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Author Topic: Information that should be on the status menu.  (Read 946 times)

Aquillion

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Information that should be on the status menu.
« on: April 02, 2009, 03:22:24 pm »

The status menu that you can call up with 'z' has a lot of odd choices for information to be shown.  There's also a lot of stuff that could be useful there, but isn't...  in general, it'd be nice to have one screen with a lot of important stats on it that the player can easily check regularly with one keypress.  Right now, it has some stuff that (while useful) isn't something you're going to check regularly -- the breakdown of every type of dwarf, for instance, or the breakdown of where your various types of wealth are.  Those things are nice and should be on a subscreen somewhere, but there are usually more important things I'd want to check.

Most importantly, instead of listing the different types of dwarves based on skills, what I'd want is a screen that shows me how many dwarves with a certain job enabled on their v-p-l screen I have.  That will let me easily see holes in my labor.  (Of course, if this was on a subscreen, it would be even nicer to be able to select one v-p-l labor and see a list of dwarves with that labor sorted by skill or something, with everyone who doesn't have that labor assigned listed after that...  and make it so you can turn the job on and off just by selecting a dwarf and hitting enter.  But that's something else.)

Another thing I'd love to be able to see is the number of empty barrels / bins / bags in my fortress.  Those are important, and it's nice to know when I'm running low before job cancellations happen and things start spilling over my stockpiles without a container.

A list of the number of 'homeless' dwarves -- ones without a room assigned / rented -- would be good, too.

I feel like I've mentioned this before, but it would be nice to be able to get a list of the most common happy / unhappy thoughts in your fortress, sorted by how common they are.

Some of these things could require a specific noble, of course...
« Last Edit: April 02, 2009, 05:42:09 pm by Aquillion »
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BirdoPrey

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #1 on: April 02, 2009, 03:43:25 pm »

I have nothing to add to this, great idea. seconded like crazy
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zchris13

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #2 on: April 02, 2009, 04:39:13 pm »

THIS IS THE BEST IDEA I HAVE EVER SEEN.  Seconded like crazy.
I have nothing to add to this, great idea. seconded like crazy
This man has the right idea.
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Sordid

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #3 on: April 02, 2009, 04:45:56 pm »

As for dwarf listing, I'd also like to be able to have a breakdown of how many dwarves are happy or unhappy, and a list of dwarves sorted by their happiness.
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GlyphGryph

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #4 on: April 02, 2009, 05:33:03 pm »

Quote
As for dwarf listing, I'd also like to be able to have a breakdown of how many dwarves are happy or unhappy, and a list of dwarves sorted by their happiness.

This.

Although I think all the ideas are great - information, easily, accessible, is a good thing!

I think the easiest thing would be to have a "Dwarfs" page with various display options.

Total dwarves
By Title (1 Miner, 1 Foodie, 1 Champion, 5 Volcano Fodder)
By happiness(39 estatic, 1 miserable, etc.)
By jobs enabled (40 hauling, 2 mining, 1 smith, etc.)
By room ownership (bedrooms)

with the standard expand option. Sort of like in the item screen, so you can see the individual named dwarves in each section.
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Aquillion

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #5 on: April 02, 2009, 06:15:49 pm »

One other thing that might be worth having somewhere:

The number of free and filled spaces in each type of stockpile.  Granted, this will miss out on custom stockpiles a bit, but it'd still be useful to get a warning when my stockpiles for food are completely full, or when my stockpiles for wood are totally empty.
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tsen

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #6 on: April 02, 2009, 06:38:09 pm »

This supersedes my other preferences... This would be AWESOME.
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Valdemar

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #7 on: April 02, 2009, 06:40:02 pm »

Great ideas, all. Another area that could be improved on is the food display. It would be great if prepared food could get its own entry. Maybe we could even subdivide each category into edible/inedible, something like:
Code: [Select]
          Edible    Inedible
Meat      99        99
Fish      99        99
Plant     99        99
Seed      99
Drink     99
Prepared  99
("Inedible meat" would be fat, tallow, etc )

This would give a much better overview of the total food stores of the fort. It would, however, take up more vertical space than is currently available, so the screen would have to be significantly rearranged.

Another miscellaneous idea: Show the number of free bins and barrels on the screen somewhere.

Chthonic

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #8 on: April 02, 2009, 06:46:06 pm »

Granted, this will miss out on custom stockpiles a bit

If custom stockpile profiles could be named and saved (something suggested in the elsewhere) you could have your custom stockpiles listed, too.
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Craftling

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #9 on: April 02, 2009, 07:23:17 pm »

List legendary skilled dwarves aswell.
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Sordid

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #10 on: April 02, 2009, 08:22:04 pm »

List legendary skilled dwarves aswell.

Meh, you can spot those easily enough by their flashing name. :P
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AncientEnemy

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #11 on: April 02, 2009, 09:50:31 pm »

I agree with this suggestion and wish to subscribe to your newsletter

Twad

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Re: Information that should be on the status menu.
« Reply #12 on: April 03, 2009, 12:18:47 pm »

o yes! OH Yes! Good ideas here.
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