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[HungryHobo]

I have  a few suggestions:

1) Remove the code or whatever that allows creatures to AUTOMATICALLY know where dwarves and other creatures are. (Demons would attack only what is in their line of sight, and wander around aimlessly when nothing is in sight)

this is probably a bigger deal than you might think.
With current pathing you have to keep track of the map.
If you want to do this then you need to start keeping a seperate map for each entity of where it knows already and what it can sense currently.
it's a can of worms.

[LordZorintrhox]

Yeah, each entity would need to do some kind of awareness sweep every step of the AI.  I am sure there is a clever way of dealing with this issue programmatically, but I'd have to think real hard.  The real time killer is the need to deal with the Euclidean Distance between each entity and each other entity.  The time needed increases exponentially with the number of entities: 4 needs 16 checks, 8 needs 64, 16 needs 256, etc.  Hit 50 dwarves and a dozen goblin seige and you have 62^2, or 3844, checks, and each one requires two rounds of exponentiation and one square root.  Civilians need to check, too, since they are put off by baddies.

[moghopper]

I have  a few suggestions:

1) Remove the code or whatever that allows creatures to AUTOMATICALLY know where dwarves and other creatures are. (Demons would attack only what is in their line of sight, and wander around aimlessly when nothing is in sight)

this is probably a bigger deal than you might think.
With current pathing you have to keep track of the map.
If you want to do this then you need to start keeping a seperate map for each entity of where it knows already and what it can sense currently.
it's a can of worms.

Yeah... I figured it would be trouble, but my point still stands.
You could work around this by simply making creatures react to things in their sight, and limit their sight range to around 30 squares or so. But what do I know about programing? Nothing. So its likely more complicated than that...

But a man can dream, a man can dream

[Strange guy]

My biggest problem with these suggestions? Many of them force the player to fight the HFS. DF is a game of choice in many ways, and forcing a player into something they don't want to do should not be included. Once you've broken it open I have no problem with the glowing pits seriously crazying up your fortress, but being able to just leave it without any problems should be an option. Either that of it could be a .int option.

[Julien Brightside]

I kinda imagine people finding HFS by the ocean, like a portal to hell.

Then the genious/destructive dwarf behaviour sets in and an idea is born.
"Lets dig a channel from the ocean to the portal, lets flood Hell!"


And I can totally imagine a dwarf wandering around, hunting Kittens in insanity.

[Cardinal]

However, what I like is the idea that until you get rid of the demons, EVERY mood you get will be Fell, and maybe increase the chance of them somewhat significantly, and let them get more than one a lifetime. So that if you don't kill these guys quickly enough, your dwarves will end up making artifact items out of each other until there's only one left, who ends up finally going berserk because there's NOBODY LEFT TO KILL MUST HAVE DWARF SKIN.

I think putting a time limit like that on the demon extermination could really make things interesting.

That's a good and workable idea.  Maybe all Insane/Melancholy dwarves also become servants of the HFS, so that if you want to change allegiance to the HFS, you only get control of the crazy inmates locked up in your prison, at which point all the non-crazy dorfs become the enemies, then it's just a matter of killing them (and naturally making dwarf bone meal) or arranging for them to go insane, so that it's kind of like Body Snatchers (Heck, the first few caravans wouldn't know you've "gone bad" so they'd be like free deliveries of new recruits/dinner/materials).

[Morrigi]

I love the ideas of dwarves getting obsessed with the HFS until they die, and also the hallucinations. Also, i know this has been suggested before, but maybe a new kind of "phantom" HFS that moves inside the walls of your fortress unseen, killing a dwarf here and there, maybe pulling him halfway through the wall...

"Urist McDwarf cancels Drink: Embedded in wall"


"Urist McDwarf has suffocated"


"You have struck Rotten Dwarf Bits!"


Edit: grammar/clarity
More Edit: credit to wall phantoms goes to fizmat

[darkflagrance]

My biggest problem with these suggestions? Many of them force the player to fight the HFS. DF is a game of choice in many ways, and forcing a player into something they don't want to do should not be included. Once you've broken it open I have no problem with the glowing pits seriously crazying up your fortress, but being able to just leave it without any problems should be an option. Either that of it could be a .int option.

Actually, I think the suggestions in this thread are merely moving the point of no return when it comes to HFS, as well as increasing the plot of the events that occur between the discovery of adamantine and the opening of the pits. It would not eliminate the choice entirely, only change the nature of the cost/benefit calculation when making it.

