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[Halconnen]

It stops aging and adds a few other random effects.  Decapitation and bifurcation are always lethal to the living, whatever syndrome they have.  It won't always be that way, I think, although in the case of decapitation there's the tricky question of whether the soul goes with the head or the body.  If you want the thing where the guy walks over and puts his head back on, you kind of want the soul to still be in control of both units, which isn't currently supported at all by the framework.  Maybe just being in the most mobile one is crucial, but then the head couldn't grimace and stuff.

I vaguely it being mentioned somewhere (old dev goals list, maybe?) that you were planning to eventually allow one body to have several souls, as well as one soul to have several bodies. Wouldn't the mentioned situation be a case of the latter? Two bodypieces, with the same soul and the urge to reunite. That could, storywise, even lead to fun situations like a headless horseman wandering around the world looking for the head he is lacking. Which is locked in some adventurer's basement. Or something.

[Neonivek]

do zombies still have HP?

Yes they do. Zombies will have HP until the game is changed to allow the ability to "Pulp" (or uttarly destroy) a creature.

Anyhow last time I checked the size of the world in relation to travel time over the world map and it came to be slightly smaller then Europe (which was much larger then I thought it was, which was "huge city size")

Toady what would have to happen for Dwarf Fortress to include an even larger world then the maximum it has now? I wonder what would go into a decision like that.

[Armok]

Any chance future releases will be more update compatible?

Exactly zero chance.

This is technically incorrect. The protons in the cable might decay in just the right way to randomly flip just the right bits to make a thus changed version be what arrives at the server as he uploads it.

[tps12]

Anyhow last time I checked the size of the world in relation to travel time over the world map and it came to be slightly smaller then Europe (which was much larger then I thought it was, which was "huge city size")

I used a Toady estimate of one small tile being 2m in each dimension to conclude that the largest world size was around the size of the greater New York region. I think that fits in a lot of ways (the number of distinct medieval civilizations in the region, variety and relative size of ecosystems and geological variation) and makes no sense in some others (the proximity of the ice cap to equator, the number of volcanoes).

[Neonivek]

Yep there is definately more then one way to measure it.

I measured it that way because people were asking about "rot" so to speak and I wanted to see how long it took one character basically to go from one side of the world to the other. (20 days or something like that). Meaning that Dwarf Fortress doesn't deal with huge distances.

I'd certainly would love worlds to be SO large that there would be their version of very foreign places almost completely (or perhaps completely) cut off from the rest of the known world and not because of a civilisations REALLY small roaming area. Though right now that wouldn't be TOO worthwhile because Dwarf Fortress doesn't really alter civilisations too much anyhow.

[Footkerchief]

For the long term do you have any idea what kind of role writing will play in dwarf mode? Like writing books about whatever the dwarf wants like engravings (books about books about cheese) or where dwarves actually record information that gets used for something later on?

dev_single has ideas about this:

# Bloat185, LIBRARIES, (Future): Books and libraries utilizing histories. Once these are in, people that you chat with don't need to know as much. You can find legends here that reveal locations of ruins made by world gen, or your dwarf games. Various other books are possible.

# PowerGoal46, THE GIANT ASS BOOK, (Future): You go to a dwarf fortress and see a giant unliftable tome filled with maps of the Underworld. You sketch a copy and depart.

Will we ever have to bury the dead in adventure mode, to avoid overrunning the countryside with ghosts?  I can see villagers giving mundane starter quests of the nature "I found a dozen bodies about two hours walk from here.  Probably from a bandit attack.  But I am too busy farming, could you give them proper burials before it is too late?"

Ghosts only arise in Fortress Mode right now (AFAIK).  Ghosts arising from world battlefields is reasonable, but it's not in yet.  If that does go in, it would probably only occur in world gen, and would need Release 5 to occur during actual play.

Any chance future releases will be more update compatible? Ie additional features could be added to the existing world you are playing in kinda like an software patch?

Toady already does that where feasible.  Lots of bugfixes in particular are retroactive.  However, some features affect the world/save structure fundamentally enough that they can't be added retroactively without excessive effort.

While seems like vanishing zombies was fixed... do zombies still have HP? I seen no clear declaration about removing that placeholder fix.

Yes:

If a necromancer animates a severed hand, will you have to hack off all its fingers to remove its "graspers" and kill it?

Since we haven't done pulping, you just have to knock it down through the animated HP equivalent.

