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[Karlito]

There's always lots of talk about how amazing such and such mod is, or how cool it would be if we assigned all dwarves boiling points of 0, but let's get our noses out of the raws for a minute to appreciate how incredible the DF stock world really is.

Now, there's about a million things I could write here, but for now, let's focus on the major races of DF: the elves, the humans, the goblins, and the dwarves.  (I'm excluding kobolds for now because I can't think of anything interesting to say about them)

First, let's consider the world itself.  When it was created someone or something sealed a whole bunch of demons inside pits and then covered the pits with adamantine and then covered the adamantine with mountains.  Who could have done this?  Dwarf and human gods don't actually exist in and of themselves, elves don't believe in gods, and goblins worship the aforementioned demons.  The only actual [POWERS] in existence that would be capable of sealing the fiends of hell underneath the mountains are the demons themselves.  So personally I've taken to believing that the demons we see ruling the goblins are the strongest demons, who imprisoned their brethren underneath the mountains so they wouldn't have to share the overworld.  Discuss.

My next thoughts are about the elves, who are one of the most fleshed out races in the world in terms of development plans. Most players dislike the elves, as they should, since from a dwarven perspective they are insane hippy pansies that live in forests and actively seek to hinder industrial development.  However, I'd like to keep talks of drowning the elves in magma out of this thread, since my goal is to better understand the elves as a player and appreciator of Dwarf Fortress, and not as the spokesperson for the dwarves themselves (in other words an OOC discussion not an IC one).  That said, the elves are an enigma to me.  I see that they value preservation of the natural landscape more than anything else, but it is a mystery to me how they can exhibit such serenity one moment and such savagery the next.  What do you guys think?  How do the elves see themselves?  How do they see the other races?

My favorite race would probably have to be the goblins.  I think I've got them mostly figured out.  Think about them for a moment.  They are the most technologically advanced race above the ground, building massive towers that make the human castles look like run down shacks.  They live forever.  They actually worship something that exists in a tangible sense, and don't waste time shouting words at the sky like humans and dwarves.  They obviously believe that they are vastly superior to the other races, but they also believe that other races can be shown the light and converted to their superior society.  This is evidenced by the fact that the child snatchers consider themselves to be the "liberators" of children.  Now their [ETHICS] seem to suggest that they've adopted something that could only be called Social Darwinism.  The strongest goblins rise to the top and the weakest rot at the bottom.  The Demon is always at the top, and I'm not sure what role he plays in the direct control of the civilization, but that's still a point to ponder.  In short, the goblins view themselves as the noble immortals of the world, watching over it from their stone palaces, and seeking to redeem the lesser races from their own inferiority.

The humans, on the other hand, seem to be very primitive.  I view them sort of like Vikings, large barbaric warriors who drink all day and have very little science or social structure.  I hope that when boats are added, humans end up owning the seas because that would fit very much with my idea of them.  But, how must the other races see them?  Short lived, hairy, pink creatures trying to ilk out a living on the surface in their simple wooden shacks.  They're just as likely to go to war with each other as they are with the other races.  How uncivilized they must appear in the eyes of the other races.  I'm not sure what else to say about them, other than I hope they'll be fleshed out in future releases, because what we have to go with is rather bland at the moment.

Of course, everyone loves the Dwarves.  They seem to have the most advanced civilization, possessing the art of steelmaking and having a rather complicated nobility system.  Dwarves only seem to be concerned about metals and gems and stone and making things, in general.  Other races envy their craftsmanship and the dwarves do a roaring trade with the elves and humans.  They overlanders get beautiful stone crafts, and the dwarves get leather and meat and fish and all of the delicacies of the above ground land that they cannot secure themselves.  Even goblins, who won't lower themselves to trading as equal partners with the dwarves, admire their craftsmanship and their ability to make steel.  The goblins clearly want these things for themselves and actively attempt to capture forts.  Dwarves seem like they would rather live in a mountain than anything else, and they certainly don't enjoy the sun as much as other races, so it seems like they would prefer a more isolationist stance than anything else.

