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I was just reading about a bunch of weird bugs found in dwarf fortress. For instance, someone found all the cats were throwing up all over the place from alcoho

I was just reading about a bunch of weird bugs found in dwarf fortress. For instance, someone found all the cats were throwing up all over the place from alcohol poisoning. They looked into it and found the dwarves were spilling alcohol on the floor of the tavern. The cats didn't drink it though. No, they walked through it and got it on their fur. Then when the cats went to clean themselves, they ingested the alcohol. The game then calculated their blood alcohol content to be very high and gave them alcohol poisoning. Because it counted it as one standard of unit of alcohol, and the cats have much smaller body mass than dwarves. All sorts of amazing, um, features, have been found in that game.

adrianN 10y ago
I don't see the bug there. Maybe you mean that the cat simulation is not accurate enough: cat's wouldn't walk through puddles if they could avoid it.
- pbtflakes 10y ago
  Unintended behavior would be more accurate.
- Tyr42 10y ago
  One lick of alcohol soaked fur was the same amount of alcohol as a full tankard of beer. There was only one "unit" of alcohol. Hence dead cats.
- StavrosK 10y ago
  I think the bug was that it counted as "one mug of alcohol" on the floor, and the entire thing stuck to their fur, which wouldn't happen in real life.
- adamrezich 10y ago
  Maybe you don't realize just how much dwarves drink :v
gideonparanoid 10y ago
Sounds like the kind of thing I'd read on The Strange Log [0] [0] https://twitter.com/thestrangelog https://twitter.com/thestrangelog
- kbenson 10y ago
  That is hilarious. I can't believe I haven't heard of this before.
logfromblammo 10y ago
Here's a neat dwarf trick: 1. Obtain a vessel capable of holding liquids. 2. Drink from the vessel until it has one unit left. 3. Empty the vessel onto the ground. 4. Refill the vessel to its maximum capacity from the puddle you just made. 5. Drink from the puddle. The problem was that puddles and spatter and liquid coatings did not have a volume. So you can also quench your thirst by swimming in a river, then drinking the coating of water stuck to your own ear. So the cat thing was exactly the same problem. An infinite number of cats could walk through one puddle of spilled alcohol, and then ingest enough alcohol to get poisoned by licking each body part. Lick first toe of right foot? That's a shot. Lick second toe of right foot? Another shot. Lick third toe of right foot? We're having a party now! On the one hand, it seems like there should have been some additional effort there. But on the other, the game actually simulates that when you dunk something in water, it gets wet, and then stays wet until the water evaporates. I don't know of any other game that not only does that, but also handles dusts and powders, and things falling from the sky due to weather, and even getting diseases by inhaling vaporized droplets of a contaminated liquid. You would think that with all that incredible detail, the pathfinding AI would not kill the framerate just from two dozen pastured sheep all trying to find their next clump of grass to eat.
- Houshalter 10y ago
  It's crazy that the game simulates spilled alcohol, and that you can get it on you by walking through it, and that cats clean themselves by licking, and that they ingest whatever they lick, and that it computes blood alcohol content and simulates the effects of alcohol poisoning... DF is insane. The pathfinding is pretty inefficient because it's entirely invented by the guy who wrote it. Who doesn't know anything about pathfinding algorithms. Also it's entirely single threaded.
- PhasmaFelis 10y ago
  > You would think that with all that incredible detail, the pathfinding AI would not kill the framerate just from two dozen pastured sheep all trying to find their next clump of grass to eat. Dwarf Fortress is kind of the ur-example of passionately solving the wrong problem. It's a fantastic game, and it's heartbreaking to me how much more fantastic it could be if the author adjusted his priorities a bit.

adrianN 10y ago

I don't see the bug there. Maybe you mean that the cat simulation is not accurate enough: cat's wouldn't walk through puddles if they could avoid it.

pbtflakes 10y ago
Unintended behavior would be more accurate.
Tyr42 10y ago
One lick of alcohol soaked fur was the same amount of alcohol as a full tankard of beer. There was only one "unit" of alcohol. Hence dead cats.
StavrosK 10y ago
I think the bug was that it counted as "one mug of alcohol" on the floor, and the entire thing stuck to their fur, which wouldn't happen in real life.
adamrezich 10y ago
Maybe you don't realize just how much dwarves drink :v

gideonparanoid 10y ago

Sounds like the kind of thing I'd read on The Strange Log [0] [0] https://twitter.com/thestrangelog https://twitter.com/thestrangelog

kbenson 10y ago
That is hilarious. I can't believe I haven't heard of this before.

logfromblammo 10y ago

Here's a neat dwarf trick: 1. Obtain a vessel capable of holding liquids. 2. Drink from the vessel until it has one unit left. 3. Empty the vessel onto the ground. 4. Refill the vessel to its maximum capacity from the puddle you just made. 5. Drink from the puddle. The problem was that puddles and spatter and liquid coatings did not have a volume. So you can also quench your thirst by swimming in a river, then drinking the coating of water stuck to your own ear. So the cat thing was exactly the same problem. An infinite number of cats could walk through one puddle of spilled alcohol, and then ingest enough alcohol to get poisoned by licking each body part. Lick first toe of right foot? That's a shot. Lick second toe of right foot? Another shot. Lick third toe of right foot? We're having a party now! On the one hand, it seems like there should have been some additional effort there. But on the other, the game actually simulates that when you dunk something in water, it gets wet, and then stays wet until the water evaporates. I don't know of any other game that not only does that, but also handles dusts and powders, and things falling from the sky due to weather, and even getting diseases by inhaling vaporized droplets of a contaminated liquid. You would think that with all that incredible detail, the pathfinding AI would not kill the framerate just from two dozen pastured sheep all trying to find their next clump of grass to eat.

Houshalter 10y ago
It's crazy that the game simulates spilled alcohol, and that you can get it on you by walking through it, and that cats clean themselves by licking, and that they ingest whatever they lick, and that it computes blood alcohol content and simulates the effects of alcohol poisoning... DF is insane. The pathfinding is pretty inefficient because it's entirely invented by the guy who wrote it. Who doesn't know anything about pathfinding algorithms. Also it's entirely single threaded.
PhasmaFelis 10y ago
> You would think that with all that incredible detail, the pathfinding AI would not kill the framerate just from two dozen pastured sheep all trying to find their next clump of grass to eat. Dwarf Fortress is kind of the ur-example of passionately solving the wrong problem. It's a fantastic game, and it's heartbreaking to me how much more fantastic it could be if the author adjusted his priorities a bit.