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[Sabre_Justice]

Sorry if this has been suggested before (trust me, I know the feeling, CoH player), so I figure I'll do the shotgun effect and throw in a bunch of different ideas at once hoping one is newish.

I'm a bit of an animal lover both in real life and with games, and seeing that the kind of animals you get in DF are very useful in real life, many only recently supplanted by technology, I think we should be able to train other animals besides dogs to perform tasks. Assigned to a particular dwarf, they could help them in basic hauling tasks, allowing a dwarf to carry two items at once perhaps, or they could be assigned to a pump or device as a dedicated source of musclepower. Consider horses and donkeys pushing mills in real life, and elephants helping with logging today.

Of course, another way to make animals more useful is to allow them as mounts (I don't think this is in-game, right?), which is pretty self-explanatory. Mounted Combat sounds like it could be a skill of its own, or perhaps a more general Animal Rider skill. Mounts could allow dwarves to move faster, or have an advantage in combat, but the animals in question would likely need to be properly trained for it as well. At this point there might as well be a new building for it, the Stable.

[Tormy]

Yeah these have been suggested already of course. 
Either way, mounted units are in the game already. Note: IIRC Toady dislikes the idea of "mounted dwarves".

[Neonivek]

It isn't so much that he dislikes Mounted Dwarves

It is that there isn't really any creatures that make sense for a Dwarf to be riding.

[Tormy]

It isn't so much that he dislikes Mounted Dwarves

It is that there isn't really any creatures that make sense for a Dwarf to be riding.

Hm I don't know...what about bears for example?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[Sabre_Justice]

Dwarves riding elephants makes about as much sense as anything else riding elephants.

Totally gotta mod a game with Dwarf Hannibal (not the cannibal one) crossing mountains.

[Neonivek]

Except Dwarves are beings who live underground in tight spaces.

Also Bears would make horrible mounts at speeds faster then walking.

Yes I know... It barely makes sense for the Dwarves to take to farm animals as much as they currently do

[Pilsu]

Also Bears would make horrible mounts at speeds faster then walking.

Their stride doesn't look that different from any other quadruped


Bears have a suspicious tendency to guzzle down booze when they find it in the game, I find it a little hard to believe there isn't a relationship between them and the dwarves

[Neonivek]

Their stride doesn't look that different from any other quadruped

Most Quadrupeds don't make good mounts.

I find it a little hard to believe there isn't a relationship between them and the dwarves

Relationship? Yes... Mounted Bear Lancers? Probably not

[Pilsu]

Most Quadrupeds don't make good mounts.

I can think of precious few animals we don't ride and it's just about always a case of having something better already. That or the animal being specifically bred for something else, typically being delicious

It's more about the rule of cool than anything else of course. Goblins already ride two legged dinosaurs. And I will never stop complaining about them being called dogs when they don't run on four legs. It's stupid

[chucks]

Also Bears would make horrible mounts at speeds faster then walking.

Their stride doesn't look that different from any other quadruped

Yes, they do.  Bears tend to stand on their hind legs quite frequently with their back taking a vertical slope.  What happens when you try to sit on a vertical slop?  You fall on your ass in the dirt.

Sure, horses sometimes buck onto two legs, but this is the time that even highly experienced riders get thrown and scramble to keep from getting trampled or kicked.


I have a hard time visualizing dwarves riding anything other than a boar or a very stout pony.  I can see them riding chariots much easier than I can see them riding the animals directly, but they would have a hard time seeing forward past the bulk of the animal drawing the chariot due to their height.

[Neonivek]

Bears also (and this is a big one) do BADLY down hill.

[Pilsu]

a boar or a very stout pony.

Now I can see why Toady thinks the idea in general is so lame

[Vattic]

One suggestion I do have regarding mounts is that we can specify sizes like with weapons perhaps, right now if I modded in a load of miniature size 2 evil creatures who ride evil hoary marmots there is a chance that I get goblins or even orcs turn up on them.

I always liked the idea of dwarves ridding boars of some kind, I know in warhammer that's what the orcs or goblins ride though right? I cant help but picture them ridding boars in the style of Simon Bisley. I cant find the exact picture by him that I think of when I think of dwarves on boars but here's one of his boars in another picture.

[bjlong]

I pictured them having mounts that were underground creatures like worms or snakes, which they rode by practically laying down on the mount's back. But I'm ok with them not mounting up or anything.

[Starver]

[...] but the animals in question would likely need to be properly trained for it as well. At this point there might as well be a new building for it, the Stable.

My first thought when I read the suggestion was a Tiltyard.  Not as a Building, but instead an item-defined Room.  If intended to be a solo training effort, a quintain could define the area (equivalent to an archery target, inclusive of direction-of-approach style specification), or if you want a sparring-equivalent partnered practice then a row of hurdles laid down or specified similar to horizontal axels.  Why not both, though?  Or a "riding the rings"/"tent-pegging" linear feature for one?  Or sequential archery targets used for high-speed mounted-archery practice so your bear-mounted crossbowdwarves can work on the rather difficult to advance mountedmarksdwarf skill? 

But Stables as a building either: a) to more realistically house non-wandering mounts (equine, ursine or whatever) than 'infinicages'[1]; or b) to take over "train a war/hunting mount" from the Kennels...  now, that's a further idea.

[Insert: I'd suggest a Livery Stables speciality building/roomplan for chariot/beasts-of-carting training/housing/whatever-one-ends-up-doing-with-it.  It would mean things weren't lumped together too closely in use so that if either type of stable gets implemented on its own merit, it needn't require/preclude the other type.]

Though as there is Creator-resistance to this idea, I'm speaking purely speculatively, here.  [Inclusive of that last insert!] 


[1] Though a Barracks-style room-definition might again be more suitable.  One stall (either pre-built furniture item, a-la-bed, or log-sourced on-the-spot creation like the windmills) needed per currently non-wandering mount to avoid badthought-style 'problems' with our four footed/hooven/flippered friends.  And additionally the need to be baled-up with/within range of store of longlanded grasses/equivalent prefered food matter and drink (H2O, CH2OH, SiO2(liq)[2] or whatever else takes their fancy) might be 'interesting' (FCVO...) and provide a balance of difficulty when maintaining ones steads.

[2] We're going more and more into the fantastical, here, but imagine the choice of "(b)uild, (z)table" [sic, tr/z/s/] or "(b)uild, Magma (Z)table" [likewise].  And the mounts that require the latter.