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[WertyMiniBot]

The implementation of animal people on the surface of savage biomes is a missed opportunity for some fun when they're unarmed and pretty dumb too. If they had something like a wooden mace, blowgun, or even just some sharp stones, they would become capable of being a threat to civilians. Of course, just like the Sub-T animal people, a good military would be able to dispose of them. Still, any sentient creatures (without some sort of effective natural weapon) should at least have basic weapons if they're going to survive (especially with the GIANT creatures). It just seems unnecessary and unrealistic for them to be existing otherwise.

Another problem is that since you can't eat the animal people due to them being sentient and they keep out all the non-sentient creatures, you are forced to waste time chasing them with your axedwarves. I would propose, in savage biomes, having both a wild sentient spawn rate, and a non-sentient spawn rate. This would ascertain the possibility of the animal people spawning alongside the animals rather then replacing them.

My last improvement would be to make them hunt the creatures using their weapons, specifically rock spears and blowguns, and then drag away felled quarry out of the map, with both the meat and the people despawning. Dwarven hunters or other animal people could try to forcefully steal the meat, resulting in conflict. (This could be togglable for dwarves.) They could also help the animal people kill the quarry, and either share the meat or just be greedy and try to take it for themselves. The behavior could be applied to Sub-T animal people too (preferably if they were made to make rock spears). This would make the savage biomes a bit more lively and create competition between dwarves and animal people to gather quarry.

These 3 things would turn overworld animal people from a waste of space and training dummies to competition in hunting, potential threats to civilians, and much more interesting creatures in general.

[Detoxicated]

I would like to see some of the features you mentioned. Forcced into a noble's position (e.g. Tribal Diplomat) you could decide upon policies, or maybe have it be connected to the nobles personality.

[WertyMiniBot]

In order to have complex interactions between dwarves and a group of animal people, we'd have to first make the overground animal people minor entities that stay confined to a single village within their savage biome, rather than separated groups of nomads, and define nobles for each to have (such as a chieftain). I do think that the chieftain's personality could influence how the tribe in general reacts to your presence. You could get a lliason (with some security) to try to negotiate with them, and his personality could influence the effectiveness of these negotiations. (So you would want to get a high-tempered dwarf if you want peace.)

[Tristan Alkai]

This has been suggested before at least a few times.  I remember a thread somewhere around here titled "Better civ for animal peoples," but the search isn't turning it up. 

It did, however, turn up "New Races", "Semi-Sapients" and "Animal Peoples in one Creature RAW". 

However, nomadic civs in general are something I would like to see.  Relevant threads from that search include Different Society Types", "Request: A Nomadic Civ" and (in Adventure mode discussion) (Edit: this was actually in General, about an incident that had occurred in Adventure mode) Nomads?!?!?!?!?!???!!!??? (which seems to indicate that, at least at that point, only bandits were implemented as nomads).

[Dirst]

Let me add my 0.02 dorfbucks and saw that I'd like to see improved nomads.  If the animal people had a village, you'd probably be prevented from embarking on top of it (at least in vanilla)... but it really ought to show up as a neighbor.  The game can already support the village sending out patrols and hunting parties that could conceivably enter the player's embark, though army pathing specifically avoids this at the moment.

Interactions with these villages (or even nomads) will improve as the diplomacy engine and suburbs hill dwarf settlements are fleshed out.

[AceSV]

It may be worth mentioning that the next update will have expanded animal people:


http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/  May 4 2015 entry:

Some time ago, I mentioned that as part of adding visitors to your fortress inn and tavern, we'd have more animal people running around. I put that in today -- there are now reasonably rare instances of animal people leaving the wilderness and becoming involved with civilizations. Our first was a red panda man that became an herbalist in a human village for some years before taking up a wandering life as a musician. In adventure mode, you can now play as animal people if they are close to a civilization. You can also play an adventurer from any population that has established itself as a regular part of life in a civilized site where you can normally play, so you could play an elf or even a goblin if some already live in a human city, say, but you can't currently select an amphibian person from the sewers. Next up we should have some dev log on fortress visitors!

May 6:

If the sparrow man bard visiting the fortress wrote a ballad about his experiences, would he set a lighter mood and sing about how all of the guests took their clothes off and held them in bundles while the dwarven fish cleaner recounted the tale of how the first dwarven queen came to power? Or would he travel the darker road and sing about the human swordsman that attacked the goblin dancer outside the gates, cutting him down without regard for dwarven law?

EDIT:  This one struck me as especially interesting:
June 20:

I started the game as a hearthperson in a larger town so that there'd be a place to test out making orders at inns. In the keep where I began, there were a few dwarven soldiers... and a 'K'! Killer beetle! No, wait, that's Angband... the Lady ruling the town was a kangaroo woman, and she wanted me to beat some people up for her. You bet, just let me go to the tavern first. Right around the corner we had an establishment. It was called "The Cinnamon Fruit of Mouths" or something. Let's see who thought that name up. Through the doors, we have the tables and barrels... and an 'h'! Homunculus! Do I have sleep resistance? Oh, that's Hack 1.0.3... then I was like, oh, a newer 'h', humanoid... no wait... So I looked at it. "Hare man tavern keeper." Well, good, all the roguelike flashbacks made me thirsty. Barley beer in a mug! I just need to settle up, and I can't do that until it is programmed.

[TheLordMoccasin]

I'm imagining tribes of primitive animal-people declaring war on your fortress for hunting too many animals/ cutting down too many trees/ encroaching upon their land/ whatever.

To make up for their primitive weaponry, they would utilize poisoned arrows/darts, and specialize in sneaking up on lone targets, like hunters or wayward civilians, whom they would pounce on en masse.

It would certainly add an interesting aspect to warfare.

[GoblinCookie]

In order to have complex interactions between dwarves and a group of animal people, we'd have to first make the overground animal people minor entities that stay confined to a single village within their savage biome, rather than separated groups of nomads, and define nobles for each to have (such as a chieftain). I do think that the chieftain's personality could influence how the tribe in general reacts to your presence. You could get a lliason (with some security) to try to negotiate with them, and his personality could influence the effectiveness of these negotiations. (So you would want to get a high-tempered dwarf if you want peace.)

Why can we not just have the nomads roam about in the vicinity of the fortress?

[IndigoFenix]

Hmm, this is interesting.  I would like to see more blurred boundaries between wild animals and civilized beings.  If an animal person can take a fancy to civilization, might we have hippies who decide to break off from their homeland and live among the beasts?  I guess it would be based on their personal appreciation of nature, so it would be rare for dwarves but wandering elves would be a possible regular encounter.