After adding in "mineable" salt, ended up expanding reactions for cooking, tea processing, a bunch of weird stuff and what not, etc., etc So with all that in, I genned a new 1050 hidden history world w/o bogeymen. While I don't mind fighting the first mob of bogeys as it's a nice character milestone for defensive stats (you've reached lvl10), every mob after that is tedious. Really, all mobs are tedious. Who wants to fight wolves or dingoes once the counter has tipped over for "doesn't really care about anything anymore"? Too bad archers can't forecast AoE at 3 shots per 3x3 tiles.



Prior to character creation I had a brief look at the gods available for the various dwarven civs (meh) and decided to play dwarven Enkidu/Green Knight and roll a dwarf outsider with what I'd consider a peasant's observer/endurance build.



Feb Forestpebble the Good, possibly being a Finnish dwarf, doesn't have anyone in his list of people that he knows or has spoken to. He belongs to no group. Being an outsider is great in this regard. Why have a randomly assigned network that you've known all your life, particularly when it's likely they're more often cardboard cutouts? At any rate, Feb starts this run by exiting a subterranean mound into a rain shower. Weather logging itself as the first entry in the express emotions menu is always nice.



Now while it's meaningless in terms of in-game effect, using a bit of DF2014 arena mode testing (so as to see the actual xp numbers), I mapped out how to stat up Observer first so it appears as the second entry in the express emotions menu.



Usually your character gets 2xp of observer when they see or make an attack. They could get quite a bit more xp if they passively respond to a charge (might be up to 20xp?). It's fine getting charged and stunned if there's no accompanying attack. And so long as your character and the critter are at hostility level brawl, once you're on the ground you'll be ignored. With the occurrence being irregular, it's not a great thing to wait on.



Naturally, it's back to waiting to see an attack for the consistent 2xp of observer and then dodging away, where you'll only get 3xp of fighter and 3xp of dodger if there's an attack reportmeaning you dodged after their attack's prepare phase. Feb's doing this versus a horse. Horses kick for a standard attack of 8 ticks (4 to prepare, 4 to recover). Low end of the bracket is 6 ticks for quick attack and up at 10 for heavy/precise. Dodge away is 6 ticks (likely 3 to prepare, 3 to recover).



So, there's more likelihood of getting 2xp/0xp/0xp as opposed to a 2xp/3xp/3xp split if your character waits for the horse to become adjacent, waits one tick until the attack presents itself, then opts to dodge away.