Print

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

[higgypig]

So Ironhld, my current fort is doing pretty well...except one particular vamp who seems to enjoy draining my metalworkers dry(Low abundance of skilled smiths). Therefore I desperately need to find this pest before someone else dies. All my dwarves have rooms so dorm is out of the question, is there any tricks/cheats on finding vamps easily? I suppose it helps to know my world isnt too old, so noone in my fort is either, ruling out looking for someone cursed hundreds of years ago.

[maqertas]

The vampire has a false name ingame. You can find his real name by using DwarfTherapist. Just compare the names in DT and ingame.

[tussock]

I think the in-game non-cheaty methods are as follows. It's a fake person, so you eliminate the real ones. Nicknames, notes in bedrooms, whatever. The one (or however many) that's left, chain and cage them up and let people go as they get thirsty. Vampires don't ever display their thirst, so they can just stay there until you find a new career for them. Nice rooms around the chains help with unhappy thoughts.

They have no family at the fortress, so eliminate everyone with family (v-z-r), dorfs with huge families all outside the fortress are suspicious. They claim a bedroom but never sleep in it, so eliminate everyone you notice sleeping. They never eat and never drink, so everyone sitting at a table with a meal is eliminated, as is anyone standing on a booze pile with a barrel in hand. They never have long-term injuries, so that can help. People who are pale survived a drain, and aren't the vampire.

And in general, build some windows into your rooms and set up a patrol through the bedroom complex. At least then you'll get a witness on the next dead body. Convicting and hammering them makes everyone happy again too, though it's really a waste of a good immortal. Now if only I could find mine.

[puke]

Just had to do this myself.  Went through the Unit list, rueled out anyone with Eat, Sleep, or Drink jobs.  Viewed the thoughts of the remaining, ruled anyone who recently ate, drank, or slept.

I could have also ruled out anyone who spoke with a sibling or spouse, but was not certain of this at the time.

This gave me 5 (out of about 55) remaining suspects, whom I gave nicknames to.

Over the course of a season, I watched those 5 for eating, drinking, or sleeping.  Narrowed it down to two.

Verified both of those are complaining of lack of alcohol, when there is plenty.

Drafted them, and locked them in rooms until I can devise a use for them.

If you're feeling exploity, there will usually be a god on one of the relationship lists whom has cursed someone in worldgen.  This won't match the vamps assumed name, but it will match any nickname you give them.

[Panando]

In principle it should be possible to use the drowning test. I think this should work:
Make a drowning chamber.
Make everyone go in it.
[save the game]
Fill it with water.
The one who survives is the vampire!
[reload the game]

If you don't want to save/reload you should be able to use temporary immersion, dump all your dwarves in water (or vice-verca), and just check which one isn't drowning then quickly drain the water. This could be done by having a lever in the drowning chamber, which links to a hatch or door (opens instantly) which lets the water in (under high pressure from a cistern above), and is also linked to a bridge (opens after a delay) which lets the water out again. You then have a moment to check for non-breathers.

[GavJ]

There's really no need to cheat. They're easy to find normally.

Just hop through each person's description. Only one should not have any eat, drink, sleep thoughts. This one method should be sufficient by itself, the end. Usually that's enough for me to just kill them. Unless it's an immigrant that JUST arrived. And if you're paranoid of even them killing people before their first thirst, just lock immigrants in rooms until they are all thirsty, each wave.

As a confirmation if you're unsure still, the same person should also have a ridiculously huge list of gods and family members and groups they were associated with, and a lot of skills.
As an absolute confirmation, chain up the dude and see if he starts getting thirsty, sure.

But still all largely redundant.

[Button]

As a confirmation if you're unsure still, the same person should also have a ridiculously huge list of gods and family members and groups they were associated with, and a lot of skills.

This is only true if your world is pretty old, and isn't always true even then. One time I got a vamp who'd only been cursed two years before the end of worldgen, and so escaped suspicion.

[puke]

But you can see that on the diety bios, and know what to suspect.

Trick is with those, they could possibly have living family.  Might the even bring some to the fort?  Can a vamp mary after bring cursed?

I think they can't,  that their family is slways fiction, but not sure.  Only thing I count on, is eat-drink-sleep.

[Button]

Trick is with those, they could possibly have living family.  Might the even bring some to the fort?  Can a vamp mary after bring cursed?

Not sure. Mine was from the wrong dwarven civ, which is what eventually tipped me off.

I'm pretty sure they can't marry or have kids after being vamp'd, but I don't know about preexisting family.

[TheFlame52]

Married couples have to be within ~10 years of each other. Vampires often outlive their families, but I once had a married couple of vampires arrive.

[tussock]

Oh, and on finding mine (I think they might only use the claim bedroom trick the one time, so if you free a lot of rooms they won't have one), I did follow his bloodsucking behaviour for a while, for !!SCIENCE!!

They eat where they work. The victim is the closest sleeping dorf when they went on break, and any second victim was the closest to the first. Yes, they can quite happily drain at least two dorfs in one break.

PS, candy warhammers and full steel armour make for a pretty soft punishment regime. Bruised upper arms. Minor problem, as soon as they get off the chain, they like to go "on break" again. But it does make for easier science.

[wierd]

I like the automated migrant filtration system I devised some time ago.

Non-vampy, non-necromancer migrants will eventually need to sleep. They will prefer to path to a bed. So, some clever door controls, and some cheap beds, and you have yourself a nice little migrant filter.

EG--

Spoiler: Clicky to see basic filter layout (click to show/hide)

Inside of main fortress                 |            Isolation quarantine ward for migrants

TO FORTRESS<-|
                    O  O=============O========================O
                    |   PPX  B        PP    X                                                              |
                    |  O=============O              MEETING AREA               |
                    |   PPX  B        PP    X           HAS FOOD AND DRINK       |
                    -------------------------------------------------------
                                        --HOWEVER MANY CELLS YOU NEED--
                    |  O=============O                                                           O
                    |   PPX  B        PP     X                                                            D <--Entrance to fortress
                    O==============O=========================O

Where:

D == Door
X == Floodgate
P == Pressure Plate
B == Bed
= == Walls
O == Pillar/walls
| == Walls


Concept:

Dwarves congregate in the quarantine zone meeting area at right, after entering fortress via outside doorway.
As they get sleepy, they wish to path to the comfortable looking beds at left.
Flood gate "A" defaults to "open" position, to permit entry. As dwarf steps on the 2 pressure plates, signals are sent.
First pressure plate closes the floodgate behind him. The second one opens the gate in front of him.
He paths unobstructed to the bed, and takes his nappy time.
He wakes up, and finds he can no longer path to the nearest meeting area. Having proven himself to not be a vamp
he is safe to admit into the fortress. He paths to the nearest pathable meeting hall, which is deeper inside the fortress.
As he passes through floodgate "B", he steps on 2 more pressure plates. The first one closes the gate behind him
The second one opens the gate at the far right, making the bed accessible to migrants who are sleepy.

You will need to assign burrows to keep dwarves from trying to sleep in the quarantine testing beds, and upsetting the gate signal states however.