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[I3erent]

Toady has said he hasnt decided so maybe we can come up with some good suggestions for this?

Have at it.

[mickel]

I haven't ever dug to the adamantium so I don't know except from the forum how it works...

However. It makes little sense to me to have a timer that starts as soon as you begin mining. It seems to be generally agreed that this is a stopgap measure Toady put in to have some sort of ending.

Me, I think adamantium definitely shouldn't be in every map, and if it is, it's deep down, and far in. Of course, as with every metal, there should be hints in the landscape as to where it can be found.

Perhaps adamantium only occurs in areas where lava flows near the surface, or something like that? Maybe it only occurs in areas heavily influenced by evil magic? That could explain why it seems to attract demons in the first place...

[BurnedToast]

I think that the more adamantium you mine, the more attacks you should get. Enemy goblin tribes trying to take it, wizards who want it for experiments, dragons who covet it for their hoard, daemons who are freed by mining it and so on. It should never instantly end your game like it does now, but mining enough of it should mean you are pretty much constantly under siege from without and within until you finally succumb to waves of ever stronger enemies.

Of course this assumes various cheese like flooding the world with lava, splatbridges, locking doors and drawbridges making you safe, and so on get fixed.

[ravensword227]

A 3x3 tile encasing a random greater demon or demon spawn pit would be greatly prefered to extending the release date to add in magic.  You can't dig it without unleashing Hell.

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I don't see how outside civilizations would know you have accessed adamantine unless you traded it, then I can see getting sieged.

Every mountainous location should probably have a little adamantine until it is possible to have real armies and multiple fortresses with trade routes between them.

[ August 29, 2007: Message edited by: ravensword227 ]

[Reign on your Parade]

why 3*3? Why not other sizes?

[mickel]

Well, if we assume adamantium has massive magical properties one could theorise that exposing a vein of it causes a burst of magical radiation that can be picked up by those attuned to it. Certainly mages, dragons and demons, but maybe also races that are closer attuned to the flow or magic or whatnot, like goblins and elves?

Following that line, smelting and forging the stuff could cause even more intense bursts of magical energy, making your fortress a homing beacon for anyone who wants adamantium.

[Fieari]

No reason for 3x3.  The simplest thing would be to surround the pits by a layer only 1 or 2 deep of the stuff, so that you never know whether mining it will unleash the demons or not.

The demon populations should regenerate, in my opinion, so that you can't simply kill them all.  And of course, the Balrog should be buffed somehow.

I agree that adamantine should attract global attention, PARTICULARLY from dragons.  

I think it would be cool if every nation that knows of your existence should send diplomats demanding a share of the adamantine or they'll declare war.  This could be avoided by keeping the ore secret of course, but that'll be tricky... dwarves will have a flag saying "Knows about the adamantine" or not.  Any time a dwarf with the flag is seen by another dwarf, the flag spreads.  Once the merchants know you've got the stuff, the cat is out of the bag.

[Gask]

At the very least each and every demon pit you open up should contain a wave.

[I3erent]

The addy doesnt attract demons it holds them in a la paradise lost.

The gates of hell are made of addy to hold the devil in.

[ August 30, 2007: Message edited by: berent ]

[hactar1]

Perhaps adamantine ore should only be mineable with steel picks?  It would follow from other late-game work requiring steel, like the lava workshops and bridges.

[Tamren]

How about this:
Adamantine is present in small pockets very deep underground. Every now and then a large bubble of adamantine can be found. Most are empty, but some contain hidden treasure, and most often, demons. If you delve even deeper you may find a gigantic pocket containing a greater demon.

In game terms, feep past the magma you will start to find scattered pockets of adamantine, most of these pockets are the size of gem clusters. Every now and then you will find a larger deposit. Invariably each of these has a demon pit inside (with a finite number).

If you want to avoid the demons you can carefully skim tiles off the sides of the deposite and leave the pit encased. Or if you have enough manpower, you can break open the bubble and kill the demons. Since Z levels are in, we could possibly dig out the demon pits and see what they keep in there, probably treasure. This goes on for many layers. However once you get VERY deep you will find larger, thicker bubbles with lone but very powerful demons.

Eventually you hit this solid wall of adamantine. This can be mined to your hearts content. HOWEVER! The wall has cracks in it and is not of uniform thickness. If you happen to bust through the wall, then all hell breaks loose. Or rather, the uberdemon. If you somehow defeat him then you can go ahead and mine the adamantine to your hearts content, but good luck with that!  

--

Now this way we can gather adamantine without making the game die. There are considerable risks involved which balances out the rarity. For one you have to dig DEEP, you may uncover caves full of beasts or lava pockets.

[mickel]

Of course, in the next version you might not be near lava. But then again, you'd have no adamantium either.

No pain, no gain.

[Turgid Bolk]

With Z-levels, I don't see how random "pits" would work. Shouldn't a pit be pretty deep? Would you just have addy at the top, or all down the sides of the pit? Demons in a kind of "bubble" of adamantium doesn't make much sense to me either. What are they doing in a little bubble? I guess they could have been trapped there long ago or something.

Maybe the demons could have a sort of tunnel system around adamantium deposits, leading deeper into the earth. That way you get a few little deposits for free, then uncover one of their tunnels. You can try to block up the tunnel again (with rewalling), but to get more addy you have to fight your way deeper into the tunnel system. This way the demons have kind of their own biome, still seperate from the chasm, but they have their own society and feed off the adamantium or something. The walls wouldn't be solid adamantium, just tunnels connecting different veins, all leading to the big demon in the central "demonhome" or whatever. This would make for an interesting war over resources deep under the mountains.

Not all mountains would have enough adamantium to attract the big guy, of course. Some would just have small tunnel systems, or maybe only a couple demons.

Oh, and if you hear about "In 4, Suchandsuch was imprisoned deep within Craggypeak," or "Lonelymountain lies to the west. Demons call it their home," it could tip you off to where adamantium lay.

[ August 30, 2007: Message edited by: Turgid Bolk ]

[Tamren]

Well i dunno about the pits and the Z levels.

See, even now chasm tiles pretty much signify "bottomless". Filled with lava you will be able to see a line of lava in the bottom of the chasm, but it is doubtful that you could get to the bottom of them with only 15 Z levels.

Of course that might change in the future, from what toady said the future of the fortress topic, chasms are more natural and organic instead of the preset line we always find, sometimes with branches.

Right now the pits are fissures made of 3 squares and they seem to lead into the center of the earth. If we had bubbles instead of pits they would be all different shapes but each would have walls formed of addy.

[Kittenykat]

Well here's my suggestion. In mechanics terms, take out the 'countdown to armageddon' flag when addy is mined, and simply place the Adamantine Demon wandering in the pit behind the adamantine wall. Set it immune to thirst and hunger so it can sit there wandering back and forth until doomsday should it have to. Then add pockets of adamantine peppering the area before the wall, little 1x1 squares fairly well dispersed. Now your dwarves actually get to battle the demon when the wall to the final chasm is breached. It should be godly powerful though, perhaps taking nearly your entire army with it. There's a reason the ancients sealed it in that prison rather than vanquishing it after all. (Then again don't they always in fantasy RPGs? lazy bastards xD "Eh, not our problem anymore!" lol)