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[Meph]

Sounds good. I had a similar system in a workshop for my old kobold mode, you can summon creature #1 for free and fight it. Corpse is used in reaction to get reward and a token for creature #2. Went up to 10, with different creatures and groups to fight, for 10 different rewards.

Guess your boogeymen will stay adv-mode only?

[IndigoFenix]

Yes, the concept is very similar to the Colosseum.  It's adventure-only though.  Although I suppose you *could* take your unholy abomination of an adventurer and retire them in a fort... though this might prove to be a bad idea, what with the necromancy and plague and insanity they wind up spreading.

[Meph]

Ok.

another idea, which has big implications for both adv. and fort mode would be custom necromancers that do not make zombies, but other creatures. I remember science about custom necromancers that animate dead and transform them into other creatures, which allows to make all kinds of stuff. Manical-puppeteer with mind-controlled slaves; druid with army of carnivorous plants; firemancer with hellfire-imps; mad dwarven engineer with golems...

I've never seen a released/finished mod like this, but the science in the thread (which is years old and I wont find) showed that they build towers, can be visited in adv. mode and siege in fort mode.

[IndigoFenix]

Hmm...

I have been experimenting elsewhere with making a huge number of secrets, each with a single minor spell, basically so that scholars could spread useful information in a fort and collecting a library would allow you to accumulate more spells for your wizards.  Unfortunately, it seems that the more custom secrets there are, the lower the chance of towers being made (I guess because each world generates a certain number of secrets picked from a list, and the more non-necro secrets there are, the less chance of necromancers showing up), and since necro towers are still the main places where wizards trade knowledge, the secrets don't seem to spread too well in worldgen.  And if you *do* get a secret in a fort, it spreads like crazy, since all someone needs to do to learn a spell is to read a single book.  (One possible solution is to create a dedicated wizard caste using a syndrome that adds the SUPERNATURAL tag, and prevent non-supernatural creatures from learning spells.  I haven't actually tested how well this works in practice, though.)

If all or most secrets included the ability to produce minions from corpses, that might improve the ability for spells to spread.  Unfortunately, it's pretty much impossible to make such a mage 'safe' for fort mode; transformed zombies will indeed build towers, but they will also attack the living just like regular zombies.

[Meph]

I did not intend them to be safe for forts, but to build towers that attack forts.

[IndigoFenix]

That can be arranged.  Pyromancer, cryomancer, hemomancer, phytomancer, theromancer, sarcomancer, tyromancer, oinomancer, dracomancer, melissomancer...

[IndigoFenix]

So I made an update with a bunch of whatevermancers, all of whom will build towers in worldgen.  Most of them are less threatening overall than necromancers, as their minions are often made of flimsy materials, but most have one or more special abilities alongside producing minions.  They can only animate whole bodies as minions, but most can also revive pieces of their minions as lesser, 'blob' minions (the exceptions being the lithomancer and the ferromancer, who are tough enough as it is).

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Pyromancer - Fire, uses fireballs and can make fire men
Cryomancer - Ice, uses ice webs and ice balls and can make ice men
Keraunomancer - Lightning, can shock enemies and make lightning men
Hydromancer - Water, can produce water men
Hemomancer - Blood, can inflict bleeding and produce blood men
Emetomancer - Vomit, can inflict nausea, shoot vomit globs, and produce vomit men
Geomancer - Earth, can produce dust blasts and make mud men
Lithomancer - Rock, has a hard body, can shoot rocks and make rock men
Ferromancer - Iron, has an extremely hard body and can produce iron men (similar to the vanilla iron men, with a gas inside)
Magmamancer - Magma, can produce magma men
Tyromancer - Cheese, can shoot cheese webs and produce cheese men
Oinomancer - Wine, can spray inebriating wine and produce wine men, is also permanently inebriated

More will be coming.  I am not passing up the chance of making dracomancers that turn into dragons and invade with a bunch of smaller dragons, or phytomancers that make plant minions, or melissomancers that turn corpses into living beehives.

