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[Immortal-D]

With the Steam release in mind;
- Have you considered giving Legends Mode a similar GUI overhaul?  (Possibly similar to the popular utility 'Legends Viewer')
- What about being able to use Legends Mode during Fortress Mode?
- Have you (and I suppose KitFox here) considered doing a promotional release several days before launch?  Give a pre-release copy to streamers and the like.

[Mr Crabman]

- What about being able to use Legends Mode during Fortress Mode?

He says it would be technically easy enough, the only problem is immersion issues, like it being too easy to unmask vampires for instance.

[BlueManedHawk]

- Why are demons only ever given the ampersand as their creature tile, whereas other procedurally-generated creatures like experiments, titans, and forgotten beasts are given random tiles?
- On a related note, why do demons have the same [DIFFICULTY] as forgotten beasts and titans, despite definitely being generally usually pretty harder?
- On a related note to that one, would it be possible for procedurally-generated creatures to have different [DIFFICULTY]s depending on their properties?

[voliol]

Demons are as dangerous as FBs and Titans on an individual level. It's that you have to fight off a hundred of them at once that make them the ultimate challenge of the game. I don't think the DIFFICULTY rating is meant to account for that, since the wiki claims it's for adventure mode and if you encounter them there it wouldn't be in the big wave of Fortress Mode.

DIFFICULTY | Increases experience gain during adventure mode. Creatures with a difficulty of 11 or higher are not assigned for quests in adventure mode.

[pamelrabo]

¿will you take some kind of rest, or holidays, when the Steam version is launched?
I guess you'll addres the most worrying bugs but after that, I mean.

You talk about development in a really casual way, like it's no big deal, but I'm pretty sure there's been a lot of stressful moments and a lot more will come with the release. I love the game, but no game is worth its creators' wellbeing.

If it's not too personal, ¿Have you ever felt you abused yourself pushing a release or hunting a bug? Is it difficult to handle the community's expectations and constant "when when when" questions?

Thanks for your attention and your work.

[Paaaad]

Why is the current default tileset nonsquare? If I remember correctly, there’s a square one in the files too.

[Putnam]

With the Steam release in mind;
- Have you considered giving Legends Mode a similar GUI overhaul?  (Possibly similar to the popular utility 'Legends Viewer')

Yes, it was shown off in January

[Ziusudra]

Why is the current default tileset nonsquare? If I remember correctly, there’s a square one in the files too.

When the game was first created it was meant to hav exceedingly simple graphics and to that end they decided to emulate old DOS text displays, thus the 16 colors, the CP437 characters, the 80x25 character minimum size, and the 8x12 pixel character font. In 2002 when the game was first released most people were still using 800x600 monitors, with 1024x768 not over-taking that until the next year. The square font is 16 pixels, which at 80 characters requires at least a 1280 wide monitor. Some people still play DF on older computers or devices with various displays, so the defaults need to be small enough to fit those. Edit: well, sort of, the tileset is resized to be small enough to fit the current window size, but that can cause blurring or distortion. (And that also might hav been added by Baughn.) (Also, I think the square font may hav been added by Baughn when he helped update the graphics.)

Anyway, the Premium version will default to the square graphics and loses the various limitations. I would guess the classic version will retain the current defaults, for the sake of those using older computers or smaller displays.

[Doorkeeper]

- Why are demons only ever given the ampersand as their creature tile, whereas other procedurally-generated creatures like experiments, titans, and forgotten beasts are given random tiles?
...

Probably lack of unique characters. It's better to have a single symbol represent a single type of object anyways. NetHack also uses the ampersand near-exclusively for demons (shared by a handful of demonlike monsters).

As for the other procgen creatures: probably ran out of unique characters. Demons were added before FBs and way before experiments.

The tiles for titans, FBs, etc. aren't entirely random though. It's the first letter of the form/animal of the random creature. Humanoids are 'H', anklyosaurids are 'A', and so on. At the very least, the latin alphabet letters are mostly used to represent creatures, with notable exceptions like 'O' and 'X'.

[BlueManedHawk]

[…]
The tiles for titans, FBs, etc. aren't entirely random though. It's the first letter of the form/animal of the random creature. Humanoids are 'H', anklyosaurids are 'A', and so on. At the very least, the latin alphabet letters are mostly used to represent creatures, with notable exceptions like 'O' and 'X'.

Oh, i didn't know that!  Thanks for telling me.

[myk]

I think I remember you saying that ncurses mode is going away. Is that true? If so, is it still necessary to support 80x25 screens? What are the new minimum tile dimensions that you are targeting for the UI? In other words, when you design a new menu/screen/dialog, what can you assume about how much screen space you have to work with?

[voliol]

I think I remember you saying that ncurses mode is going away. Is that true? If so, is it still necessary to support 80x25 screens? What are the new minimum tile dimensions that you are targeting for the UI? In other words, when you design a new menu/screen/dialog, what can you assume about how much screen space you have to work with?

Remember to mark the questions in lime green if they are meant for Toady. I did it for the above in case you don't visit this thread much.

Edit: Will we be able to read the next part of Tales Foretold in the foreseeable future?

[myk]

Remember to mark the questions in lime green if they are meant for Toady.

Thanks!

[Randomizer]

If the release of the game generates enough money, would you be willing to hire additional programmers. This could dramatically increase the speed at which you will be able to move through your update/feature timeline. This would also free you up to do more work on the design end of the game which would benefit everyone.

[PatrikLundell]

The answer to that question has been no in the past.

There are several reasons for NOT hire on other people:
- Spending ever increasing parts of the time on managing others rather than doing the work that's actually enjoyable. That, in turn, risks killing the interest in the project, and can thus lead to it being abandoned.
- Lack of control and knowledge, i.e. things written by others may not be easily understood. Toady has had bad experiences in the past, with some things written by somebody else not being readily understood (and thus not updated).
- Theft. Again, Toady has had bad experiences in the past when people with access of the code has taken it without permission.

The answer may have changed both as a result of the project going commercial and as a result of experience of having to do management to coordinate and review artist activity.