It stops aging and adds a few other random effects.  Decapitation and bifurcation are always lethal to the living, whatever syndrome they have.  It won't always be that way, I think, although in the case of decapitation there's the tricky question of whether the soul goes with the head or the body.  If you want the thing where the guy walks over and puts his head back on, you kind of want the soul to still be in control of both units, which isn't currently supported at all by the framework.  Maybe just being in the most mobile one is crucial, but then the head couldn't grimace and stuff.

I vaguely it being mentioned somewhere (old dev goals list, maybe?) that you were planning to eventually allow one body to have several souls, as well as one soul to have several bodies. Wouldn't the mentioned situation be a case of the latter? Two bodypieces, with the same soul and the urge to reunite. That could, storywise, even lead to fun situations like a headless horseman wandering around the world looking for the head he is lacking. Which is locked in some adventurer's basement. Or something.

One soul with several bodies is a valid approach to the decapitation issue, yes, but not the only valid approach.  That's what makes it a tricky question.

[Neonivek]

*Reads Footkerchief's statements*

I am not on it! SCORE!

Thanks for answering our questions Footkerchief, your watchful eye blesses us all.

[Cruxador]

Would the ability to state your intent for a retired character use the same framework as the hopes and dreams of the personality rewrite?

[Footkerchief]

My questions:
1. Could the head be used like a phylactery keeping the body alive and making it resistant to death?
2. If phylacteries are possible, will it be possible to transfer your life energy into the chosen item and become a lich?
3. Will an undead be able to re-attach body parts he or she has lost thru an interaction or will this be near impossible?
4. Would it be possible for when an adventure dies to be transported to the land of the dead? This of course would only be his soul, and not his body and items, which would lead to some interesting situations, and would give one way to become an undead.

Missed these before:
1, 2. Not in the upcoming version.
3. The closest the next release might get is "constructed undead":

Are constructed "Frankenstein Monster" type things going to be in the upcoming version?

We are hoping to get to constructed undead and the stalkers.  You can't mix and match pieces though -- that will take significant work (and should also lead to proper centaur-style critter generation).  Having weapons tacked on to the constructed undead is about as far as we'll be able to take it this time (since that can more or less co-opt the stitch-as-inventory-item code).  Player involvement there is unknown.  It may even end up being in dwarf mode first as a mood before anything else anywhere, since they practically do it already, although there is an atmosphere question there.

4. This is discussed heavily in DF Talk 16.

Would the ability to state your intent for a retired character use the same framework as the hopes and dreams of the personality rewrite?

If you mean the storage aspect of that ability, that sounds reasonable, but since Toady isn't implementing either system yet, there's little certainty to be had.  Were you anticipating specific advantages/pitfalls aside from the obvious similarities?

The input aspect will probably look more like the proposed systems for adventurer backstories, like in Liberal Crime Squad etc.

[YetAnotherStupidDorf]

do zombies still have HP?

Yes they do.

Bummer. Ah well, it seems zombies are now harder to kill, so I can patiently wait for pulping.

what would have to happen for Dwarf Fortress to include an even larger world then the maximum it has now? I wonder what would go into a decision like that.

64-bit version of DF, for starters. DF already is too big on 32-bit when dealing with largest embarks, and I would imagine world data take significant chunk of memory allocated by DF.

[Neonivek]

Survived a second round of Footkerchief's ever burning eye.

*Wipes forehead*

Now I just have to survive the "What were you asking in the first place?" that happens to me quite often.

[Willfor]

Survived a second round of Footkerchief's ever burning eye.

*Wipes forehead*

Now I just have to survive the "What were you asking in the first place?" that happens to me quite often.

This might have something to do with the fact that I can't even find your question, and I have searched between here and Toady's last post three times.

[metime00]

It seems the only way to escape the Footkerchief filter is to not ask a question at all.

[Askot Bokbondeler]

you guys are talking as if getting your question answered is a bad thing

E: i mean, if you're not satisfied with foot's answer, ask a more specific one or clarify your previous question. footkerchief is doing a service for free here, a bit of gratitude would be appropriate

[Neonivek]

you guys are talking as if getting your question answered is a bad thing

a bit of gratitude would be appropriate

I thanked him earlier. Not only because he deserves to be thanked but because my checking to see if he answered one of my questions could be seen falsely as antagony

Also it IS a bad thing. It means you asked a bad question and should be ashamed. ASHAMED!