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Author Topic: Nice mask, vamp! (Don't know how you make them think you're wounded, but nice!)  (Read 3738 times)

Imp

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My civilization has a god which has made two vampires.  One of them immigrated to my fortress and lived there for about 4 months before I noticed, I spotted him when I was doing a quick 'does everyone have a bed' check.  Everyone but him and children had picked out beds of their own.... silly vamp, be more greedy next time, your restraint has given you away.  Am sure he's a vamp, no food/drink/sleep thoughts, cant give nickname, all the rest.

So I knew it had been a few months, and no one's gone missing or pale, and I was really wondering how long it would be before he needed to feed.  Watching him more and more closely, as well as searching the fortress for any signs that he had fed but I missed it (hey, not one of my dwarves has even a 0 in diagnose.  I've got a chief medical dwarf, but am CERTAIN he has no idea what he's doing).  As this is my first vamp, I really want to see what happens, to not miss anything!

A new migrant wave comes.  Kk, assign labors through therapist to my liking and go back to brooding over my fortress and it's surely-growing-peckish vampire.

Suddenly I see it!  A dwarf is going to recover wounded!  There's been no combat messages.  Health screen still shows no health issues for any dwarves (there's two hurt animals, so the screen is working at least, but those are not new injuries)  Drat, I missed the feeding, I think.... I check my vamp.  He's -still- doing labors, he's no where near the beds.  No one is missing.  No one near him is pale or dead or anything.

Odd, methinks.  I start watching the dwarf that's recovering the wounded.  He's.... not going for the beds either.  He's headed out of the fortress!  He's going towards the incoming migrants!  I check for trouble.  No beasts, no fights... There's 10 migrants he could be heading towards, so I check each one's health, first the overview, then their personal health screens, then their thoughts and physical traits.  None have any wounds or any crippled issues like can't stand or anything, but I notice one of them doesn't show an age, he has 'the appearance of somebody that is one hundred twenty-nine years old and is one of the first of his kind'.

Whoa, methinks.  A few more checks, and I see that he claims to know no one, save for his god, the one that made two vamps...  a little more checking and I am sure he is the other of these.  Bemused, I sit back to see if somehow he is making my dwarves believe he is hurt and needs help - even as he slowly makes his way to the fortress.... very slowly.  His stats are the worst by FAR of any dwarf I've ever seen, and true or false, he's acting like they are real.  Interestingly as well - he's not wearing any jewelry but is garbed like a normal dwarf.

Sure enough, the rescuer goes directly to the 'appearing old' vampire and picks it up as his 'recover wounded' job.  Like a momma bird with a cuckoo's egg in her nest, he gently carries the vampire to an unclaimed bedroom (my hospital lacks beds at this moment) and tucks it in.  The vamp doesn't need a bed and promptly hops out and heads off towards the meeting area like he had been before he was carted in like an invalid...


Very interesting!  I must say, I'm not fooled, but this vamp has REALLY convinced my dwarves!
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dragginmaster

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Very interesting. Did he feed on the one that carried him?
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Imp

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Very interesting. Did he feed on the one that carried him?

Not that I could tell - no paleness or anything.

The vamp being carried showed 'no job' for the time he was being carried, and the carrier 'recover wounded'.

The vamp was newly arrived and once placed in bed assumed normal duties - I assume he was not yet hungry.  Amusingly, -while- vamp 2 was leaving the bed area, vamp one was headed in, on break.

He went straight to a sleeping dwarf.  The sleeper was 'corpulent', though slow to heal and susecptible to disease, so allowed the feeding to see what would happen.

The victim died - in immediate sight (within 4 squares) of 3 other dwarves, several of whom walked immediately beside the bed during the feeding.  My justice screen shows no criminals, there is no cold case, though the dead dwarf is listed as missing.

His wife was one of the 'right there!' dwarves, and instantly gained the bad thought and flashing ! of having lost a spouse to tragedy.  One of the 'right there!' dwarves grabbed the corpse of the dead dwarf and hauled it to my corpse stockpile.

The dead dwarf remains 'missing'.   Ahem.  Guess I figure out how to submit a bug report. :(

Can't imagine much more certain knowledge of 'he's dead, Jim' than 'I threw his exsanguinated corpse out with the rest of the trash while his widow sobbed' - at the VERY least this dwarf is not missing, he's been PLACED where is he by a non-vampire dwarf!
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For every trouble under the sun, there is an answer, or there is none.
If there is one, then seek until you find it.
If there is none, then never ever mind it.

