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[FallingWhale]

Actually, I'm complaining that I need to control them.

That's our point.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Did you even read my posts? As I've stated, my problem is with dwarves wasting resources, not "missing out on anything". Now, I can keep micromanaging and killing off the ones that grab things I want to save, but my suggestion, as originally posted, is that wood, bone, and stone crafting should be restricted once enough (I feel 5 is a decent number) dwarves are legendary in those fields.

Strange moods are supposed to be uncontrollable. You're complaining that you can't control them. Diagnosis: working as intended.

Actually, I'm complaining that I need to control them.

You know what I hate about the HFS? You need to kill it!
You're missing the point of strange moods. Dwarf takes items, dwarf makes artifact, you marvel at the result and wish the item was more useful. Losing is fun, whether you lose a fortress or a forgotten beast skeleton. (Why do you need those forgotten beast bones? They're not even worth a lot!)

Jesus, I don't understand how half the people have interpreted my first post as "I don't think moods are useful". It's not that I don't like dwarves getting moods, it's just that after I've had a dozen legendary crafters crop up, I simply don't need any more. Now, with the way the game currently works, I either let the mooder go on if he/she's using resources that I don't care about, and kill the ones who do. However, my suggestion was that after I have 5 legendary bone crafters already, I simply do not need more unskilled dwarves going into that profession. I like encrusting my goods, and I like masterwork, but all you need for that is ONE legendary dwarf, not five, not ten, not twenty, and that's the way my fort is going.

It's not horribly detrimental as I can simply assign them to do other jobs, but I figured if the game slowed down or halted moods in a field that's overcrowded, opting instead to strike less populated professions with a mood, then we wouldn't have to micromanage every single detail (which I understand is a part of the game and half the reason I play it, but why not cut down on parts that are simply tedious?).

First off, why are we misinterpreting your first post?

I've had my fort for a little while now, and I'm starting to get irritated by upstart dwarves constantly getting moods for professions that I already have several experts in...
...
I've just recently moved all of my craft shops into separated, locked rooms so I can kill off moody dwarves if they're consuming a resource I consider precious.

Yes, that doesn't even hint at finding moods irritating and useless. I understand that you don't see why you need so many bonecarvers. Well, a few reasons:
1. You don't have enough bone bolts.
2. It gives you an excuse to slaughter cats.
3. You really don't. DF is like real life: You take what the RNG throws at you and roll with it. The difference is that people in the real world don't ever go crazy to create awesome, legendary lead axes or what-have-you.

I'm just not impressed enough with a subjective problem that you've misidentified anyway to think it warrants screwing up an otherwise good thing.

Whole stacks being consumed for single bone projects is a bug.  Fucking up strange moods isn't a solution to that problem.

Weenog you sure have a funny attitude when it comes to game improvement. Looking at all of your recent, inflammatory posts on other topics, however, I'm just surprised you haven't devolved to name calling yet.

My, oh, my. Someone thinks that the best way to fix a bug ISN'T to screw up another, functioning aspect of the game in a way that has no ability to fix most of the problem? He must be a troll!
In case you can't tell, that was sarcasm. If you are saying he's on the verge of name-calling, actually explain why his post is trolling you and don't assume that we'll agree with you just because he doesn't think your little anecdote suggests a solution that weenog decries as not helping the base of the problem. If you've got a bush that you need to kill, do you trim at some of the twigs and cut yourself while doing so? No, you hack at the root!

[Bohandas]

I think that the optimum solution to the OP's problem would be a wider range of possible focuses for unskilled dwarves who get strange moods; Masonry and Carpentry in particular would make perfect sense as being at least as likely as the craft skills, and stone and wood are relatively easy to come by.

-----------------

On a different note

Randomness and lack of control is also another factor I enjoy about this game, but when you get your seventh legendary bone carver in a row, it just starts to get tedious.

Well, the thing about that is that that kind of thing makes you question the randomness.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Maybe the game wouldn't throw two moods of the same skill at you in a row? That seems like a simple solution.

(Also: Probability theory suggests that, given a sufficiently large data set, any possible event, even if improbable, will eventually occur.)

[Carp McDwarfEater]

I like big forts (well over 200 dwarves) and have five or six dwarves minimum for every skill, with few exceptions. I wouldn't mind have 4 or 5 legendaries. Why the fuck do moods piss you off so much anyways? The solutions people described to you only take a few seconds to do. You might as well complain that having to flip a page in a book is "tedious". And like others have said, moods are supposed to be random, pain in the asses that occasionally give you something good. It's like the RNG; it's random, you shouldn't be able to control it.

And weenog is on the verge of namecalling? Okay, go back and read your own posts, and try to see how people are going to interpret them. Maybe if you had a nicer demeanor we'd read your posts better.

[weenog]

He's even newer than me, he's upset that I'm not diplomatic about saying "you're wrong," and a recent posts check at that time was mainly participating in the thread with that open source troll.  No big.

I do like the idea of opening up the possibilities for unskilled strange moods.  Maybe add not havnig two of the same kind of mood in a row, too, it's always annoying when you get half a dozen possessions in a row and no skill bumps at all.

