have more silver than I care to track, and a legendary weaponsmith, I could have enough masterpiece silver blunt weapons to arm my entire population twice over.

It's really just a case of wondering if the frustration from being so choked for supplies is worth the fun of constant attacks.

Oh, and the necromancer is fine, he's locked in a fancy silver cage sitting just outside the barracks. He doesn't have a line of sight to any of the food production or refuse areas, and if he does bring something back to life there's always at least 6 active dwarves near the barracks, So he's pretty harmless.

78
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: What's going on in your fort?
« on: April 01, 2013, 09:34:17 am »
Quote from: Catsup on April 01, 2013, 09:10:20 am
Quote from: Jenniretta on April 01, 2013, 08:46:27 am
I seem to have acquired a ghost I can't put to rest...

I'm starting to consider abandoning, though, as the lack of any good metals means I depend on the caravans a lot, and the constant ambushes and sieges make trade impossible. I'm expecting the humans and elves to start attacking any time now, since all of their caravans that have come here have not returned. Most of them find their way into my corpse stockpile, or rotting in my zombie collection.


yea, caravan guards cant be put to rest if their corpse is missing, see what kind of ghost it is, and use dfhack tog et rid of it if it is a violent ghost or something really bad.

and why abandon such a fun settlement? goblin siege + elven siege + undead walking=massive amounts of fun in 1 season

i'd just build a wall and wait till they kill each other and clean up. Though that might not be such a swell idea as the necromancers would probly get a massive army...eh consider building archer towers to cover most parts of the map, necromancers' only weakness is non-lethal cunning traps or at its simplest, cage traps, as well as ranged attacks.

Oh, the constant fighting isn't the issue, I'm considering abandoning because of the lack of military-grade metals, If I had access to at least bronze on-site (without trading) I wouldn't mind, but as is all I've found is one vein of malachite (which I hope leads to more) and more silver than I can keep track of. No tin for bronze, no iron. If the map were less hectic I would just make silver and gold trade goods and buy armour every year from the caravans, but I've gotten two dwarven caravans in 5 years, and neither of them have made it off the map alive, and the humans have never made it off the map, so I think they'll be sending sieges, not merchants, in the future.
I found the copper after that last post, so I'm definitely reconsidering now. It's not much, but at least I can make SOME armour now, and usually one vein means there will be more, so I might be able to get ~20-30 full suits of copper armour now, which is a step up from having most of my combat dwarves in nothing but leather and a few in some scraps of metal armour scavanged from the humans and goblins.

In the mean time, I've started a collection of zombies. I have 31 right now, a few even have proper names. Oh, and that one necromancer. I'm using them to decorate, and remind my dwarves what they're up against. Don't want them getting complacent in the odd season or two the dead aren't scratching at the doors.

79
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: What's going on in your fort?
« on: April 01, 2013, 08:46:27 am »
I seem to have acquired a ghost I can't put to rest... He was an axe dwarf, before he took a bolt to the face (one of about 20 casualties in a huge three-way fight between a squad of goblin marksmen, some left-over zombies, and my military, from which almost no one escaped).
I tried to make a slab for him, but he doesn't appear on the list for engraving. When I was checking my coffins, I noticed he has a coffin assigned to him, but it's empty. Looking at all my stocks and body parts, it appears his body was completely decimated... Or he was reanimated and wandered off the map. He's not one of the twenty-nine or so zombies I have decorating the cavern either.Regardless of what happened to his body, it leaves me with an annoying ghost floating around my trade depot harassing whoever wanders past. At least he isn't violent, just very annoying.

Speaking of dead dwarves, I also lost 3 to a forgotten beast (A giant green-scaled fly) with a nasty vapour- the three dwarves who got caught in it for a few rounds of combat died before their was even a task generated to bring them to the hospital or diagnose them. They suffocated. Luckily it's ichor and body seem to be pretty safe so it shouldn't get out of hand.

Cleaning the map is going disappointingly slowly. With all the deaths, and the lack of trade from all the zombies, my population is down to 72 and migrant waves seem to be coming slowly. I really want to clean up all the bodies, though, and get them 12 levels down in the refuse and corpse stockpiles, far from the influence of these damned necromancers.

My engravers have finally reached legendary status, and one of them seems to be legend+5, since he is spamming my announcements with masterpieces, so I should be able to keep any tantrum spirals at bay by making even the tiniest bedrooms look good.

