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More tech tree!

36 (26.1%)

More ritual tree!

8 (5.8%)

More lore!

12 (8.7%)

More mythical weapons/armor!

22 (15.9%)

Plagues!

28 (20.3%)

More secrets!

21 (15.2%)

More mechanical constructs!

11 (8%)

Total Members Voted: 137

[Pan]

If it makes you feel any better, I use to be VERY picky about embarks, but the sheer number of new test builds I've had to load has changed that.

What modding will change in a man, eh? Actually, thinking on your part, it must be quite a bore embarking from scratch everytime you need to test a new feature... Another reason modding was something I never really paid any attention to.

Are you considering that golem idea Carn bought up a couple weeks ago? I recall the idea was that they can't breed, and can only be bought from caravans, and are good for defending embarks. Cuz I feel like winning in a melee fight against voidwalkers.

Also, I think it will make the game more interesting if you could add some dwarf domesticated animals. It would be interesting to have a livestock with very high quality meat (sugar beetles or something), but big grazing needs. And perhaps some dwarf domesticated cave animal (can't think of anything atm though) that would be a little more useful as a war animal than a dog?

[narhiril]

If it makes you feel any better, I use to be VERY picky about embarks, but the sheer number of new test builds I've had to load has changed that.

What modding will change in a man, eh? Actually, thinking on your part, it must be quite a bore embarking from scratch everytime you need to test a new feature... Another reason modding was something I never really paid any attention to.

Are you considering that golem idea Carn bought up a couple weeks ago? I recall the idea was that they can't breed, and can only be bought from caravans, and are good for defending embarks. Cuz I feel like winning in a melee fight against voidwalkers.

Also, I think it will make the game more interesting if you could add some dwarf domesticated animals. It would be interesting to have a livestock with very high quality meat (sugar beetles or something), but big grazing needs. And perhaps some dwarf domesticated cave animal (can't think of anything atm though) that would be a little more useful as a war animal than a dog?

These are both fantastic ideas that will probably round out the lineup for 0.13a.  I am deliberately withholding golems until the next version of DF because I have some ideas for those that will involve the new features in that.

And I actually managed to fight off a voidwalker ambush squad with zero casualties yesterday.  It took a squad of well trained and well equipped (damascus steel and some hadrine and mithril pieces) soldiers, but it is possible to beat them.  Even fighting a larger number of them, it is possible to win, though it is a costly affair in most cases.  They're meant to be very challenging.  Even though they're immune to fear, traps, and pain, there are ways to defeat them.

1) A well geared and well trained military.  I wouldn't even look at them without steel or better.
2) Slightly superior gear  (adamantine - which has its own risks).
3) Indirect means.  Repeating spikes, cave in devices, drops, magma.  Note that voidshard is not magma safe (in fact, it blows up in a cloud of extremely dangerous fumes when heated to magma's temperature).

[Teach]

I myself absolutely cannot stand an embark that is not flat.   It's mainly just an aesthetic for sieges because I like to see the enemy off in the distance as opposed to having to go observe their movements with the z level keys.   I had an idea for post endgame content while playing adventure/dwarf mode yesterday.  I have a really mature fortress with about 20 legendary marksdorfs, around 20 conscripts (of varying skill), and a squad of 10 super soldiers (most have triple digit kill counts) and they seem to wipe out most sieges relatively easy.  Anyways, later I was playing Genesis ADV mode as a giant and I noticed that they take years to bleed out (yes it is this peculiarity that inspired me).  I was thinking a race of hyperadvanced giants with their own unique material (without armor they would just be huge pinatas full of blood). 

Also, I'm not sure if it's possible but perhaps a novelty caste would be an ultra rare dwarven android or clockwork dwarf.  Make them immune to pain and fear and perhaps change all their organs into machines (not sure if it's possible) and have them bleed black oil or teal coolant or something like that.   You allude to an advanced civilization that was wiped out before the current Civs came to be that left behind many artifacts.  Perhaps this clockwork dwarf was put in place by the progenitors of the dwarven race to oversee their development before they all mysteriously disappeared.   

[darkflagrance]

Clockwork dwarves would also be genderless and immortal with no childhood.

[narhiril]

I myself absolutely cannot stand an embark that is not flat.   It's mainly just an aesthetic for sieges because I like to see the enemy off in the distance as opposed to having to go observe their movements with the z level keys.   I had an idea for post endgame content while playing adventure/dwarf mode yesterday.  I have a really mature fortress with about 20 legendary marksdorfs, around 20 conscripts (of varying skill), and a squad of 10 super soldiers (most have triple digit kill counts) and they seem to wipe out most sieges relatively easy.  Anyways, later I was playing Genesis ADV mode as a giant and I noticed that they take years to bleed out (yes it is this peculiarity that inspired me).  I was thinking a race of hyperadvanced giants with their own unique material (without armor they would just be huge pinatas full of blood). 

