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Author Topic: Evil stuff in non-evil biome  (Read 437 times)

ond_magiker

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Evil stuff in non-evil biome
« on: July 13, 2016, 10:07:57 am »
I've been taking a crack at building an above-ground fortress which didn't end well. It was a 3x3 start in wilderness surroundings so it came as a surprise when it started raining rotten goo. A bit weird, but none of the dwarves complained as far as I could see. Then a bunch of undead animals killed my unprepared dwarves.

I re-checked the area to find it bordering a haunted biome. Is it possible for the evil to "spill over" onto nearby areas? Can evil weather travel a distance to mess things up?
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Skorpion

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Re: Evil stuff in non-evil biome
« Reply #1 on: July 13, 2016, 11:55:44 am »
Yes and yes. Both have been documented in the past.
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The *large serrated steel disk* strikes the Raven in the head, tearing apart the muscle, shattering the skull, and tearing apart the brain!
A tendon in the skull has been torn!
The Raven has been knocked unconcious!

Elves do it in trees. Humans do it in wooden structures. Dwarves? Dwarves do it underground. With magma.

DeKaFu

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Re: Evil stuff in non-evil biome
« Reply #2 on: July 13, 2016, 12:13:17 pm »
Out of curiosity, were the undead creatures birds? I had a non-evil embark that was completely destroyed by murk-covered raven husks.
Some other bug reports:
http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/mantisbt/view.php?id=9476
http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/mantisbt/view.php?id=8781
http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/mantisbt/view.php?id=8724
http://www.bay12games.com/dwarves/mantisbt/view.php?id=9477

In these cases it seems to be related to "biome shearing"... Where the upper z-levels of an embark can randomly belong to the biome of a neighboring region, even if they are several world-map-squares away.

I never saw any evil weather in my case, but all the eerie-murk-covered wildlife consisted of birds, which suggests something weird was going on in the sky.

Not sure whether it's entirely a bug or just a poorly-documented and poorly-thought-out feature, but I'd really rather it be fixed. Not everyone finds it "fun" when their carefully-chosen embark location turns out to be incompatible with their plans.
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PatrikLundell

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Re: Evil stuff in non-evil biome
« Reply #3 on: July 13, 2016, 03:02:08 pm »
You can actually have a weird biome shear whereby you've got an evil biome in the air above the normal one. I've had blood raining onto my dog box watch towers, for instance, but not reach the ground. The blood even formed (invisible) pools up in the air. This is some kind of bug, of course, but it hasn't been tracked down.

Also, as said above, flying undead in particular can come from a few tiles away.
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ond_magiker

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Re: Evil stuff in non-evil biome
« Reply #4 on: July 13, 2016, 04:51:33 pm »
Quote from: DeKaFu on July 13, 2016, 12:13:17 pm
Out of curiosity, were the undead creatures birds? I had a non-evil embark that was completely destroyed by murk-covered raven husks.

Yes, there were ravens involved. I'm pretty sure they were called something like "raven corpse", and not husks.

Quote from: PatrikLundell on July 13, 2016, 03:02:08 pm
You can actually have a weird biome shear whereby you've got an evil biome in the air above the normal one. I've had blood raining onto my dog box watch towers, for instance, but not reach the ground. The blood even formed (invisible) pools up in the air. This is some kind of bug, of course, but it hasn't been tracked down.

Maybe that's the reason no dwarves complained. I found remains of evil rain in the trees, but never on the ground.

Oh well, new embark. An arctic biome this time, so it's the polar bears' time to ruin things.
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