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[zwei]

There are many, many example of body-mutilation as a sign of membership to certain group: Circumcision (both male and female.), Neck enlongation, Earlobe/Lip stretching, Skull enlongation.

I agree that this does not really have much place in DF.

[King_of_the_weasels]

Urist McAssassin cut off right ring finger to make room for hidden blade.

Nothing is true everything is dwarven.

[NW_Kohaku]

There are many, many example of body-mutilation as a sign of membership to certain group: Circumcision (both male and female.), Neck enlongation, Earlobe/Lip stretching, Skull enlongation.

I agree that this does not really have much place in DF.

While tattoos and hairstyles are acceptable, ritual mutilation needs to stay out of the game. No one sane would do it and the ones that do wold cut off the hands of the fortress guard just to exploit it. You can't seriously expect the guard to accept having their bits chopped off when rest of your culture doesn't do any of it. Let's not abuse the unquestioning loyalty of our mock-up dwarves.

Actually, just thinking about it, having different elven civs that have unique rituals for attaining adulthood seems like a cool way to distinguish one game from another.

One game, they have elongated necks.  The next, they body pierce themselves so that they have finely crafted wooden rings hanging from their skin, one for every decade they have lived.

Seeing elves who come in to town with skin made to look like tree bark by having their skin bitten by an acidic/poisonous insect bite repeatedly to prove how elfcore they are might make dwarves think twice before dismissing them as total pansies.

[Grendus]

There are many, many example of body-mutilation as a sign of membership to certain group: Circumcision (both male and female.), Neck enlongation, Earlobe/Lip stretching, Skull enlongation.

I agree that this does not really have much place in DF.

While tattoos and hairstyles are acceptable, ritual mutilation needs to stay out of the game. No one sane would do it and the ones that do wold cut off the hands of the fortress guard just to exploit it. You can't seriously expect the guard to accept having their bits chopped off when rest of your culture doesn't do any of it. Let's not abuse the unquestioning loyalty of our mock-up dwarves.

Actually, just thinking about it, having different elven civs that have unique rituals for attaining adulthood seems like a cool way to distinguish one game from another.

One game, they have elongated necks.  The next, they body pierce themselves so that they have finely crafted wooden rings hanging from their skin, one for every decade they have lived.

Seeing elves who come in to town with skin made to look like tree bark by having their skin bitten by an acidic/poisonous insect bite repeatedly to prove how elfcore they are might make dwarves think twice before dismissing them as total pansies.

Now they're crazy... and just a squishy as ever.

[NW_Kohaku]

There are many, many example of body-mutilation as a sign of membership to certain group: Circumcision (both male and female.), Neck enlongation, Earlobe/Lip stretching, Skull enlongation.

I agree that this does not really have much place in DF.

While tattoos and hairstyles are acceptable, ritual mutilation needs to stay out of the game. No one sane would do it and the ones that do wold cut off the hands of the fortress guard just to exploit it. You can't seriously expect the guard to accept having their bits chopped off when rest of your culture doesn't do any of it. Let's not abuse the unquestioning loyalty of our mock-up dwarves.

Actually, just thinking about it, having different elven civs that have unique rituals for attaining adulthood seems like a cool way to distinguish one game from another.

One game, they have elongated necks.  The next, they body pierce themselves so that they have finely crafted wooden rings hanging from their skin, one for every decade they have lived.

Seeing elves who come in to town with skin made to look like tree bark by having their skin bitten by an acidic/poisonous insect bite repeatedly to prove how elfcore they are might make dwarves think twice before dismissing them as total pansies.

Now they're crazy... and just a squishy as ever.

Regardless, this sounds like the sort of thing that could exist for modding purposes where people could find something cool to do.  Even if it might not have a place in vanilla DF, it can certainly be built into a place in modding.

[Warlord255]

I'd think that different body decorations should reflect different degrees of "barbarism", if you will, where the decorations are cumulative - the most barbaric society (or person) would have all options considered.

Barbaric: Scarification (e.g. goblins)
Gruff: Tattoos (e.g. humans, dwarves)
Civilized: Piercings (e.g. elves)
Refined: Hairstyle (all races)

While this shouldn't be abstracted, a general trend of this sort would make exceptions - i.e. Elves with ritual scars or a well-kept goblin - more noticable.

That being said, ritual amputation sounds a bit heavy, even for DF. Scarification in "evil" civs seems to be a good upper limit.

