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[Slash Harkiri]

After watching a couple of cheesy flicks, i started to feel that those Calavera zombies from the day of the dead festival are pretty freaken sweet, the whole idea of an undead musician seems cool to me, but. alas, this is not dwarfy enough on its own. while a musical skeleton bringing about a peppy beat to the destruction of a goblin horde is a decent idea, i've got a much better one.

Modders, if anyone is interested, i propose a rather interesting proposition.

Proposition 1. new undead

Calavera Zombies are an oddity to the world, born when a person of great musical taste is struck down, rather than stay dead, or even turn into a much more horrid form of monstrocity, the calavera's will to perpetuate its movement re-animates it, and in the process, even strengthens its own song!

But like all things, just because some may seem like a being of revelry and sport, does not make all of them so...

Types of Calavera

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Just like ghosts, But a lot more instant, their are many moods of calavera, depending on the mood that they were in when they died, and the musical talent of the dead (IE, Musicality). Since the calavera is in no sense a fighter, its main form of communication or interaction with the world of the living is through its song. songs affect things like thoughts, healing and attributes, with more benelovent calavera even giving buffs to your soldiers! heres a few of the ideas i had for them...

note that since causes of ghosts cannot be determined easily, simply re-writing ghosts themselves may make this easier, also, for a calavera to spawn, the deceased must have at least a natural ability with music


Tragic Calavera: like a Howling ghost, it haunts its area of death, annoying all those concerned with the beast, but not via intense screaming. This Calavera constantly spews forth the tale of its death, and while depressing at first, it quickly becoems annoying after it bothers to repeat itself the fifteenth time in a night. this interrupts the sleep of most of your fortress, and causes a bad thought due to the irritation, they, like skeletons, can be killed via a hamemr to the head, but they are quick little devils and tend to run from provocation

Battle-Bard:This Particular soul was born from someone killed in battle, but as opposed to being sorry for himself, like the Tragic Calavera, this one found quite some enjoyment right before it died. it instead belts out a tune dedicated to lifting the spirits of the soldiers of the battle-front in an attempt to increase the amount of martial trances they enter.

[i2amroy]

While this is a cool idea a lot of it (such as the state of death or musicality affecting the type of zombie) isn't possible right now. You could make a special creature that functioned that way, but you couldn't get a dwarf's state of death and other things surrounding it to determine what it became if raised.

[Slash Harkiri]

While this is a cool idea a lot of it (such as the state of death or musicality affecting the type of zombie) isn't possible right now. You could make a special creature that functioned that way, but you couldn't get a dwarf's state of death and other things surrounding it to determine what it became if raised.

point taken. but all that means is a little tweaking about. lets just make it a seperate species then. well.. groups of species. perhaps living bards and musicians that give buffs while most calaveras are detrimental/!!FUN!!. perhaps a calavera that emits a "musical aura" (basically a fog) that literally causes dwarfs ears to explode?

[Godlysockpuppet]

You could make a caste of dwarf that has high musicality and set the interaction so only this caste could be raised. That'd work.

[Slash Harkiri]

You could make a caste of dwarf that has high musicality and set the interaction so only this caste could be raised. That'd work.

Thanks, i didn't even think of that.