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[Teldin]

A very basic, simple addition to creature raws:

Rather than the simplified baby template->child template->adult creatures, why not have a much more malleable method of upgrading a creature? I imagine it could work like this:

[BECOMES:<creature token>:<trigger>:<trigger variable>]

For example, using this method you could change a purring maggot into a 'purring hornet' once it reaches 3 years old: [BECOMES:PURRING_HORNET:AGE:3]. You could use some specific, restricted creature tokens for basic transformations, such as [BECOMES:CHILD:AGE:1][BECOMES:BABY:BORN:0][BECOMES:ADULT:AGE:12]. The game should still support the more basic [BABY:1] for backwards compatibility on raws, though.

The 'trigger' tokens could have a wide variety of triggers: age, amount of food eaten, distance travelled, highest skill, amount of kills, amount of sentient creatures eaten, etc. etc.

When a creature becomes a different one, it would carry over all its kills, lost limbs (if both forms share the same body token), skills, personality traits, etc. In essence it would be the same creature, but with a different body.

Thoughts?

[i2amroy]

I think that that would be an awesome idea, but I don't think that it should carry over missing or damaged limbs, as the creature is basically morphing into a whole new creature, plus, it would take way to much time to code something like that.

[Granite26]

There's already code for going from a child to an adult, so the basic idea is there.

Carrying over lost limbs is a necessity, if you want to emulate a weak 'child' form growing into a strong 'adult' form.  In fact, reading this, I thought that aging would be the primary use.

As far as taking to long to code, it'd be a useful tool for any further creature developments.  Utility (huge) trumps time (prolly pretty bad)

[Neoskel]

There's already code for going from a child to an adult, so the basic idea is there.

Not really. Baby/child/adult stages are just the same creature. It's a template which is vastly different than having it change to different creatures.

I like the idea though, and i think it might be better served by having a separate tag(s) for creatures with a life cycle. Also, i believe that the details for the different stages should all be in the same creature 'file'.

[Neonivek]

We need something similar for Antmen, Bees, and stuff that are dramatically different from one another in different stages of their lives.

To add to this

There should be a way to split up the life stages as well... This is especially useful for races that have their individuals differ physically by large degrees such as Termintes and ants who have Soldiers who have large mandibles and can spit acid, while the workers are just small creatures.

[Neoskel]

And something for major gender dimorphism. Like how antmen would probably only have male drones which would only breed with the queen.

[korora]

I can't help linking (again) to this excellent wishlist for creature tokens.  It doesn't cover everything in this discussion (no transformation, particularly) but it does handle dimorphism and would probably make a good starting point for the rest.

It seems like this really covers a few different scenarios: aging, metamorphosis, and (potentially) magic transformation.  Perhaps a flag is needed to indicate whether injuries, etc. are carried over; for age you'd probably carry things over but for the other two you might not.  You also might need to map old body parts to new ones explicitly if you want to handle drastic transformations with injuries.

[Granite26]

There's already code for going from a child to an adult, so the basic idea is there.

Not really. Baby/child/adult stages are just the same creature. It's a template which is vastly different than having it change to different creatures.

I like the idea though, and i think it might be better served by having a separate tag(s) for creatures with a life cycle. Also, i believe that the details for the different stages should all be in the same creature 'file'.

It's not different at all...  It's one thing, and then it's another.  Sure, child is probably defined as a meta-creature state with -1 of the original with different stats, but there's still a code hook for going from child to adult.  It just needs to be fleshed out.

Also, asking that the raws be artificially limited (storing the transformations in one file) is shortsighted.  You are taking away possibilities for minor bookkeeping reasons.

[Teldin]

It'd be pretty easy of course to just add tag(s) on the end for extra data for the transformation, like if the wounds carry over (assuming matching body tokens):

[BECOMES:ELDER_DRAGON:AGE:500:YES]

It'd be neat to have it check for the transformation triggers on history generation, too; this way you could have very interesting species that change into different forms as they grow older.

"In 847, Xondar Scorchfrenzies the Dragon became an Elder Dragon."

[Shinsetsu777]

You would also need to define what creature is born from reproduction. For example, if you have creature that goes:

Egg -> Wyrmling -> Longwyrm -> Great Wyrm

using the aforementioned tag, one would have to have a tag that indicates when two Longwyrms or two Great Wyrms mate they produce the Egg creature. I think that the system purported by JT (linked above) is apt to do so.

[Sowelu]

You're replying to posts from quite a few months ago. 

[Capntastic]

Regarding stuff that's already somewhat implemented in the future release, as well.

[Neonivek]

Toady knows that we want some form of creatures transforming and is planning on doing something about it.

If I remember correctly the reason he hasn't done so already is because of several problems. For example what do you do with a creature who lost an arm and transforms into a creature with only legs?

Though I believe he will get to it eventually as Curses that involve more then slight changes would rely on such.

[alfie275]

The other arms drop off.

[Neonivek]

The other arms drop off.

What arm? The creature it transforms into has no arms only legs. Do the legs fall off?

What if it has no arms or legs in its transformation does nothing happen? If it has a transformation after that where it does have arms is it missing one?

It is basically all these questions that are the reason it isn't in the game already.