Anyway, these are my thoughts on the stock world.  There's a lot of missing pieces in my understanding of these societies, so I was hoping that we could help fill in each others gaps.  And I hope you weren't too put off by my wall-o-text.

[ArkDelgato]

Could kobolds/megabeasts have something to do with the adamantine?
The come when your wealthy to make you die and stop mining the adamantine.
Are the megabeasts fighting for a greater good?

[Fossaman]

This is a superior quality wall of text. On the item is an image of the programmer Tarn Adams in code. Tarn Adams is world-building.

Anyways, you make some good points. I think that you could go farther in your analysis of dwarves, though.

Dwarves strike me as shallow and selfish, as well as 'civilized.' The better term might be hierarchical. As long as a dwarf has enough luxuries, nothing else matters. Nobles are indigent taskmasters who care nothing for the suffering of their minions. And (because of various programming quirks) dwarves are kinda stupid. Granted, so are the other races. But still.

[ArkDelgato]

This is a superior quality wall of text. On the item is an image of the programmer Tarn Adams and dwarves. Tarn Adams is crafting the dwarves out of *Binary code*.

[Duke 2.0]

 Perhaps the goblin realist perspective is why they are so cruel. Despite how they might view themselves as the liberators of children, their language is riddled with words for rather ugly things no other race has. We can see this in the names they give things, aka Towerrape. Other races believe in things greater than themselves, something that requires faith and generally a sense of afterlife to go to. Thus moral standards. I know there is no afterlife implied ingame yet, but considering how different planes of existence will be implemented in the future their gods will make the demons pale in perspective. They merely own a small portion of the world. Their deity controls all of Otik, the Realms of Smiting.

 Now if humans are such pathetic things, why would these haughty races even trade with them? The way I see it, Humans are the ones with the fewest extremes. I'm sure there are some of every race who admire the fact that humans don't go cannibalistic like the elves, rape the land like the dwarves(Alright, they use wooden constructions. Still, dwarves seem more active in salting the earth after ripping out every natural resource. At least from the player perspective.) or snatch their children like Goblins.

 Elves... Well, I don't think of them so much as guardians as much as haughty nobility that take great offense at things and don't like to waste. They are perfectionists, and like accuracy. Thus their deadliness with bows is shown. They find animal and plant 'cruelty' so offensive that they must take out that which is assaulting their tastes. Of course, they don't mind coming around to trade to make some witty insults about other races.

 Kobolds had better have bug-based items!

 This is a +Wall of Text+. It menaces with spikes of disagreement. It has hanging rings of discussion. On it is a rendition of Karlito. Karlito is holding up a superior wall of text.

[Zorgn]

And (because of various programming quirks) dwarves are kinda stupid. Granted, so are the other races. But still.

And yet these stupid dwarves are going to eventually make a nuclear weapon out of cheese and basalt.

[Ampersand]

With the more recent fleshing out of the elves in game, my perspective on them has shifted.

They live forever, the have no advanced living style other than probably lean-tos and tents, which we never see in the game. They seem to understand that the humans and Dwarves do need to cut down trees, which is why they're willing to make concessions if you agree not to cut down more than so many trees per year, so they're not completely psychotic in their protection of their forests.

But then... There's that tipping point at which they throw themselves, hardly armored, poorly equipped upon the weapons of those who displease them by the thousands, often loosing to a handful of defenders, but only to come back with another human wave.

I see them as lacking individuality. Willing to throw themselves to their deaths because their individual lives have no value. I feel it is the named trees themselves that are the true centers of Elvish society. The elves are just the fleshy avatars of the trees.

[Zorgn]

Elves still eat people, right? The fact that this hasn't been mentioned yet makes me wonder.

[Jim Groovester]

On demons from the pits: I like to think that the megabeasts were once great civilizations unto themselves and they sealed the demons in the adamantine pits. Then, after ages of hubris, warfare, decadence, and loss of intelligence, they destroyed themselves and left only the few megabeasts that were left when the world began. I speculate this based on the spheres of worship they possess, which I think makes them more than mere supernatural occurrences from the beginning of the world.

