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[Starver]

I would say more serfdom than slavery. Yes, there are parallels, but there are also sufficient differences.

Not that this helps (or hinders) any actual return of Dwarven Economy, sorry.

[Urist McVoyager]

One of the best first moves for all of this is to unify the time scales between the two modes. If you don't do that first, every new fix for the economy would compound the work it takes later on to do it. Once you have the two modes synced, you can alter the time a task takes based on amount of ingredients, quality of the work, and skill of the worker. Then you can adjust the value of a good based on time as well as quality.

Beyond that, we also need the outside economy to sync with the in-fortress one. For our moves to have an impact on the economy of the actual Kingdom. To an extent they already do because of our effect on wars, with our raiding and tributary system, but it's indirect. The more we win the fewer soldiers the enemies can throw at the rest of our Kingdom, especially if they're too busy attacking us to get their settlements back. But we need to be able to truly fulfill the Kingdom's needs, as well as introduce new goods completely into the Kingdom. We tame new animals to the point they're counted as domesticated, and new fortresses can embark with those animals. We bring in new supplies through our tributaries, that should also be reflected in future embarks from that Kingdom. We should also see those animals and goods appear in future caravans from the homeland.

[jecowa]

Playing Economy sounds like it could be fun, but I'd like there to still be an option to make a Commune instead.

I would like to be able to pay different rates for a job based on the skill the dwarf has at that job. And I would like to be able to set limits for how many times a dwarf can perform a job. Even now, it would be nice to make an order that all dwarves with less than n skill can only use the craftsdwarf workshop once every couple of months. (So dwarves can fulfill their need to craft without low-skill laborors hogging craftsdwarf workshops.) Then with the economy, the once-per-couple-months job could be used to make sure even the poorer hauler dwarves are getting paid at least what they need to survive on.

[Mohreb el Yasim]

I like the idea that the Dwarven anarchist utopia after regressing to a monarchy descends even further into a a capitalism with the economy kicking in.
It is like difficulty levels slowly setting in, however it will surely be changed if it is to come back so no worries to be have.

[wooks]

So I'm a real life economist, and I just wanted to add my two cents here;

The current state of the game with a sort of 'global economy' that shows up as trade demands etc. Is probably the best we can hope for. The bonus of elven production demands is peak economic commentary too. So too are noble demands and trade restrictions.

I think there's room for adventure mode to improve, it's pretty hard to see the global economic conditions as an adventurer. Part of that is due to every civilian using a different currency for some reason, but that too is a pretty funny historical commentary.

What I don't think would be a good idea is any sort of walrasian modeling of fortress mode. To put it simply, that's kind of the game, isn't it? To me fortress mode has always been throwing down the gauntlet to all those who claim that the 'benevolent dictator' is a reasonable way to run a society. It's clearly not, and DF makes this case in spades.

[Starver]

It's been said before (maybe in this thread, I'm not scrolling up to check) but the one additional tweak to the current system of trade demands might be to deprecate oft-traded items[1]. Just to keep the player on their toes.

A trade-advantage will not be offered for exactly the kind of thing you're already offering. If it looks like it might (based on some tally of recent sales) then it adds something to it. Bolts? No, now they would like steel bolts, etc. Not sure how to better qualify some things (like seeds) except going more specific to variety (which could make it even more inaccessible to take advantage of than with the usual lack of steel issues).

I take advantage of craft-and-dumpsell as much as anybody. Whatever stone type(s) I have plenty of that aren't useful (ore, flux, magmasafe) or aesthetic (a useful hue for building purposes) tends to be shifted into a Crafts industry that is almost entirely destined for trade (maybe also mugs) suitable for all visitors without ever worrying about elven wood-issues. If the Dwarven trades say that they'd appreciate rings then I'll hold back the rings for them, over the intervening year (and prob. buy in any and all rings offered by the intermediate caravans). I just think that there should be a limit. Maybe your site could become the actual Ring Capital Of The World, but (see footnote) that does not mean that it can pass on any old trash, year after year after year, and also expect that occasionally that some of the most artless forms of that trash is in peculiar demand.


[1] Or deprecate the below-average-quality items. Once you're turning out mugs in their millions, they become sought after if they are unusually good exemplars of the art. The cheap, tacky ones (or those 'merely' Masterwork-but-undecorated ones, once you've flooded the market) are considered kitsch, and now you must develop new variations every season to satisfy the outside world.

[Atarlost]

It's been said before (maybe in this thread, I'm not scrolling up to check) but the one additional tweak to the current system of trade demands might be to deprecate oft-traded items[1]. Just to keep the player on their toes.

That's not how trade works.  Traders go somewhere in the pre-telegraph era because they expect to be able to buy more of the stuff that they bought last time because they have markets for it.  Some will show up speculatively at exotic places looking to see what exotic goods they can find new markets for, but the regular traders want more of the same.  They might have buy caps for some items based on what they think they can sell, but they're not going to change their demands just to troll you.  That's just bad business. 

