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[Magistrum]

Df Ray Traces!

Fast InvSqrt()!

[therahedwig]

Most of the questions I had have been asked already so here's a random one totally unrelated to the current work.

There's a different tile for creatures that swim under the water, there's a sun direction, there is field of view, so: Is it possible, if only in a long-term development sense, to have reflections off of water and/or silvered mirrors?/color]

-snip- I'm just super curious if your kind of graphics have this advantage over non-text games.

The main thing DF has over high-fidelity games in this case is that the resolution of DF is very low, that is, for once it isn't responsible for calculating as much. So if you play adventure mode, ray casting is already used to determine what you can and cannot see. For mirrors, if a really big mirror(water?) takes up 3 squares horizontally, then for each of those squares a ray should be casted and laws of reflection should be applied, and you can have a reasonably accurate ability to see reflections in the mirror.

While in a modern ray tracer, that calculation needs to happen for each pixel, several hundreds of times(the way raytracing works means that for each pixel a path from the camera to a lightsource needs to be calculated, and to get the a good approximation of behaviour of diffuse surfaces there's a certain amount of 'randomness' in how this path bounces off a surface, meaning that several hundreds if not thousands of these calculations need to be done to get a proper avarage of this 'random' behaviour). For 3d video games, what is often done is that each reflecting object contains a panorama image of the area from its point of view that is then used to simulate reflections. (It is actually kind of sad, the increase in resolution makes high end monitors much more expensive to render for, but people don't always realize that, it's a very common factor in graphics lag)

But like, DF, being tile based shouldn't have to do anywhere near as many calculations, so I think it is feasible.

Besides reflection, are there plans for other vision weirdness things? Darkness is a thing already, but what about refraction/simple distortion or fog?

[golemgunk]

When necromancers attack cities, are they just trying to kill everyone, or do they stop after seizing power?

I've just always wondered if a necromancer's idea of world domination is anything less than "extinction of all life" and if the living have any place under their rule.

Edit: Additionally, will the death of a necromancer have any affect on their raised undead?

I know it currently doesn't, but it seems apropos for that to change now that the activities of zombies are being considered.

[KittyTac]

snip

Also, I'm pretty sure that a weirdness slider has been mentioned. For all your bucketmancy needs.

[PlumpHelmetMan]

When necromancers attack cities, are they just trying to kill everyone, or do they stop after seizing power?

I've just always wondered if a necromancer's idea of world domination is anything less than "extinction of all life" and if the living have any place under their rule.

I think "end of the world", which is the term Toady has used to describe necromancer domination, would imply an end-goal at least of wiping out all civilized creatures (if not all life in general). Though I guess they could pull a Sauron and just seek to enslave some creatures and wipe out others.

[Pillbo]

Personally, I'm just wondering why zombies going AWOL and joining performance troupes is considered a bug.

It'd assume that the necromancer asked them to, because even immortal beings of immense evil enjoy a good show.

It might get a little less funny once all necromancers' schemes flounder because they don't have any intelligent lieutenants :p

Mind you, I think everyone seems to agree that a lieutenant whose necromancing boss is unable to give orders(or just uninterested) should get a bit more agency in how they fill in their day... If only because a zombie running about trying to hatch an escape plan for their captured master while moonlighting as a bard seems pretty interested :p

Intelligent undead running away to follow their dreams just makes sense to me, though it would have to be in moderation.   If some amount of the intelligent undead are escaping to live their own lives they could start little undead refugee settlements and all kinds of cool things could happen (persecution from other civs, ghosts joining up, creepy trade caravans, who knows).  Maybe intelligent undead could organize a prison break and steal the secrets of life and death from their necromancer- undead raising more of their own intelligent undead in solidarity or to have the numbers to defend themselves.  Or even a coup, kill the necromancer and take the tower for themselves. This is working under the assumption that Intelligent Undead != Berserk/Opposed To Life, but they are like reanimated slaves with their own wills somewhere inside.

