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[FantasticDorf]

So far, most of the technical issues surrounding Ettins have already been solved, they have two individually cognitant heads with two cones of sight but the one facet that they're missing is how to use both of their body parts in not total unison but least effectively in combat.

So i propose [MULTIPART_DEXTERITY] , wherein the ettin heads has full control over both its hands for weapon or item slots based on the method that they're two seperate heads, a centre of thought being directly attributed to control of the hand in their own body.

In a active combat situation with your military dwarves or against your adventurer while one Ettin head may be riling up for a attack here, the other ettin head effectively like a soldier upon a mounted horse is thinking about attacking simulatenously around itself using its other dexterous arm, queuing up two attacks at once.

• Killing one of the heads will release the dexterity of the hands causing them to effectively drop what they're holding. Since ettins are already no-stun this is a effective though not pernament way of defusing the threat. A adventurer could do this to quickly reprieve a ettin's grasp of them, or a dangerous or coveted object.

For the rest of the creature beastiary, dexterity can show itself in alternative ways since they aren't so blessed to be [AMBIDEXTEROUS] like a ettin is in its own cheating way, but instead have randomized chances split between handedness, mentioned within the intelligent personal player read biographies of favoring a particular hand preference or neither which will always comprise for military means their weapon-hand which they are most able to use.

[HAND_DEXTERITY: ((chances of lefthandedness)) : ((righthandedness chance)): ((ambidexterious chance))]
* Only accounts for bp left and right hand, a odd number of left arms to right arms and lefthandedness still constitutes being skilled with that side of your body. Seperate tokens can determine irregular BP's as preferences if relevant.

A token like [DEXTERITY_LIMIT:((num range of what is normal 0 to a 100))], with a certain level of math with skill & (agility/concentration) whether a dwarf can use more than one item in each hand effectively & dual wield weapons with equal precision, would be totally overcome by things like weapon mastership (dwarves with legendary skill and physique can twohand swords in combat, weapons both becoming lighter through training and applied more deadily with parry training) and martial trances for clarity of how to grip and stab someone at the same time or instantly shield-block.

Monkeys and creatures with some grasping appendages that aren't their mouths typically have poor but varying natural dexterity, until you reach the level of great apes, yeti's, bigfoot, and other man-like monsters such as troglodytes & giants with a typical baseline. A octopus or giant desert scorpion might not breach a enormous threat on picking up a weapon, but a octopus man has a slim or guranteed chance through weapon mastership of harnessing all grasping points & arms limbs at once.

• Same for creatures if you wanted to show off holding your extra weapon on your tail, teeth or trunk, but this debuffs the advantage multi-armed races not gifted with automatic appendage mastery are usually given in fort & adventure mode.

[Red Diamond]

I thought that the use of ettin body parts are not related to the heads at all.  There is also no reason to assume the ettins are two separate minds in practical functioning. 

[Egan_BW]

Would be interesting to give each head of a creature it's own soul with personality facets and such.

[Red Diamond]

Would be interesting to give each head of a creature it's own soul with personality facets and such.

It might be interesting, but that isn't how it works.  At the moment were all basically ettins ourselves, we have two hemispheres of our brain that function independently of eachother with minimal connectivity, indeed you can cut the connection between the two hemispheres and you still do not get two people. 

So a creature with two brains is a single creature with two brains, it isn't two creatures inhabiting the same body.  Creatures are not their brains and brains themselves are not centralized in their functioning.

[Pillbo]

If Tarn decides that an ettin has one mind in two heads then ok, there is no reason to assume realistic rules. But in reality, a brain having two distinct regions isn't the same as an organism having two separate brains. Animals are born with two heads, and those heads do have individual minds and often have varying amounts of control over the body as a whole so they have to learn to work and communicate together.  We are not like ettins, ettins are like conjoined twins.

The two headed Italian conjoined twins Giacomo and Giovanni Battista Tocci

The twins spoke Italian, French, and German. They settled disputes between themselves with their fists. While Giovanni liked beer, Giacomo preferred mineral water. Giacomo was talkative, and Giovanni quiet.

American two headed conjoined twins Abby and Brittany Hensel born in 1990.

Each twin controls one arm and one leg. As infants, learning to crawl, walk, and clap required cooperation. They can eat and write separately and simultaneously. Activities such as running, swimming, hair brushing and driving a car require coordinated action.
...
Each twin manages one side of their conjoined body. The sense of touch of each is restricted to her body half; this shades off at the midsagittal plane such that there is a small amount of overlap at the midline. Stomach aches, however, are felt by only the twin on the opposite side.