If it's something temporary like "The Halls of Soaking need giant corscrews and tubes" that would be different next year, but if "The Mountainhome has a market for mugs" the traders are more likely to turn their nose up at you switching from rock to clay than to want a change.  The rock ones they knew would sell.  The clay ones might not. 

[Laterigrade]

What I don't think would be a good idea is any sort of walrasian modeling of fortress mode. To put it simply, that's kind of the game, isn't it? To me fortress mode has always been throwing down the gauntlet to all those who claim that the 'benevolent dictator' is a reasonable way to run a society. It's clearly not, and DF makes this case in spades.

That’s so true, isn’t it? The way the player walls in the vampire so he can become their never-sleeping manager or walls out the last two dwarves to die by goblin because they’ll get there too late and they’re too slow and they’re nothing more than useless Legendary Stonecrafters anyway or walls in the three people who got bitten by the werelizard, gives them no food and water because they’ll regenerate every month anyway, and then releases them on the invading goblins to die when the time is right, for the good of the Mountainhomes and the Crying Melons, just destroys the idea of a benevolent dictator. It would be even worse if the player was physically a dwarf who could die, because they’d do anything at all to save themselves.

I mean, maybe we do all this because it’s !!dwarfy!! and efficient and they’re all just little bearded smiley faces and binary anyway, but still. Still.


Edit
Oh and for the record and to be at least slightly on-topic the economy sounds like a terrible idea, to me, at least without a worldwide economy first to give it meaning.

[Mohreb el Yasim]

It's been said before (maybe in this thread, I'm not scrolling up to check) but the one additional tweak to the current system of trade demands might be to deprecate oft-traded items[1]. Just to keep the player on their toes.

That's not how trade works.  Traders go somewhere in the pre-telegraph era because they expect to be able to buy more of the stuff that they bought last time because they have markets for it.  Some will show up speculatively at exotic places looking to see what exotic goods they can find new markets for, but the regular traders want more of the same.  They might have buy caps for some items based on what they think they can sell, but they're not going to change their demands just to troll you.  That's just bad business. 

If it's something temporary like "The Halls of Soaking need giant corscrews and tubes" that would be different next year, but if "The Mountainhome has a market for mugs" the traders are more likely to turn their nose up at you switching from rock to clay than to want a change.  The rock ones they knew would sell.  The clay ones might not.

The best that it is already (somewhat) in the game.
They might ask for specific items (in prévision which seems logic)
Also they bring more of the same you bought last time. (that is why you buy all pets from the elves, all those useless capibaras will lead the way for your giant bear breading program, also you should avoid buying all of their cloth if you don't want to have only that)

[muldrake]

I've never experienced the dwarven economy, but I did look through the 40d description of it, and it's bad.

What even is this wall of text?  Do you not realize we have to get well beyond the phase where for some reason spiked wooden balls are an economy-breaking commodity that are on the level of tulip bulbs in the 17th Century as to their sheer level of ridiculousness?

Seriously until "dwarf economy" is beyond that level we don't even need to consult Marx, Engels, Rothbard, or any of those lunatics to grasp that there is nothing resembling economy in this game.

[Iapetus]

Something that I think could be interesting would be if fundamental rules about how the economy works (property rights, etc) could be changed or (re)defined, whether in the raws (either universally, or at an entity level), or in-game at a civilization or site level.

It would be interesting to see how an economy (and the fortress society more generally) would develop (or collapse) depending on what rules applied.

Examples of possible rules:
* Raw materials:
** Unharvested raw materials are common property.  Whichever dwarf digs up / catches / harvests them becomes the owner.  Anyone who wants to use that item has to buy it from the owner.
** Raw materials are the property of the fortress (or a noble, or a guild).  Whichever dwarf digs up / catches / harvests them is paid by the owner for doing so. 

* Workshops:
** Workshops are common property.  Any craftdwarf can use them for free.
** Workshops are owned by the fortress (or a noble, or a guild, or an individual dwarf).  Any craftdwarf that uses them is paid for their work by the owner.  The finished goods become property of the workshop owner.
** Workshops are owned by the fortress (or a noble, or a guild, or an individual dwarf). Any craftdwarf that uses them pays the owner for doing so.   The finished goods become property of the craftdwarf.

[muldrake]

Whichever dwarf first hits a vein of ore owns not just the first strike, but the entire vein and has a claim to it.  However, they have to convey their claim to some official, like the expedition leader, mayor, or some other suitable official.  If some other dwarf murders them and jumps their claim, they get to make it, so long as they don't get caught.

[anewaname]

@muldrake

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

McUrist has entered a fell mood... McUrist has struck down McClaimHolder.... McUrist has created a legendary dwarf bone pick.

[klefenz]

Urist McMarx cancels seize means of production: hunting for vermin

[Maloy]

I'm fine with what we got personally

I also use coins a good bit, but I use it more as "change" or really how legal tender used to work when I don't have enough of whatever trade good I specialize in

Just short of what I need to push the deal through? Okay 200 gold coins and we pass


That said your description of all the problems and potential downsides actually makes it sound more enticing lol

Dwarven soldiers joining mercenary campaigns with villains across the continent?
Corpse haulers being dwarven millionaires?

All of that sounds crazy and interesting lol