SirAaronIII

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How mysterious. And kind of silly of the dwarves.
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Cheet4h

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AFAIR the witnesses have to report to your Sherriff/CotG for the case to show up on the Justice Screen.
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NonconsensualSurgery

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Clearly, Alucard has immigrated to your fortress and is on watch for other, lesser vampires. Weaponize him.

The "has the appearance of someone x years old" is normal and means he was alive at the start of worldgen and was created by Armok already grown up, to avoid a planet of children in year 5. All adult dwarves will have that in their description on short-history worlds. Vampires in my (old) world impersonate dwarves who were born after worldgen.

Trying to give him a nickname is the only reliable way to test if a dwarf is normal or not. The inventory screen lies on vampires and shows just regular clothing with no jewelry. The "is a former member of" list is NOT a lie on vampires and will often be extremely long because they've spent centuries going from one civilization to another to feed.
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Talvieno

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This is definitely amusing... lol   I didn't know vampires were so clever.
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FrisianDude

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Not hard to be more clever than Dwarfs though.
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Deus Machina

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I've had immigrants get retrieved before, but I'm unsure of why. They could have spawned on a ledge or something or, depending how in-depth worldgen goes, could have been wounded at the time your fortress starts. Show up, it's been a little while, game says that it's been long enough that they heal but hasn't clicked off the wounded tag yet.
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dwarfhoplite

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Can children be vampires? I have only one vampire identified at the moment and she didnt suck in years. She's running around babbling. Lately people have been sucked empty. Could the sucker be one of the children or is he this vampire who is babbling?
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Imp

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Clearly, Alucard has immigrated to your fortress and is on watch for other, lesser vampires. Weaponize him.

The "has the appearance of someone x years old" is normal and means he was alive at the start of worldgen and was created by Armok already grown up, to avoid a planet of children in year 5. All adult dwarves will have that in their description on short-history worlds. Vampires in my (old) world impersonate dwarves who were born after worldgen.

How exciting!  I'd never seen that message and did not know how to interpret it, thanks for explaining this.

Trying to give him a nickname is the only reliable way to test if a dwarf is normal or not. The inventory screen lies on vampires and shows just regular clothing with no jewelry. The "is a former member of" list is NOT a lie on vampires and will often be extremely long because they've spent centuries going from one civilization to another to feed.

I disagree about that being the "only reliable way".  I noticed a slew of other unique characteristics of this guy, some of which are highly obvious, others are more subtle...

He goes on break only to feed.  Interrupt that feeding and he goes back to work immediately - let him finish the feeding and he'll continue with a more normal break.

He does not claim a bedroom.  I don't assign everyone bedrooms, I make bedrooms and let dwarves autopick as they get sleepy - that's about a couple of monthsish after getting to the fortress.  If you attempt to go to the screen where you can assign bedrooms and look for who hasn't got one - there's your children and vamps.  (wouldn't work to find a child vamp of course).

His thoughts are far, far more limited than other dwarves.  Granted, my guys are getting next to no idle time - but all the thoughts related to the normal processes of life, which fill all my other dwarves heads within a couple months of immigration, are absent.

In Therapist, his name is absent, but there is a different name with skills and personality traits that match his.  Additionally, both of my vampires claim to ardently worship the god that cursed them - and the name on therapist matches the name they gave (and their fake names are nowhere on the list of that god's followers).

I wouldn't say that their membership list is excessive, but they do have one eerie membership that no one else does - both are "former sacred mists" of a civilization branch (surely a cult of some kind).

My vampire that claims to be married with kids immigrated without his wife or children - the only dwarf in my fortress to date to have arrived 'alone' after appearing to have a married family (that seems to be why we are awash in kids - every underage family member seems to migrate with the parents, who seem to migrate together)

I've had immigrants get retrieved before, but I'm unsure of why. They could have spawned on a ledge or something or, depending how in-depth worldgen goes, could have been wounded at the time your fortress starts. Show up, it's been a little while, game says that it's been long enough that they heal but hasn't clicked off the wounded tag yet.

All immigrants seem to spawn on the same tile and walk inwards... there's no ledge I can see that could injure any of them.  However, I bet it did arrive wounded and heal - except that its body shows no scars, and as far as I've seen (though this is all from DF2010 so far) if a dwarf gets hurt and doesnt get medical aid, they always scar - then again, vamps may be very different.

For anyone wanting to see, here's the relavant screens for anyone wondering about these dwarves and their thoughts/memberships/relationships and so on.

vamp 1, the 'normal one':
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

vamp 2, the 'carry me' one:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'll be REALLY interested if I get any other vamps, because it appears on surveying my fortress that only one of my fortress's gods curses, and he only made 2 vamps.
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For every trouble under the sun, there is an answer, or there is none.
If there is one, then seek until you find it.
If there is none, then never ever mind it.