They cooperatively use their limbs when both hands or both legs are required. By coordinating their efforts, they are able to walk, run, swim, and ride a bicycle normally. Together, they can type on a computer keyboard and drive a car.
...
The twins both passed their driver's license exams, both the written and practical tests. Although driving is a coordinated activity, they had to take the test twice, once for each twin. Abby controls the devices on the right of the driver's seat; Brittany, those on the left. Together they control the steering wheel.

They both graduated from high school in 2008. They began college at Bethel University in Arden Hills, Minnesota, majoring in education. They had considered pursuing different concentrations within that major, but the volume of extra coursework was prohibitive.
...
They usually have separate meals, but sometimes share a single meal for the sake of convenience. For tasks such as responding to email, they type and respond as one, anticipating each other's feelings with little verbal communication between them. In such cases as the latter, their choice of grammatical person is to use "I" when they agree, but use their names when their responses do differ.

[Egan_BW]

...Besides realism, Ettins are usually portrayed in fantasy as having different personalities.
Also any time someone starts talking about brain hemispheres my pseudoscience alarms start blaring.

[Azerty]

If Tarn decides that an ettin has one mind in two heads then ok, there is no reason to assume realistic rules. But in reality, a brain having two distinct regions isn't the same as an organism having two separate brains. Animals are born with two heads, and those heads do have individual minds and often have varying amounts of control over the body as a whole so they have to learn to work and communicate together.  We are not like ettins, ettins are like conjoined twins.

The two headed Italian conjoined twins Giacomo and Giovanni Battista Tocci

The twins spoke Italian, French, and German. They settled disputes between themselves with their fists. While Giovanni liked beer, Giacomo preferred mineral water. Giacomo was talkative, and Giovanni quiet.

American two headed conjoined twins Abby and Brittany Hensel born in 1990.

Each twin controls one arm and one leg. As infants, learning to crawl, walk, and clap required cooperation. They can eat and write separately and simultaneously. Activities such as running, swimming, hair brushing and driving a car require coordinated action.
...
Each twin manages one side of their conjoined body. The sense of touch of each is restricted to her body half; this shades off at the midsagittal plane such that there is a small amount of overlap at the midline. Stomach aches, however, are felt by only the twin on the opposite side.

They cooperatively use their limbs when both hands or both legs are required. By coordinating their efforts, they are able to walk, run, swim, and ride a bicycle normally. Together, they can type on a computer keyboard and drive a car.
...
The twins both passed their driver's license exams, both the written and practical tests. Although driving is a coordinated activity, they had to take the test twice, once for each twin. Abby controls the devices on the right of the driver's seat; Brittany, those on the left. Together they control the steering wheel.

They both graduated from high school in 2008. They began college at Bethel University in Arden Hills, Minnesota, majoring in education. They had considered pursuing different concentrations within that major, but the volume of extra coursework was prohibitive.
...
They usually have separate meals, but sometimes share a single meal for the sake of convenience. For tasks such as responding to email, they type and respond as one, anticipating each other's feelings with little verbal communication between them. In such cases as the latter, their choice of grammatical person is to use "I" when they agree, but use their names when their responses do differ.

We also have the Hogan Sisters, whose heads are joined to the point their brains are partly fused:
Krista and Tatiana Hogan

Krista and Tatiana Hogan (born October 25, 2006) are Canadians who are conjoined craniopagus twins. They are joined at the head (the top, back, and sides). They were born in Vancouver, British Columbia, and are the only unseparated conjoined twins of that type currently alive in Canada. They live with their mother, Felicia Simms, in Vernon, British Columbia, have two sisters and a brother and often travel to Vancouver for care at BC Children's Hospital and Sunny Hill Health Centre for Children.

[...]

In January 2009, a documentary was filmed which reported on the twins, and followed their progress up to their third birthday. This documentary was released and aired in October, 2010. In this documentary, it was confirmed that they share a thalamus which connects their brainstems. Through this shared brain tissue structure and the interconnected neurons, one brain receives signals from the other brain and vice versa. This documentary also reported on experiments that were carried out that confirmed that visual cortex signals based on what one girl saw, were received by both girls' brains. So in effect, one twin could see what the other twin was seeing, making them unique even among craniopagus twins.

[...]

A 2014 CBC Radio documentary described how they can feel and taste what the other is experiencing. Later it was also confirmed that they can see through each other's eyes.