[Pilsu]

Let me rephrase that. We shouldn't give the players the ability to arbitrarily start modifying the bodies of their dwarves with no regard to tradition. As is, dwarves do pretty much exactly what you tell them to and until we get nontraditional or even conservative dwarves giving your militia the finger when the captain tells him to go get circumcised, it just isn't going to work to a satisfactory degree. There should be controls in place to prevent arbitrary procedures seeing as your civ is not capable of resisting your order. Dwarves accepting facial tattoos unquestioningly just because they have the [GRUFF] tag does not ring right with me, it has to be deeper than that.

[NW_Kohaku]

I don't see why this can't be included for modding.  Modders, after all, will put in races of giant cthonic horrors that stalk the land, or will try to alter cultures as much as they are able to do so.  Having cultures that have ritualistic eyelid-cutting ceremonies for their giant floating eyeball monster soldiery wouldn't ruin the games of anyone else, after all.

That said, I wouldn't really want goblins to be treated just as some sort of clump of savages as if we were playing some sort of myth out of the Age of Exploration where our race represents civilization, and all other races are savages who must be taught the value of our culture.

[Footkerchief]

That said, I wouldn't really want goblins to be treated just as some sort of clump of savages as if we were playing some sort of myth out of the Age of Exploration where our race represents civilization, and all other races are savages who must be taught the value of our culture.

Agreed.  I'm not crazy about the idea of DF espousing a cultural hierarchy or associating "uncivilized" practices with evil.

[nenjin]

Agreed.  I'm not crazy about the idea of DF espousing a cultural hierarchy or associating "uncivilized" practices with evil.

Well...doesn't it already in some ways? Dwarves don't kidnap Goblin and Kobold Children. They don't steal. (Admittedly some dwarves end up doing much worse things.) There is some of those fantasy stereotypes already part of the game, and by all accounts, more will follow. What about the semi-sentient cave dwellers and the weird stuff? This isn't a statement about the game's intent or anything...it's just how it's presented now.

With the armies arc and such, and the level of detail creature and civ descriptions can and will include, different civs dominated by "evil" baddies masquerading as gods...associations between non-dwarf civs and evil are going to happen at some point just because that's how the world spits it out. And eventually, yeah, you're going to culturally dominate them. There's going to be a very large "Age of Exploration" arc in DF at some point. 

So scarification. It's ok is ok if it's on your dwarves by player choice, but not ok if it's on goblins and others just by the way the world gen shook out? Not trying to attack you here, just looking for where you believe the line is.

Personally, I'm ok with it as a procedural element. Making it permanently part of other cultures descriptions leads to speculation about motive. Making it part of the procedural process, you can't accuse the computer of racism. And it's not really in the spirit of DF to stereotype. (Much, anyways. The Elves get it pretty rough....) The only things I object to are examples that seem to be there just to plumb how uncomfortable it could be made. We don't need to make circumcision (sexual orientation, some others) ect.. part of civ traits just because it can be done.

[Toastergargletop]

ritual body modification is ok (and to some extent practised) by me!

keep it somewhat on this side of tasteful and i would be an interesting addition.

BTW, there are much less intrusive/extreme levels of body modification or medical procedures that we see everyday and don't think twice about.  earring's and other piercing s spring to mind.  Grills would count too i suppose.

[NW_Kohaku]

Yes, in response to Nenjin, I'd rather prefer it if you could have it as part of Dwarven culture if you declare it to be dwarven culture to have tattoos or piercings or maybe even scarrification or the like, but that other cultures not have extreme things (beyond piercings or maybe tattoos... I don't think elves with tattoos would be "shocking", and as much as elves are disparaged in this game, they aren't rendered as "EVIL" the way that goblins are, and so doesn't carry the same sort of social judgement), with the ability to mod this in as the player sees fit for their own custom races.  (Yay modding!)

[Naes Draw]

On a side topic, I read a story where this civ decided that they didn't want their leaders to make any mistakes.

So, when they are appointed, they are killed. Can't make mistakes when you are dead, now can you?

[varkarrus]

Yeah, they made the mistake of running. How inefficient.

[Krumbs]

I think the idea of all military dwarves having a certain tattoo would be quite interesting. Same if other races, specifically the goblins, did it also. All Elites of a certain goblin tower might have something like a fist holding dwarf bones or something randomly generated like that.

it's an interesting idea that's for sure.