[scionreaver]

He's even newer than me, he's upset that I'm not diplomatic about saying "you're wrong," and a recent posts check at that time was mainly participating in the thread with that open source troll.  No big.

I do like the idea of opening up the possibilities for unskilled strange moods.  Maybe add not havnig two of the same kind of mood in a row, too, it's always annoying when you get half a dozen possessions in a row and no skill bumps at all.

Fair enough, I was just being upset at your being undiplomatic, and it's true that the other side of the argument is just as valid in terms of how the game shouldn't be only following what I want its behavior to be, and that it should be somewhat out of my control. However, implying that the system is correct as is is just as false a claim as mine stating that the system needs to be fixed. Even if it's "good enough", why wouldn't you want it to be better?

As for being newer than you, this is probably true in regard to the forums, but I've played every major version of DF since .23 extensively, before z-levels. I'm not a newcomer to the game's mechanics at any rate.

I really do like the idea of broadening unskilled moods. It's a far better idea than capping moods; increased variety is almost always a preferable alternate. Maybe a mix of this and GreatWyrmGold's suggestion, tweaking the rate at which moods occur based on the previous mood (if I just saw somebody make an amazing breakthrough in their field, I'd try to stake my name somewhere unexplored, rather than edge them out).

I like big forts (well over 200 dwarves) and have five or six dwarves minimum for every skill, with few exceptions. I wouldn't mind have 4 or 5 legendaries. Why the fuck do moods piss you off so much anyways?

Moods as a whole don't piss me off. This is what you have been misinterpreting repeatedly. It's that the same exact mood happening over and over again  that bothers me. I don't like the frequency with which the game's engine has been selecting who to be mooded (I have many, many eligible other dwarves to be mooded, but in the several years this particular fort has existed, it continues to choose only unskilled dwarves and children). Yes, this being a pain in my ass CAN be part of the game, but this isn't a pain because I'm "losing", it's a pain because I'm bored of the exact same thing happening over and over again. I take back my suggested solution, it's not a very good fix, but this idea of freeing up the possibilities for moods really does appeal to me.

[GreatWyrmGold]

I think weenog's point was that messing around with moods wouldn't really help with the bone-stack-size problem.
Maybe we could try something like this:
1. No two moods may have the same skill used. Dwarves with, say, the Bonecrafting skill have that skill effectively removed from the calculations when choosing the mood.
2. The number of legendaries is taken into account when assigning skill weights to various skills, maybe something like 5%/legendary. So, 10 legendary bone carvers means that, after a non-bonecarving mood, bonecarvers would have their effective weight halved. This would provide a "soft cap" on legendaries from moods, as well as a hard cap around 20. Once all moodable skills have 10+ legendaries, this count would be reduced by the number of the lowest legendaried skill, if that makes sense. I doubt it would ever come up, but it's worth worrying about.
3. Unskilled dwarves have non-craftsdwarf options. Perhaps they'd have a chance of any moodable skill, with craftsdwarf skills having higher chances and forging skills having lower ones (for instance). Or maybe currently non-moodable skills should get kinds of moods assigned to them.



I also appologize for being undiplomatic. I thought you were starting to sound like a troll. I'm glad to see I was wrong.

[Ubiq]

The best way to do it would be to just set it up so an unskilled dwarf can have a Strange Mood in any labor that can produce an item with a quality level rather than just limiting it to Bone, Stone, and Woodcrafting. At the every least, expanding the possibilities to include the other Craftsdwarf skills like Leatherworking, Clothesmaking, or Glassmaking would give a few more options since the three default options are categories where supplies are either fairly limited, better used elsewhere, or both. Legendary Leatherworkers or Clothiers are vastly more useful than the rest and Glassmakers are rare enough that getting one might give your fort something that it didn't have previously.

[GreatWyrmGold]

...
3. Unskilled dwarves have non-craftsdwarf options. Perhaps they'd have a chance of any moodable skill, with craftsdwarf skills having higher chances and forging skills having lower ones (for instance). Or maybe currently non-moodable skills should get kinds of moods assigned to them.
...

I hope I don't sound rude, but will you please read other peoples' posts before posting? (Or did you just not realise there was a second page? That's happened to me before.)

[Bohandas]

Wait... What?

[Silverionmox]

...
3. Unskilled dwarves have non-craftsdwarf options. Perhaps they'd have a chance of any moodable skill, with craftsdwarf skills having higher chances and forging skills having lower ones (for instance). Or maybe currently non-moodable skills should get kinds of moods assigned to them.
...

I hope I don't sound rude, but will you please read other peoples' posts before posting? (Or did you just not realise there was a second page? That's happened to me before.)

I concur, and I add that the both of you might benefit even more from glancing at the poster's name.

[GreatWyrmGold]

I hope you don't mind me saying that this thread is becoming increasingly confusing. Erm...actually, I can't think of anything that would help, since it seems that I'm confusing everyone as much as I'm starting to be confused.