[Bumber]

...Besides realism, Ettins are usually portrayed in fantasy as having different personalities.

https://youtu.be/pxRkHXisdzU?t=108

[Red Diamond]

If Tarn decides that an ettin has one mind in two heads then ok, there is no reason to assume realistic rules. But in reality, a brain having two distinct regions isn't the same as an organism having two separate brains. Animals are born with two heads, and those heads do have individual minds and often have varying amounts of control over the body as a whole so they have to learn to work and communicate together.  We are not like ettins, ettins are like conjoined twins.

Ettin's having two personalities in fictions is rather a bad case of Reality is Unrealistic.  It is not realistic to have two minds because you have two brains, but you can be forgiven for thinking that.  The realistic thing is actually for an ettin to have one mind and two brains, not the reverse since individual creatures due not usually have develop multiple minds in nature.

This is because the hemispheres of the brain are not really best described as regions of the brain, they are more like two entirely functional brains that have been joined together.  Don't believe me?  Read about Hemispherectomy where the surgeon actually removes one hemisphere of the brain.  Apparently this results in no real problems.

Overall, hemispherectomy is a successful procedure. A 1996 study of 52 individuals who underwent the surgery found that 96% of patients experienced reduced or completely ceased occurrence of seizures post-surgery. Studies have found no significant long-term effects on memory, personality, or humor, and minimal changes in cognitive function overall.[24] For example, one case followed a patient who had completed college, attended graduate school and scored above average on intelligence tests after undergoing this procedure at age 5. This patient eventually developed "superior language and intellectual abilities" despite the removal of the left hemisphere, which contains the classical language zones.

Not only does removing half of your brain not kill you, you basically are fine.  Just like you have two kidneys or two lungs, you effectively have two brains in your head.  We just don't think of ourselves having two brains because we like to philosophize of ourselves as being our brains/joined to our brains and obsolete science originally allowed us to believe the brain was a single unitary thing that we could be/be joined up to.  In reality the brain is two entirely functional brains glued together, that we out of convention continue to refer to as a single object in a singular.

Reality gets even more unrealistic when you consider Corpus callosotomy where the two hemispheres are severed from eachother by removing the connecting element the corpus callosum.  We can cut the hemispheres apart and we do not end up with two people, even though as we learn above both hemispheres are entirely functional brains on their own. 

...Besides realism, Ettins are usually portrayed in fantasy as having different personalities.
Also any time someone starts talking about brain hemispheres my pseudoscience alarms start blaring.

The pseudoscience I am afraid is the idea that two brains would realistically produce two minds.  The science supports claim that the brain largely functions as two seperate mini-brains and both of those brains produce only one mind.  The only notable difference then between ettins and ourselves is that they have four hemispheres rather than two. 

[Azerty]

If Tarn decides that an ettin has one mind in two heads then ok, there is no reason to assume realistic rules. But in reality, a brain having two distinct regions isn't the same as an organism having two separate brains. Animals are born with two heads, and those heads do have individual minds and often have varying amounts of control over the body as a whole so they have to learn to work and communicate together.  We are not like ettins, ettins are like conjoined twins.

Ettin's having two personalities in fictions is rather a bad case of Reality is Unrealistic.  It is not realistic to have two minds because you have two brains, but you can be forgiven for thinking that.  The realistic thing is actually for an ettin to have one mind and two brains, not the reverse since individual creatures due not usually have develop multiple minds in nature.

This is because the hemispheres of the brain are not really best described as regions of the brain, they are more like two entirely functional brains that have been joined together.  Don't believe me?  Read about Hemispherectomy where the surgeon actually removes one hemisphere of the brain.  Apparently this results in no real problems.

Overall, hemispherectomy is a successful procedure. A 1996 study of 52 individuals who underwent the surgery found that 96% of patients experienced reduced or completely ceased occurrence of seizures post-surgery. Studies have found no significant long-term effects on memory, personality, or humor, and minimal changes in cognitive function overall.[24] For example, one case followed a patient who had completed college, attended graduate school and scored above average on intelligence tests after undergoing this procedure at age 5. This patient eventually developed "superior language and intellectual abilities" despite the removal of the left hemisphere, which contains the classical language zones.

Not only does removing half of your brain not kill you, you basically are fine.  Just like you have two kidneys or two lungs, you effectively have two brains in your head.  We just don't think of ourselves having two brains because we like to philosophize of ourselves as being our brains/joined to our brains and obsolete science originally allowed us to believe the brain was a single unitary thing that we could be/be joined up to.  In reality the brain is two entirely functional brains glued together, that we out of convention continue to refer to as a single object in a singular.

Reality gets even more unrealistic when you consider Corpus callosotomy where the two hemispheres are severed from eachother by removing the connecting element the corpus callosum.  We can cut the hemispheres apart and we do not end up with two people, even though as we learn above both hemispheres are entirely functional brains on their own. 

