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[Adrian]

Or RNG metallurgy, if you prefer.

In addition to the raw defined alloys (many of which are only interesting because of the increased value compared to their components), why not have an alchemist tinker with bars to create alloys? Or when he gets moody, a few bars of [ADJECTIVE] metal?

Generally alloys created by an alchemist would have their properties be the average of their components weighted by how many bars of each component are used. With each property having an n% chance of diverting from the norm, based on the alchemist's skill and the amount of component going into the reaction.

Alloys created this way should be materially expensive to produce, with each reaction only producing one bar, no matter how many component goes in. (Though maybe it should produce some bars of useless byproduct or slag, so the reaction abides by the conservation of mass)
Each bar of alloy created should remember the recipe that created it, so it can be used as a catalyst to produce more bars of that alloy.

[StagnantSoul]

I like this. Not exactly sure how it would be implemented, but I'm not exactly sure how a donkey carries an elephant, either. Toady could probably work it. Maybe you could choose what metals go into it, like say "Five bronze plus two iron and a fine pewter bar, please." Alchemist runs off, and based on his skill, he could spend months making a single bar of brown fine pewter, or a little while making Fine Colossus Bronze. Maybe a fey mood dwarf would make some brilliant metal that is even above steel, even if just by a little bit? It'd have to work on a system like the forgotten beasts, taking a lot of components and randomly generated stats into account, rounding them off, and making it plausible. Maybe even a rejection system, like world gen, that makes the alchemists work longer? There's a lot of possibilities in this idea. And it's a metallic idea. Dwarfy enough for me.

[MightyEvilPunk]

Why not add just damascus steel and wootz? Taking ordinary iron/steel bars, consuming plenty of time and fuel, requiring high smithing skills, but producing metal composite, that better, than ordinary steel.

[rampaging-poet]

Unfortunately the properties of real-life alloys aren't just the average of the properties of the components.  Atoms of different metals have different electrostatic interactions, so mixing them changes the crystalline structure of the resulting alloy.  The crystal structure has a big effect on the overall properties of the metal.  For example, some alloys are less dense than the average of their components because the atoms become more spread out to accommodate the differences between the two elements.

[Dirst]

Unfortunately the properties of real-life alloys aren't just the average of the properties of the components.  Atoms of different metals have different electrostatic interactions, so mixing them changes the crystalline structure of the resulting alloy.  The crystal structure has a big effect on the overall properties of the metal.  For example, some alloys are less dense than the average of their components because the atoms become more spread out to accommodate the differences between the two elements.

One striking example of this is solder.  An alloy of 63% tin and 37% lead has a lower melting point than either component and fully retains tin's ability to dissolve gold (rather than some average of tin's and lead's).

Metallurgy is complicated, which is why the non-Dwarves don't get to have steel.

[Adrian]

Unfortunately the properties of real-life alloys aren't just the average of the properties of the components.  Atoms of different metals have different electrostatic interactions, so mixing them changes the crystalline structure of the resulting alloy.  The crystal structure has a big effect on the overall properties of the metal.  For example, some alloys are less dense than the average of their components because the atoms become more spread out to accommodate the differences between the two elements.

I am aware.
But until Dwarf Fortress tracks lattice parameters and grain boundaries to accurately simulate crystalline solids, assumptions will have to be made. And i think averaging things with an n% chance of deferring from the norm is a decent way to do that.

[GavJ]

No, do not want. Metallurgy is not geneology. The world doesn't work remotely like this.

Alloys also routinely pick up properties that NEITHER of their components had, etc.

assumptions will have to be made.

Assumptions don't have to be made, because the suggestion doesn't have to be implemented... Toady can just continue to implement actual alloys and input their actual, known properties and thus perfectly simulate the effects of lattice and crystal structure and everything else, even things science might not know about yet.

[BoredVirulence]

I partially like the idea.
The idea that the world could have randomly generated alloys is cool. The idea you could, potentially, add to the list of alloys is cooler.

Averaging stats is lame. Why would I mix steel with anything, when its almost always going to come out worse than plain steel?
The chance for something to deviate should be fairly high, and it would be nice if it deviated in a pattern. Rather than a few random stats changing in either direction, we should see patterns that make sense together. They also need to have appreciable differences. I'd be very upset if, after hundreds of bars of testing I finally find an alloy of steel which is superior to normal steel, by 3%.

The way I see it, the default allows would remain in game, during world gen civ's could discover a new alloy. When a new alloy is discovered for the first time, its raws are set, and only civ's with knowledge of it can create it. Each new allow would have to deviate by an appreciable amount, say 15%-35%. If another civ were to discover the same alloy through the same reaction, it would be given access, no new raws are generated. I would add a possibility for quality modifiers, which would increase its natural deviation.

If done intelligently, it would add the possibility for making different worlds play differently, because they could end up with different metals. Assuming only existing metals would exist is lame, this is fantasy. Procedurally generated stuff is the future of DF, and its worth a discussion.