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[Arek]

Since we will be able to equip friendly NPCs in goblin controlled settlements or elsewhere, would we be able as necromancers to arm our undead minions too (given they are suitable for it, like at least body with legs and at least one arm, or some similar restriction?

[WillowLuman]

Since we will be able to equip friendly NPCs in goblin controlled settlements or elsewhere, would we be able as necromancers to arm our undead minions too (given they are suitable for it, like at least body with legs and at least one arm, or some similar restriction?

I'm going to guess that, by default, it will work. Maybe it will have some glitches at first with them rejecting stuff?

[Man In Zero G]

 And if skin and hair reanimates, what's to stop necromancers from just animating people's clothes and constricting people to death? If a severed limb reanimates, and skin reanimates, then logically any piece of leather, fur, or hide clothing should too. In fact, what's to stop them from just having people's dandruff stand up and burrow into their skull?

See, that's where the "pulping" comes in. Tanning the rawhide, cutting the tanned hide up into panels and stitching those panels into a shirt is effectively destroying the original skin - it is rendered into an object that in no way resembles it's original state. Which is, at the core, what the whole "pulping" thing is about. Destroying the animated object to the point it it unrecognizable.

For the record, I do not support reanimated hair's viability.

[monk12]

 And if skin and hair reanimates, what's to stop necromancers from just animating people's clothes and constricting people to death? If a severed limb reanimates, and skin reanimates, then logically any piece of leather, fur, or hide clothing should too. In fact, what's to stop them from just having people's dandruff stand up and burrow into their skull?

See, that's where the "pulping" comes in. Tanning the rawhide, cutting the tanned hide up into panels and stitching those panels into a shirt is effectively destroying the original skin - it is rendered into an object that in no way resembles it's original state. Which is, at the core, what the whole "pulping" thing is about. Destroying the animated object to the point it it unrecognizable.

For the record, I do not support reanimated hair's viability.

Actually an interesting distinction, in that it suggests that clothing made of whole animal hides should be valid targets for necromancy even if most mundane clothing isn't. I can imagine some rich human's dead fox scarf coming to life in a most awkward position, or something like Hercules's Nemean Lion Skin suddenly getting feisty at an inopportune moment.

[WillowLuman]

 And if skin and hair reanimates, what's to stop necromancers from just animating people's clothes and constricting people to death? If a severed limb reanimates, and skin reanimates, then logically any piece of leather, fur, or hide clothing should too. In fact, what's to stop them from just having people's dandruff stand up and burrow into their skull?

See, that's where the "pulping" comes in. Tanning the rawhide, cutting the tanned hide up into panels and stitching those panels into a shirt is effectively destroying the original skin - it is rendered into an object that in no way resembles it's original state. Which is, at the core, what the whole "pulping" thing is about. Destroying the animated object to the point it it unrecognizable.

For the record, I do not support reanimated hair's viability.

But what's to stop dandruff? If skin peeled from a mangled severed limb revives, what's to stop skin cut into panels? Why is tanned leather unsuitable for reanimation but embalmed/dried out mummy skin perfectly fine? The thick, outermost layer of skin on a living person is dead, what's to stop a necromancer from seizing control of that and making it kill someone?

Does pulping require completely pureeing the offending dead matter, or does, say, causing multiple fractures to a limb put it down for good? Are we talking pumpkin pie or just smashed jack-o-lantern?

[Caldfir]

I agree that something should be done about strange undead, but it has nothing to do with the current "pulping" work (in terms of programming at least).  It's a problem with how butchery is treating certain items. 

As Toady already pointed out, the issue with those undead showing up isn't a problem with the undead system, it's a problem with butchering currently working like perfect extraction of the skin and hair from the creature.  That means that the skin and hair have "hands" and a "head" if the creature had skin or hair covering hose parts.  Since the DF arbitrary distinction of an "animatable corpse" is something with hands and/or a head that come from an appropriate creature, this makes them valid targets.  By contrast, wool or tanned hides no longer have specific body parts, and cannot be reanimated.  Really, if you think about it, it's a pretty good approximation of how most magically animated stuff from real myth works - if it looks enough like a man, and it was part of a man's body, you can turn it into an undead-man. 

