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[Syreal]

DF has really broken the rougelike mold in many ways. I recently had a cool idea for megabeasts, though, that would bend the RL genre even further.

If you think about it, its really quite anti-climatic when you discover a dragon for the first time, and visually he is the same size as you. I know that the "size" field is different in the raws, but what does that change? He's harder to damage and he deals more damage. That's it.

Now imagine: You set off on a quest to kill your first dragon. You come to the cave and venture in. After some series of tunnels you find an enormous, open  cavern. Filling about half of it is a gigantic pile of gold, and sleeping upon the gold is a dragon -- half the size of the cavern. You are stunned beyond words -- how are you supposed to kill this brute?? Armor covers almost every inch of his body, except his underside. You can see his razor sharp teeth and sulfurous smoke bellowing from his nostrils. Then he wakes up.

Thats the end of the narrative. Now imagine actually playing the game at this point. All you can see are the dragon's front feet from your current z-level, but up 4 levels is the brute's head. A single adventurer would be almost completely helpless against a beast such as a dragon. The dragon would be able to smash the ground with his feet, sweep it with his tail, or just light you up with his breath.

But imagine commanding an army against such a fearsome foe . . . and winning. Your pikemen would charge the dragon, 4 or 5 getting flung away, but some would make it to the soft underbelly, and penetrate the dragon's insides. At this point he'd be weakened, and the vollley of arrows would pierce his wings so he couldn't fly away. Then you'd finish him off, gashing a mighty wound in his neck.

That'd be epic.

[Glacies]

Suggestions forum.

[Cthulhu]

Multi-tile's been suggested before, but multi Z-level would be pretty neat.

[Torak]

A single adventurer would be almost completely helpless against a beast such as a dragon.

Tell that to a Multi-Legendary Speardwarf.


He'd just rip the big guy's foot off with a few thrusts and continue onward to jump onto it's back and skewer the hell out of it without any fear.

[Cthulhu]

Which is a problem.  As much as I like the idea of a legendary hero slaying a huge beast, it's not likely to happen in the real world, probably because of our lack of huge, legendary beasts.

[Torak]

Which is a problem.  As much as I like the idea of a legendary hero slaying a huge beast, it's not likely to happen in the real world, probably because of our lack of huge, legendary beasts.

DF is about as far away from realistic as you can possibly get. Why worry about that now?

[Cthulhu]

Because worrying about unimportant things distracts you from worrying about important things.

[Syreal]

The dragon would be heavily armored everywhere except the underbelly and eyes. So unless you shot it in the foot with a ballista, its probably staying attached, no matter how skillful you are with a spear.

But that's the point, right now, fighting megabeasts is just like fighting a mountain goat. Except with a little more chance of dying. I want to make fighting megabeasts a totally different experience than fighting creeps.

Oh yeah, I want to make a Dwarfortresque roguelike game with this feature. Though on an infinitely smaller scale for the time being. (That'd be smaller scale as far as having a dungeon only, instaed of an entire world. I want to make megabeasts as big as possible!)

[Dwarfaholic]

Then we'd need to be able to climb, though, so as to better reach the head.

[MMad]

Isn't the biggest problem with multi-tile megabeasts that they'd be unable to get inside of your fortress unless you made a multi-tile entrance?

[Syreal]

Then we'd need to be able to climb, though, so as to better reach the head.

Definitely. That's why I would include a "Climber" skill.

Isn't the biggest problem with multi-tile megabeasts that they'd be unable to get inside of your fortress unless you made a multi-tile entrance?

True, but in the same way, a multi-tile megabeast can effectively "siege" your base by just standing out there. Why would the beast need to actually invade the fortress when he can just starve his foes to death? Of course, that wouldn't work if you had predicted such a scenario and built a small escape route.

In any case, fortresses are in the distant future for the game I want to make.

[Jamuk]

Well, and if a creature was big enough to take up multiple tiles it would probably be able to break down walls and widen the opening on its own, given a little time.

[Syreal]

That too.

[Jay]

You can't siege in the literal sense if the enemy has underground food and drink production.
The literal sense being the aforementioned starving them out.
A notable tactic in real life warfare, yes, but against dwarves it's just useless.

[Cthulhu]

Even then, they can't keep it up forever.  After so many years of the same crop, the soil won't be arable anymore. 

Speaking of which, during prolonged sieges goblins should kill nearby animals and catapult them over the fortress walls, creating miasma and (once it's in) disease.