With all the dead merchants and a few dead goblins, I have come across a bit of usable armour metal, not enough to outfit a full military, but at least some of them have some mail now, which is better than they were.

I'm starting to consider abandoning, though, as the lack of any good metals means I depend on the caravans a lot, and the constant ambushes and sieges make trade impossible. I'm expecting the humans and elves to start attacking any time now, since all of their caravans that have come here have not returned. Most of them find their way into my corpse stockpile, or rotting in my zombie collection.

80
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: What FPS are you content playing DF at? [Poll]
« on: April 01, 2013, 02:29:15 am »
I've played fortresses at 1FPS for (in-game)decades, I don't really mind it.

81
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: What's going on in your fort?
« on: April 01, 2013, 02:26:50 am »
So, the necromancer ambush left jsut in time for the Dwarven caravan to come in, however before they finished unloading their goods, the necro returned with two more necromancers (apparently there are three of them, not two, one must have slept through the last siege) and about 80 of their loyal abominations. The siege hasn't let up, I did manage to capture a fair number of the zombies (about 15) and one of the necromancers, so if they ever go home (it's been about a season so far) I'll have one less to worry about next time at least.
Unfortunately, this is the 3rd caravan that's been slaughtered in my depot - one of each friendly race! the first time the elves came by, a goblin ambush killed them all, and I shruged and took their stuff. then the humans stopepd in, and the necro ambush finished them off, then the dwarves come in and we get a siege! at this rate I'll be fighting elf and human sieges on top of my undead problem and the usual goblin visits. At least the dwarves won't siege, but they'll probably stop sending the caravan all together if they keep getting killed by zombies and skeleton bits. I don't mind the elves going to war with us, never liked them anyway (although I did TRY to be civil, not my fault they tripped over the goblins on their way in, and never made it out).

Something really annoying about hte undead, though, is that by waiting them out, their numbers swell! when they showed up I counted 80 undead of elf, human, goblin, and dwarf varieties. Now, they have added 10 Ravens, 6 foxes, and a pair of water buffalo to their ranks! combined with a few lost limbs in the fighting while they "recruited" these new minions, they have reached 100 strong in the season they've been clawing at my doors!

Oh well.. if I ever get a break, I have two full caravans worth of goods that the owners will not be reclaiming in the trade depot... I jsut don't know if I'll ever have enough free time to move it all inside.

Edit: Ha! The zombies are still here, and now the goblins decided to invade. Most of them will prob. end up under the necro's command, but if I'm lucky they'll manage to kill my remaining necromancers for me, and I'll jsut have to clean up the mess.

82
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: What's going on in your fort?
« on: March 31, 2013, 08:30:50 pm »
After a pretty peaceful year or so, my necromancer duo is back. This time, however, they decided to sneak in behind the human caravan. I have a pair of merchants locked in the fortress (they fled there when the first skeletal water buffalo charged the depot), the rest of the humans are now zombies - Including a spearman and a lasher.
I lost two dwarves trying to find the necromancers, and they decided to hack the zombies to bits, so what was once about 5 mostly-whole corpses became about 25 bits and pieces of animated dwarf, human, water buffalo, and fox bits. All of which are sitting in the trade Depot with the abandoned goods of the traders.

A migrant wave arrived, but I can't let them in because the undead are blocking the only entrance, so I'm jsut hoping they run into the necromancers so I can deal with this infestation once and for all.

In the mean time, I have found the first cavern layer finally, so this run-in with the necromancers won't stop my woodcutting and fishing, or cut me off from fresh water, like their siege in the first year did.

The only weapon-quality ore I have come across is silver - this includes the ore lining of the giant pit in the first cavern layer, so while I can make some devastating maces and hammers, my other weapons are pretty poor, and I can't make metal armour at all without importing materials... which, of course, these necromancers are not giving me much chance to do. I am working on some exploratory mining to try and find something, anything, I could use for some proper armour - I would even settle for copper at this point.

Such is life in Katthirletmos, "Nourishedcobalt". At least I do, in fact, have cobalt, so the name makes sense.

83
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: What's going on in your fort?
« on: March 30, 2013, 06:28:36 pm »
Started a new fort a couple days ago. It was in range of a necromancer's tower, but I didn't worry because usually they leave me alone long enough for me to necro-proof my fortress.
This time was different. In late summer of my first year - before the first Dwarven caravan even arrived, but after 2 migrant waves - I was sieged by a pair of necromancers and about 30 zombies of sentient races (humans, dwarves, goblins). I locked the doors and they finally went home in autumn of the 3rd year of this fortress. I'm happy I had everything inside, and got everyone inside, before they got too involved, but they put a major delay on my fortress' progression.

