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Author Topic: Item: Gunpowder!  (Read 2315 times)

Saer

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Item: Gunpowder!
« on: July 28, 2009, 10:09:48 pm »

Now, although it may be illegal in some places to reveal the ingredients to gunpowder, really I don't think it is too far fetched to add it into the game, but not make the ingredients obvious.

Anyway, GUNS! Guns are only used by dwarves in Warcraft III, and so why can't dwarves use it instead? It is less elfish, and more DWARF! Those dirty elves... Bows are for dirty elves! Guns are for DWARVES!

Gunpowder, when lit, obviously would have "explosive" results. Quite fun right? Potentially, it could carve out mountains.

With gunpowder, comes CANNONS! Bastilas are a thing of the past! Cannons, to me, would do more damage, but less accuracy.

Now programming this in I am unsure of, since I am not a programmer or something.
I also searched it, but I didn't find a yes or no... But I also expanded on the idea.
People in that other topic said it is a tech issue for the time.

I hope this idea is considered, and try not to bag on it too much.
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Phantom

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Re: Item: Gunpowder!
« Reply #1 on: July 28, 2009, 10:16:31 pm »

I believe this was suggested, suggestion had failed.
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Luke_Prowler

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Re: Item: Gunpowder!
« Reply #2 on: July 28, 2009, 10:17:40 pm »

Gunpowder has been brought up, and frowned on because people seem to think that it's too modern.

I personally like the idea of cannons and explosions, but that's me
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Phantom

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Re: Item: Gunpowder!
« Reply #3 on: July 28, 2009, 10:22:44 pm »

I personally just want a stick with a grip that acts like a bolt action rifle, not accurate and needs more ingredients than a crossbow (Wood, metal, metal for switch). That and battling rams and wagons like in the old west (Guy riding with driver that shoots enemies, when they reach destination or find an amount of armed enemies soldiers from in side jump out.)
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tsen

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Re: Item: Gunpowder!
« Reply #4 on: July 29, 2009, 04:11:23 am »

As much as I like the idea of primitive firearms, I don't think it would be wise to add them in just yet. To make them true to life they would need to be:

1. highly innacurate
2. unreliable
3. dangerous
4. not as destructive as people seem to think they are

Guns *TODAY* are horrifically destructive, but our dwarves wouldn't have:
1. advanced chemical propellants
2. mass produced ammunition casings
3. precision machined weapons (no rifling)

So mowing down a goblin siege with a few legendary rifledwarves is... Extremely unlikely. They'd fire more slowly than crossbows, occasionally not fire at all or blow up in the dwarf's hands, and the muzzle velocity of a primitive black powder weapon wasn't like our APDS rounds--didn't automatically pierce armor to huge damage through tumbling and fluid shock.  Platemail would have a reasonable chance of limiting the damage to a bruise or maybe a fractured or broken bone.  Still nasty, but we're not talking Warcraft dwarves who are inexplicably accurate and as damaging as a .50cal round despite the relative crudity of their weapons.
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Footkerchief

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Re: Item: Gunpowder!
« Reply #5 on: July 29, 2009, 04:44:31 am »

I also searched it, but I didn't find a yes or no... But I also expanded on the idea.

It's very rare to find an actual "yes or no."  That doesn't mean the topic needs further discussion.  There have been dozens of gunpowder threads.

If you want an official answer, though, it's "maybe":

Given that anything I add which is both highly controversial and unnecessary will be optional, people can afford to be calm about future additions.

A lot of it comes down to where I devote my energy.  Technological innovations sort of fall into a category with projects like tileset support.  These options would make some people happy and expand the audience, while taking up some of my time that other people want put somewhere else.  As they get further and further away from what we've already got, they are less likely to have time found for them.

For those interested in a specific development timeline for gunpowder, I'll be faced with the question when I make the alchemist's workshop more interesting (assuming that workshop continues to exist).  Handling the workshop itself is a middle-priority matter, since the game elements involved aren't crucial but the the building is languishing in a limbo surrounded by mysterious useless raw entries like golden salve and gnomeblight.  I may or may not add optional gunpowder around that time.  I don't know.

Regarding gunpowder and some basic associated technologies, I can see myself playing either way, really, since I'm not that picky.  If I had to choose between having gunpowder on or off in a release distribution init file, it would be off, because Arnold got shot in Commando not Conan, and the Argonauts didn't get shot by handguns or cannons, and Medusa had a bow not a gun, and stuff.  We grew up with that crap, and our core DF, our myth/fantasy game, mainly hovers around that sort of fluffy nostalgia, but it doesn't need to impact you more than a one line file change.

Yeah, I'm aware of this.  I've been thinking for a while of using their chemistry as the dwarven model, prior to gunpowder arriving in the mid 13th century.  Plaster isn't the first time we've bumped into them.  In any case, as plaster casts predate that by 300 years and had the direct mineral link I mentioned, I think it's all good.  Dwarves should probably distinguish themselves in fields like this, if anything.  It's their element, at least in part.  Some of it'll depend on flavor (gunpowder is a decision like this more or less).  I'll have to decide on a case by case basis, but I think most of it will go in.  Our dwarves have more idle time than fighting crazy viking-style scottish dwarves.

edit:  though they drink twice as much.
« Last Edit: July 29, 2009, 04:49:12 am by Footkerchief »
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Kruniac

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Re: Item: Gunpowder!
« Reply #6 on: July 30, 2009, 01:17:33 pm »

1: Add Throwing to your Dwarves in Fortress Mode.

2: Equip a Torch, made from wood, cloth, and magma/firesource.

3: Throw Torch at Gunpowder Barrel laying near an enemy siege.

4: Clean.

5: Cancel Clean: Too awe-inspired.
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