Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[nil]

In most of the worlds of Dwarf Fortress, there is a verdant underground ecosystem.  Herbivores eat a variety of foodstuffs, most of which are at least suggested to be fungal in nature.  A number of carnivores subsist on the herbivores, and certain rare, but very large, creatures live a life either at the top of or completely outside of the food chain.  In the real world, most cave life is tiny--there simply isn't enough available energy to support larger creatures.  So what is your theory for this discrepancy?

Personally, I'm going with geothermal.  Something on the bottom layer extracts energy from the nearby magma sea.  Perhaps some of the underground "trees" have long taproots that act as biological thermocouples, or maybe some sort of exotic thermophilic microbe creates enough rotting biomass to feed the various giant fungi.

[Shagomir]

I would say geothermal in places, but there are probably also geophages and organisms that eat detrius from the upper layers or the surface, if the cavern systems are connected.

Otherwise, it's a fantasy game, so.... MAGIC!

[Skid]

The ecosystem is based on magma and mud.

Outside of that, the megabeasts probably haul down a fair amount of prey from the surface, likewise for whatever other creatures spend part of their time outside.  Never underestimate the nutritional value of a thousand tons of giant bat guano.

[nil]

Otherwise, it's a fantasy game, so.... MAGIC!

But what kind of magic? 

[h3lblad3]

Otherwise, it's a fantasy game, so.... MAGIC!

But what kind of magic? 

Magic Mushrooms.

[abculatter_2]

The ecosystem in DF is based off of Toady One.

[puke]

the prevalance of mushrooms and worms strongly suggest geophages.  everything else works upwards from that, until you get those giant chompy things.  whatever theyre called...

forgotten beasts are pretty clearly magical in nature, since they can be made of salt or ash.

[Hyndis]

Mushrooms are the base of the ecosystem.

What do the mushrooms feed on? More mushrooms.

Its mushrooms all the way down.

[Toast024]

Its based on my back yard.

[Heavenfall]

Magic probably has a huge influence. This is, after all, a fantasy setting. With megabeasts, titans, GODS, and various other things stalking the [your world name here].

The omnipresent magma (30-150 z-levels down) has probably created a stable, hot environment.

A lot of the caves are connected as well. The caves we have in our world are cut off from each other. Huge caves underneath all the world means there's lots of different diverse settings life can evolve in - and then spread. My point is, maybe underneath the oceans there are tower-caps hundreds of z-levels high. What you see is the starved version. But spores spread like insanity.

[Toast024]

No seriously, my backyard sustains the underground life. I did a controlled experiment. I turned my back yard off for a day and everything died.

[Heavenfall]

"Do your bit - dump in the caves"?

Would explain why we don't have any caves left today. They're all filled with adamantite armor.

[breadbocks]

Mushrooms are the base of the ecosystem.

What do the mushrooms feed on? More mushrooms.

Its mushrooms all the way down.

At least, until you go far enough down that you reach the sea, and then the HFS. Then it feeds on the heat and the inner clowns of the world.

[Shinziril]

I think an ecosystem based on sulfur-eating thermophilic bacteria (such as live near various geothermal seeps in the real world) would work reasonably well, or at least well enough to keep the willpower required for suspension of disbelief to a minimum.  There's certainly plenty of energy coming off that infinite sea of magma; something's bound to figure out how to use it eventually.

[Deon]

Its based on omnipresent teleporting spores which make underground creatures pregnant when their specie appears anywhere aboveground.