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[Kezeal]

Hello, DF community!

I'll spare you from an introduction and get right to the point:

I wish to create a new race for the adventure mode, but I'm wondering if all of the following would be possible:
Metal skin
Metallic "bones"
Wires as arteries(instead of blood coming out, it'll cause energy/electricity to escape through those)
Not quite sure what to put as artificial muscles, or even what material it should be.

Three "modes" - casual, battle and war.
Casual mode would look rather similar to a human, except being all robotic and what not. When turning into a battle mode, the knuckles would get "spiky", you would get a new interaction in battle so you could slash and stab with fingers, because they also would get "sharp". Same as with fingers would also happen to toes.
Upon entering the war mode, two additional arms would come out of the body, right beneath the previous ones(imagine Goro from Mortal Kombat) and short yet sharp spikes would "appear" all over the body, causing damage to anything hitting it.

I presume adding a new skill would be difficult/impossible, so I was thinking that when using "stab" and "slash" with fingers/toes, you would gain "Sword" skill and those attacks would use that skill, in order to not make them kind of pointless.

Also, I would like for them to not be able to wear any armor, but somehow increase their own body armor and make it more durable, but not too heavy for fighting. Basically get new armor and weapons without getting armor and weapons, but instead upgrading their own body(imagine the most advanced
(Doctor Who spoiler)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Cybermen shown in the latest episodes of Doctor Who, who could upgrade themselves to withstand nearly everything,

but this race would require some materials instead)


That is all that comes into my mind right now. I had nearly everything thought out earlier, but I didn't think that I'd actually start to create it. I would need your help in order to see if it would be possible for such a "thing" to be created.

[Trapezohedron]

Yes, yes, and yes. This is possible. Let me show you the ways...

Metal skin is very possible. It is as simple as making a material based on Skin in material_templates, and use the values of any inorganic metal that you wish.
For bones, it is also possible with the very same method.
It is possible to use either gas, liquid or a solid for blood, but be warned that gas and solid blood bleeds out a lot and very quickly. You can name the blood whatever you want, and if you also want to name the arteries as something else, you may need to edit the tissue_template.txt.

The modes are possible with body transformation.

Skill gain for swords and such are possible, but it isn't possible to make a new skill.

To make them unable to wear armor, you must make them larger than any race, or smaller than any of them, so they can't wear those articles of armor at all. It is, however, impossible to make them upgrade their own body armor. If you used iron as a skin type, you will wear it all your life, until to your death. For an example of how to make a metallic creature, check one of the materialmen creatures in the raws.

[Kezeal]

What about using the body transformation as an "upgrade"?

[Trapezohedron]

Create a creature with 4 arms, and make the creature transform into that form using an interaction, and etc.

You can check Genesis' Polymorph Druid interaction for an example.

[Kezeal]

No, I meant that could a body transformation remove items from your inventory? In that case I could simply create lots and lots of different creatures, depending on what upgrades are installed.

[Meph]

Yes, but it would get quite complex.

Creature with a shield => 1. creature
Creature with a sword => 2. creature
Creature with a shield and sword => 3. creature

You would have to make one creature for each possible combination of upgrades.

[Hugo_The_Dwarf]

Yes, but it would get quite complex.

Creature with a shield => 1. creature
Creature with a sword => 2. creature
Creature with a shield and sword => 3. creature

You would have to make one creature for each possible combination of upgrades.

wait why a separate creature for each body plan? That's a bit excessive and would clutter up the games memory too much, if you have:

[CREATURE:DWARF]
   [DESCRIPTION:A short, sturdy creature fond of drink and industry.]
   [NAME:dwarf:dwarves:dwarven]
   [CASTE_NAME:dwarf:dwarves:dwarven]
   [CREATURE_TILE:1][COLOR:3:0:0]
   [CREATURE_SOLDIER_TILE:2]
   [CAN_LEARN][CAN_SPEAK]
   [BENIGN]
   [CANOPENDOORS]
   [PREFSTRING:beards]
        ......

copied for each creature is just a waste, when you can simply have:

[CASTE:4_ARMS]
   [BODY:4_ARMS:other parts]
[CASTE:SWORD]
   [BODY:SWORD:other parts]
[CASTE:SHIELD]
   [BODY:SHIELD:other parts]
[CASTE:SWORD_SHIELD]
   [BODY:SWORD:SHIELD:other parts]
[SELECT_CASTE:ALL]
   apply all standard materials and tissues to all parts (custom BDP)

organizes the creature better, saves on (if minor) memory/FPS, and allows you to easily find what caste has an issue (if each creature you made one issue in one, and copied them all. Time to go fix all of those errors (not to mention and future upgrades)) when making a creature, and most of all making a creature that has upgrades it's best to go the way of castes. Not a ton of clones, just leads to a big mess down the road.

And if you really want to have upgrades only accessed through an interaction or consumtion/inhaled/contact with a subtance. Then make a just one clone and have the upgrades in it, that will stop adventure mode from allowing you to force start as an upgrade.

Remember, keep it compact, keep it neat. If you do this you can reduce the amount of work of managing it to something bearable, else you just get one big frigged mess.

[BoogieMan]

I created a four armed humanoid race awhile back and it seems like there isn't much benefit in having extra limbs outside of some minor wrestling benefits. You may have backups, but more targets to get hit as well as and more places to bleed from I imagine. Equipping weapons and shields worked fine but it wouldn't equip the extra pair with gauntlets. But your race sounds like it won't ever need such things. If I recall the minimum size to not be able to wear human sized armor was 80000.