I sure hope necromancers start doing things like making undead performance troupes for their own entertainment, could have undead barkeeps, and librarians too... basically they could have a whole functional civ of undead and that sounds awesome... Maybe this should be a suggestions thread?


Are you considering allowing any of this 'undead runaway performer' thing to stay?
Do the intelligent undead have their old goals, dreams or preferences or are they clean slates?
Will the undead have any of their own agency or will they act solely under direction? Are they considered Opposed To Life?
Also what happens to an army of intelligent undead when their necromancer is bumped off?

[Shonai_Dweller]

I think it would be tremendous Fun if a zombie siege left for too long started turning your biome evil.

Undead siege in first summer? Turtle 'til they go away. Oh so easy....until a couple of seasons later when the butcher's workshop comes to life...

Perhaps post Mythgen.

[Shonai_Dweller]

I guess it may be a matter for Kitfox, but what do you envisage the Steam release to go like? Generally right now it's Release, Emergency patch or three, settle into small updates/bug fixes. This time might it make more sense to Free release, emergency patches then Steam release to avoid Steam backlash/refunding?

Or do you perhaps have a playtest with Kitfox/others planned? Or even a closed beta?

[EternalCaveDragon]

A couple questions this time. Also sorry for contributing to the unnecessarily long and heated discussion from long before.

1. With the necromancers getting world conquest as a goal. Will other supernatural villains (vampires, werebeasts, and demons) that currently exist be getting similar goals as well? Such as for example a vampire wanting to increase the amount of vampires in the world and/or induct everyone into their associated cult. Or a werebeast getting the idea of turning everyone they can into werebeasts of their type.

1a. Same as above, but will the conventional villains also gain such aspirations? Would it require that their aspiration in life is to rule the world?

[PatrikLundell]

I agree with Shonai_Dweller that delaying the release of the Premium version until it has been "beta tested" and patched a few time in the Classic version is probably a good approach (possibly in parallel with a closed beta testing of the Premium version to try to catch any issues with the updated tile set handling and other Premium or vendor platform functionality).
Looking a little further ahead, i.e. at new releases when the Premium version has been released, it might be suitable to make use of the functionality of Beta releases Steam has (I know nothing about Itch.io), although I don't know anything about the process of moving a version from Beta to main version. You don't want to force an auto update of largely broken releases onto regular users.

@EternalCaveDragon: It would be hard for a Were to implement any schemes since the phase where they can spread the curse (i.e. the Were phase) is one where they're completely overcome by rage, and thus unable to implement anything they might have planned. The problem is similar to that of sapient undead who are Opposed to Life (if that's how Toady implements them): the urge overpowers any plans.

[Rubik]

Hello Toady, I've been listening to all the DFtalk podcasts when I go for a run
I had only read 3toe's stories and read the many devplan pages, but I've never decided to listen to them until now.
First, these are some very good content, albeit the many scars made by scamps it must have costed you over the years, these are a blast and very informative

Second. In many talks, specially the 9th one, I think (since that's the one I was listening some hours ago), you mention that you took classes in many areas aside from math. This combined with all the research you do for the different mechanics (also mentioned in the talks) gives a polymath air.
Are there any books you have read on sciences and history that you'd recommend to people, because you found them really good?

Third: Are rogue adventurers(not belonging to any civ) gonna be able to acquire pets and mounts in adventure creation mode?
I kinda wanted to do an eragon mod and this question came to mind
If a sapient does not belong to any civ, which creatures does he have access to?

[FantasticDorf]

Third: Are rogue adventurers(not belonging to any civ) gonna be able to acquire pets and mounts in adventure creation mode?
I kinda wanted to do an eragon mod and this question came to mind
If a sapient does not belong to any civ, which creatures does he have access to?

Im not sure where you're exactly driving from unless we take 'rogue' as to mean A: Morally and ethically ambigious or B: Part of no present civilisation, acting on their own interests.