Ideally, the point at which the player would be free of the burden of the pits would be just as he/she has hit adamantine. At that point, the player could be content with digging out the peripheral pieces, or if he/she were greedier/more ignorant, he/she could continue down at risk of hitting the wall of the pit. Once the pit is touched, the player would be subject to some of the events talked about in this thread, and the demons would appear when the pit is at last breached.

The choice still exists in whether or not to pursue the adamantine once it is discovered. However, as you take more and more risks in your desire for that lovely blue metal, you eventually approach a point of no return.

[Bauglir]

-snip-

[Morrigi]

Maybe like the warnings about wet or warm stone.

[Hummingbird]

This could perhaps be accomplished like in 2D: make it dependent on the amount of adamantine you have dug out. The more of the adamantine you have excavated, the greater the effects become, coming to a head as you breach the pit itself.

Lastly, neither magic, faith, nor brute force can ward off every crazy-ass demon/ghost/titan/dragon/possession.  But giving the player no options of how to deal with them other than "kill it! kill it NOW!" is unacceptable.

This; the game should be giving the player a greater, not smaller, number of options, none of which would work in any number of situations.

[Pilsu]

The pit needs to be encased in adamantine from every direction for this to be viable. You shouldn't breach the pit by accident. Of course, the shell can't be predictable lest it make it easy to chip away just the borders. Just enough so that you can't dig down into the pit without hitting adamantine at all

Exorcisms and other nonsense are very Jesus savey. Your greed should be your undoing, that's what the pits are about. Or were at any rate


I would like to see demons eventually starting to pour out of the pits in addition to the craziness. Right now they just immediately pop out and fizzle out once the initial incursion is dead, not very threatening. The pathfinding needs fixing though, especially if the place is walled off. Additionally, I'd like the pits to look more distinctive. A small, randomly generated hole is rather uninspiring

[Neonivek]

Exorcisms and other nonsense are very Jesus savey

Actually if you look into it, and I was sort of surprised by it, exorcisms have occured in many cultures.

Whether it is drilling a hole in someone's head or presenting the spirit with a gift (So not all of them are "GET OUT!" some of them are "Please leave, here is something to appease you") is has been around for thousands of years.

As for "Those are Spirits", well oddly enough many forms of spirit warding was supposed to work on physical beings as well (as long as they were affiliated with certain beings) and many "spirits" were physical beings or had the ability to manifest.

The Demons using a weakening of their containment to leak their mental influence through (or to travel through in a bodyless form) is fairly interesting.

[Smitehappy]

What he meant be "Very Jesus savey" means that it involves combatting them with spirit, faith or no physical methods, all of which aren't very dwarfy or fit the theme of DF. The demons in DF are not some kinda spirits who can manifest into our world, they are physical beings bent on rending/burning/torturing you dwarves just for giggles. It needs to be kept in the physical realm.

[Foehamster]

The pit needs to be encased in adamantine from every direction for this to be viable. You shouldn't breach the pit by accident. Of course, the shell can't be predictable lest it make it easy to chip away just the borders. Just enough so that you can't dig down into the pit without hitting adamantine at all

I don't think fully encasing the HFS in adamantite is necessary.  The pit should be opened unexpectedly.  First, canned evil is always Fun.  Second, if the In Character knowledge of the dwarven civ might realize that there is adamantite there and saving/retaking the fort becomes priority (Reclaim with 200 dwarves makes sense in that case).



For the psycological attacks, I think there should be 3 stages:
1. (Within several region tiles of the HFS)A slightly strange feeling/mannerisms/paranoia that dwarves get just from being in the area.
2. (Adamantite found)More intense feelings along with greater violence, greed, hoarding, and thievery.
3. (Section of the HFS revealed)If the HFS is breached/revealed the worst levels of madness begin to manifest.

Level 1 should be almost unnoticeable until dwarves have been in the area for years.
Level 2 should still be subtle, but slowly get worse, but stay manageable.
Level 3 is slow madness, slowed to a crawl only by keeping dwarves several region tiles away from the HFS.  Cured by only by cleansing the HFS, or being dragged to a safer fortress far away.

Some kind of HFS madness counter would probably be needed on each dwarf to keep track of their HFS exposure.  The madness should eventually wear off, but extremely slowly.  So even after cleansing the taint, a few dwarves may still go mad.