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[Sutremaine]

At the moment, if a dwarf gains XP in a skill, it's on their skill list forever. It'd reduce clutter if they'd just go away after not being used for a while, because while I'm very glad to have my metalsmith or mechanic helping out with the brewing and butchering in the first six months, I really don't care about it five years later.

I suggest that at the start of each year, every Dabbling skill is marked with a flag that goes away if any XP is gained in that skill. At the start of the next year, any skill that still has this flag is reduced to 0XP and removed from the dwarf's skill list.

[GreatWyrmGold]

You don't forget everything about something after a year or two of disuse. Just letting current skill rust work skills all the way down to 0 would work better. Otherwise, a legendary dwarf stuck without its industry for long enough (say, a weaponsmith waiting for the forges to be reclaimed or remade after the Magma Flood of 1052) would completely lose all its skill. Sure, it should probably drop...but once you reach that point, you'll always be better than a random peasant pulled off the street (unless some kind of malady prevents you, but that's separate).

[SuicideJunkie]

Just sorting the list by skill would be good enough I think.
Let all of the dabbling skills fall to page 2, and look right at the top to see what the dwarf is best at.

[10ebbor10]

The suggestion is only for dabbling skills. Reducing those makes sense.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Not implied very well, and certainly not stated.

[Sutremaine]

"Every Dabbling skill" implies that every skill not at Dabbling is excluded. Also, your suggestion of letting skills work their way down to 0 is either mostly implemented or the thing I'm suggesting.When a dwarf does drop a level to rust, their XP is set to 100% of the new level. Give them a couple of jobs to work off the (sometimes invisible) rust, and they'll be at the skill level they were before, though with a lot further to go to their next level up. When their skill level is at 0, there's no level for that skill to drop to and it hangs around. Based on these odd first-year jobs, the XP gained at the Dabbling level is retained.

It's a pretty minor thing. Even with the skill list being splittable into combat, workshop, and miscellaneous skills it can get a little crowded, and it just bugs me to see those old skills hanging around.

[FearfulJesuit]

I'd second this.

[GreatWyrmGold]

"Every Dabbling skill" implies that every skill not at Dabbling is excluded.

...I seem to have missed an important word there. Consider my objections withdrawn.

[Sutremaine]

Alrighty then.

[Naryar]

I honestly think than skills should never ever downgrade from one level to another, with the exception of inferior to Novice level skills, for the reasons Sutremaine said.

However, skill rust should have a very noticeable negative effect on the result when the skill is actually rusted.

Like a grand master metalcrafter who has not used Metalcrafting in ten years : he is still grand master metalcrafter but very rusty.
When he crafts again, his work should be at something like proficient level. Then after the job he becomes rusty, which increase his practical skill to something like Expert. and then lastly if he does another metalcrafting job he loses the rusty attribute and works at his original, grandmaster level.

By all accounts his experience should be reduced to the minimum for Grandmaster (plus the two jobs to un-rust him), because we can safely assume he has forgotten the tricks of the trade which are above Grand Master level during the ten years.

Or skill rust should be a function of memory, with low memory dwarves suffering from serious skill rust if they don't work when high memory dwarves barely suffer from it.

[Scoops Novel]

How about temporary skill increases? A dwarf is driven to fight harder and better then he ever has, or fights an enemy he understands well, etc. Actually, that raises the question of how fighting one creature should transfer over to another. Elves are not gremlins after all, and probably not Eldritch Abominations.