...Besides realism, Ettins are usually portrayed in fantasy as having different personalities.
Also any time someone starts talking about brain hemispheres my pseudoscience alarms start blaring.

The pseudoscience I am afraid is the idea that two brains would realistically produce two minds.  The science supports claim that the brain largely functions as two seperate mini-brains and both of those brains produce only one mind.  The only notable difference then between ettins and ourselves is that they have four hemispheres rather than two.

OTOH, the Hogan Sisters, who have the same thalamus, have two separate minds.

[voliol]

Lots of suggestions here. As for the ettins (and similar multi-headed creatures e.g. the hydra), both options are good, both split minds and not-split minds are common enough tropes that could co-exist through mythgen producing varied ettins/hydras/cerberuses.

Continuing on that mythgen track, ”multiple minds” brings my mind to ”multiple souls”. Dwarf Fortress already has a system that separates body and soul, it is what allows the existance of ghosts, bodiless souls. Afaik it isn’t used with the current ettins though, so they are still one soul/mind in one body, like all other non-ghost creatures, instead of two souls in one body. But multi-headed creatures aren’t the only possibility for multiple souls in one body.
Could you have a ”half-way” possession allowing the possessor and the possessed to cooperate in combat, or the possession of just an arm, used to inflict ”self-harm”? Creatures born with multiple souls for non-capital reasons, the souls fighting for control? It certainly would be cool (and tropey), enough so that I propose the tokens (i.e. MULTIPART_DEXTERITY) should be adapted to fit with these options.

How do you propose MULTIPART_DEXTERITY would split up the body parts among the ettin’s head, by the way? Using the LEFT/RIGHT bp tokens?

[HAND_DEXTERITY: ((chances of lefthandedness)) : ((righthandedness chance)): ((ambidexterious chance))]
* Only accounts for bp left and right hand, a odd number of left arms to right arms and lefthandedness still constitutes being skilled with that side of your body. Seperate tokens can determine irregular BP's as preferences if relevant.

+1 I wonder though, how this would work with the military? It certainly would be annoying if you had to manually regulate it, otherwise your left-handed dwarves would pick up their weapons with the wrong hand.

[FantasticDorf]

Lots of suggestions here. As for the ettins (and similar multi-headed creatures e.g. the hydra), both options are good, both split minds and not-split minds are common enough tropes that could co-exist through mythgen producing varied ettins/hydras/cerberuses.
-snip-

How do you propose MULTIPART_DEXTERITY would split up the body parts among the ettin’s head, by the way? Using the LEFT/RIGHT bp tokens?

Ettins have dexterity aligned left and right heads is a easy enough explanation, so your analysis is pretty much correct. The legs may have to be ommitted or worked around its not satisfactory, unless it doesn't affect movement but does create a desirable limpness when the controlling head is took care of.

Not even discussing a potential Tri-Ettin which has a central head nestled between both other heads as a independent part, but that's a little bit over the top.

[HAND_DEXTERITY: ((chances of lefthandedness)) : ((righthandedness chance)): ((ambidexterious chance))]
* Only accounts for bp left and right hand, a odd number of left arms to right arms and lefthandedness still constitutes being skilled with that side of your body. Seperate tokens can determine irregular BP's as preferences if relevant.

+1 I wonder though, how this would work with the military? It certainly would be annoying if you had to manually regulate it, otherwise your left-handed dwarves would pick up their weapons with the wrong hand.

Dwarves would just pick up their weapon within their weapon-hand every time because of the dexterity burden of using their offhand effectively without training until they're proficient to carry a weapon in either or both hands at once.

[Red Diamond]

OTOH, the Hogan Sisters, who have the same thalamus, have two separate minds.

That is because they are Siamese Twins, that is two creatures fused together; that they are so stuck together as to basically control the same body is an 'accident'.  They are not that same as a single creature with two heads and it is actually rather offensive to suggest that is the case.  An Ettin is defined in the game as single creature creature with two heads and mechanically speaking based upon the way the brain works there is no problem with two heads one mind.

As already mentioned, the mind is not some kind of central command to a brain; it is something that is related somehow (this is a fierce philosophical argument) to a large number of cooperating and often multiply redundant structures with no central command structure over them.  Given that this is basically how the brain works already, there is no real problem with two brains cooperating to support a single ettin mind.  The idea that two heads would mean two minds is basically an obsolete understanding of how the brain works (the central command concept).

