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[GreatWyrmGold]

Is this on the Eternal Suggestion voting? If  it is, I can't find it. On another note, you're all brilliant!

Thank you. 

Now potential unfortunate results would be interesting....

Heh heh, of course. You think it's bad when your mostly-tame bear snaps and starts to kill dwarves? Imagine if you lost a bunch of clothiers and such to a recent siege, meaning that the antman miners and tigerman rangers don't get their silk clothes that they requested in exchange for doing work, leading to a strike and a lack of stone, gathered plants, hunted meat, and wood; leading to the creation of those promised rooms for various non-dwarves being delayed and the humans who help with relations not getting the cups they wanted; leading to the tigermen rebelling, killing antmen and humans; leading to the antmen leaving, taking their picks and such with them, and the creation of some iron goblets to placate the humans; leading to a lack of metal, digging tools, and diggers; leading to...you get the point.

[Splint]

A potential !!FUN!! spiral of the greatest order. Beautiful.

[RhymeNorReason]

Now potential unfortunate results would be interesting....

Heh heh, of course. You think it's bad when your mostly-tame bear snaps and starts to kill dwarves? Imagine if you lost a bunch of clothiers and such to a recent siege, meaning that the antman miners and tigerman rangers don't get their silk clothes that they requested in exchange for doing work, leading to a strike and a lack of stone, gathered plants, hunted meat, and wood; leading to the creation of those promised rooms for various non-dwarves being delayed and the humans who help with relations not getting the cups they wanted; leading to the tigermen rebelling, killing antmen and humans; leading to the antmen leaving, taking their picks and such with them, and the creation of some iron goblets to placate the humans; leading to a lack of metal, digging tools, and diggers; leading to...you get the point.

*Sniffs and wipes a tear from his eye* That was beautiful!

[GreatWyrmGold]

Why, thank you very much. Do you think an extended and expanded version would make a neat story? (Answer, then we'll possibly take this to the Community Games & Stories subforum.)

[RhymeNorReason]

Why, thank you very much. Do you think an extended and expanded version would make a neat story? (Answer, then we'll possibly take this to the Community Games & Stories subforum.)

YES. Yes, it would.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Alright, since I finally noticed that reply, I will.

At some point when I have more time.

[Masked_Hunter1825]

Lets face it. The first thing everyone would do if this got implemented, would be to have Cave-fish-man citizens.

[NW_Kohaku]

Lets face it. The first thing everyone would do if this got implemented, would be to have Cave-fish-man citizens.

I~t's beginning to look a lot like fishmen, e~verywhere I go. 

Now if only we could get cross-breeding rules...

To go back to the serious side of the suggestions, though, I do think that one of the better ways to make the animal-people cultures less of a resource to just be exploited on the assumption that they would of course want to become a part of "superior dwarven culture" (because, really, who WOULDN'T look at the squalid hole your dwarves live in and instantly become green with envy... or is it green from the choking sulfurous gasses from all the magma you pipe over your blasted Hellscape?) would be both the use of a "cultural pride" meter and the pressures they face from external forces.  A culture that has faces no military threats and can feed itself well has no need to risk trusting those crazy dwarves and working hard labor in dwarven mines for food they can already get elsewhere.  A starving or militarily defeated and demoralized culture, meanwhile, will be willing to make a deal with the Devil, and if they're even more desperate, worse, players to take a wild shot at survival. 

If they become less desperate, they may want to have relations cool somewhat and bargain for better deals for their continued labor or break off.  Cultural indoctrination should be a very slow thing unless players use totally brutal methods, such as the infamous Stolen Children methods of Australia, and so it could create a situation where just plain being nice may not always get you everything you want, but cruelty can have disastrous long-running consequences as well, (provided you can't just genocide them out,) so that skill with negotiation may play a greater role than simple noble intentions or ironfisted power. 

To add to this, you could have a degree of difficult-to-control dwarven sympathy/prejudice, where good treatment of natives will lead to some dwarves being angry, and poor treatment of natives, especially ones that are friends to those dwarves, will lead to other dwarves becoming angry.

[GreatWyrmGold]

That being said, some cultures should probably see the dwarves as possessing a culture superior in, if not every way, then in by far enough ways that they'd gladly shuck their old ways of life to join them. I remember stories about a variety of native cultures destroying their cultural artifacts because anti-pagan Christian religious leaders or what-have-you told them to, and one instance where some Polynesians changed their drainage ditches from vertical to horizontal at the Europeans' suggestion (the gardens got washed away the next time a big rainfall came along). That's assuming that their religion isn't unfortunately geared towards misinterpreting your dwarves as gods, as famously occurred to the Aztecs.

Also bear in mind that, if we're talking about technologically/socially "inferior" races like the animalmen, there is historical precedent for treating them as a resource (enslaving them, that is), as well as for treating them like people (sometimes even inter-marriage) and genocide. Dwarves are against slavery, so they'd probably tend towards integration or extermination rather than subjugation, but that should be more a matter of ethics/unhappy thoughts/whatever than a game mechanic.

