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[FantasticDorf]

Right now, non intelligent or subservient races are not very well defined within the game of DF, though most of them are only accessible through modding, the biggest and most cruicial crutch to this arguement revolves how these suggestions and topics affect gremlins, who are a feature of the raw unmodded aspect of the game in a relevant fashion.

Gremlins - Pet intelligent archetype (Immediate to DF mode)

> Bug - Gremlins have upkeep issues with training, which is a notorious error unless you breed (tame) second generational gremlins, once they are enrolled as citizens, the tame gremlins will be fine, but the caught and tamed parent gremlins will revert, making it a difficult process.

> Gremlins are also hard to breed because of insistence to marry as a intelligent being.

Troll - Semi-intelligent pet archetype (with required modding)

> Bug - Trolls take up lots of profession jobs they can't complete on worldgen because they have a dual status as both common citizens and livestock (which sometimes makes it difficult to segregate the two 'types' of livestock desired troll, and trolls that work as per like citizens)

• This behaviour can be seen and repeated in both adventure and fortress mode, firstly by looking around goblin towers, there will be LOTS of trolls 'contributing' to jobs they cannot do, such as leather-workers and smiths. Additionally imported [pet] trolls via modding and most intelligent imported creatures will also have random professions they cannot complete.

> Bug - Trolls and semi sapients never acquire individual names for themselves when integrated into a society, breaking lots of menu screens (namely the barracks screens, which draw literal blanks) and otherwise make them hard to distinguish individually.

Suggestions to improve

> Semi sapient, and [pet] races can only apply for jobs in worldgen that are aligned with their natural set of skills (allowing them to do it), or are otherwise put into military draft's and locational/visitor jobs if appropriate.

• A gremlin would for instance typically result in worldgen, being site-rangers using their active sneaking ability, though additional opportunities may be present...

• A greater reliancy on using other races and diversity to doing unusual jobs not defined in the entity, such as [ITEM_THEIF] [MISCHEVOUS] [LOCKPICKER] being ideally suited to thieves, spies and shady people (two such traits being found on gremlins alone)

• As militant citizens, other opportunities as mercenaries may appear if there is no room to practice their martial skill in their home and instead seek employment and 'adventures' elsewhere with whoever or alone (anybody fancy a troll companion for your warband?)

> A more distinct line to distinguish stray livestock trolls from citzen trolls in behaviour, so that it would not become so blatently taboo even with preferable ethics to eat a livestock troll, shear its wool or carve its bones because its mindless livestock rather than a contributing member of your civ's society. A dwarf would never consume a gremlin, but it would be without guilt in eating livestock gremlins if they could and leave citizen gremlins out of the equation.

• A opportune time to revamp the rules on semi-sapient involvement and behaviour, trolls would not be brought along to sieges as war animals because they are 'EVIL' as defined by the rules, but more because they have electively been enrolled for citizenship and drafted into the army as a citizen and one of the few options availible under them with a existing military squad (because semi-intelligents cannot lead, only follow).

• Also worth mentioning that a leader could go out into the world (lets say a goblin demon) and tame the harpies/assimilate them, there would be a population of wild harpies on site, but also functional intelligent member of society harpies also within and around dark fortresses. Adding to the 'forces of darkness' if you will.

• All embarkable sentient creatures begin as livestock for consistency and to prevent instant citizenship bloat over the starting seven (for example elves having mastery over exotic races, stopping themselves from just bloating up with citizen unicorns and endless moose men for starting 200 population)

• Yes, under this model you could assign a dragon as a solo militia captain by enrolling them as a citizen (though with [POWER] it'll probably be completely sure that it will become later a oppositional factional leader, so that's probably a REALLY BAD idea unless you really want to give the boot to your monarch) or a champion noble so they can waddle round and give demonstrations if you also gave them [CAN LEARN] & [CAN SPEAK] tags

> Creating a transitional process from livestock (which would be the norm default for semi-intelligent and pet intelligent races) where races respectively apply for citizenship, and cast off their animal status, adopt a cultural name and join the society as a normal member to their capability.

• Prior to citzenship, and becoming a citizen, non pastured or otherwise zone assigned 'livestock' will not commit to jobs other than hauling and cleaning if they have grasping hands, and will remain within their pastured/pit areas willingly like a non-defined burrow, as to keep them in a non-obnoxious defined space where they can be accounted for and receive attention by animal caretakers if they can't feed themselves. If they can be milked or sheared or otherwise have any other interaction put onto them, they can be bunched up conveniently

• Citizenship would also affect marriage rules for semi-sapients, rather than indiscriminate lovers as to stop citizen trolls breeding with livestock trolls indefinitely, and respectively 'livestock' intelligent creatures like non-enrolled gremlins would have more relaxed rules than normal

• When livestock are civilised they gain access to a regular dwarven mind screen like most intelligent creatures, on sem-intelligents this is stripped back by a degree but still present into a more limited non-cultural range, and they will take account of things like their nakedness, and demand drink and hot meals if they can eat & drink. They are also prone to becoming upset with additional needs, and if they are prone to anger they may be more easily triggered, unlike their livestock cousins.