Having a single ettin have two minds may be taken as evidence they are all Siamese Twins.  However it could also mean that all ettins have Multiple Personality Disorder/Dissociative identity disorder.  Not only can two heads theoretically support a single mind but a single head can potentially support multiple minds. 

Lots of suggestions here. As for the ettins (and similar multi-headed creatures e.g. the hydra), both options are good, both split minds and not-split minds are common enough tropes that could co-exist through mythgen producing varied ettins/hydras/cerberuses.

Continuing on that mythgen track, ”multiple minds” brings my mind to ”multiple souls”. Dwarf Fortress already has a system that separates body and soul, it is what allows the existance of ghosts, bodiless souls. Afaik it isn’t used with the current ettins though, so they are still one soul/mind in one body, like all other non-ghost creatures, instead of two souls in one body. But multi-headed creatures aren’t the only possibility for multiple souls in one body.
Could you have a ”half-way” possession allowing the possessor and the possessed to cooperate in combat, or the possession of just an arm, used to inflict ”self-harm”? Creatures born with multiple souls for non-capital reasons, the souls fighting for control? It certainly would be cool (and tropey), enough so that I propose the tokens (i.e. MULTIPART_DEXTERITY) should be adapted to fit with these options.

How do you propose MULTIPART_DEXTERITY would split up the body parts among the ettin’s head, by the way? Using the LEFT/RIGHT bp tokens?

[HAND_DEXTERITY: ((chances of lefthandedness)) : ((righthandedness chance)): ((ambidexterious chance))]
* Only accounts for bp left and right hand, a odd number of left arms to right arms and lefthandedness still constitutes being skilled with that side of your body. Seperate tokens can determine irregular BP's as preferences if relevant.

+1 I wonder though, how this would work with the military? It certainly would be annoying if you had to manually regulate it, otherwise your left-handed dwarves would pick up their weapons with the wrong hand.

Actually the way to go here is to actually define the separate hemispheres of the brain and then divide up the limbs among the hemispheres.  Each hemispheres would be a separate [THOUGHT] part so that in order to kill things through brain damage you would impair the function of both hemispheres, not the single unified brain thing.  But damaging the hemisphere would cause penalties to your opponent ability to effectively control the other hemisphere's limbs for a period of time until the brain adjusts and places both under the same functioning hemisphere's control.

We can divide control over limbs automatically between the hemispheres according to spatial location.  We have two hemispheres and four limbs, so we divide the limbs up bilaterally so that the right leg and right arm are controlled by the left-hemisphere and vica versa.  With ettins we would divide it up further, since there are four hemispheres and four limbs we would instead give each hemisphere control of only a single limb. 

Some issues with this model I can think of.  One of them is the role of the lower-brain parts (the cerebellum and brain stem) that are not bilaterally divided but it should not be possible to survive their destruction; effectively these function similarly to way brains work at the moment, if the brain stem stops working the creature just dies since it controls vital functions like the heart.  Probably if both cortexes are damaged, the creature should lose consciousness potentially permanently but if the brain stem is damaged the creature should insta-die. 

The other problem is invertebrates.  Invertebrates do not work along the lines we have been discussing, they take the whole brain decentralization even further than vertebrates do.  Each limb and major organ in these cases has it's dedicated mini-brain that controls that body part.  That means that insects for instance can often actually survive decapitation, since they only lose the part of their brain that is in their head. 

[Uthimienure]

Instead of arguing about realism vs fantasy... why not have BOTH kinds in the game?

[Pillbo]

If Tarn decides that an ettin has one mind in two heads then ok, there is no reason to assume realistic rules. But in reality, a brain having two distinct regions isn't the same as an organism having two separate brains. Animals are born with two heads, and those heads do have individual minds and often have varying amounts of control over the body as a whole so they have to learn to work and communicate together.  We are not like ettins, ettins are like conjoined twins.

Ettin's having two personalities in fictions is rather a bad case of Reality is Unrealistic.  It is not realistic to have two minds because you have two brains, but you can be forgiven for thinking that.  The realistic thing is actually for an ettin to have one mind and two brains, not the reverse since individual creatures due not usually have develop multiple minds in nature.
...
The pseudoscience I am afraid is the idea that two brains would realistically produce two minds.  The science supports claim that the brain largely functions as two seperate mini-brains and both of those brains produce only one mind.  The only notable difference then between ettins and ourselves is that they have four hemispheres rather than two.

Philosophize all you want based on the interesting results of brain surgeries, but we know for a fact what people with two brains are like, they are alive right now, you can ask them. There are no examples of people with two heads that think as one.

I'm fine with either version, but I find two minds more interesting.