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[Boea]

It helps if you contemplate an "Other" that is "RADICALLY OTHER", and not just "Slightly other".
[..]
The issue at hand, is how those change when they become exiled, and what other effects that may have on them.

Does that help any?

I should have stated this a bit more clearly but, in the sense of egotistical to its opposite, and for lack of better word, communism.

And then the last part about the general 'innateness,' all I can say, outside of the raws, it feels ham-fisted.

[SirHoneyBadger]

I'm using the method of building up infrastructure in Fortress mode, to simulate technological growth and innovation.

This applies both to constructing a series of gradually more advanced, and more specialized, buildings, and also individual items, where you may have to mine, smelt, and forge different types of iron, and collect different fuels, and other necessary materials, before combining, and then recombining them, to make artisanal steel.

I specifically refer to the Japanese swordsmithing method as a baseline, since that's the method I'm most familiar with, but I'm researching and planning on adding a wide variety of high-end steels, and other intricate metals (Every metal currently in the game will get an overhaul, so that each is as interesting, and hopefully useful, as possible. Even lead will have unique and valuable use as a component of training-weapons.), that will aim to simulate techniques from around the world, and around history, as well as more fantastic methods.

This will be labor-intensive, and make it challenging to set up production of high grade steel on a large scale, but that should make trade much more interesting, create a "labor-sink" for excessive migrant waves to fall into, and give you several Fun choices on whether to equip a fairly large defensive force of dwarfs with lower quality gear, or to focus on a small but elite squad of shining knights.

It will also make it much more vital for you to carefully manage your most skilled artisans, since a Legendary weaponsmith or armourer is going to be extremely valuable when you're forging some ridiculous Neutron Slade uber-breastplate for 'The Emperor of All the Dwarfs, Defender of the Bat-Man Faith, and Protector of the Gnomish Territories' that took 3 years for your entire Fortress to prepair.

[Neonivek]

Dwarves "Just knowing" how to make steel is not an inherant knowledge in a dwarf but rather how the game decides to start dwarves off.

Technically the Romans knew how to create steel.

[wierd]

I'm using the method of building up infrastructure in Fortress mode, to simulate technological growth and innovation.

This applies both to constructing a series of gradually more advanced, and more specialized, buildings, and also individual items, where you may have to mine, smelt, and forge different types of iron, and collect different fuels, and other necessary materials, before combining, and then recombining them, to make artisanal steel.

I specifically refer to the Japanese swordsmithing method as a baseline, since that's the method I'm most familiar with, but I'm researching and planning on adding a wide variety of high-end steels, and other intricate metals (Every metal currently in the game will get an overhaul, so that each is as interesting, and hopefully useful, as possible. Even lead will have unique and valuable use as a component of training-weapons.), that will aim to simulate techniques from around the world, and around history, as well as more fantastic methods.

This will be labor-intensive, and make it challenging to set up production of high grade steel on a large scale, but that should make trade much more interesting, create a "labor-sink" for excessive migrant waves to fall into, and give you several Fun choices on whether to equip a fairly large defensive force of dwarfs with lower quality gear, or to focus on a small but elite squad of shining knights.

It will also make it much more vital for you to carefully manage your most skilled artisans, since a Legendary weaponsmith or armourer is going to be extremely valuable when you're forging some ridiculous Neutron Slade uber-breastplate for 'The Emperor of All the Dwarfs, Defender of the Bat-Man Faith, and Protector of the Gnomish Territories' that took 3 years for your entire Fortress to prepair.

Most of the "more interesting" steel and industrial metal alloys require metals that dwarves are very unlikely to be able to produce... like vandium, titanium, aluminum, chromium, manganese, magnesium and the like.

For instance, "stainless" steel is made with chromium in it. Chromium is highly reactive as a free metal, and somewhat difficult to refine.

Here's a valuable resource for chemical compositions of many industrially used alloys.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Point missed

This is not helpful. Please elaborate and be painfully specific. I was operating under the presumption that Kohaku is an educated and intelligent individual, and has already been exposed to the workings of economic systems, including natural economic systems, like food chains. How would it be appropriate to rub his/her nose in that, given I am operating on the assumption that they are educated about that topic already, and that I don't want to be condescending?

Kohaku's point, if I understand it, was that saying "Ecomonics!" as a solution to a problem doesn't actually say or solve anything.

(Concerning racism being necessary)
Why?

