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[Kathe]

I just had an idea, while watching my miners opening new shafts on their quest for emeralds on the current mine level: what if Forgotten Beasts, in addition to arriving through the caverns, were occasionally unearthed while mining? Like the HFS, but in normal, although deep, rock. They could be "trapped" in small air pockets inside the rocks, maybe through a past cataclysm. Maybe a way to implement this would be to make the game change every 1000th (or whatever) large gem cluster into a little cave with a FB trapped within. Maybe some of the caverns have inscriptions, or runes, or sigils, indicating that the beast was trapped by an intelligent race...
Other parameters could be set so that the cave is at a minimum (or maximum) depth, or between the 1st and 2nd cavern, or whatever else.

[FantasticDorf]

There used to be something like this for frog demons (a commented out and removed feature) long ago, i wouldn't be against more varied forgotten beasts though at the same time i wouldn't want to have to constantly harrassed with potentially game ending monsters (or they become predictable/ weaponised with save cheesing) just digging around early in the game (like put them on third or second cavern layer etc) because some people are pretty intensive with strip mining or going after ore veins.

As long as there were definitely logged and dispersed in a area, and their means to be were also logged in legends ("Hiberating in stone/trapped in stone/woke from its slumber etc.) then id welcome the changes personally for more nasty surprises.

[GhostDwemer]

Old version of Masterwork has something like this. There's a large inclusion rock type called "living rock" (I think). It can be mined for meat (mmm, mysterious underground meat-rock) and also has some other good stuff in it, but it potentially has some nasty elder-god type things which infect your miner, who turns into a blob and then into some kind of shuggoth like creature. It also had balrogs you could uncover, in the lower rock layers. As both were simply types of rocks until you mined them, if you were careful and watching your miners and/or announcements, you could usually avoid them.

Here's a thought: bubbles of adamantine with demons inside. Not a spire, but a hollow bubble, and you don't know how much is safe to mine out, or how nasty the demon trapped inside it is. You could just leave it alone...

[PatrikLundell]

I like GhostDwemer's version as it provides a clear warning, but also a reward to tempt you. I'd probably prefer the bubble to be something else, like mithril or divine (infernal?) metal you couldn't get elsewhere.
However, Kathe's original proposal could be mixed in with this if the critters in normal gem clusters were nasty but not game ending, You should still have some means if getting a warning of potential danger, though, rather than suddenly find your miners long dead and something(s) rampaging through the fortress.

[Melting Sky]

This is a very cool idea. 

Maybe limit these entombed ancients to the bedrock deep in the roots of the world that way dwarves won't accidentally unearth one of these things while first striking the earth to make a farm etc. If these slumbering horrors from before time were restricted to being entombed only in the deepest bedrock, lets say the sort of depths you find the second cavern and below, it would allow people to avoid them if they desired, but add to that whole "they dug too deep and too greedily" mystique.

One can build a completely functional fortress without ever digging down into darkest depths of the world looking for forbidden riches and the magma sea, but those who choose to chase such power must do so at the peril of unearthing ancient evil. It would be nice to have something as an intermediate threat and an aside to the easily avoided but cataclysmic unearthing of the circus. These unearthed forgotten beasts would be harder to avoid, but much less threatening than a circus breach. You would want to make them quite rare, maybe a single entombed horror per every three or four embark tiles on average. I think this would be a lot of fun and if people wanted to avoid any chance of running into them they could just build shallow and pretend they are elves.

[rhavviepoodle]

One of the things that players can already (sort of) do with candy is carving fortifications to see whether or not the tile in question is safe. This of course fails if the demons in question are made of smoke or steam (which seems not to be uncommon). I think forgotten beasts aren't usually composed of gases, which means they might could ultimately carve fortifications and never really put their dwarves at risk.

Clearly the horrors generated could be tweaked where they were more likely to be gaseous or whatever, mostly I'm just concerned that it might involve making players jump through more hoops simply for the sake of jumping through more hoops.

