Bay 12 Games Forum

Yes, restricted only makes the dwarves see the path as longer, not inaccessible.  If it's the only path, it's the shortest by default. 

I love the golems from Jewish lore, but I don't know if they fit with Dwarves.  Dwarven Golems, in most fiction, are more like mechanical constructs.  They're a shell that's either powered by some kind of clockwork or magic, or some in-between form of "magitek."  The Talmudic Golems would be excellent for human civs, though. 

My idea for Dwarven Golems is this: 

First, two separate types of Golems:  Worker Golems and War Golems.  Worker Golems can only do simple tasks like Hauling and Pump Operating, but never need to eat or sleep.  They can fight, but won't be much of a threat to an armored foe. War Golems can't do anything but kill stuff, but can be extremely powerful depending on components, also never need to eat or sleep. 

Armorsmith builds the body.  Quality and material type determine how effective its armor will be. 
Weaponsmith builds two weapons, one for each arm.  Same rules apply as with regular weapons, quality and material determines effectiveness. 
New "Golemancer" profession puts it all together using silver/gold/platinum and assorted gems.  His skill level affects the behavior of the Golem.  IE, with a Dabbling Golemancer be prepared for a psychotic Golem to start rampaging through your fort immediately.  Building Golems increases his skill level, and eventually a Legendary Golemancer will be able to make a Golem that won't ever go on a rampage... if he lives long enough to acquire the skill.  Higher-value precious metals and gems will also result in more stable Golems. 

In addition to the precious metals and gemstones, Golem-making would also require sentient sacrifices.  It's Slaves to Armok, God of Blood, after all.  Worker Golems would only require a sentient prisoner, like a Goblin for example.  War Golems would require, say, 4 Prisoners and a Dwarf.  For Worker Golems, any GoblinElf/Human/Kobold (Or Dwarf if you've got a lot of Chessemakers or Fish Cleaners hanging around drinking your booze) will do.  Quality of the parts is all that affects their performance in hauling/pump operating. 

War Golems would a different beast altogether, though.  In terms of their combat skills, they get the skills of the Dwarf who is sacrificed.  So if you want an awesome Double-Axe Golem, you're going to have to sacrifice an Axe Lord.  Once created, the Golem can't learn, so the initial skills it has are all it will ever get.  Could even take it a step further and have the skills of the PRISONERS factor in, make it a weighted average like (Prisoner Skills)(4 x Dwarf Skill)=Golem Skill, so for a Legendary Axe Golem you'd need FOUR Legendary Axegoblins and a Legendary Axedwarf.  This, plus the difficulty of getting a decent Golemancer who doesn't get killed off by his flawed creations, would keep you from amassing legions of Legendary Golems easily.  Could even have it so your Dwarf sacrifice gets cold feet at the last minute for added Fun... have that happen if he doesn't have the "doesn't care about anything anymore" tag.  Basically, you'll need to fortify your Golemancer's Workshop as heavily as your front entrance if you want to do some serious Golem-making =p

So, breakdown on Golems:
Pros: Don't eat, drink, or sleep.  Heavy armor, no organs to stab or brains to crush in, powerful attacks.  Don't die of old age. 
Cons:  Can go crazy and slaughter your people if the Golemancer's not skilled.  Can't heal or be repaired, lopped off limbs stay that way (the materials are magically animated, so you can't just slap on a new arm).  Need high-quality components and highly-skilled sacrifices to be effective.  Can't learn.  Can only do specific tasks. 

Hmm... should also have different types be more resistant to damage.  Some types should be more or less immune to damage from a certain tier of siege engine. 

Example:

Tier 1:  Vulnerable to building destroyers
Wood

Tier 2: Vulnerable to Battering Rams and Ballistae
Weaker stuff like chalk, ice or glass

Tier 3: Vulnerable to catapults/etc
Strong stones like granite, weaker metals like copper

Tier 4:  Invulnerable to almost everything (Dragonfire?), must be scaled over or tunneled under (unless we get cannons, which I doubt =p)
Stronger metals like iron or steel

Could even add in a little more realism by having the layer behind it affect things as well.  For example, having a layer of dirt behind a wall would kick it up to the next category. 

All really depends on how siege engines are eventually implemented, though. 

Hmm... add in Demons as a civ, but have them start with no sites on the overworld... then if you breach hell in one of your forts and die/abandon, it becomes a demon site that sends out invasions?  I like it.  Could even tie in with the army arc where you'd need to recapture the site with an army to allow it to be "sealed" before you can reclaim it, and/or have it sealed by an adventurer? 

This shall lead to many awesome engravings and kitten leather images, methinks. 

"This is an image of dwarves and demons in kitten leather.  The dwarves are burning.  The demons are dying.  This relates to the sealing of the hell breach at Frostedsilvers in 1170."

For military dwarves, just have them slaughter unarmed prisoners.  For civilians, kitten/puppy chutes into the dining hall work well over time. 

Just build a chamber 10-20z above your dining hall and chain up some female cats there. Have hatches over chutes leading to areas of your dining hall behind glass windows, but make sure the chained cats can't go far enough to stand on them, but still close, so 2 tiles from the chains.  Tie the hatches to pressure plates in well-traveled areas of your dining hall, seal the room off, and then when your dwarves come in to eat or have a party it rains kittens who wandered onto the plates.   More cats = more kittens = faster desensitization. 

If you don't have a glass industry or enough gems for windows, you can use bars or fortifications, but you'll need either an atom smasher or a dump hatch for the kitten corpses to keep your dining hall free of miasma.  I'd recommend having a disposal mechanism anyway, because hundreds of exploding kittens ends up producing a LOT of parts which can hurt your frames. 

Lol, Possum beat me to it. 


This looks amazing, though.  Nothing like exploding grizzly bears with the power of Poseidon. 

This usually happens when the construction gets suspended because a goblin showed up, a cat ran over it, etc.  Just re-designate it.  Also, if there's a stone there of the type the wall is going to be built out of in the tile, it won't complete because the dwarf will step on to the tile to pick up the stone, but not move before he tries to build the wall, which gets suspended because HE is in the way.  Dump the stone to solve the problem. 

Are you playing with weather off?  LNP and other utilities have an option to do that, and some people turn it off to save framerate.  If weather's off you'll never get snow.