0003133: Dust attacks cause instant KO (old code from cave-ins?)

Dwarf Fortress Bug Tracker - Dwarf Fortress

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Project

Category

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Date Submitted

Last Update

0003133

Dwarf Fortress

Creatures

public

2010-08-31 09:10

2015-03-08 12:02

Reporter

Khift

Assigned To

Priority

normal

Severity

minor

Reproducibility

sometimes

Status

new

Resolution

open

Platform

Windows Vista

OS Version

Product Version

0.31.12

Target Version

Fixed in Version

Summary

0003133: Dust attacks cause instant KO (old code from cave-ins?)

Description

Some variations of the deadly dust cloud attack given to various FBs, titans and demons act as unstoppable area of effect one-hit-KO attacks. Any creature caught in one of these clouds of deadly dust has an extremely high chance to simply die as a result of exposure -- including the creature that emits the dust. A single emission of dust can kill dozens of dwarves near the beast with absolutely nothing that could be done to counter it. No amount of skill, training, or raw toughness can mitigate it; if a creature is exposed to one of the bugged dust clouds then it almost certainly dies and there is nothing that can be done about it.

Steps To Reproduce

I admittedly am not familiar with the arena mode, but if you are able to spawn randomly generated creatures in it it would be a great place to test this. Create a group of two dozen dwarves in full adamantine gear (bonus points for adamantine clothing below it, too), full Legendary+5 on all combat skills and pit these super-dwarves against FBs until you encounter one with deadly dust and note the dust's effects. Frequently, although not always, the beast's dust cloud will result in the mass killing of the dwarves fighting it, usually some time after the fight is over and the beast is decapitated (it often takes a while for the toughened military dwarves to finally suffocate).

Another method to replicate this bug is to pit FBs with deadly dust against kittens. The FB will make short work of the kitten, but you will be able to clearly see that the dust cloud it emits is so dangerous it frequently kills the beast itself.

If FBs cannot be generated in the arena testing is going to be more difficult; you would need to come across the dust beast by yourself in an actual fortress and repeat the above tests. It'd be much harder, to say the least.

Additional Information

I would like to state again that while many iterations of deadly dust are this lethal not all are. I've seen some that 'merely' stun the creatures hit by it for extended periods of time. This, in my mind, is the correct balance for this attack -- if all it was was an AoE incapacitate I would still rank it as the most deadly special attack a randomly generated creature can have but it would no longer be so unfair and imbalanced that the only sane solution is to wall the creature off and chuck kittens at it until it chokes to death on it's own ridiculous dust. While I appreciate the imagery of killing something with kittens, it isn't balanced gameplay and it certainly isn't fun to lose a dozen or more skilled military dwarves to a single creature, especially when the combat log is exactly two lines long:

Duster, Forgotten Beast releases a cloud of deadly dust!
The Axe Lord strikes Duster in the head with his *Adamantine Battle Axe* and the severed part sails off in an arc!

Mass incapacitation is dangerous enough, trust me. Especially if FBs ever receive any rebalancing with regards to the strength of their skin and natural weapons. A beast releasing a cloud of dust and then ripping the incapacitated dwarves to shreds afterwards is fair and fun, but having the dust be an area of effect one hit kill regardless of the actual combat is not.

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Relationships

related to	0000524	resolved	Toady One	Liquid glob material breath attacks come out solid
related to	0004834	new		Forgotten Beast damages self with dust attack.
related to	0002166	resolved	Footkerchief	Cave-in dust causes direct injury to dwarves
related to	0001775	resolved	Footkerchief	Miners fail to fall unconscious after cave-in until current job is ended.