Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Toady One]

Elephants at it again (cnn link)

[Keilden]

let me fix that:
NEW Mountain Home, Etlekhop -- An elephant in eastern Etlekhop has sparked complaints from caravans who accuse it of blocking traffic and refusing to allow wagons to pass unless drivers give it dwarfs to eat, a newspaper reported on Monday.

The Dwarfestan Times said the elephant was scouting for dwarfs to eat on a road in the eastern state of Oratkep, forcing traders to roll down their windows and get out of the wagon.

"The tusker then inserts its trunk inside the wagon and sniffs for dwarfs," local resident Rokha Longpants, who has come across the elephant twice, was quoted as saying.

"If you are carrying dwarfs inside your wagon, then it will gulp them and allow you to go."

If a commuter does not wind down his window or resists opening the wagon door, the elephant stands in front of the wagon until the driver allows him to carry out his routine inspection.

Forestry officials told the newspaper that the elephant is old and is therefore looking for easy food.

"So far, it has not harmed anybody," said Sekhro Easyleg, a forest elf working in the state.

"We are telling commuters regularly not to tease the elephant. But if people don't heed to our advice and harass the tusker, then it can retaliate."

[TotalPigeon]

LOL very good

[JT]

Yeah, I've never had as many problems with elephants as everyone else has: they're certainly not dwarf killers.  An attrition rate of one dwarf per year isn't really that significant to me, either; I get at least twenty in each wave of immigrants. =P

This post does make me wonder again about random animal encounters for migrant groups; i.e., automatically, every time a migrant group moves on the world map, there'd be a small chance (proportional to their "juiciness" as a target and inversely proportional to their apparent military strength and their covertness) they'd be accosted in abstract form by animals and possibly lose a member or two or at least suffer injuries.

The other possibility is migrant bandit groups who deliberately try to intercept caravans and such, requiring an active military presence from civilisations in order to maintain safe passage.  And, if you're a wandering marauder in a civilisation in Adventure Mode, you certainly don't want to get caught by a 20-man patrol of well-trained, -armed and -armoured soldiers...

The idea would eventually be that you can clear areas of (hostile) animals or dangerous animals by issuing instructions to your patrolling armies; there would then be absolutely no need to correct the behaviour of blaming you for the loss of caravans or representatives, because if they cross over into your border, your negligence in safety becomes a big point of dispute with other nations.

[Keiseth]

Very funny, but they have it easy. That's a relatively calm part of India; if you go to one of the more sinister areas, you'll find that commuters are utterly devastated by skeletal elephants that stand on their cars until they're dead!

[Slartibartfast]

And just like in DF, leopards aren't a big deal -> cnn link <-

[ May 29, 2007: Message edited by: Slartibartfast ]

[KFTrendy]

quote:Originally posted by Slartibartfast:
<STRONG>And just like in DF, leopards aren't a big deal -> cnn link <-

[ May 29, 2007: Message edited by: Slartibartfast ]</STRONG>

His daughter was in their bed because she had been frightened by a mosquito.  A mosquito.  How could a man who can wrestle a leopard right after waking up have such a pansy child?

[Jaqie Fox]

quote:Originally posted by KFTrendy:
. . . . frightened by a mosquito . . . .

Hey, the bugs down there are big.  

[ May 29, 2007: Message edited by: Jaqie Fox ]

[Heliopios]

thank god a marksdwarf isnt around there

[Slartibartfast]

quote:Originally posted by KFTrendy:
<STRONG>

His daughter was in their bed because she had been frightened by a mosquito.  A mosquito.  How could a man who can wrestle a leopard right after waking up have such a pansy child?</STRONG>

She was accosted by vermin, even the toughest dwarves hate that.

[Veroule]

Sounds like the leopard was having a fey mood, and just wanted a good warm bed and a little snuggle.  The wrestiling match likely quilified for the snuggle and since the bed was warm it was all good.  Artifact happy thoughts were being built and that construction completely occupied the leopard's mind.  Hence the man's seemedly superior abilities.

Also almost all animals are not wrestlers.  So as long as you have at least a decent idea of what their joints can do, and a willingness to take a few wounds to get position you can nearly always win at wrestling with an animal up to about 300lbs.  The hard part is getting them to wrestle instead of killing you in the first strike.  I haven't tried that theory much beyond large dogs though.

[JT]

According to the article, the leopard was old and weak from starvation, which is why it came into the city in the first place -- seeking easier prey like housecats and pet dogs.