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[ZiggyZapf]

Watched some DF streams and I've been struck by a Strange Mood to create my own take on kobolds after being away from the game for a long time. Thought I'd pick the community's collective brains for guidance, since I don't want to underestimate how much work is involved. I'm leaning toward having my kobolds dwell in wetlands in connected wooden huts, emphasizing the bone, leather, and ceramics industries. I'm thinking of a Shaman's Workshop along the lines of blessing bones, teeth, and horns into a stronger material, burning some "magic reagents" to be determined. Items on my checklist thus far:

• Replace Kobold creature (in progress)
• Replace Kobold entity
• Create/steal Positions
• Create custom Shaman's Workshop and reactions
• Create Sacred Bone material
• Create/steal Kobold-appropriate weapons, tools, and armor.

So, anything I'm forgetting?

[delphonso]

You might consider a language file, but it's not really necessary, I don't think.

The procgenned towns will look like only what is in the vanilla game, I guess human hamlets and towns are the best match. Won't matter much, as there's no adventure mode yet.

Consider how they will source materials for all the crafts you want them to be able to do, and remove any that they can't possibly do (no coal? Okay, no steel.)

On this, consider the list if their accessible animals and the potential to add some swampy-lizardthings. Helmet snakes and giant cave spiders are very very strong if tameable into war animals, and potentially have huge broods with the snakes.

[DPh Kraken]

As for positions, I think that Kobold Quest has some neat class names, though it's unclear on how they'd apply to Dwarf Fortress. KQ definitely leaned into the venomous edge of kobolds, with their only weapon being randomly generated toxic insects.
The military progression goes ambusher -> poisoner -> venom lord -> chieftain -> warlord
The civilian progression goes gatherer -> wrangler -> shaman -> witch doctor -> hivemaster

The shaman class might be represented as using the MAGIC_NATURE skill (defaults to Druid, but can be renamed on a creature level), though it might be wise to have a second look at naming kobold ritual specialists given that the simplicity of kobolds plays into the same colonialist space.
Your conception of kobold rites is tied to strengthening creature remains which calls to mind ideas of purification, but it's hard to find English words to describe a person who does that, but doesn't sound like the kobolds have Catholic priests. I was reminded of Chinese oracle bones, so perhaps a non-unique Oracle performs these tasks. The profession of oracle has also gathered some reptilian associations (dragon bones and the Pythoness) just like our little friends.

Weapon stealing is an interesting prospect, since while offsite raids can't bring back generic equipment, you'll inevitably be sieged by armed opponents. Perhaps the craftsman (craftsbold?) workshop could have a category for reactions that cut foreign edge weapons into large daggers (perhaps also producing some spare resources like branches and scrap that can be reclaimed elsewhere or thrown out of a sling), and "tailor" pieces of armor into kobold-suitable items. A chunk of charcoal will likely be needed.

The lack of metallurgy can be done by removing kobolds' access to anvil-suitable materials. The "furnace operator" profession smelts ore into metals in worldgen, without such a job you can force what metals they have available or not. With a non-workshop reaction, you would cheat other metal bars into kobold hands to replicate the "weapon-stealing" behavior of vanilla without having anvils available in fort mode. If you're aggrieved by the lack of iron, you could give them a separate metal with iron's properties but no anvil compatibility. ([STATE_COLOR:ALL_SOLID:RUST], anyone?)

I'm not sure where cobaltite fits into this, since the unusable ore is right out of the kobold myth. Kobold magic might take such trickery literally and be able transmute silver into it, but that should be something you do for a reason. Maybe it's just something that lays around kamps, just as a byproduct of other reactions.

I do have raws for small axes and mining tools, plus a couple more usable stone sword types sitting around. I can send them over if you'd like.