[NW_Kohaku]

Also bear in mind that, if we're talking about technologically/socially "inferior" races like the animalmen, there is historical precedent for treating them as a resource (enslaving them, that is), as well as for treating them like people (sometimes even inter-marriage) and genocide. Dwarves are against slavery, so they'd probably tend towards integration or extermination rather than subjugation, but that should be more a matter of ethics/unhappy thoughts/whatever than a game mechanic.

Ethics/Unhappy thoughts/Whatever are game mechanics, however, (presuming most normal definitions of "Whatever",) and so that is a statement that needs a better description. 

Anyway, it's Personality Rewrite stuff, but making a xenophobia personality trait or derivative of their cultural ethics (probably with cross-pollenation, if possible). 

Likewise, some cultures having high cultural pride does not by any means preclude others from having low cultural pride and being willing to adopt any new practice that seems to come from a "superior culture".  In fact, you could just call it a "reticence to change" and apply it both ways, as the marker of dwarven xenophobia and how upset they will get at "the beastmen polluting our proud dwarven culture" just as much as the animalmen will see dwarven intervention as "brutish outsiders with no respect for the old ways". 

Conversely, it may be opposed by (or if simply at the low end of the spectrum of the xenophobia personality trait) some sort of cultural curiosity. 

We are supposed to be exploring the game not as some sort of deity, but as the consensus of the bureaucracy of the fortress itself.  To be subjected to pressures both from the animalmen and from the dwarven populace over every decision that you do or don't make, with the necessity to please every faction of each side could make the game's internal politics an interesting one.

... Suddenly, I'm merging this idea very heavily with the ideas I've had for expanding Class Warfare...

[Splint]

Class warfare you say? Man those non-military nobility are screwed...

Oh wait, you meant socially...


I gotta say, I'm starting to warm up to some of the more complex things mentioned. Others... not so much.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Also bear in mind that, if we're talking about technologically/socially "inferior" races like the animalmen, there is historical precedent for treating them as a resource (enslaving them, that is), as well as for treating them like people (sometimes even inter-marriage) and genocide. Dwarves are against slavery, so they'd probably tend towards integration or extermination rather than subjugation, but that should be more a matter of ethics/unhappy thoughts/whatever than a game mechanic.

Ethics/Unhappy thoughts/Whatever are game mechanics, however, (presuming most normal definitions of "Whatever",) and so that is a statement that needs a better description. 

Anything that makes animalpeople, etc, more than resources should be based more in the mechanics of dwarven psychology than in those of actually allying with them.

Anyway, it's Personality Rewrite stuff, but making a xenophobia personality trait or derivative of their cultural ethics (probably with cross-pollenation, if possible). 
Likewise, some cultures having high cultural pride does not by any means preclude others from having low cultural pride and being willing to adopt any new practice that seems to come from a "superior culture".  In fact, you could just call it a "reticence to change" and apply it both ways, as the marker of dwarven xenophobia and how upset they will get at "the beastmen polluting our proud dwarven culture" just as much as the animalmen will see dwarven intervention as "brutish outsiders with no respect for the old ways". 
Conversely, it may be opposed by (or if simply at the low end of the spectrum of the xenophobia personality trait) some sort o cultural curiosity. 

My point was that many cultures were very receptive to "greater" cultures coming in and destroying theirs. Sure, humans, goblins, and probably elves would resist assimilation, as would some groups of other sentients, but many would tend to flock to a chance to enjoy the "soft, easy" life afforded by dwarven civilization.

We are supposed to be exploring the game not as some sort of deity, but as the consensus of the bureaucracy of the fortress itself.  To be subjected to pressures both from the animalmen and from the dwarven populace over every decision that you do or don't make, with the necessity to please every faction of each side could make the game's internal politics an interesting one.
... Suddenly, I'm merging this idea very heavily with the ideas I've had for expanding Class Warfare...

I was fairly certain that that's why our debate, and that of others, has been going on for so long in this thread.

I gotta say, I'm starting to warm up to some of the more complex things mentioned. Others... not so much.

Mind explaining what you do and don't like?

[Splint]

To much one either side to really list. Plus I don't feel like sifting through the loads and loads of stuff here.

Thing I like: Having to keep the new tribals happy or they backstab/leave you.

Thing I don't: Going into the psychology of the dwarves too much. Althought a very xenophobic king would probably pitch a fit when/if you become a mountainhome with a mess of legal alien residents, which is always funny.

Dwarves just strike me overall though as not caring so long as they earn thier keep (help drive off invaders and whatnot.) I dunno. I've been up too long (52 hours. Test anxiety and caffine is one hell of a combination.) and don't really know where I'm going with most of what I say anymore.

[Masked_Hunter1825]

Just out of curiosity to some earlier statements. . the people who would butcher kittens and puppies, make their dwarves go insane and generally be all-around crazy and likely making their fortress area's surface apocalyptic. . . have problems with slavery? And uplifting? Forget about black white and gray morals. People here have Violet and Turquoise and Banana as their morals.

Back on topic. . I love this idea. The thought that if I manage to survive long enough that I could have an entire fortress that once belonged to the now removed dwarves, houses a civilization of moosefolk is amazing. I support this!

[Splint]

No, our morals are clearly bacon and necktie. There's a difference.