Also, I'm not sure if it's possible but perhaps a novelty caste would be an ultra rare dwarven android or clockwork dwarf.  Make them immune to pain and fear and perhaps change all their organs into machines (not sure if it's possible) and have them bleed black oil or teal coolant or something like that.   You allude to an advanced civilization that was wiped out before the current Civs came to be that left behind many artifacts.  Perhaps this clockwork dwarf was put in place by the progenitors of the dwarven race to oversee their development before they all mysteriously disappeared.

I have big plans for after the next DF release.  The new tokens and syndromes will allow me to do some very interesting things with creatures and castes for the next version.

As for post-endgame content, it's something I have given a considerable amount of thought to.  The voidwalkers are the most obvious challenge, but there are (growing) number of other surprises in LFR to that extent, but that's all you're going to get out of me about that right now.

[Pan]

 Today I just noticed how amazing the Nephilim's archers can be. There was a small siege of a single squad of bog troll pokers when the Nephilim 'merhants' showed up, and they immediately bull rushed the 'caravan'. The bog trolls had (if i recall) copper and bronze stuff while the Nephilim melee guards had steel and some bronze stuff. The melee guards were immediately defeated, though they moderately wounded a few, failing to kill a single bog troll.

 However, I noticed a Nephilim archer was doubling back (the siege caught the back of the long caravan, and the archer was in front), so I thought that, since I had nothing to do with the gate sealed, I'd watch him die. Turns out, he began to fire at the bog trolls in the air, and killed 4 of them! (Of course, he then charged downwards after his ammo ran out to bash the Bog Troll leader on the head with his bow, swiftly getting evicerated. But before this, the bog trolls could do nothing!)

 Anyway, after that I started wondering if, perhaps you could mod in a ranged weapon that's good in melee, and remove most of their current melee weapons? and After all, they are supposed to be some great empire of fallen angels anyway, so making them more powerful would make sense. It would be quite a challenge when they eventually come and siege you cuz since they can fly up z levels, they can target the usually invincible, 1 z-level higher marksdwarves (who are only vulnerable to elite marksmen). After all, if you could fly, why use weapons like swords and axes anwyay?

 It probably wouldn't even be overpowered, since they don't get pissed off till late game (unless you act stupid), where you'll have a good military going.

[narhiril]

Today I just noticed how amazing the Nephilim's archers can be. There was a small siege of a single squad of bog troll pokers when the Nephilim 'merhants' showed up, and they immediately bull rushed the 'caravan'. The bog trolls had (if i recall) copper and bronze stuff while the Nephilim melee guards had steel and some bronze stuff. The melee guards were immediately defeated, though they moderately wounded a few, failing to kill a single bog troll.

 However, I noticed a Nephilim archer was doubling back (the siege caught the back of the long caravan, and the archer was in front), so I thought that, since I had nothing to do with the gate sealed, I'd watch him die. Turns out, he began to fire at the bog trolls in the air, and killed 4 of them! (Of course, he then charged downwards after his ammo ran out to bash the Bog Troll leader on the head with his bow, swiftly getting evicerated. But before this, the bog trolls could do nothing!)

 Anyway, after that I started wondering if, perhaps you could mod in a ranged weapon that's good in melee, and remove most of their current melee weapons? and After all, they are supposed to be some great empire of fallen angels anyway, so making them more powerful would make sense. It would be quite a challenge when they eventually come and siege you cuz since they can fly up z levels, they can target the usually invincible, 1 z-level higher marksdwarves (who are only vulnerable to elite marksmen). After all, if you could fly, why use weapons like swords and axes anwyay?

 It probably wouldn't even be overpowered, since they don't get pissed off till late game (unless you act stupid), where you'll have a good military going.

Out of curiosity, did he have a great bow?  Nephilim and elves have access to different, more powerful bows than other civilizations.  Of course, nephilim actually use metal arrows, so they're a fair bit more dangerous than standard archers, though nowhere near void energy projector territory.

I've found through testing that they're already quite challenging foes.  Even voidwalker ambushes don't always kill them smoothly.  However, I'm reluctant to turn up the power dial on them, seeing as their role is mostly to provide tentative ambush relief.  I don't want them doing all of the work for you, after all.  Against a more competent siege force, they won't win with just their caravan guards.

That doesn't mean, however, that hybrid melee-ranged weapons are out of the question.  There's still a lot to be done with the tech tree

---

Putting the finishing touches on two new creatures today.  One will be a vermin hunter that does not adopt its owner. 

Spoiler: Are you ready for it? (click to show/hide)

The other will be a less common creature found in the caverns that can be tamed and used as a powerful war animal.

[narhiril]

Somewhat surprisingly, things have been going quite smoothly with development.  I am moving the tentative release date of 0.13a forward a bit.  If testing proceeds as it has thus far, you guys will probably see a release within a week of today.  There are plenty of ideas I still have, but I'd rather put what's done out there and just save any new stuff for the next version.

