Print

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

[Detros]

Given humans can also navigate your mines fine, I think the answer can pretty much only be 'abstracted-away light'. Maybe in the future we'll actually need to make sure our fortresses are adequately lit.

Yeah, with all those other races that can now join your fort. With sized-for-race armor it has only started...

[FrisianDude]

That reminds me that I just want Dwarfs to be able to use halberds

[steel jackal]

Given humans can also navigate your mines fine, I think the answer can pretty much only be 'abstracted-away light'. Maybe in the future we'll actually need to make sure our fortresses are adequately lit.

Yeah, with all those other races that can now join your fort. With sized-for-race armor it has only started...

hmm the issue of every species being able to navigate the supposedly lightless halls would eliminate it being something unique to dwarves

perhaps dwarf fortress is some sort of expanded flatland of which everyone can pass between many 2 dimensional layers that would give the illusion of a 3d environment
this would also make sense of quantum stockpiles because everything would be infinitely thin and as such infinitely stackable, and it would make sense that dwarves normally cant just infinitely stack objects because in flatland you cant normally pass over the same space as another object, but if it was being warped to that point from another layer it would be possible due to everything having no depth

what dose this have to do with seeing?
flatlanders dont have a sun, or any other source of light, yet they can see in full color, but they dont see in the same way we do, our eyes are far different from theirs so it seems plausible that they dont need light

[Trappington]

Given humans can also navigate your mines fine, I think the answer can pretty much only be 'abstracted-away light'. Maybe in the future we'll actually need to make sure our fortresses are adequately lit.

Yeah, with all those other races that can now join your fort. With sized-for-race armor it has only started...

hmm the issue of every species being able to navigate the supposedly lightless halls would eliminate it being something unique to dwarves

perhaps dwarf fortress is some sort of expanded flatland of which everyone can pass between many 2 dimensional layers that would give the illusion of a 3d environment
this would also make sense of quantum stockpiles because everything would be infinitely thin and as such infinitely stackable, and it would make sense that dwarves normally cant just infinitely stack objects because in flatland you cant normally pass over the same space as another object, but if it was being warped to that point from another layer it would be possible due to everything having no depth

what dose this have to do with seeing?
flatlanders dont have a sun, or any other source of light, yet they can see in full color, but they dont see in the same way we do, our eyes are far different from theirs so it seems plausible that they dont need light

The mystery of an alternate reality, it is too great.....

Urist McTrappington's intelect takes the full force of the impact, bruising the reason and jamming the imagination through the logic.
Urist McTrappington has been struck down.

[Bearskie]

From a raw-based perspective, dwarves have [LOW_LIGHT_VISION:10000]; others do not. Its only used in Adventure Mode though. I like to think that the entire map is brightly lit with sunlight/torches/what-have-you whenever you are playing Fortress Mode.

[Randos]

I just wanted to say thanks for all of the amazing responses here! I was away for a while and came back to find all of this brilliant creativity going on! Totally changes my view on the game and how people can portray it differently. I love the freedom of imagination found in the DF community here.

I like the night vision idea, this is plausible up to the points mentioned where humans and other races come into the fortresses and see too. But maybe humans, elves, etc are smart enough to bring their own lamps or torches?

The bearded ideas are all awesome too And echolocation!

Since it seems that there is nothing specifically defined by the game, which was in part my question, I think I am going to assume that they set up torches along the way, and maybe those torches become lamps during smoothing and engraving by default. This will work visually for my comic to the extent that I need.

Of course any further discussion is welcome, this was really fun.

Also lamps, torches, etc might be an interesting addition for future dev!? Maybe lighting is not required but will increase happy thoughts in vicinity, like wells. Now imagine a well AND lighting

[Shonai_Dweller]

Also lamps, torches, etc might be an interesting addition for future dev!? Maybe lighting is not required but will increase happy thoughts in vicinity, like wells. Now imagine a well AND lighting

Toady's Development page says:

FIRE AND LIGHTING ARC: The lighting in caves is artificial right now. It should be pitch black. This is also true of moonless cloudy nights. Once that's in, your adventurer will want fire. Fire can also come up in dwarf mode in various ways. Related to Core14, Core55, Req96 and PowerGoal150.

Req96, LIGHTING, (Future): Should be pitch black inside adventure caves and on cloudy moonless nights. Vision state should influence what you can see. Can try to make sunlight shine inside caves a bit by casting light lines on map-gen. Can track light with RGB filters so that things through red gem windows look red, etc. Things seen through glass statues could be distorted from their proper positions. Once fire is in, can do torches and other such light sources. Dwarves could place fires or gem lamps in dark places. Any magical take on alchemy could make extensive use of gems in this fashion, and the different colors of light can please certain nobles etc. Related to Core55.

