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Author Topic: Of trees,elven weapons and trade  (Read 3245 times)

alter05

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Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« on: November 11, 2011, 12:03:39 am »

Here are some suggestions I came up with, I'm sorry if they have been mentioned before. (warning: elf-friendly  :P )

Trees: Make the ecosystem more dependent on trees. Cutting trees would weather the grass off the soil and eventually the soil would wash away to the underneath rock, effectively turning the lush forest into a rocky wasteland. This would give good reasons for Elves to interfere with your cutting. Plus, animals would start ignoring areas barren of vegetation. Could also prove to be a good use for potash to re-vegetalize a cut-out area or already barren wasteland/mountain/desert biome (terraforming ?)

Weapons and trade: It disturbs me that elves would not even bother making stone or bone blades/hammerheads for their weapons. Sissy as they might be, it's just stupid to beat other folks with sword-shaped sticks. In D&D lore, which I'm not saying DF is based upon, they have excellent craftmen able to forge light metal weapons. Rapiers, throwing stars and the like come to mind. I believe they should actively seek to buy shiny metals & alloys like silver, bullion, sterling and gold and transform them into various weapons and armors. Did someone mention mythil as a possible ore already ?

Trade: This brings me to my last point. Stuff that you sell to someone shouldnt dissapear in thin air when the merchants leave the map. It should be stockpiled somewhere (OK maybe not all the finished goods, but the weapons, industrial goods and seeds would make sense) AND used by that civilization. Imagine selling steel bars to goblins only to have them turn them into weapons to attack you. Or having your champion killed by a gem encrusted goblin bone bolt to the head, etc...

Seeds could be spread and used. Giving some seeds to your mother civilization could make them able to plant them (maybe stretching it here, they are dwarves after all). Selling pig tail cloth and dye powder to elves could make them useful in turning it into colored clothing. See the above point for selling metal bars.



Please tell me what you think !
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Dsarker

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #1 on: November 11, 2011, 12:08:53 am »

Elves can't use metal, because they'd require the ability to smelt it, which they don't have.

As for the trade, I believe that is one of the things Toady is working on already.
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alter05

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #2 on: November 11, 2011, 12:32:51 am »

Wouldnt they be able to still work the metal once its in the bar form, by say removing the need for them to use charcoal? And limiting their metal to silver alloys and the like
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Dsarker

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #3 on: November 11, 2011, 12:38:58 am »

Only by using only very malleable metals, which aren't good for weapons.
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Silverionmox

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #4 on: November 11, 2011, 07:06:34 am »

Bog iron and sometimes meteor iron are usable without heating. The earliest copper ores (malachite and the like) could be smelted on campfire-like fires.
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Dsarker

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #5 on: November 11, 2011, 07:08:59 am »

Camp fires use heat, though.
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Stronghammer

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #6 on: November 11, 2011, 08:48:26 am »

First with your eco-system suggestion. This is a good idea as it would create a better simulation of the natural order of things. So from a story or flavour sense really, cool. However in gameplay sense, horrible. The reason that it would be horrible is that like any representation or simulation, as you approach closer to reality, the amount of computing power required skyrockets. Ex. I am a geographic analyst, who is someone who takes the real world and creates simulations which is used for predictions, planning, models, and observations. Just the few things you listed for your "ecosystem idea" requires the computer network of my university to sit and calculate for ten minutes, and that is just one instance in time, completely disregarding the passage of time and increasing influence of outside forces. DF already has a hard time tracking and recalculating the change in heat of lava passing through are lava pumps to get closer to the surface, and that it just one attribute. Now could you imagine DF trying to track tree cover, for grass survival, then the rate of grass decay, then the removal of grass, then the addition of things like the potash which helps growth, and the introduction of creatures changing their pathing based off of vegetation amounts. then to top it of add every other thing that DF already has to keep track of. omg god the LAG youd always be at 1 FPS. any who sorry for the rant it arrises from my fusration with the limitation of simulations....omg so many "tions". on the topic of the smithing, the elves of DnD can smith because they do not abhor the thought of burning wood, they dont overly and excessively do it, but they still do it. The elves of DF have no heat source with which to smith or smelt, and any metals that can be smithed by hand would be useless except as a heavy blunt weapon which would break after a few hits. On the topic of the trade Toady already anounced this as part of the Trade arc.
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peskyninja

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #7 on: November 11, 2011, 10:15:26 am »

I think ALL races in DF should be able  to use meteor iron (in small quantities and/or in the begining of the world gen.), it don't require heat to be transformed into weapons, armor and other stuff.
And it's better than common iron because it has iridium and nickel.
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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #8 on: November 11, 2011, 12:16:37 pm »

I might be wrong, but doesn't "Stuff that you sell to someone shouldnt dissapear in thin air when the merchants leave the map. It should be stockpiled somewhere (OK maybe not all the finished goods, but the weapons, industrial goods and seeds would make sense) AND used by that civilization." sum up the entire point of the (current) caravan arc? :S
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Funk

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #9 on: November 11, 2011, 04:25:24 pm »

back in 40d the traders did go back to where thay came from with the goods, ok thay just sat there with dead wagons full of stuff.


 
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Agree, plus that's about the LAST thing *I* want to see from this kind of game - author spending valuable development time on useless graphics.

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Funk

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #10 on: November 11, 2011, 04:48:12 pm »

i have this image of DF elves, tradeing with the humans for weapons and armor to fight the dwarfs with.
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Agree, plus that's about the LAST thing *I* want to see from this kind of game - author spending valuable development time on useless graphics.

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alter05

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #11 on: November 12, 2011, 12:06:31 am »

My big point for the Elves is trying to find something even remotely "realistic" to make the elves more challenging. Right now they are a big pushover and I could use some epic war against some better equiped elves.
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Deimos56

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #12 on: November 12, 2011, 04:33:23 pm »

I think ALL races in DF should be able  to use meteor iron (in small quantities and/or in the begining of the world gen.), it don't require heat to be transformed into weapons, armor and other stuff.
And it's better than common iron because it has iridium and nickel.
Sadly, space isn't in the game yet, so no meteors to get meteor iron from.
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thisisjimmy

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #13 on: November 13, 2011, 02:31:06 am »

I like your ideas.  I think it would make elves a much better race if they could forge high quality weapons and armour, like in Tolkien lore.
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Dsarker

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Re: Of trees,elven weapons and trade
« Reply #14 on: November 13, 2011, 02:38:29 am »

It would make them less unique. How is that better?
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[Dsarker is] a good for nothing troll.
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