In the mean time I did manage to get about 700 Bars of Coke from lignite and find some silver, though, so that should jump-start my metalworks nicely when I get enough population to keep it running smoothly.

3 years in, we finally got our first caravan, at least. The necros took off just in time I guess. we have plenty of trade-goods for them at least.

84
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: House Rules/Personal Challenges
« on: March 28, 2013, 05:01:39 pm »
Quote from: Catsup on March 28, 2013, 02:50:41 pm
Quote from: Jenniretta on March 28, 2013, 02:36:33 am

I normally try to avoid trapping them in airlocks, arenas, etc., and like I said, this challenge usually ends in a torrent of blood at the first siege... or giant beast... or zombie infestation.. :P basically the fortress will die in the first 6 or so years, most of the time, unless it's in a remarkably calm area and there are no hostile civs around.
this challenge must be what playing elves feel like (now i know why elves tend to settle in "good" forests). They should implement wooden weapons for this challenge of yours and let the dwarves use that, then it'll be elf fortress

Never tried it with elves modded to be playable. Usually I avoid the pointy-ears, wooden weapons are still weapons, so it defeats the purpose of the challenge anyway. It would be pretty easy (well, relatively) to just load up on wooden bolts and crossbows and pelt invaders with splinters until they go home, so it's not really a pacifist fortress anymore, it's just a bunch of pointy-ears throwing sticks at everyone they don't like.

85
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: So if you house-rule no danger rooms...
« on: March 28, 2013, 04:51:34 pm »
Quote from: CognitiveDissonance on March 28, 2013, 02:23:30 pm
If you are starved for resources, labour or time - try and provide the basic protection. Protect the chest and the head to prevent critical hit kills. Protect other parts with leather gear. Work your way up to full armor as available, but emergencies do happen.

Of note:
http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2012:Armor#Types_of_Protection

Oh, worth adding, I usually prioritize getting high quality metal armour as: Mail -> Helmet -> Gauntlets -> High Boots -> Breastplate -> Shield. So, protects vital organs first to avoid one-hit kills, then protect their arms, since an axedwarf with no hands isn't particularly useful, then legs to keep them moving, then the breastplate to sure up their defenses. I use leather, bone, and wood to fill in for the pieces I haven't made out of metal yet, so even though the shield is the last piece I'll make out of steel, it's usually the first piece of leather gear they pick up, along with their first weapon.
On a resource light map trading for armour or the materials to make armour from the dwarves helps a lot, they might not bring masterpieces to trade, but even plain steel mail it better than leather.

86
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: So if you house-rule no danger rooms...
« on: March 28, 2013, 02:47:46 am »
Yeah I just let mine train up on their own, with their squad. Most of the time it's slow, but it works eventually. Archers are bugged, (http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/mantisbt/view.php?id=4530) So you have to be cautious with them, or else they will just not train.

Most of their training comes from actual combat though, harass the local wildlife, chase down ambushes, etc. With some decent equipment even a squad of 5 or 6 recruits can handle an ambush with few serious injuries.

87
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: House Rules/Personal Challenges
« on: March 28, 2013, 02:36:33 am »
Quote from: Catsup on March 27, 2013, 08:21:07 pm
ahh but you see we're never walled off completely, the end of my maze of cage traps for example still needs into my fortress, its just a really long detour when the siege shows up and your normal entrances close for some reason and an alternative one opens. I can see this is a very hard restriction, especially earlier (you'll practically need to go architecture right away, perhaps even using wood and skipping trying to break an aquifier). But, do you still allow air locks? because if not it'll probly be gg pretty early unless a siege and a forgotten beast show up at exactly the same time. Forgotten beasts can easily be lured into a 3x3 or even 1x3 airlock using a piece of crappy furniture, sieges require a sacrifice (preferably kitten or child) at the end of a maze to lock them up. Should still be fun though, as you'll have no way to get rid of the "siege" tag until another enemy that hates goblins show up, which means no regular trade and no regular migrants for a few years.

I normally try to avoid trapping them in airlocks, arenas, etc., and like I said, this challenge usually ends in a torrent of blood at the first siege... or giant beast... or zombie infestation.. :P basically the fortress will die in the first 6 or so years, most of the time, unless it's in a remarkably calm area and there are no hostile civs around.