Current changelog for v0.13a (subject to final tweaks, but fairly complete):

Added nephilim and meowkin diplomats.  Added carbuncles, a new common domestic creature.  Added dwarven savants - more details on this later.  Added the second tier of the "tech tree," including five new buildings and lots of associated reactions.  Added new easter eggs.  Added new graphics for relevant creatures.  Added the moroii, a new underground tribal race.  Added rare drops for more creatures.  Moved bog troll siege trigger back slightly.  Took the opportunity to fix a bug with kobolds that was causing them to starve to death by year 4 of worldgen.  It is now possible for players to purchase tame tortoises at embark.  Pet value for tortoises has been adjusted for this purpose.  Added amaroks and humbabas.  Added jackalopes and sabre-toothed tigers.  Added a caste of lizardmen which carry mischievious behavior tokens.  Removed a special caste of pigeons from the arena spawn list.  Resolved an issue causing widow's tears to appear as black squares.

Tier 2 tech tree:


Buildings

Advanced Metal Caster
Advanced Magma Caster
Experimental Materials Workshop
Weapons Concept Laboratory
Magma-Powered Weapons Concept Laboratory
Experimental Lustrum Energy Extractor


Reactions

Efficient javelin casting
Random weapon fabrication
Hadrine synthesis and reactive armor
Unlock reactions for new buildings

Spoiler: Tech tree flowchart (large image) (click to show/hide)

[Mandango]

/follow thread

[Hoooooooar]

I've tried a lot of the other mods but i think i like this one the best, keep up the great work.  This stays close to the core game.

On my first fort i had a d.steel epic line going i found a map with ferrorstuff, coal, and gold, it was amazing.  I had a city built on gold, and an army with nothing but d.steel suits, i had about 60 or so dwarves just about to be drafted up and begin training when the first epic invasion came.  I was accustomed to the little ambushes which my 20 man city guard at the front dealt with rather nicely, however when the first "big" one came........ well the 20 guards went down with great easy, taking a considerable amount of lizards and trolls with them, one almost master speardwarf fought off the horde while the rest of everyone ran to the armory and grabbed what they could, by the time the trolls and lizards made it past the cage traps their numbers had decreased but there were easily 30 or so left, my rag tag army, well armed army, but still green managed to defeat them, a once glorious clean city built out of gold with a population of 270 dwindled to 68 after the epic battle.  The crybabies found their way to magma heaven while everyone else was happy enough living in a city of gold and each having a golden apartment and masterpiece meals and drinks.  My 3 man team of legendary mechanics went to work to replace the traps, but as it was happening a glorious merchant arrival spurred on another wave, this time voidwalkers were involved.  The entire populace immediately rallied to the baron's room (former room, it was converted into a mass graveyard) for the last defense, extremely well armed this go round the voidwalkers were defeated, the population has fallen to a new epic low of 30 something and little did i know that there was an army of trolls hanging out near the front door, eventually they worked their way down to the final battle where the remaining 30 dwarves met their demise at the hands of some trolls.  I tried to reclaim but that wasn't happening with the massive massive massive amount of everything thrown all over the place, all 280 apartments had cab's and chests, all gold. and they were everywhere.  I don't use any cheats except for dfdig, because there is no sense in manually mining out a vein, i dont consider it a cheat anyways :0

I plan on starting a new game tonight and maybe the 60 or so people can train on those mechanical dummies for a while, put a bunch of them in the meeting hall so bored dwarves can at least train up for the wave that will come eventually.

[Pan]

I've tried a lot of the other mods but i think i like this one the best, keep up the great work.  This stays close to the core game.

I agree. The mod is very original with the tech tree. Many mods strive to add tons and tons of new fauna, civs, and weapons that, while is great and very nice of those authors, feels pretty old for me after awhile.

[Pan]

Unintentionally awkward criticisms aside, I just had a bog troll siege at my second Spring. I'm using 0.12a, but is this intentional?

[narhiril]

Unintentionally awkward criticisms aside, I just had a bog troll siege at my second Spring. I'm using 0.12a, but is this intentional?

There have been a substantial number of changes to them since 0.12a.  At the time, they were supposed to do that and use weaker weapons to compensate, but I decided based on feedback that it was better to give them their metal weapons back and move their siege triggers back substantially.

If you're set on using 0.12a, you can get rid of them by removing all of the [ACTIVE_SEASON] tokens from their entity raws.  This change, unlike most entity changes, does not require a new worldgen.  Though I wouldn't get too attached, as I'm planning to have 0.13a up and running this weekend, and it runs circles around 0.12.

Also, I'm ditching TrueType until it gets fixed (according to Baughn, it's much better in the next DF version).  Some of the items involved in the tier 2 tech tree have very long names, and this was causing a TrueType-related crash on some occasions.  Though most of you have probably already done this, it will be turned off by default for the next version.

[thatkid]

Not sure if this has been reported already or not, but Nephilim traders bring items but refuse to actually trade them.

I'm using tanmod, wanderer's friend, a slightly modified version of kobolds, and a replacement for dragons that I made if that matters at all.

[SirAaronIII]

Yeah, that's a known thing. It's because the nephilim fly ahead of their pack animals or something.