PowerGoal150, I SAW A BRIGHT LIGHT, THEN EVERYTHING WENT DARK, (Future): You stand before your opponent, blocking the sun. You jerk to the side, blinding him with the sun's rays before headbutting him in the teeth.

Some of this is quite old and may have been re-thought since, but it essentially shows Toady does have eventual goals for lighting.

[steel jackal]

Also lamps, torches, etc might be an interesting addition for future dev!? Maybe lighting is not required but will increase happy thoughts in vicinity, like wells. Now imagine a well AND lighting

Toady's Development page says:

FIRE AND LIGHTING ARC: The lighting in caves is artificial right now. It should be pitch black. This is also true of moonless cloudy nights. Once that's in, your adventurer will want fire. Fire can also come up in dwarf mode in various ways. Related to Core14, Core55, Req96 and PowerGoal150.

Req96, LIGHTING, (Future): Should be pitch black inside adventure caves and on cloudy moonless nights. Vision state should influence what you can see. Can try to make sunlight shine inside caves a bit by casting light lines on map-gen. Can track light with RGB filters so that things through red gem windows look red, etc. Things seen through glass statues could be distorted from their proper positions. Once fire is in, can do torches and other such light sources. Dwarves could place fires or gem lamps in dark places. Any magical take on alchemy could make extensive use of gems in this fashion, and the different colors of light can please certain nobles etc. Related to Core55.

PowerGoal150, I SAW A BRIGHT LIGHT, THEN EVERYTHING WENT DARK, (Future): You stand before your opponent, blocking the sun. You jerk to the side, blinding him with the sun's rays before headbutting him in the teeth.

Some of this is quite old and may have been re-thought since, but it essentially shows Toady does have eventual goals for lighting.

some days you can forget this game is alpha
little details like lights, proper water and gravity physics, caravans piled with xrope reed socksx so high it makes mount everest look short, and urists theory of non-relativity ( E☺MC^2 )
i wonder how horrifyingly complicated that v1.0.0 will be

[Shazbot]

I usually build skylights in the forward portions of the fortress, complete with gem windows. If there was one bit of magic I'd like to see, its enchanted gems as torches.

[FrisianDude]

torches along a long underground corridor seems the best way to completely destroy eyesight. Short of axing yourself in the eyeballs.

[Shazbot]

I cannot fathom how light bulbs in mines work. Do miners just go blind over time, or...

[Trainzack]

Apparently it depends on how deep they're used to living. I forget which DF Talk it was on but Toady has stated that deep dwarves are supposed to have a very different physiology from hill dwarves. The description that stuck out to me was "glowing eyes, a 'beard' composed of flesh, and other Lovecraftian traits that speaks in a Scottish accent".

A little bit late, but:

Spoiler: DF Talk 20 (click to show/hide)

Capntastic:   So the deep down dwarves, when they come up, maybe they should just be very very allergic to the sun?
Toady:   Well they will be cave adapted.
Rainseeker:   Exactly.
Capntastic:   But extremely cave adapted, have another tier.
Toady:   Maybe blind, they'll just lose their eyes.
Capntastic:   They'll be blind and they'll be completely white, you know, like those cave fish.
Toady:   Beardless, beardless, no, they'll have flesh that replaces the beard or something like these tendrils that come out..
Capntastic:   Fleshy beards?
Toady:   Translucent fleshy beards that generate light, but they don't have eyes, so it doesn't mean anything. And yeah, they have alcohol detectors in their stomachs and so on, they waddle around and roll in the mud. And yeah, so that's about like a dwarf. That's what we expect from a dwarf.
Rainseeker:   Ya, that's pretty good.
Toady:   A Cthulu-esque mob that comes out of the deep.
Capntastic:   But they're friendly and they talk with a Scottish accent.

[madpraxis]

I just had to chime in here. Way back in the days before the dorfs discovered up and down, I used to have my central hallway have a center channel of magma. Why? LIGHT. I felt that it would be very very dwarf fortressy to have my main hallways lit with the nice warm glow of lava. I still on occasion, now that we have up and down (magical!), have the urge to have my main hallways 2-3 tiles wide on either side of a channel full of lava. Because the poor dwarves need to see where they are going... And for the chance to be !!dwarf!!...

[LordPorkins]

Actually, Dorfs cant see. They use their "beards" (actually dextrous prehensile fibers) to feel their way around the world, similar to the hair in tarantulas.

[Bumber]

Actually, Dorfs cant see. They use their "beards" (actually dextrous prehensile fibers) to feel their way around the world, similar to the hair in tarantulas.

Then how is Cog a blind dwarf?