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[Sizik]

Wait, do you mean actually removing the ponds from the game in non-marshlands? That's just silly, then we wouldn't have aboveground water sources in places without rivers.

Who needs water when you have booze?

[Mel_Vixen]

Wait, do you mean actually removing the ponds from the game in non-marshlands? That's just silly, then we wouldn't have aboveground water sources in places without rivers.

Well toady could make that ponds a bit larger but therefore more sparse. The ponds might also be good for keeping birds like ducks and goose's. Ponds that are smaller then a average room are silly in my opinion. They wouldnt have enough depth nor would they withstand a hot summerday. And yes i would also like to see if the roads circumvent the most ponds. Smallish forests etc. too.

Also what about citys near bigger lakes and rivers? Will they get channels and screw-pumps for watering the fields or for drainage of swamps and marshes for farmland? Little one-tile boats for fishing? Aqueducts for dwarves?

[NW_Kohaku]

Wait, do you mean actually removing the ponds from the game in non-marshlands? That's just silly, then we wouldn't have aboveground water sources in places without rivers.

Who needs water when you have booze?

Well, when you need crops to make booze, and Toady eventually puts in Improved Farming, so crops need to be watered...

[Mel_Vixen]

Only as long there isnt enough rain or you have a aquifer near the surface.

[cakeonslaught]

I have to say, the number of ponds is quite nonsensical. They should be larger and far less frequent. In my opinion, it wouldn't be problematic in terms of lack of water - because nobody would choose to embark in an area without water unless they wanted to see how long it takes for dwarves to die of thirst.

[LASD]

Like Jiri Petru, I just have to say I love the new fields and little villages, they will completely change the look of Adventure Mode.

Big permanent change is always fun.

[Neonivek]

I have to say, the number of ponds is quite nonsensical. They should be larger and far less frequent. In my opinion, it wouldn't be problematic in terms of lack of water - because nobody would choose to embark in an area without water unless they wanted to see how long it takes for dwarves to die of thirst.

Dwarf Fortress is a world where every puddle has the birthright to become a pond.

So as you can imagine there is a lot of taken up space.

[Jiri Petru]

Wait, do you mean actually removing the ponds from the game in non-marshlands? That's just silly, then we wouldn't have aboveground water sources in places without rivers.

Well... last time I hiked the landscape, there really weren't ponds every fifty or so meters. And in the rare occasion where there was a pond, it was man-made 

If you are concerned about water, I guess making brooks more frequent (and perhaps creating even smaller brooks than we have now) would be much better. The ponds simply look ridiculous.

[Arihim]

About the ponds: probably just a marshy area. If this is the normal then that's not very realistic I think.
Also I really like the asymmetry in how farm plots are layed out, very pleasing to the eyes.
 
Anyone know the details about what kind of structure toady will put in? Will there be barn houses,mills, and stables and such?
Also, will villagers actually harvest the crops, store them, then eat them ? In general, will villagers have needs (like food and drink) and a schedule by which they live? I think this would enable you to put in mills and barns and wheat silos and stuff while giving them real purpose. We could cause all kinds of mischief then, like sabotaging their food production lines. This would then have real consequences.

Edit: more ideas.

[Askot Bokbondeler]

i also believe that brooks having 7/7 water is a bit absurd, the rivers should be larger, and ponds should be either larger and rarer in dryish lands, or shalower (like brooks, being able to be walked over) and frequent in wet biomes.

also, bread?(please  )

[li]

Many of the villages I've been reading about have their buildings centralized, but there are examples of villages with homesteads spread out as well.

I live in an area between Bresse plain, the soil being roughly speaking clay, and Jura mountain, the soil being limestone. I learned in school that the villages of Bresse and Jura have very different shapes, because of the capacity of the soil to retain water. Limestone being unable to retain water, the Jura villages are very tight and dense around the scarce watering places, while the Bresse villages have homesteads scattered in a very large area because you can find ponds anywhere.

Did you consider using that kind of rule for the villages morphology? That could be simple, by just relying on the soil type, or even be based on the actual water layout, with this layout depending on the soil type, although that would probably be more complex to implement.

That's also kind of related with all the previous posts about the ponds, many ponds anywhere make sense on a clay soil but not on limestone.
It's another topic, but I think that the biggest problem of ponds is their inability to refill from rain water, as far as I know... (I mean in game, not IRL)

[Krash]

snip

This might work out to a Toughness of 1200. But, as you can see, our human is much more vulernable near the head areas, and his leg is much more resiliant to blunt hits than slashing hits.

That same reasoning can be applied to strength. Endurence is more of Willpower plus calorie system, so that can be replaced too.

Seriously?  I'm all for complexity in DF, but I don't think I've ever seen such an unnecessarily complicated system.  RPG stats aren't there to recreate reality, just to simulate it

[NW_Kohaku]

About the ponds: probably just a marshy area. If this is the normal then that's not very realistic I think.
 

I get murky pools in scortching deserts, that can't contain water for more than a couple minutes before going dry, and they're STILL about 4 of them on a 4x4 desert embark.   How do those things even exist before your dwarves get there?  They evaporate faster than rain can fill them.