On elves: I agree with your perspective that they are well fleshed out. I see them as living a symbiotic relationship with nature; nature provides and protects them, and they return the favor, usually violently upon other races. Because of this, I don't see the forces they worship to be gentle spirits of nature, but violent and vengeful spirits that suffer no outrage. Unfortunately, they currently don't get to do any of the cool stuff that a symbiotic relationship with nature would entail, like riding giant tigers into battle, living in enormous trees, healing the land by violent destruction of fortresses by plants, etc.

On elven cannibilism: It's like hunting. A human eats an animal when he kills it. The elves take it to an extreme. An elf eats what he kills, period. If he had to kill it, then he should derive as much benefit from the act as possible. Also, it's awesome.

On goblins: I don't think goblins view themselves as the noble protectors of other races. Their worship is by tyranny, they are angry and immoderate, they murder each other, they mutilate the bodies of their enemies, and they snatch babies for reasons I don't understand. Their ethics do suggest a survival of the fittest social structure, and this pessimistic societal view would certainly clash with the optimistic societal view of enlightening other races to their way of life.

On humans: I don't think they're primitive. I think they're like fourteenth century humans, although their cities should reflect it better. They can do all the jobs that dwarves can except process adamantine, they build roads, which is a sign of an advanced civilization, and they only intend to trade. They send diplomats to negotiate trade agreements, which is something civilized nations do, not barbarians. They have no central ruler, so they seem to be a loose coalition of city-states like the ancient Greeks that band together to face threats to the entire nation.

As for dwarves, we all know dwarves. Crafty and intelligent, but greedy. Their lust for valuable ores and gems send them deep into the mountains they live in, only to unleash the horrors contained within.

As for dwarves led by players, they are foolish and extraordinarily lucky, settling everywhere: swamps, forest, oceans, deserts, tundras, glaciers, and sometimes even mountains, and conquering the challenges there just because they could. They are barbaric, sending hopeful migrants plummeting to spike pits and drowning the nobility because they are annoyed with them and murdering traders simply because they want the challenge of their armies.

[Turnip]

And (because of various programming quirks) dwarves are kinda stupid. Granted, so are the other races. But still.

And yet these stupid dwarves are going to eventually make a nuclear weapon out of cheese and basalt.

Sigged.

[jester]

in the begining there was The Toady, and he looked upon the gamers and they had jobs, girlfriends and the beginings of advanced doctorates in quantum astro physics.  So he fixed it.  Then he made it 3D and it was all over.

[Skorpion]

The elves I see kinda like crocodile dundee: Never kill something unless you intend to eat it.

The dwarves, however, I kinda see like the Victorians. Ripping up the landscape in order to advance their own aims, strip-mining, undermining things, tapping the very blood of the world itself (magma), and seem to have absolutely no morals. I mean, they tend to massacre merchants, fend off goblin sieges in extremely bloody and sadistic ways, and then slaughter their captives.

[Kogan Loloklam]

GOBLINS:
I don't know if anyone else has done it, But I went in a goblin fortress in adventure mode to assassinate all the leaders (I was going to build a fortress on top of it and didn't want !!☺!! all over the place.)
Anyway, I am exploring and run into a goblin thief. I talk to him and ask him about his profession. What does he say? He brings the lost children home.
Goblins send snatchers because they think all children are their's. An interesting concept.

[Gunner-Chan]

What does he say? He brings the lost children home.
Goblins send snatchers because they think all children are their's. An interesting concept.

I think he may of meant "Lost" as in not knowing ones way, as in he thinks he saves deprived children. In any case those snatchers might be nicer than we think, most of the "captives" are taken care of rather well.

After I found that out I just started releasing gobbo thieves, no point in killing someone just because he was trying to help. But ambushers are still fair game.

[Duke 2.0]

 It could be those children grow up into much more physically formidable fores to their enemies?

 In which case, just bettering their ability to rape pillage and murder. Dwarves only do that to the land.