Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Funburns]

This suggestion is about adding the option to display statues' art to the player similarly to the way engravings' art can be displayed. It would add a nifty new level to aesthetic design in fort mode, and perhaps make you do a double take in adventure mode now and then! Customizing statues to individual rooms and locations would be all the more rewarding, and easier to do, remember, and appreciate having done.

Maybe there could be a "Toggle Art Objects" option, as a designation and possibly init default option, similarly to how engravings work for those who would prefer their statues to remain majuscule omega symbols. This would be for the same reason Toggle Engra[v]ings exists as a designation. Alternatively, or in conjunction, there could be a [t]oggle Art option on each statue-object when loo[k]ing at the statue. That could work like forbidding, melting, dumping and hiding via the [d]esignations -> Set [b]uilding/Item Properties interface and the stocks screen.

It occurred to me that the code for revealing statues might be more difficult than simply adding a new building/item property. A statue is an item that is used to create a building, not a static tile of terrain, so the direct analogy with toggling engravings could be flawed. Buildings currently inherit the color of one of their components, but I don't think there's yet any building that changes its symbol based on an item property, so that might need some new code.

If it is easy enough to implement, making it somewhat of a general command ("toggle art objects" instead of just "toggle statues," or possibly replacing toggle engra[v]ings) would leave it open to future player-added objects with dynamically generated art on them such as tapestries or paintings... when that function is put in the raws, which is a discussion for a different thread. Statues would be wonderfully more than enough for me.

The offhand comments in this different thread from way back when was the closest I got to seeing this suggestion posted when I searched for "statues", so I think the idea is worth making a topic on. Anyone else like it?

[Kattaroten]

I support this

[Funburns]

Hurray, support!

I've recently decided to remodel my current fort's throne room/treasure chamber to fit its current inhabitants, and I feel it would benefit from having more thematic-looking statues. ASCII symbols can have degrees of realism, too.

Back in her wilder youthful days as the fort's animal trainer, the Duchess corralled and then managed to befriend a gigantic cave dragon, cursed long ago to remain incredibly skinny (and thus ravenously hungry). She keeps him on a long masterwork adamantine chain in her ominously dark throne room.

She has trained him so that whenever he hears a visitor walking towards the chamber, he stands very, very still, directly behind the throne, in the one gap in the room-spanning line of giant beast statues set into recesses in the walls. When negotiations with the evil despots of the Overbright start to turn sour (as they always do), all she needs to do is snap her fingers...

[RabidAnubis]

Agreed!

Or even just to be able to view it while planted would be nice.

[peskyninja]

Try "t".
but the letter the statue represents should differ from others, something like being on a white trim or other thing.

[Eneverforgets]

I came here to suggest this too.  It would be cool to have the ability to have the same icon you get for engravings on statues.  Like I have a great green glass statue of anchovies in the middle of my dining hall.  I'd love for that to be a green "α"  And yes, the anchovies are surrounded by the anchovies (for those who were curious).

[GreatWyrmGold]

Try "t".
but the letter the statue represents should differ from others, something like being on a white trim or other thing.

Sounds neat. I must say that something like this sounds simple (probably isn't, though) and would add nicely to the interface without detracting from the aesthetics.

Only potential issue: What happens when the statue is deconstructed, or if it's not constructed to begin with?