I do agree that the rare metal bubble is a neat idea--the player knows what he'd be getting into, and he wouldn't get entirely suckerpunched for the simple sake of being suckerpunched. Sometimes the game -does- do that, but usually the dangers that are consistent can be anticipated and fairly worked around without jumping through too many hoops. In the case of the circus, it simply means exercising self control and saying no more candy, which as we all know is easy enough to do.

[PatrikLundell]

I've seen FBs made out of fire and water, but I'm not sure about gas (nor whether such creatures can "swim" though air to get through fortifications). However, many FBs have ranged attacks, so carving a fortification can still result in the engraver tracking some nasty syndrome stuff through half the fortress before succumbing to it. It should also be noted that an enclosed monster will always be very close to the engraver, and thus within ranged attack range.

[Kathe]

Well, if they were encased in normal rock, maybe there could be an announcement pop up similar to warm or wet rock: "You hear a deep hum/vibration/faint whispering coming from this rock...". That way, you can either choose to ignore that area altogether or continue digging.
Or..
"An inscription is carved on the rock. It depicts a squid-faced colossus surrounded by figures. The figures are chanting."

[Bumber]

Here's a thought: bubbles of adamantine with demons inside. Not a spire, but a hollow bubble, and you don't know how much is safe to mine out, or how nasty the demon trapped inside it is. You could just leave it alone...

You could just drop the roof on them. Atom-smashed demons, free candy. If the roof doesn't cave, the tile below is safe.

Wait. Does this work for the regular spire, too? It probably fails if you have a hollow tile that goes all the way to the bottom, which may be guaranteed. Throw more z-levels at it?

[GhostDwemer]

Bumber, I don't think the clown rush exists until you pierce the candy cane. I've also never seen a candy cane that went all the way straight down. So, no possibility of atom smashing clowns in the candy cane. But any candy cane is free candy if you stay away from the 4x4 interior block, all the little side shoots can't possibly contain a hole. Also there's the dwarven farm plot/meeting zone exploit to tell you where the hollow starts. And you can always make a huge spear trap hall, that will take care of any number of clowns.

If it is really important to limit the ability of the player to avoid the clown (which I really don't think is important, given that you can currently get guaranteed clown free candy if you know what you are doing) you could make it like the current candy canes: the clowns don't appear until you open them. You could even make the clown encased in candy, dig out that square and you have an angry clown, but it's solid candy so you can't drop a rock on it.

[Melting Sky]

One of the things I find a bit lacking in modern DF is the lack of surprises. Having a rare threat that you could just stumble into while mining in the deepest darkest depths would be cool. At the moment we don't even really have a reason to build a military at all. Every threat in the game is so predictable that you can literally just use traps to stop them. Having an undetectable threat that only occurs when you dig super deep would be a good way to shake things up because those who don't want to deal with it simply can avoid digging deep and those who want the power that comes with magma and the aqua colored treasures of the deep will have an added dimension of strategy and risk involved. It's not like digging into a forgotten beast would be the end of the world so long as the fort has bothered to build a military and put some barriers between the rest of the fort and the deepest dig sites.

[Bumber]

Bumber, I don't think the clown rush exists until you pierce the candy cane.

I predict one of four things will happen:
1) The cave-in will prevent the clowns from spawning. All the candy can be safely mined with repeated cave-ins, as long as you don't collapse the last level.
2) The clowns will spawn during the cave-in and be immediately smashed.
3) The clowns will spawn in the remaining sealed area and can be smashed in a 2nd cave-in.
4) The clowns will spawn outside the spire. Uh-oh.

I've also never seen a candy cane that went all the way straight down. So, no possibility of atom smashing clowns in the candy cane.

That's not the issue. You can take care of them level-by-level. A cane that goes straight down presents a problem because the cave-in tiles will go all the way to the circus floor and leave an opening.

But any candy cane is free candy if you stay away from the 4x4 interior block, all the little side shoots can't possibly contain a hole. Also there's the dwarven farm plot/meeting zone exploit to tell you where the hollow starts. And you can always make a huge spear trap hall, that will take care of any number of clowns.

Dwarven radar will eventually be fixed. Clowns of fire will melt the traps upon death.