[Kogan Loloklam]

And I disagree. Why have all that tied to a single Toughness when we can have skin thickness? Take your average human, ie.

Code: [Select]

            Head
            ⇕(Neck)
Left Arm ⇔ UB ⇔ Right Arm
            ⇕
Left Leg ⇔ LB ⇔ Right Leg
lop off everything but the Head, UB, LB, and left limbs, and give him a toughness of 1200. (s)He is a tough human in the current system. But, since we already track bones in bodyparts (you can see this by butchering), we can expand the notion:

Code: [Select]

            Head (Skull, density: 900, elasticity: 900)
            ⇕(Neck)
Left Arm ⇔ UB
(humerous, D:1300, E:1300)
Left Leg ⇔ LB
(femur, D:1200, E:1400)
This might work out to a Toughness of 1200. But, as you can see, our human is much more vulernable near the head areas, and his leg is much more resiliant to blunt hits than slashing hits.

That same reasoning can be applied to strength. Endurence is more of Willpower plus calorie system, so that can be replaced too.

And yet Toughness ≠ fatness, nor is it an arbitrary number that is the same for any human.

Also, Endurance is more than willpower plus calories. Calories are an expression of energy available to the body, not energy usable by the body. Endurance is more of efficiency of energy used and availability of that energy. Two people with the same amount of willpower and the same amount of calorie intake can have quite different endurance amounts. This is easily seen when you compare Olympic sprinters versus Olympic marathon runners. One trains up speed, the other endurance. Do you wish to claim sprinters have less willpower than marathon runners? Or that sprinters don't eat enough?

You argue for "simplifying" the system while making it more complex. Remove aspects because you feel that something tied to appearance can represent something that you cannot even tell in human appearance. I don't understand why, except because it can be. Is there really any great benefit to removing the arbitrary numbers that can be assigned to creatures in dwarf fortress that represent abstract concepts like toughness, willpower, stamina, and strength?
(Muscle mass is not directly equal to usable strength in humans as well, but at least there it is close enough that I could let it slide.)

Bottom line, justify why it is needed. Just to "reduce the variables" isn't a good reason, because we don't have a true to life simulator that can simulate the pressure in the veins so only the exact amount of blood comes out. We also don't simulate the lungs oxygenating the blood which is then pumped via the heart to pass oxygen to all the important body parts. There are MILLIONS of variables for every bit of tissue in your own body, so why reduce the variables that represent this to create a sum whole with tissue interactions that are based on appearance modifiers, when the appearance of a body changes due to those hidden variables in the first place?

It seems odd to me, and I don't understand why it should be done your way rather than how Toady is currently progressing with it. Again but with less math and more justification.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

A hypothetical society went through a period of famine lasting nearly a decade 40 years ago. Many of the current adults were children at the time, and their bodies would have been permanently weakened by nutritional diseases as a result. They could have decreased mobility, would certainly have lesser bone density, etc. Personality traits would also reflect this experience, such as the famed inability to let go of the 1930's Depression mentality many of us have encountered in older members of our own American society.

Some goblin tribes have been engaged in tribal warfare for hundreds of years (think Germanic tribes or Mongols), and have experienced an accelerated period of natural selection. The genes of those who were strong, intelligent, and early to develop and act sexually would have prevailed. Should they unite, they'd be a force to be reckoned.

A militaristic society conquers a sizable empire, and settles down to enjoy itself. After 3 generations or more, the values and strengths of the older generations have been lost. They may still have great technological military strengths (consider the stirrup), but their mental attitudes and behaviors would have deteriorated. They would lack developed physical strength and discipline, mental fortitude developed through important decision making and so on. Should a trying time come along, their luxurious lifestyle would surely make its effects apparent.

So you have a society that has been naturally selected to be stronger and more fit than normal. Then because they conquered everyone they become decadent and more easily overcome. I guess the genes weren't that strong and/or there was too much crossbreeding with their conquered civilizations.

Something to note... Rome didn't collapse because it's people lost the warrior way. Quite the opposite, actually. They became more factionalized and aggressive, and lost the non-warrior ways that allowed their empire to stay together. This mostly occurred because someone gave them a new idea for rulership that gave advantages to those who spent more effort on fighting ability rather than engineering and consolidation. It was this factionalization that caused the decline in technology, since you didn't have as many people learning it. No need to train someone to use something that would only be of use if there was cooperation.

i also believe that brooks having 7/7 water is a bit absurd

Yes. Brooks should have 3/7 water. You can swim in them, but not drown. Maybe some smaller like 2/7.
There should be runoff seasonal gullies too. Basically brooks that are dry for parts of the year. And a smaller version of a brook: There are a few always-flowing bits of water near where I live, things that could be stepped over and don't even cover your shoe in water, but are flowing year-round.

[Chthonic]

Wait, do you mean actually removing the ponds from the game in non-marshlands? That's just silly, then we wouldn't have aboveground water sources in places without rivers.

Could be solved easily enough if we could build cisterns that collect rainwater the way that murky pools do.