If its the former, there's never been any restriction before now really on what a player can do, Fortress & Adventurer mode sillyness is written off as possessed insanity. If its the latter thus far you can be a 'outsider' but you'll always have a parent civ as a safety blanket which also allocates the data such as picking out the right data for you and where to appear in the world. So that'll probably not happen until smaller sites/scenarios can justify place with only world links, not explicit civilization links like a exile's hermit tent out in the forest or something, closest you have are monster shrines & caves currently, but even those feel a civ's influence.

To dance around your question a bit, it'll probably revolve around the mechanisms that pets are aquired, either by terms of taming them yourself or not being blacklisted from town merchants for silly antics (possibly hostile civ towns if you want to buy a beakdog on the sly under a false identity) a devlog might clarify in the future if we're lucky to hear more from Toady.

• The answer to your no civ:no animals sapients question is; none, all the data is done by the civ, a creature without the framework is just a singular unit if not just a wilderness creature statistic, though the smallest entity/civ groups can be just one unit depending on what they are, like a army or refugee's from a very underpopulated place.

[LordBaal]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Personally, I'm just wondering why zombies going AWOL and joining performance troupes is considered a bug.

It'd assume that the necromancer asked them to, because even immortal beings of immense evil enjoy a good show.

It might get a little less funny once all necromancers' schemes flounder because they don't have any intelligent lieutenants :p

Mind you, I think everyone seems to agree that a lieutenant whose necromancing boss is unable to give orders(or just uninterested) should get a bit more agency in how they fill in their day... If only because a zombie running about trying to hatch an escape plan for their captured master while moonlighting as a bard seems pretty interested :p

Intelligent undead running away to follow their dreams just makes sense to me, though it would have to be in moderation.   If some amount of the intelligent undead are escaping to live their own lives they could start little undead refugee settlements and all kinds of cool things could happen (persecution from other civs, ghosts joining up, creepy trade caravans, who knows).  Maybe intelligent undead could organize a prison break and steal the secrets of life and death from their necromancer- undead raising more of their own intelligent undead in solidarity or to have the numbers to defend themselves.  Or even a coup, kill the necromancer and take the tower for themselves. This is working under the assumption that Intelligent Undead != Berserk/Opposed To Life, but they are like reanimated slaves with their own wills somewhere inside.

I sure hope necromancers start doing things like making undead performance troupes for their own entertainment, could have undead barkeeps, and librarians too... basically they could have a whole functional civ of undead and that sounds awesome... Maybe this should be a suggestions thread?


Are you considering allowing any of this 'undead runaway performer' thing to stay?
Do the intelligent undead have their old goals, dreams or preferences or are they clean slates?
Will the undead have any of their own agency or will they act solely under direction? Are they considered Opposed To Life?
Also what happens to an army of intelligent undead when their necromancer is bumped off?

[/quote]What about intelligent undead just wanting to stay regularly dead so they coup the necromancer just to undo the spell and finally rest in peace?

[FantasticDorf]

What about intelligent undead just wanting to stay regularly dead so they coup the necromancer just to undo the spell and finally rest in peace?

A Mummy is a undead summoner (of sorts, for their tomb), but since the undead are already immortal without a explicit reasoning that lieutenants can raise their own inheriently, killing the necromancer would mean no more zombies and we can assume that without instantly collapsing, they'll just dissapate and still haunt the wilderness populations until they're all exterminated.

Finnicky magic stuff, determining the properties of the spell, what they are and what they do. Threetoe's stories covered a aspect of it, such as the protagonist night creature hunter having the supernatural ability to 'see' the dark energies of his quarry, which were detached but similar to zombies.

[ZM5]

Question about advanced worldgen, since I'm struggling with a mod I'm doing - does setting the parameter for bogeyman generation to 0 completely disable bogey attacks, even if custom ones are in the raws folder, or does it only prevent vanilla bogeymen from generating?