This is quite a lot of points, thoughts and suggestions and i thank you for reading through them all. Feedback would be appreciated.

[PatrikLundell]

I disagree with the livestock-> citizen progression for "civilized" races, as they (currently) don't accept slavery.
I think it would fit goblin society to have trolls and other "wild" (semi) sapients captured in raids and kept as livestock for semi sapients and adopted members (after proper indoctrination and quite possibly indefinite slavery) for full sapients. Worthy slaves and semi intelligent "livestock" could be promoted to citizens according to various rules (that need not be consistent either within or between fortresses).
It can be noted that goblin trolls have names when invading and they can come as both monster invaders and as soldiers. In the first case they still have clothes, while in the second case they are also armed (I'm not sure, but they may have a last name as well). A related bug is that beak dogs can come as "soldiers" as well, and it's been reported they've been riding beak dogs...

For (dwarven) fortresses wild sapients ought to be able to visit the fortress as other visitors in the form of "tribals" or some similar status, but otherwise behave as other visitors (i.e. offer their martial prowess for hire, or perform, or just come to gawk at civilization [and get drunk] etc. When magic comes along they might also offer shamanistic clerical services and magical research). Once citizens they'd be normal citizens.
Semi sapients are trickier, but they certainly might show up as mercenaries, and might be capable of reasonably simple labor (hauling, wood cutting [after all, if they can cut enemies they ought to be able to cut trees], threshing,... Semi sapient visitors would have a name when arriving as visitors, but would just be unnamed savages when visiting the embark as "animals" (although it would be cool if a savage acquires a name and becomes historical to later show up as a savage visitor or member of different civ).
You might want to allow players to ban tribals and/or semi sapients from visiting the fortress to foster prejudice (already present versus goblins and elves among a lot of players).

I don't see unicorns and dragons as viable in this context, as neither is considered sapient in DF. I certainly would want (non/low/normal/highly) sapient dragons though, and the same goes for other (semi) mega beasts. Once sapient these creatures would be suitable options for inclusion.

Since I've never gotten any animal people visitor who wanted to become a citizen or even resident, I have no experience of how well they function in the current DF version when joining the fortress though that avenue.

[FantasticDorf]

I disagree with the livestock-> citizen progression for "civilized" races, as they (currently) don't accept slavery.

Slavery covers a different aspect, I mean moreso out of intelligent tamable creatures, slavery in the game as current & theoretically is the with the proper ethic settings, the resettlement of people from conquered sites and theoretically subjugating local animal-men through force & making them join your civ settlement rather than 'taming'

Gremlin taming is not slavery, neither is animal men elven migrations, but forcefully removing X tribe of animalmen in its entirety for a region and pushing them inside the nearest dark fortress/civ building would be.

I think it would fit goblin society to have trolls and other "wild" (semi) sapients captured in raids and kept as livestock for semi sapients and adopted members (after proper indoctrination and quite possibly indefinite slavery) for full sapients. Worthy slaves and semi intelligent "livestock" could be promoted to citizens according to various rules (that need not be consistent either within or between fortresses).
It can be noted that goblin trolls have names when invading and they can come as both monster invaders and as soldiers. In the first case they still have clothes, while in the second case they are also armed (I'm not sure, but they may have a last name as well). A related bug is that beak dogs can come as "soldiers" as well, and it's been reported they've been riding beak dogs...

I agree on the raid/slavery mechanic (see previous point about removing X tribe or X creatures from regions) and only partially agree on rules, given that having a ability to grasp & speak should be enough to become a citizen, and the rest remain livestock slaves (there is no intermediary) trolls do not speak, are not fully intelligent but can grasp so fufill part of these rules.

Both of those instances are not indicative of intelligence, the [EVIL_ANIMALS] tag natually flags up trolls as evil semi-intelligents for use as non-declared war animals, same for (no tags like war animal or tamable) beak dogs also being used. Those names are acquired in the same way as animals getting kills given that nicknames (gained via getting kills) and actual names are separate.

