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[DeKaFu]

Back in February 2020, Toady announced they'd be retiring crayon drawings as rewards, so I took the opportunity to jump in and finally donate and request one (as I'd meant to for years).

For my request, I decided to go for one of the more mysterious and poorly-described cave creatures, the draltha, because I'd always been curious how they were envisioned. I also hoped I might be able to donate the image to the DF wiki page for dralthas, as has been done for a few other creature pages.

As a reminder, here's the description of a draltha:

A large, long-bodied grazer with a thick mane that feeds on the tops of towercap mushrooms deep under the earth.

Dwarves like dralthas for their lustrous manes.

When I got it in the mail (which happened a long time ago, I only just got the scanning equipment together), it was.... beautiful. More than I ever could have hoped for. Though quite different from what I had imagined...

Marvel at the majesty. (Image here)

...Different enough that after reviewing the cave critters for a while, I started to have some doubts. Is this really how a draltha looks? Because it seems like it might possibly bear a lot more resemblance to a different creature... a drunian.

Description of a drunian:

A large quadruped with a mane circling its manlike face and hands at the end of its forelimbs.  It lives underground and is fond of raiding the supplies of cavern outposts.

Dwarves like drunians for their manes.

-----

With this sudden doubt lodged firmly in my mind, I tried comparing the raws of both creatures to the critter in the image:

- They both have manes, but only one (drunian) mentions it circling the face like in the picture.
- Both are quadrupeds, and neither have hooves, which both match the picture. Drunians have hands, which the one in the picture... are those hands? Maybe?
- In terms of colours, dralthas have yellow hair, ecru skin and brown eyes. Drunians have grey hair, brown skin and purple eyes. The fellow in the drawing appears to have purple hair, pinkish skin and green eyes. So... welp.
- Notably, drunians have GENERIC_TEETH_WITH_LARGE_EYE_TEETH, whereas dralthas simply have GENERIC_TEETH. Crayon guy certainly seems to have LARGE_EYE_TEETH to me, so that's something.

-----

In the end, it doesn't really matter to me which of the two creatures the picture portrays. I love it either way. I wouldn't be shocked or dismayed to learn that in the rush to finish piles of crayon drawings, they mixed up their "dr____" cave creatures.

But it does put a bit of a question mark over my hope to add it to the wiki as a future resource. To me it seems there's a bit more evidence weighing towards classifying it as a drunian, but is it solid enough to actually add it to the drunian's page? Am I overthinking it, should I take them at their word and call it a draltha? Or is it going to have to be stuck in limbo and unusable on the wiki because it's ambiguous?
(Also I might need to be directed to resources on the proper way to add it to the wiki if I do, as I've never contributed before.)

What do you think?

[Salmeuk]

My guess is that, due to a lack of interaction with those two specific creatures, there may have been some misremembering involved in the final form of that 'draltha'.  I am astounded by your examination of the difference of the two species. say, are you planning on publishing any treatises on the origin of life anytime soon . . ?

So. Is there a place where people upload and store their crayon drawings. . ? for everyone to see? I have one sitting around from like a decade ago and it should probably be preserved considering the retiring of their creation.

[FantasticDorf]

maybe its a matter of perspective, the neck is obscured by the mane or as you theorize there was a mixup. Kruggsmash had a go at their own but i dont think it really hits the article, looks more like some sort rutherer mixed with a enteledon than a gentle giant.

Nominally i imagine a Draltha being a mixture of a large lipped shaggy haired fraggle, with a slightly arched sauropod neck, fluffy whip-tail, stout body and digitless elephant feet.

[voliol]

I remember the draltha shown as one of the Premium sprites being quite horse-like, at least in regards to its mane. Though chances are that specific sprite is one of the one that had to be redrawn, if it was originally drawn by Meph. And honestly I do not know how much of the creature designs are influenced by the brothers, versus the interpretations of the artists. So maybe this is just a curious tidbit.

[brewer bob]

I got more draltha vibes than drunian ones from the drawing, but that's just my interpretation. Perhaps it's the smile? Dralthas seem more benign and likely to smile, while drunians seem more like it'd have a more nasty disposition.

But I dunno, if you want a definitive answer to this mystery, maybe ask on the Future of the Fortress thread?

[Eric Blank]

It looks like it could be either, but then again, dralthas and drunians are overall quite similar, maybe so much as to be in the same genus/very closely related species with divergent diets

I would say they meant to depict a draltha. The hind foot also has similar toes, colors probably chosen at random

[DeKaFu]

An update so as not to leave this topic hanging:

I originally felt like it might be silly to bug Toady One about something so trivial, but I finally went ahead and asked in FOTF and just got my answer:

Bit of an odd question, but I was hoping to add the crayon drawing I received to the wiki as an illustration on a creature page. Could you confirm whether this picture depicts a draltha or a drunian? (I requested a draltha but the colours and body shape threw me off, so now I'm second-guessing and don't want to put it on the wrong page.)

Ha ha ha, sorry, yeah, that looks like a drunian to me.  Total failure on our part.

So there's the answer. My gut feeling was correct and it was a drunian all along. A bit disappointing I didn't get what I asked for, but it's hard to complain about what I ended up with. Now to hopefully figure out how to get it added to the drunian wiki page!

[brewer bob]

I originally felt like it might be silly to bug Toady One about something so trivial, but I finally went ahead and asked in FOTF and just got my answer

On the contrary, it was the most important question!

(Been bugging me too for not knowing which one it was. And, as per usual, my guess was wrong.)

[Thisfox]

Thankyou for the update.

I guess if crayons are open sometime, the next step is for someone to make an appropriate donation and request "a draltha not a drunian" or alternatively a large enough of a donation for "a draltha AND a drunian" so that comparisons could be made.