History VideoGame / DwarfFortress

* [[PerpetualBeta Perpetual Alpha]]: Technically not perpetual. WordOfGod says that Version 1.0 will be when Toady makes 100 core elements.

* AnimalWrongsGroup: Elves, but for trees (they still eat and tame animals.) They will be horribly offended when presented with anything made from wood or charcoal. And because steel and proper forging requires charcoal, and beds and bins must be made of wood, elves are notoriously unpopular.

* TurnsRed: Dwarves can "enter martial trances" while other species can become "enraged".

* YouFailPhysicsForever: Also known as "[[http://df.magmawiki.com/index.php/DF2010:Dwarven_physics Dwarven Physics]]." It's actually possible to build a perpetual motion machine, and melting a metal item only allows you to recover one third of its original mass. Some of these will probably be fixed eventually.

* PerpetualMotionMachine: The mechanical energy needed to pump water up one story is only one tenth the amount generated when the water comes back down and powers a water wheel. Power the pump with the water wheel, prime it once with manual labor, and it will endlessly generate power.

* BreadEggsMilkSquick: Personal descriptions of dwarfs string together happy and sad events with no distinction for either.

*** According to Threetoe's Stories, this is justified because elves use magic to make trees and plants grow into items.

* CuteKitten: At least some of your dwarves think so. Since cats tend to be slaughtered to keep framerates down, this sometimes ends badly.

* EverythingsCuterWithKittens: At least some of your dwarves think so. Since cats tend to be slaughtered to keep framerates down, this sometimes ends badly.

* DecontaminationChamber: Theoretically, dwarves [[http://df.magmawiki.com/index.php/DF2010:Cleaning try to clean]] both themselves and dirty floors. [[ArtificialStupidity More likely]], they will not only walk in goblins' blood and vomit, but contaminate the whole area with germs or poisons quickly melting a dwarf into puddle of pus (doing the same to others on contact), if they can find any. So once the player can afford this, any entrance into habitable area tend to involve something like a [[CaveBehindTheFalls waterfall]] or "[[df.magmawiki.com/index.php/User:Uristocrat/Dwarven_Bathtub Dwarven Bathtub]]".

* PaintTheTownRed: You'll end up with blood all over whatever horror move-inspired fields of traps you set up in front of your fortress, and in the latest version, buggy mechanics for bathing will leave a giant pool of the stuff around your well when your dwarves come to clean themselves off.

* DeathSeeker: "I will agree to travel with you if you lead me to glory and death." -- Said by some {{NPC}}s upon joining the party.

[[caption-width-right:211:[-You want a dwarf? There's your stupid dwarf. You want some better graphics? '''Screw you.''' Dwarves can do lots of stuff. Like digging. Can you dig? '''no'''. Idiot. Play ''DwarfFortress''.-] ]]

* AllMythsAreTrue: There's always supporting-to-conclusive evidence to be found for any event of the Age of Myth: razed hovels, plundered hoards, injured victims, surviving eyewitnesses, and the beasts themselves. Averted by a few mythical beasts, magical creatures, and gods depicted in art that will not appear in any world (though more and more are added each release.)

** An amusing subversion is that megabeasts can still take ''injuries'' from encounters with non-megabeasts in worldgen. This leads to the occassional incident in which a megabeast arrives on a fort's map, and promptly keels over from previously-sustained injuries, since it couldn't have died from them when they happened.

*** The system however does not account for spatial limitations on extremities. This troper once had a legendary wrestler place a hold on a goblins left upper molar with the rear of his knee. The goblin then proceeded to bite the dwarf in the head.

[[caption-width-right:211:[-You want a dwarf? There's your goddamn dwarf. You want some better graphics? '''Screw you.''' Dwarves can do lots of stuff. Like digging. Can you dig? '''Hell no'''. Play ''DwarfFortress''.-] ]]

* PaintTheTownRed: You'll end up with blood all over whatever godawful fields of traps you set up in front of your fortress, and in the latest version, buggy mechanics for bathing will leave a giant pool of the stuff around your well when your dwarves come to clean themselves off.

* GameMod: By editing the raw .txt files, many aspects of the game can be added to or changed. The mods created by the community range from minor bugfixes to ''{{Fallout}}'', ZombieApocalypse [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking and]] MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic total conversions and everything in between. The game is highly mod-receptive, and Toady has stated that he wants a high level of end-user modification ability, which will have its own high-level programming language that's trivial to pick up and start using.

* RealityEnsues: When the game's physics isn't [[GoodBadBugs hilariously buggy]], it can produce some of this. For instance, [[{{Unobtanium}} adamantine]] items are ridiculously valuable, don't bend or break under any ''amount'' of stress once formed into items, can be sharpened to [[AbsurdlySharpBlade an incredible edge]]... and have the same approximate density as ''styrofoam''. This means that while adamantine ''armor'' is NighInvulnerable and ''edged'' weapons are capable of producing a OneManArmy in skilled hands, adamantine maces and warhammers are a joke.

* RidiculouslyCuteCritter: Despite being represented with only the 'k' symbol, people seem to interpret kobolds as mentally retarded, yet lovable humanoid creatures who are just trying to survive in a world where every other civilization hates them. According to the fanbase, cutebolds are another term for DF kobolds.
** An in-canon example would be the fluffy wamblers. Small, vermin that only appear in good aligned biomes and are so adorable dwarfs won't butcher them. And we're talking about a race who will gleefully butcher a newborn puppy should the need, want, or thought arise.

** Any Military dwarf that earns the right of a *InsertWeaponHere* Master or lord. They can dispatch goblins like no ones business.