v50 Steam/Premium information for editors
  • v50 information can now be added to pages in the main namespace. v0.47 information can still be found in the DF2014 namespace. See here for more details on the new versioning policy.
  • Use this page to report any issues related to the migration.
This notice may be cached—the current version can be found here.

Magma crab

From Dwarf Fortress Wiki
Revision as of 17:43, 18 June 2015 by Albedo (talk | contribs) (tightened up & clarified language; added links)
Jump to navigation Jump to search
Magma crab
C
Urist likes magma crabs for their chittering.
Portrait

No portrait

Biome

  • Underground Depth: 3-5
Attributes

· Fire immune

Cannot be tamed 
Size
Birth: 1,000 cm3
Mid: 2,000 cm3
Max: 30,000 cm3

Age
Adult at: Birth
Max age: 50-70
Cannot be butchered

(Value multiplier ×2)

This article is about the current version of DF.
Note that some content may still need to be updated.

A small rock-eating creature that lives in molten rock. It scurries on little feet and swims through liquid rock with sharp wings. It uses magma to digest rock and spits out burning globs.

A magma crab is a small magma-dwelling creature that has the unique ability to spit magma in small quantities. It does so at a very fast rate when at range, but resorts to wrestling in close quarters, primarily by pushing and possibly biting. The magma is a very small glob of the stuff and as such only burns areas it hits, generally melting off the fat of that body part. It should be noted however that this can be exceptionally deadly, especially to smaller dwarves/if they're struck multiple times as they rapidly bleed until all the fat on the hit parts is melted away.

Due to having few organs, magma crabs are quite resilient, but they can be killed relatively easily by just about any conventional means, from cave-in traps and marksdwarves to having a mace- or hammerdwarf bash it enough times to crush its body. Using militia dwarves can potentially result in fatalities as dwarves are easily hit by magma spit, though soldiers with enough skill in shield use may come out unscathed. Overall, if you leave an open path from their home, magma crabs can be quite disrupting and dangerous, but any potential threat can be neutralized if you wall off any magma access before or after they appear, sealing them in and your dwarves out.


Before 0.40, magma crabs used to spit solid globs of basalt (this was a bug) and were therefore much more fun.