Print

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

[McDonald]

My first artifact was a robe with an artifact elf bone short sword image sewn into it. Some time later I get another artifact... Guess what? Of course! Elf bone short sword. How is that possible? I cant remember the names but im more than sure that they matched.

BTW is an artifact elf bone short sword good for fightning?

[Urdothor]

I don't think theres anyway to predict artifacts. Its probably just a coincidence.

As to the viability of an elf bone short sword being a good weapon, I couldn't tell you for sure. Though I don't doubt it would intimidate those tree hugging hippies.

[Girlinhat]

This is a known quirk.  The first time you look at an artifact, it decides its decorations.  If you don't look at it, it only knows "Material: Steel.  Decoration: Microcline."  When you look at it, THEN it decides, "Decoration: Microcline hanging rings."  Because it decides on decorations later, you can have it show images of things made after its construction, because then they're valid image subjects.

This saves room on common junk.  When the traders arrive with thousands of jugs and bolts and nest boxes, each decorated, they're saved vaguely.  They're only saved in meaningful ways when you look at them, because until you look at them, they don't matter.

Yes.  Artifacts are quantum and don't exist in any meaningful way until observed.  In theory, common items should also be able to show events that happen after their construction.

[McDonald]

Ive came up with an idea: a list of artifacts in your fort is randomly generated along with things like what materials are used, what decorations on them are like etc. Each time a mood is ?starting? game checks for dwarves whose preferences and skills match the artifact (or at least partially) and choose them for making the artifact. This way, the game just generated the first artifact with this swords' image on it. Guh, my fingers hurt .

[Girlinhat]

The game doesn't know if the second mood will fail or not, players notoriously wall in failed moods asking for silk and such.  The first artifact cannot have an image of the second one, because it doesn't know if the second one will ever exist or not.

[McDonald]

Ummm... Ah, nevermind, just magma my previous posts. I see your point.:/

[slothen]

artifact elf bone short sword is a terrible weapon.  I'm not saying its useless, I'm just saying you shouldn't expect to kill anyone with it.

[Tacomagic]

Pretty sure the only thing the elf-bone sword would be good for is decorating a trap for value boosting.

Or giving to a dwarf as a themed weapon, though getting that full set of artifact elf-bone armor to go with it might take you a while.

[gestahl]

artifact elf bone short sword is a terrible weapon.  I'm not saying its useless, I'm just saying you shouldn't expect to kill anyone with it.

Put it in a weapon trap at the bottom of the elf pit. (you do have an elf pit right?)

[Di]

Bone is stronger than wood, so a dwarf armed with this one still has the upper edge over elves.

[slothen]

By the way, is there any confirmation that this ONLY happens when the artifact is viewed for the first time long after its creation?  The idea being that if you don't check it, it doesn't choose the actual decorations until you view it the first time, allowing this time-predicting phenomenon.

[McDonald]

I dont have an elf pit, just a drowning chamber *turns around embarassed*. I think that i checked the description of the first artifact before the creation of the second one, but i'm not sure.

[Quietust]

This is a known quirk.  The first time you look at an artifact, it decides its decorations.  If you don't look at it, it only knows "Material: Steel.  Decoration: Microcline."  When you look at it, THEN it decides, "Decoration: Microcline hanging rings."  Because it decides on decorations later, you can have it show images of things made after its construction, because then they're valid image subjects.

Technically, it starts out as "Material: Steel. Decoration: Microcline art image" (i.e. it knows the type of decoration), and it isn't until you view the item that it decides what the art image depicts; in this case, it happens to choose to depict a history event that happened after the artifact's creation (because it doesn't restrict the event pool it draws from).

The reason it does this is because vast numbers of items get created during worldgen, many of which are decorated with art images, and generating art images is rather CPU-intensive (during gameplay they happen infrequently enough that it isn't as noticeable, but if you do something like use DFHack's "fastdwarf" and mass engrave a bunch of tiles you will feel the lag).

[LordPaleWind]

I just got an artifact andesite cabinet, that "predicted" the future creation of an artifact water buffalo leather helm.. And while this may just be a bug or something, what I thought was special about this artifact was the name... "Cattenzalud, Channeledfuture, a water buffalo leather helmet".

[yfwong31]

This is a known quirk.  The first time you look at an artifact, it decides its decorations.  If you don't look at it, it only knows "Material: Steel.  Decoration: Microcline."  When you look at it, THEN it decides, "Decoration: Microcline hanging rings."  Because it decides on decorations later, you can have it show images of things made after its construction, because then they're valid image subjects.

Technically, it starts out as "Material: Steel. Decoration: Microcline art image" (i.e. it knows the type of decoration), and it isn't until you view the item that it decides what the art image depicts; in this case, it happens to choose to depict a history event that happened after the artifact's creation (because it doesn't restrict the event pool it draws from).

The reason it does this is because vast numbers of items get created during worldgen, many of which are decorated with art images, and generating art images is rather CPU-intensive (during gameplay they happen infrequently enough that it isn't as noticeable, but if you do something like use DFHack's "fastdwarf" and mass engrave a bunch of tiles you will feel the lag).

Will the revealed art images hurt FPS? I like to read the engraving from time to time but I want to play longer before FPS death.