Lua scripting

Research Pending! This article or section is incomplete/under construction (likely due to recent changes) and may still be outdated or missing details. Feel free to do some testing and expand it.

This article is about procedural raw generation. Information on Utility:DFHack scripting can be found at https://docs.dfhack.org/en/stable/.

Lua scripting is an upcoming feature. It is used to create custom procedurally-generated objects that were previously created by hardcoded methods. It was announced in a video, with the stated goal of "supporting future magical endeavors."

Inorganic materials, languages, creatures, interactions, items (currently excluding instruments), reactions, entities, and plants are open to this system.

Code Samples

Divine language

This is the divine language, which generates a bunch of random-sounding words from a set of syllables.

languages.GEN_DIVINE=function()

    local letters={}
    letters.vowel={}
    letters.cons={}
    letters.vowel.COMMON_NUM=5
    letters.vowel.NUM=35
    letters.cons.COMMON_NUM=12
    letters.cons.NUM=22
    letters.vowel.lookup={
        "a","e","i","o","u",
        "ae","ai","ao","au","ea","ei","eo","eu","ia","ie","io","iu","oa","oe","oi","ou","ua","ue","ui","uo","ah","eh","ih","oh","uh","ay","ey","iy","oy","uy"
    }
    letters.cons.lookup={
        "b","p","g","k","c","z","s","d","t","m","n","ng",
        "v","f","w","h","j","l","r","q","x","y"
    }

    for k,v in pairs(letters) do
        v.common={}
        v.rare={}
        for i=1,5 do
            if trandom(5)~=0 then v.common[i]=v.lookup[trandom(v.COMMON_NUM)+1] else v.common[i]=v.lookup[trandom(v.NUM)+1] end
        end
        for i=1,15 do 
            v.rare[i]=v.lookup[trandom(v.NUM)+1]
        end
    end

    local function letter(t)
        if trandom(5)~=0 then
            return pick_random(t.common)
        else
            return pick_random(t.rare)
        end
    end
    local gen_divine={}
    for k,v in ipairs(world.language.word) do
        local str=""
        if trandom(2)~=0 then
            str=str..letter(letters.cons)
            str=str..letter(letters.vowel)
        else
            str=str..letter(letters.vowel)
        end
        local num_letters=trandom(3)
        str=str..letter(letters.cons)
        if num_letters>0 then str=str..letter(letters.vowel) end
        if num_letters>1 then str=str..letter(letters.cons) end
        gen_divine[v.token]=str
    end

    return gen_divine
end

Identity language

This makes a language called GEN_IDENTITY which is, like. "Abbey abbeyabbeys the abbey of abbeys" - i.e. it's the "English" language you might see occasionally.

languages.GEN_IDENTITY=function()
    -- just to demonstrate the absolute most basic method of generating one of these
    -- also so that you can just mod stuff to use GEN_IDENTITY
    local tbl={}
    local unempty = function(str1, str2) 
        return str1=='' and str2 or str1
    end
    for k,v in ipairs(world.language.word) do
        local str=''
        str=unempty(str,v.NOUN_SING)
        str=unempty(str,v.ADJ)
        str=unempty(str,v.VERB_FIRST_PRES)
        str=unempty(str,string.lower(v.token))
        tbl[v.token]=str
    end
    return tbl
end