The issue is then less with necromancers having overreaching powers, and more that dwarves are able to peel things way too well. 

[Lolfail0009]

The issue is then less with necromancers having overreaching powers, and more that dwarves are able to peel things way too well.

That is a very disturbing notion.

[Osmosis Jones]

Really, if you think about it, it's a pretty good approximation of how most magically animated stuff from real myth works - if it looks enough like a man, and it was part of a man's body, you can turn it into an undead-man.

...and there we have it folks, DF uses a variation of the magic system from Brandon Sanderson's novel, Warbreaker.

[Neonivek]

Well there will probably be multiple magic methods

But as always I hope Necromancy as it currently is (In that it is an ability with no cost that can raise any number of dead in a single moment it wishes) remains in some form.

I'd ask Toady about that, but it seems like one of those "I don't know yet" kind of questions.

[mastahcheese]

With the way that towns and cities will build roads when enough people are moving between them, will roads be built to our own active forts? And if so, how will this work?

[Spish]

Will the framework for retired player fortresses have improvements that apply to abandoned/conquered ones as well?

I.E. regarding things like item scattering, NPC location, abandoned pets, etc.

[Caldfir]

With the way that towns and cities will build roads when enough people are moving between them, will roads be built to our own active forts? And if so, how will this work?

There's some relevant chatter from DFTalk stuff:

Rainseeker:   Okay, XSI asks: [8]'Dwarven strongholds seem to have tunnels between them, would it be possible to eventually make one of those in fortress mode; probably useful to get migrants and dwarf caravans while being sieged?'

Toady:   I think there's a dev item on that, I don't know if it was called 'deep outposts' or something like that, and I think it originally sprang forth from a suggestion someone posted so there's probably a few posts on it as well. We're definitely for that; the issues that arise are the same issues that always arise when you have off-site sites. How do you connect it up? How does digging commence off map? And the same thing would go to like building an aboveground wall, or aboveground roads and that kind of thing; how do you build that site when your view is restricted to a single fortress? But I think those questions are just a matter of making a good decision about it; I don't think that they're super hard and we're definitely planning to do that, especially because those tunnels are there. The fact that the tunnels are there is one of those things that kind of demands satisfaction in terms of actually being able to do it yourself or getting rid of them. So it's just a matter of ... Right now you can't designate digging on the edge of your map, and if you can designate 'I want to dig there, I want to dig a tunnel' then that's got to be some kind of special requirement or you have to have say five or six miners leave the map and do that digging for you and it's going to tie into a number of things. It's going to tie into having little - like when you become a capital - having outposts outside of your map and sending armies off the map, having those larger populations that we talked about last time; all of it ties in again to that kind of thing so I imagine those questions will start to be answered around that time.

For some reason I thought that quote was more recent than it is... maybe something similar was said in #20 but the transcript isn't available right now. 

Anyway, the plan is for those world constructions (roads and tunnels and walls) to eventually make it to your fort, but the expectation is that usually it's going to require the player to have some input there.  Like, roads aren't going to just "show up" without you actively trying to get a road, since that would probably annoy many players (I'm 100% certain the AI would be completely stupid with road placement).  Like other stuff, there has been no mention of site expansion, growth, or placement for this release, nor has there been any mention of world constructions forming during play, so it is unlikely to be in the upcoming release. 

Someday though!

[mastahcheese]

Thank you Caldfir! That helped me.

[MDFification]

Are we going to be able at some point to send our military to attack other settlements? Are our kings and generals going to demand to "borrow" our militaries at some point?

[Footkerchief]

Are we going to be able at some point to send our military to attack other settlements? Are our kings and generals going to demand to "borrow" our militaries at some point?

This is the long-awaited Army Arc:

Military
    Dwarven armies
        Ability to send out fortress dwarves to lead larger groups of surrounding dwarves out around mid-level maps (or just go alone)
        Ability to send equipment and fortress dwarves out to train surrounding dwarves
        Ability to attack sites and entity populations with your dwarven armies
        Ability to set fires and select supplies to haul back when sacking a site