> In GM editor, trolls have no true name & will only aquire surnames - AKA. Terry Wogan, simply becomes 'Wogan' Tame Troll like a adopted animal, rather than 'stray tame troll'

For (dwarven) fortresses wild sapients ought to be able to visit the fortress as other visitors in the form of "tribals" or some similar status, but otherwise behave as other visitors (i.e. offer their martial prowess for hire, or perform, or just come to gawk at civilization [and get drunk] etc. When magic comes along they might also offer shamanistic clerical services and magical research). Once citizens they'd be normal citizens.

Well that'd would mean detracting from the mindless wandering animal people naturally milling about by giving them too much player interaction and removing whatever aspect of antagonism they have (not to mention visitor bloat, there are more types of certain animalmen than others, months and months of skill-less fly men)

Alternatively you could offer a identity and a mini-culture to said animalmen so their regional presences are more distinct, as to pinpoint where a elven migration comes from rather than drawing on obscure references. There used to be behaviour like this prior to 42. in a earlier version with savage tropical grassland Hyena men poaching your livestock to take back to tents usually constructed out of above ground spider silk.

That i feel would give them a bit more depth and properly help with your tavern recruitment idea, so it comes from small communities (though that'd be opening a jar of worms to certain below ground citizens) that can be displaced (see first point's slavery idea) rather than just drawing from the pool of animalmen

Semi sapients are trickier, but they certainly might show up as mercenaries, and might be capable of reasonably simple labor (hauling, wood cutting [after all, if they can cut enemies they ought to be able to cut trees], threshing,... Semi sapient visitors would have a name when arriving as visitors, but would just be unnamed savages when visiting the embark as "animals" (although it would be cool if a savage acquires a name and becomes historical to later show up as a savage visitor or member of different civ).
You might want to allow players to ban tribals and/or semi sapients from visiting the fortress to foster prejudice (already present versus goblins and elves among a lot of players).

Semi sapients are mechanically hard capped against commiting to labours they don't naturally already have skills, there's no real way around it & learn martial and non assignable skills at half pace. I have nothing against semi-sapients becoming mercenaries but i feel like it should be out of a sheltered society rather than spontaneously from the wild (EVIL entity ogre & troll merc's who specifically cater to babysnatcher / same kind of civs as them) due to their limited capacity to do pretty much anything beside punch stuff & haul (both good traits)

I don't see unicorns and dragons as viable in this context, as neither is considered sapient in DF. I certainly would want (non/low/normal/highly) sapient dragons though, and the same goes for other (semi) mega beasts. Once sapient these creatures would be suitable options for inclusion.

Since I've never gotten any animal people visitor who wanted to become a citizen or even resident, I have no experience of how well they function in the current DF version when joining the fortress though that avenue.

The dragon example is a extreme one, which i can agree the principle of semi-mega's having exclusive or restricted (/specific) access to certain roles should be considered. My point (though I foolishly forgot they dont both have intelligence) is about moddability and how additional modding might change things, it might be a bit impractical to have a fortress run entirely by non grasping unicorns (or hold everything inside their mouths) because your livestock taming got out of hand before everyone died in a tragic incident.

I can't remember either given that my DF sessions don't tend to last that long with a large amount of tavern traffic, If i remember correctly, they will adopt the dwarven CIV's ethics but retain whatever personal traits they have on their RAW that are hard wired into themselves. The should be accessible, but gremlins are not accessible because they are pets & the tameness is never cleared.

> I know from GM editor that trolls being part of the civ also posess power dreams relevant to the civ's values which they adopt, this is debatable whether this is intentional as it seems to quite buggy when put in perspective of semi-intelligents or all creatures that a indirectly part of your civ having sentient creature facets.

[PatrikLundell]

Being kept as livestock is one step worse than being kept as slave, in my view. I find gremlins being kept as pets to be akin to catch a "savage" human to keep as a pet. Ideally captured animal men (and gremlins) should demand to be set free (and then actually wander away) most of the time, but occasionally request to stay a the fortress.

I do not count animal people joining human and elven civs (and possibly goblin civs as well) as slaves, but visitors that have requested to join.

"Various rules" could be the whim of an influential citizen, worthy deeds, slaves working themselves out of slavery, or the whim of a mad emperor to appoint his horsetroll as a general.

I haven't checked goblin trolls with gm-editor, but they are displayed with a single first name, such as Bax, Snodub, and other normal goblin first names. I've never seen one in a goblin raid without a name (but it can very well be a nickname).

I'd doubt there'd be huge volumes of visitor bloat from occasional animal people visiting from the wild. Unless they spontaneously started to wander, the visitors would come from the local animal people populations, one group which might enter the map every few years or so. Only a small minority of the animal people that would visit the embark map would visit the fortress, and hostility on the part of the dwarves ought to result in them either being wary and keep away, or start to ambush dorfs in retaliation.

