'Ello, Bay 12! First post here. :3
To begin, my latest fortress is entrenched in thick and savage jungle where a wide range of... fauna lurks about. Oddly, a lot of creatures seem to prefer deliberately entering my fortress and inevitably falling prey to the gauntlet of cage traps I have set within the outer walls. By the number and variety of beasts I have penned so far, I'm thinking of starting a spacious (and I mean spacious) zoo whenever I get around to it. Of these caged curiosities, however, are the tigermen. I believe I have about twenty so far. Packs of them have meandered the region ever since I've settled there. Their raws indicate that they can talk and learn -- after all, being anthropomorphic usually entails a hint of sentience -- but I never thought much of it. I mean, they're still just savage beasts, aren't they? Surely unable to take to the civilized and sophisticated ways of the dwarves. Until I glanced at the kennels, and a curious thought arrested me:
taming them! It should be possible, shouldn't it? And it was. But these aren't
just animals. These are (somewhat) intelligent creatures with humanoid features; there could be promise here. So I went for it.
I started with two of them, a male and a female. If successful, these two could be our
first ambassadors to the tigerpeople! 
Well, at least until I got around taming the rest of them. After some undoubtedly awkward negotiations through some cage bars, surely facilitated by some tempting haunches of meat, the trial appeared successful -- the two were now sporting (tame) tags! Cautiously, I planted their cages further in the fortress by the kennels and let them out... They apprehensively left their cages and, at first, just stood there: two wide-eyed creatures of the wild suddenly plunged into the dark, cold, geometric depths of an eldritch underworld, populated by a numerous community squat, perplexing beings. It wasn't long, however, before they started walking about. I was thrilled. Surely the occasional visitors from the Mountainhomes think this place strange enough for being smack-dab in the middle of a perilous, tropical wilderness -- imagine what they'll say now, with
tigermen walking about like proper citizens! Ha!
If only I could train one of them to be a broker... trading might go a lot more smoothly.Despite seeming confident enough to wander about now, they didn't leave eachothers' side. They headed toward a well and cleaned themselves off. Curiously, I then noticed they started walking
out of the fortress. Before long, I found out why: they were thirsty. Instead of consuming some of the plenitude of booze, they prefer water. Yet, why didn't they just use the well? Fresh stream water only, at that, eh? How picky. Either way, it doesn't seem possible to see what they're doing like you would with a dwarf, so their actions are a little more cryptic. After getting their fill, they promptly returned inside. It seems that, despite sitting in a cage only to be coaxed out with first piece of food they'd seen in weeks, they've been convinced of the hospitality of the dwarves, after all. Their destination seemed to be, like all the other animals', the drinking hall. Tigerpeople relaxing in the drinking hall. I don't know why, but the idea delights me immensely.
Since then, I've proceeded to tame and civilize the rest and I've noticed they've started to dabble in basic dwarven skills -- primarily those in combat (kicking, biting, striking, even armor using) followed by social ones (negotiating, comedy, flattery, etc.). This not only confirms they have the intelligence to possibly adopt a dwarven lifestyle, but they can steadily learn how to speak, to boot; otherwise how would they crack a joke or compliment someone's beard, unless it means they only have that ability amongst each other (which I doubt because they would have already had those skills, in that case). I've even noticed a few
tigerman cubs running about. I'm currently torn whether or not to designate them as available pets for dwarves. A tigergirl? I'd sure want one. But due to the fact that they speak and learn skills, I'd rather consider them second-class citizens of the fortress rather than pets. Not to mention that, while pets ordinarily follow their masters everywhere, the tigerpeople seem to enjoy the freedom of wandering out of the fortress from time to time -- and make stalwart defenders of the surrounding area when the need arises. It's good to know you have some allies out in the jungle.
To that end, however, I don't know the full scope of this but I think Toady should allow you to manage tamed humanoids like you would dwarves (of course, probably to a lesser extent, such as they cannot be nobles or preform workshop jobs). It would be nice to be able to draft them into the military, for instance, if they seem able to learn all weapon, armor and combat skills -- who wouldn't want a militia of seven-foot, bipedal tigers clad in steel?
Anyone have any other thoughts on this?
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Topic: Adopting the locals... (Read 7149 times)