[lavamind]

Cave-ins would also probably be an interesting hazard. When digging there would be a (low but present) chance of triggering a cave-in which would kill the digging Imp along with any nearby minions. If wall building is implemented, then dirt walls would also have a tiny chance of caving in every turn. Stone/reinforced walls wouldn't be subject to cave-ins.

[lavamind]

I added torches mostly for decoration, although they influence the line of sight, so you can have minions shoot enemies from the dark, for example. See this screenshot (https://keeperrl.com/images/keeper_screen323.png). I'm sure there will be use of them later on. They could influence minion productivity, I need to think if it would be interesting.

I agree that lighting influencing creatures can be interesting. You would need proper lighting in training rooms, workshops and laboratories to get full productivity, for example. This could also influence rest, where lower lighting in bedrooms and graveyards would be allow creatures to rest faster. Also, very low lighting would slow down movement in general, however creatures who normally live underground or in the dark (eg. dwarves, vampires, etc.) wouldn't be affected. Having very dark passages could be part of a defense strategy to slow down invaders, however at the cost of also slowing down your own creatures.

Maybe one issue I'd try to correct with the current implementation is that the base lightining level on an underground tile seems to follow a gradient dependent on how close it is to the surface. I think it would be better if ligthing worked a bit more naturally: that it flows into the dungeon following line of sight from entrances. All other tiles further underground would have the same basic low level lighting.

Combined with the wall-building idea we're discussing in another thread, I'm thinking maybe it's better if stone and reinforced walls didn't have a light source by default. You would need to add torches manually. You could even have different light sources, with torches emitting just enough light to enable penalty-free movement, and lanterns which would give off more light and be suitable for rooms such as workshops and laboratories.

[lavamind]

First off dungeon walls should be just dirt, easy to dig through and sort of cave-like in appearance.

Then, Imps would automatically build basic stone walls (maybe with torches as you suggest), in the order in which the gallery was dug. For example, if you start by digging your dungeon and then branch out galleries to reach minerals, the Imps would first build walls around your dungeon chambers, before going out and building walls in the mining galleries. Building walls should be a low priority for Imps: they should place higher importance on gathering resources, moving corpses around, etc. This should create an incentive to have a good number of Imps, otherwise they might never get to wall building.

Once basic stone walls are built, you could upgrade them to reinforced walls. These reinforced walls would be placed manually and cost extra stone or iron, or both, and be really tough to tunnel through. Tunneling enemies would try to avoid having to tear those down and would seek to breach your dungeon through the weaker walls.

On a related topic, there should be some kind of warning when tunneling enemies are approaching your dungeon. When they're in the vicinity you could hear a sound, and when they're closer, say trying to tear down a wall, then the tile from where the enemy is attacking would be revealed, giving you a few seconds to scramble a defense party.

[Author]

Posts