I agree animal people ought to belong to some kind of tribes or family groups/clans. It would make sense for most of them to be migratory, with only a small subset being settled in small (semi) permanent communities.

Below ground animal people are described as being settled in the cavern, but I've never seen any indication of anything indicating a settlement. They just camp and currently stare vacantly in front of them as they're jostled by dorfs rushing about to haul away bones and rotting carcasses. Most animal people probably should be migratory, with only a few being settled.

If dorfs can run around for years with someones arm in their mouth, unicorns using their mouths to carry stuff doesn't seem so far fetched

[FantasticDorf]

Being kept as livestock is one step worse than being kept as slave, in my view. I find gremlins being kept as pets to be akin to catch a "savage" human to keep as a pet. Ideally captured animal men (and gremlins) should demand to be set free (and then actually wander away) most of the time, but occasionally request to stay a the fortress.

I do not count animal people joining human and elven civs (and possibly goblin civs as well) as slaves, but visitors that have requested to join.

"Various rules" could be the whim of an influential citizen, worthy deeds, slaves working themselves out of slavery, or the whim of a mad emperor to appoint his horsetroll as a general.

• Practically the gremlin has a much higher quality of life being 'tamed' by dwarves than the alternatives given it can't just offer to work given it is technically just a intelligent wild animal, spends so much time just surviving in the caverns (without a [local heroes] tag, which could be a initiator for your work offer behaviour)
• You'd be correct (though nobody knows how it works really, animal people just 'spawn' inside the civ and occasionally breed from adventuers) but the future is open to making a clearer distinction between volunteers & populations that have been displaced and forced to work.


• Those rules would be unclear and more in the hands of the appointed master of the slave or highest ranking official on the site, given that we still have to abide by the DF game world context. It was not uncommon for personal reasons and sometimes highly treacherous reasons for slaves to be freed, as civilisations that utilised slaves like the Roman Empire shows us, then again a slave rebellion group might also be highly amusing to watch and even more amusing when they are all sent to be executed.

I'd doubt there'd be huge volumes of visitor bloat from occasional animal people visiting from the wild. Unless they spontaneously started to wander, the visitors would come from the local animal people populations, one group which might enter the map every few years or so. Only a small minority of the animal people that would visit the embark map would visit the fortress, and hostility on the part of the dwarves ought to result in them either being wary and keep away, or start to ambush dorfs in retaliation.

I agree animal people ought to belong to some kind of tribes or family groups/clans. It would make sense for most of them to be migratory, with only a small subset being settled in small (semi) permanent communities.

Below ground animal people are described as being settled in the cavern, but I've never seen any indication of anything indicating a settlement. They just camp and currently stare vacantly in front of them as they're jostled by dorfs rushing about to haul away bones and rotting carcasses. Most animal people probably should be migratory, with only a few being settled.

If dorfs can run around for years with someones arm in their mouth, unicorns using their mouths to carry stuff doesn't seem so far fetched

• You'd be suprised, fly men have been known to have populations of 100,0000 upwards in human towns where they gain the majority, and again there might be problems unless the 'friendly' members of the wandering wild population aren't distinct. If a bunch of eagle men suddenly turn up and refuse to leave because they are happily fluttering on the corner of the map eating FPS, wouldn't that mean the sufficient time to sign a petition might expire if they decide to go suddenly?

• Too easy to get the labor, and lots of technicalities with leaving the map/distinguishing interested members from wild ones, not really convinced and i think the small migratory communities to draw petitions off by individuals in range arriving via the usual methods (taverns, attractions etc) wearing basic garments would work better. Making you aware of the community where they came from when they arrive from the fortress civ screen would also be a neat touch.

> Im all for giant wolves with oversized swords, but dropping what you're holding to eat/pick something else up or lack of dual wielding a shield is impractical so i wouldn't mark it as very helpful.

[PatrikLundell]

I didn't mean animal people would leave groups just entering the map to visit the tavern, but those would rather be distinct events. I meant the visitors would be drawn from the same population, so it seems we actually agree. I agree references to their home would be a nice touch.

[Nagidal]

Please enlighten me, what is a "QoL"?

[FantasticDorf]

Please enlighten me, what is a "QoL"?

Quality of life.

The core premise of the suggestion is to make modding easier by simplifying or adding functionality onto the existing systems because using intelligent pets (which i use gremlins as a immediate dwarf mode feature to raise its urgency and how it would affect the base game) is currently heavily bugged at the moment and not exactly clear.

So it'd make it easier for modders to use and more enjoyable (not least understandable) to see the different behaviours & utilities.

[Nagidal]

Quality of life.

Ah, user experience (UX) sort of thing, then. Thanks.