I feel obligated to mention that the -mancer suffix is not, in fact, correctly used here, as it means 'divination' and a better suffix would be -urge or -kinetic, but since DF uses the term 'necromancer' improperly it should be consistent in its wrongness.

There are also the beginnings of the bogeyman system but it's not quite done yet.

[IndigoFenix]

Updated again!

This update includes several new creatures, including the Sphinx, who is really hard to kill but if you answer all of its questions it becomes much easier.

There's also the Wild Hunt, which is basically a very rare encounter that sends a huge army of fae creatures at your fort, trying to steal your food, drink, and items, and break down your buildings.  And kill you.  Basically it's a surprise invasion from the wild.  An army shouldn't have much trouble, but if you're unfortunate enough to face them early in your fort's life, it might be best to stay out of the way and let them take what they want... They only show up in savage biomes.

Treants are also roaming the joyous wild forests, and will not take kindly to dwarves building on their turf.  Be prepared to fight them if you want to keep your fortress standing.

[IndigoFenix]

Another update with more monsters!

Kappas are a new playable creature with some interesting qualities.  Their toughness is below average, but they get extra defensive abilities when wet, either from being underwater or in the rain; this will also remove their need for drinking water but give them a craving for blood.  You can also tame them for your fort.

Sirens are ocean-dwelling, more attractive (but just as evil) harpy clones with the ability to induce both extra confidence and reduced skills with their song to make hapless NPCs rush at them and die.  They are also playable.

Nymphs can now inspire artistic abilities in others.  You can tame them for your fort to inspire more artists and writers, or play as them.  Their fighting skills are subpar, but they are good at dancing and running away.

This update also adds Bakeneko, demon cats that can raise the dead.  They will also turn your cats into stealth necrokitties, (as if DF cats weren't enough trouble already).

All supernatural creatures (with the exception of megabeasts and subterranean critters) are now restricted to good, evil, or savage biomes, which is also the case for vanilla DF.

[IndigoFenix]

Okay, question.  I want to make a gorgon that can turn people to stone with a look.  Simple enough.  Next question.  How do you kill it?  (As an adventurer)

[Teneb]

Okay, question.  I want to make a gorgon that can turn people to stone with a look.  Simple enough.  Next question.  How do you kill it?  (As an adventurer)

The way I found to "balance" creatures that can turn others into stone is to make the probability for the transformation lower than 100 (I use 50) and giving it a significant cooldown.

Too bad there is no way to check if a target has functioning eyes, since the tactic in the myths was to just not look. (No idea if DFHack makes it possible, of course)

[IndigoFenix]

Too bad there is no way to check if a target has functioning eyes, since the tactic in the myths was to just not look. (No idea if DFHack makes it possible, of course)

Actually, that gives me an idea... if it gives you the ability to "close your eyes" before using its gaze attack, you can avoid its gaze by inflicting a blindness syndrome on yourself.  Of course, that means you'd have to fight it while blinded.

Going to try fiddling with it to see if I can get the AI to behave in a sensible manner.

[Meph]

You could add secrets that give you the ability to block it learned from slabs or books, or use itemsyndrome to give silver shields an immunity-reaction.

[IndigoFenix]

Using some weird interaction AI exploits I managed to get the gorgons working pretty well.  You get a short period of time between the gorgon hissing at you and revealing her face which allows you to avoid the attack by closing your eyes.  NPCs will usually close their eyes in time unless taken by surprise.  She is by far the smallest semimegabeast (currently debating whether to make her straight humanoid or the lamioid model) but is about as threatening as any of them in practice.  Still beatable by one highly skilled fighter or several less skilled ones.  Only problem is that worldgen won't take their ability into account so they will probably die pretty fast.  Extravision also grants immunity to their gaze, so vampires will have an easy time.

This could be a nice system for copying... Like for an eldritch abomination that makes you go insane if you look at it.

[Meph]

Will you only do things that do not require dfhack for this?

I always wanted to write something like shades/spirits that possess a dwarf and open a portal to their realm, teleporting more and more of them into your fortress. I never got around finishing those. Spawnunit-related, of course.