88
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: House Rules/Personal Challenges
« on: March 27, 2013, 01:59:39 pm »
Quote from: Catsup on March 27, 2013, 03:44:56 am
Quote from: Jenniretta on March 27, 2013, 01:08:12 am

11- Pacifist. If invaders break in, it's pretty much all over. No military training, or weapons (other than picks and axes, for job completion), or traps, no violent defenses whatsoever. Fun, but tends to end at the first siege in a torrent of blood.
this ones quite easy, just wall off; and it depends on how "flexible" violent defenses and traps mean. just build cave-in traps for all the goblins if your excluding simple traps only. Or secret passages that lure forgotten beasts and goblin sieges into a contained area that also lead to a arena where they duel and your dwarves watch.


:P I mentioned that I never wall off fortresses, so part of the challenge is from not walling it off completely. As for my limits for traps and violent defenses: no traps, simple or complex (no drowning chambers, no magma falls, no cave-in traps, no stone fall or weapon traps, not even cage traps... even though those are technically not violent so feel free to make an exception if you try it.)
I do let invaders fight amongst themselves, though, so if the goblins want to deal with my dragon problem for me they're more than welcome too.

89
DF General Discussion / Re: How do people react to seeing you play dwarf fortress?
« on: March 27, 2013, 01:48:31 pm »
Quote from: fractalman on March 27, 2013, 04:16:01 am
My dad played rogue itself. On the original machines it was written for.

He was intrigued by dwarf fortress, but didn't think it was particularly special.  Though, he was a bit confused by the fact that I was not playing as any one dwarf, but as their hive-mind.

I bet his rogue backround would make him pretty good at adventure mode.

Adventure Mode is significantly harder than original rogue. There is just a lot more going on, and the controls are more complex.

90
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: House Rules/Personal Challenges
« on: March 27, 2013, 01:08:12 am »
I never use Danger Rooms, Quantum Stockpiles, Atom Smashers, or outside tools other than sometimes 3d visualizer things to see how a project/fortress looks in 3D (Yes, that means no therapist or any of that), and no tilesets or graphic packs, just default ASCII.
Also, I never seal off a fortress completely from the rest of the word, there is always a path for building destroyers to enter through the front or a back/side gate.

For other stuff, well, I rarely use all of these for any given fortress, but some that I like to do once in a while:

1- F*** Elves. I don't normally kill them on sight, but when they try to trade I seize their caravans and make them leave with nothing. If they ask me to stop cutting down trees, I scale up wood-based industries. I don't like elves.

2- No underground Farming. This one usually isn't too hard unless a zombie-creating mist or a flying beastie (eg. Dragon) shows up, in which case farm production comes to a sudden halt.

3- No traps. Simple enough, just no traps.

4- Contaminated Water. I get vampire blood in the water supply, so if I run out of alcohol I get infested with vampires and lose the fortress to the leeches eating everyone.

5- Light Embark. Embark with no food, extra animals, seeds, or weapons, just a pick and my dwarves. This one is really easy actually, once you survive to the first caravan, you pretty much proceed as a normal fort.

6- Never-breach aquifer. Self explanitory, get a map where all tiles have aquifer, and never breach it. Resources are limited, you never get magma, and usually you need to build above ground to have enough room for a full (100+ Dwarf) population.

7- Individual Homes. Every dwarf family has a home complete with Bed, Chest, Cabinet, Table, Chair, and Door.

8- No Alcohol. this one I do VERY rarely, because after about a year it gets to be pretty miserable waiting for anything to get done, but as the name implies - run a dry fort, no alcohol for anyone, only water. (only a challenge if you use dwarves or something else with the alcohol dependent trait, the humans couldn't care less.)

9- No Trade. Just make a self-sufficient fort, and refuse to trade or steal from any caravans that happen by. I don't even build a Depot when I try this. If you're going to do this I advise bringing the anvil at embark though :P.

10- Vegetarian. No meat, or fish. All food is plant-based. No leather. No bonecrafts. Not that hard really.
10.a- Vegan. Same, but also no milk, eggs, wool, spider silk, etc. A bit harder, but still managable.

11- Pacifist. If invaders break in, it's pretty much all over. No military training, or weapons (other than picks and axes, for job completion), or traps, no violent defenses whatsoever. Fun, but tends to end at the first siege in a torrent of blood.

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