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[smjjames]

@Footkerchief: Yea, I wasn't sure what exactly Toady was talking about in todays devlog. It may have had something to do with the mysteries 1,000* miles down.

*An exaggerration if you can't tell.....

[Footkerchief]

But then there's no word for "elf", "human", "goblin" or "kobold" either.

There are no elven, dwarven, or goblin words for any of the creatures, which is kind of problematic.  I suspect that eventually 1) creature raws (and material raws too, probably) will include their own word definitions like the ones in language_words.txt, and 2) worldgen people will make up names in their own language for each creature they encounter.

[Shoku]

Oh, I didn't realize that. Petrified wood looks more of an orange-red than bright red though.

In the init file we have 16 colors we can define. Mayday shifts them a bit and you can find other "sets" on the wiki but the number is 16. With graphics packs the actual graphics have a wider range of colors but everything that you see in the tileset files uses those 16 colors.

But then there's no word for "elf", "human", "goblin" or "kobold" either.

There are no elven, dwarven, or goblin words for any of the creatures, which is kind of problematic.  I suspect that eventually 1) creature raws (and material raws too, probably) will include their own word definitions like the ones in language_words.txt, and 2) worldgen people will make up names in their own language for each creature they encounter.

If they were all able to talk we could say they were just actually showing some respect and using people's names for themselves.

Probably a bit much to expect from any civilization though.

[Lancensis]

If they were all able to talk we could say they were just actually showing some respect and using people's names for themselves.

Probably a bit much to expect from any civilization though.

Well the only ones that don't speak intelligable language are the Kobolds. Maybe "Kobold" is just the sound they make when they die, so the other races just shrug and refer to them that way.

[zchris13]

If they were all able to talk we could say they were just actually showing some respect and using people's names for themselves.

Probably a bit much to expect from any civilization though.

Well the only ones that don't speak intelligable language are the Kobolds. Maybe "Kobold" is just the sound they make when they die, so the other races just shrug and refer to them that way.

That's a reference to something.

[Lancensis]

News to me

EDIT: Perhaps it was Unforgotten Realms. I seem to remember the Kobolds speak pokémese in that.

[skaltum]

will river flooding ever come back? e.g cave river and magma river flooding in the 2D version

and

will adv mode zombie ruins return?

[Footkerchief]

will river flooding ever come back? e.g cave river and magma river flooding in the 2D version

It's been suggested that they come back, but I couldn't find any word from Toady on it.

will adv mode zombie ruins return?

In some form, yes:

As the currently released version stands, there are ruins of old structures that come from sites that happened to become unpopulated in some way.  So if you were to find pyramids like the old ruined pyramids from the older 3D versions, they would have come from a pyramid-building civilization you could just as easily find alive.  You can currently find a ruined keep in that way (from a civ that would have an occupied keep).  The current entity defs just need more diversity than they currently have.

I don't think it's crucial to have dungeon-type locations that are left behind with level-graded treasures scattered properly or something like that (the pyramid ruins were like that -- it hid the best stuff deeper in).  If there are dungeons, they'd be either abandoned or occupied, created in world gen or during play by the sort of critters that would have a dungeon (like a dwarf fortress).  Game-wise, it would certainly be better to have the old 3D zombie ruins from before than nothing, but hopefully we can do better than that.  Ideally, every explorable adventure location that you find would have a real reason for being there, linked in with the world history and everything else.  There are plenty of ways for that to still involve interesting things to find laying around, though places that would have been looted by whoever sacked them and so on should probably be looted.

Ghost transformations are one of those metaphysical matters that didn't have explanations attempted in the game when they existed, just like the current undead regions.  When those have explanations, things like ruins with zombies should arise more naturally.  This could involve gods in pantheons of death/rebirth/etc., regions linked to death/etc. for whatever reason, etc., but it's all specific mechanics at that point.  I guess a key point there would be that site/civ-wide zombie transformations would still theoretically be able to happen during play, which would be cool, once you've got the world gen mechanics trickled over to dwarf mode or adv mode (or vice versa, whichever way it goes in first).

[Neonivek]

It is one of the major differences between current and modern audiances that certain things needed to be explained. Which in many ways killed the magic of many settings turning what is often the mechanics of the world into some sort of scientific reasoning.

In a way it is the death of mystery but it is also the death of symbolism as active participants in the story in the best way I can explain it.

For example, why do ghosts need to be explained? Even if they are explained why should it be anything then explaining that in this world people often become ghosts and that ghosts self-propigate as a implied but never stated addition (as in, the more ghosts that are around the more likely it is to have more ghosts).

Though I know this isn't really the area I should be discussing. It is just musing.

I realise that the reason isn't so much that it needs to be explained away, though seeing how people often take sci-fi now adays, but that the game needs to understand the mechanics.

I often wonder if there will be ways in which the game generates sort of non-earth laws for how things react. Where being a canible turns you into a literal monster, or where having an improper burial makes you a ghost, or even where simple trinkets harm supernatural creatures that in other games do not share that weakness... all this without even touching "it is magic/Spheres" because it isn't magic it is "How the world works".

It won't but it is always interesting to think in such ways.

[CobaltKobold]

I can't find the quote, but someone put it succinctly as "Let science work reliably, and let magic be MAGIC"

[JoshuaFH]

Actually, it's "Let's science be reliable, let magic be MAGIC!".

It's Vester's sig IIRC.

[CobaltKobold]

that it is.

[Willfor]

I'm glad Toady wants to make magic variable, because if the fanbase had their way we'd be stuck with only one kind of magic rather than different magics for different worlds. And by fanbase I mean EVERY LAST ONE OF YOU >:[

YES YOU >:[

[atomfullerene]

Nooo, not me, I agree with you.  Really, I promise! 

[Christes]

Actually, I'd just as soon not have magic.