Print

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

[Kiloku]

A simple idea, but it'd be interesting if animal people weren't threatened by animals of their base species. 
A wolf-man wouldn't be accosted by wild wolves, a tiger-man wouldn't be accosted by wild tigers, and so on. 

[Ziusudra]

I'd say base it on their personality and/or values. Some should still fear their animal species.

[Shonai_Dweller]

I'd say base it on their personality and/or values. Some should still fear their animal species.

Especially those who have "civilized" and joined human/elf/dwarf polite society. City dwelling humans don't have an affinity with troglodytes after all.

I can see wild animal people, when they start forming tribes and such in future versions being on good terms with their animal versions.

[Leonidas]

This seems pretty complicated. If a dingo man is a citizen of your fort, and then the other citizens get into a fight with a giant dingo, what will the dingo man do?

More broadly, DF's loyalty system has some major problems. That's why we have loyalty cascades. I'm seeing it in adventure right now, where I can beat one elf to death in a tavern while the elf next to him watches impassively.

I don't know how loyalty should work, but it's not a simple concept in a world where everyone has multiple group memberships. If Urist sees a dwarf from his fort fighting an elf who shares his religion, what should he do? What if he sees an elf who is a citizen in the fort fighting a visiting dwarf who is Urist's cousin? It's a complicated idea, and the complexity doesn't contribute much to gameplay.

I would suggest a very simple system that delivers predictable answers, such as nearly everyone belonging to a single low-level government and the relationships between those governments fully defining the relationships between the individuals. But then, Toady doesn't always go with the simple solution.

[Shonai_Dweller]

This seems pretty complicated. If a dingo man is a citizen of your fort, and then the other citizens get into a fight with a giant dingo, what will the dingo man do?

More broadly, DF's loyalty system has some major problems. That's why we have loyalty cascades. I'm seeing it in adventure right now, where I can beat one elf to death in a tavern while the elf next to him watches impassively.

I don't know how loyalty should work, but it's not a simple concept in a world where everyone has multiple group memberships. If Urist sees a dwarf from his fort fighting an elf who shares his religion, what should he do? What if he sees an elf who is a citizen in the fort fighting a visiting dwarf who is Urist's cousin? It's a complicated idea, and the complexity doesn't contribute much to gameplay.

I would suggest a very simple system that delivers predictable answers, such as nearly everyone belonging to a single low-level government and the relationships between those governments fully defining the relationships between the individuals. But then, Toady doesn't always go with the simple solution.

Society and politics arc is the next massive rewrite after the Mythgen releases are done with. Loyalty and grey areas (like black market trading with "enemy" civ members) are all things he's said he wants to see. In the meantime, coyote-man is friends with a coyote that belongs to his civ and not with one which doesn't.

[Pillbo]

It could just be a preference, not a loyalty.  So a coyote person might like a coyote or giant coyote, but not defend them in a fight. Though personality differences could make them despise the beasts that remind them of their savage roots, like how some people love apes and monkeys but others find them repulsive because of their human-like features.

It also sounds like another interesting trait that could could vary from world to world (once that's happening). I could see worlds where coyote people adored, cohabitated with, or worshipped coyotes, and other worlds where they looked at them like disgusting mutant threats.

+++++

Interesting aside, in the Frank comics by Jim Woodring there is a character called Manhog (half man, half pig), who gets shown the truth of his dual nature and is horrified by it.

[voliol]

Root and Animal Justice shines some light on what the animal people could be, some kind of spirit-like protectors of the wild. I imagine this will still vary though, depending on what mythgen has decided as the origin of animal people. Animal people (protectors of the wild) should be friendly with animals, animal people (cursed humans) and animal people (ascended animals) maybe not.

[knutor]

The were-entity needs this, not animal men. And it'd be better reversed. Like a hamster man and werehamsters were bff. Sometimes even sharing spores. To create a less volatile werecritter, like Lucian in Underworld. Maybe that new entity, animal man + same of same animal, could control the transformation, like a doppelganger or shapeshitter.