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[GreatWyrmGold]

Evolution takes millions of years to get much of anywhere, except with bacteria and such. A bit off-topic, but when people screw up evolutionary theory...it bugs me.

Newer theories on evolution state that it happens in leaps and bounds, typically due to cataclysmic events, or mass migrations.  E.G. a small population of an existing species has a mutation where it can digest some fungus, which the rest of the population cannot.  Then a disaster occurs, killing most of the species food source, except that fungus.  So, the only surviving members of the species are the ones who can digest that fungus.  Their offspring are likely to have that same mutation, and of course, those who don't have it will die.  In a couple generations, that population is comprised only of the members with that mutation.

The older theories on evolution being slow seemed to rely on some magical genetic knowledge of what is "better". Evolution is a product of random mutation, coupled with some reason why that mutation is seperated, either by death, or migration.  At that point you have a new species.

If you want more than a single little mutation, you need to wait a while. Whether you move a foot an hour or an inch every 5 minutes doesn't matter if you need to go half a mile.

Still despite that, due purely to the number of dwarfs in worldgen and the small time scale, it would be very rare to play in a world where evolution was visible.

I wouldn't say it'd be rare, domensticating animals or selective breeding could change things in term of decades or centuries, depending on creatures. Environmental changes can drive it a lot through selective pressure, though it's more likely to lead to extinction.

And that's not considering microorganisms that's got it's generations in hours or less

While those aren't really good example of long-term evolution, it's still similar pressures and changes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domesticated_silver_fox
This is pretty notable, at least to me, for half century of breeding something wild into tame.

On other hand, you could come up with very different strains of crops within decades with dedicated effort and enough of variety of related plants to work with, as I believe have been done with tomatoes and corn.

Aside from breeding, which is different than natural evolution and not what I was talking about, any kind of genetic change would probably need more than a thousand years to get much past normal variation and therefore worth simulating.

[Klitri]

I like this idea, a lot.
While reading I just imagined being locked up in my fortress with the best candy hybrid weapon in the entire world of *insert random world name*.
And while I totally agree, I hope it does not go to far with the whole gun thing (Which was probally a metaphor..). 1+

[Damiac]

I was only disagreeing with the millions of years.  I agree evolution wouldn't have any noticable effect in a DF timescale.  Of course selective dwarf breeding is already practiced by some !SCIENTISTS!

[GreatWyrmGold]

Of course, the exact level of change would determine how much time you'd need and the situation. Reproductive isolation of a small population on an island? Could be a few tens of thousands of years, give or take maybe an order of magnitude. Major phenotypical changes so a layman would recognize it as a new species? Probably millions of years. It would also depend on the species, come to think of it...

[Starver]

DF is medieval game and eventually you would run out of things to discover if you stay inside the time frame. That doesn't go well with the open ended nature of the game.

(Deliberately avoiding the evolutionary derail.)

The one thing about Civilisation[1] that annoyed me was the "Future Tech 1, 2, 3..." endings at the top end of the research tree.

DF, of course, is famously procedurally-led, so perhaps there could be an effectively infinite "new discovery" possibility.  I might as well at this point refer to the "novel weapons" idea that occasionally comes about.  From various components (hilt/handle/strap, chain/pole/chord to connect, sharp/blunt/pointy heads, one-ended or two-ended, one-handed or two-handed, projectile firer and (if so) different types of projectile, each element contributing qualities (including encumbrance, awkwardness and possibility of self-harm for the untrained) theoretically novel weapon-types (of varying usefulness) could be invented 'on the fly', either by tasking a weaponsmith to have a go at making something or through a mood.

With a similar principle behind it, workshops might be able to be spontaneously developed that create originally impossible objects (e.g. diamond helmets, as a bad example) or even newly procedurally-created object-types as in the possible "two axe-heads on the ends of a chain" weapon the component-based weaponry system might allow for.  If siege engines are ever made mobile, putting this kind of wheel on something vital for a fishery workshop and powering it with the bit of a pump a dwarf uses (or some other power source) could make an automated "fish hoover and gutter" that can be hauled to the river and flash-process fish.  Or imagine a mining machine moving under its own steam (and made of magma-resistant materials could make for an interesting device, depending on whether you can control it or ensure it stops before it breaches things it shouldn't or topples over the edge of a cliff in the magma-tube).

But I don't want to be prescriptive (or proscriptive), and I just see 'inventions' coming to light regularly, but sometimes they're useless (a bone-cutter-and-polisher workshop (automatic or otherwise) to create low-grade bone-based gems that don't really add value, perhaps), much as with moodcrafted items, and sometimes they're valued beyond measure.  It might also need some work to integrate the skill-types available (some dynamic ones, perhaps, developed along with the invention they would use... "Urist McNewfangled the Obsidianiser" or "Urist McUseless the Fluffcollater").

OTOH, does this fit in with the game theme?  Not sure.  I'm putting forward my 'vision' not because I think it should happen, but merely because if it does happen, I don't want to end up with deterministic development paths (a tree of development, yes, just procedurally dynamic rather than pre-mapped) and "Futuretech" cop-outs at the end of it all.


edit: [1] Whoops, sorry, "Civilization"...

[Damiac]

Well... I supposed if any game could manage procedurally generated new inventions, it's dwarf fortress.... but I wouldn't hold my breath...

[GreatWyrmGold]

Once the laws of physics are better-simulated, it should "work."

[TheFryingWeegee]

Could invent gunpowder.

[Aichuk]

Apparently this is planned. 

[GiglameshDespair]

Apparently this is planned. 

A nice little necro. This thread was somewhat old.

In DF talk 8, Toady One says that gunpowder is possible...

Where we were on that is that we are not against coding up the code necessary to get that kind of thing to work; at the very least just blowing the crap out of things. Maybe not making a gun or something but blowing the crap out of things. That probably wouldn't be in the most vanilla vanilla Dwarf Fortress

...but probably wouldn't be in most default Dorf Fort.

[CaptainLambcake]

I like having everything available to me, I wouldn't like this.  The fact that it's planned upsets me.