Again, see the very purpose of including "others" in fiction. The purpose of including others is NOT to show how they are "just like us!", they exist in fiction to show what WE "are not."  Couple that with the directly linked section. The consequence is that any given group will show innate racial preference (implicit racism) for beings it views to be like itself, over beings it does not view to be like itself.  Consider: should adorable kitties be allowed to vote? How about chimpanzees? Neanderthals? Perhaps Denisovans?  The mere fact that the answers to those questions are different, illustrates the point. Humans are innately racist agains "animals", because they "aren't like us".  The more "like us" they become, the harder it is to answer that question. Elves are like Neanderthals, in that they are like us, but can never really integrate into our society. They are purpetually doomed to the "other, not like us" category. This means the racism issue will have to be present, to be correct.

...What does it say that I can't even remember what the original suggestion was at first?
How is racism required for technological development?

(Relating to homogenized, 100% random cultures)
I don't see a problem.

Again, "Others". It negates the very purpose of incuding others, if you turn them into "sames".
One of the gameplay mechanics that players have grown to love about this game, is the endless, relentless, and brutal assaults by "vile forcess of darkness".  When the pacifist goblins of early .31 came out, the forums were swamped with people demanding to know why, because that mechanic was fundementally broken. A peaceful, rainbows and sunshine world lacks drama, and is boring. Toady needs to avoid producing boring worlds.

True enough, but "random" is the enemy of "homogenous." There would be "Others," not all "Sames." 100% Random--which is, incidentally, not what Kohaku, I, or anyone else I'm aware of is suggesting--would just add to the interest and Otherness, not to mention mean that having some violent cultures would still be about as guaranteed as they are now.

Those are not incompatible viewpoints.

I didn't say they were! The argument was against a false accusation; that I wanted cookie cutter dwarves to begin with-- that instituting racially induced restraints made dwarves into such cookie cutter civs to begin with. I was arguing that it does no such thing, and that failure to introduce such restraints made them identical to humans, just short and with beards, because the proceedural generator would treat them the same.

But why would it?

(Regarding pacifist goblins being anomalies)
What makes you think they won't be in the new system?

By failing to account for the "driven to cruelty" aspect of their race, for starters. Without it, they are just humans with green skin to the worldgen algo. Goblin berry farms would be a very common occurance, because that is more stable than constantly being at war. The equasion MUST be rigged, or else it won't work properly. The nature of that cruelty should be RNG'ed, but their base alignment should not be.

What makes you think it won't be accounted for?

The differences between human and dwarven biology aren't that severe

Truely!? And here I thought that dwarves died when they didn't get alcohol, and experienced mysterious siezures in their adult lives resulting in either insanity, or the creation of a unique artifact! Not to mention that the weakest dwarf is 25% stronger than the weakest human, and potentially totally superhuman strength at the peak end... Or how they can survive much more serious injuries, and heal faster/better without treatment.  yes. Clearly, dwarves don't have any seriously culturually altering biological differences. (/Sarcasm)

Dwarves don't die from alcohol loss, they suffer from withdrawal. Strange moods are more of a supernatural psychological effect than anything physiological--it's certainly not a seizure. Dwarves do have greater strength and liver size, but that's hardly anything that would make a giant change in culture, especially as the former would balance out the smaller size. And the things about better survival applies to DF!humans as much as DF!dwarves.

(Relating to homogenized characteristics)
What makes you think Kohaku wants that?

The premise that he/she wants to rely excusively on the RNG, without poking it first, and argues against such poking, insisting that doing so is racist. The assertion that racial traits are too general to impact culture, despite clearly and profoundly altering the intrinsic needs of the races in question. And of course, the over-arching subtle stink of wanting to view (and make) all the races equal.

Strawmanning.

Missing kotaku's point; saying it shouldn't always be that way.

You clearly don't comprehend that systems that can't turn a surplus are doomed to failure, due to entropy, and that this occurs in completely natural systems, without sapient actors as well. It can't work (for long) without it being in place. That is, unless you have an ingenious example up your sleeve, in which case, by all means share!

....Huh? How is your idea the only one in which a surplus is run?

The only one I can even remotely think of is a paracitical relationship, like supporting a tapeworm.  This is outside the scope of a "trade" relationship, however.  Traders are quite correct to shout that they can't trade at a loss.
You could, I suppose argue that "altruism" could be a situation where trading at a loss is expected, but altruism is never what it seems. Altruism is really just accepting a lower efficiency, to etain an expensive asset from being lost, and becomes a value decision. Eg, allowing 75% of the population to die from plague is more expensive than devoting the kingdom's resources for a year into containment and treatment. Likewise with preserving a neighbor; you preserve them now, as a gamble that they will be valuable trade partners later.  It is still a long term profit motive, and therefor not really trading at a loss, and thus not true altruism. If you look at any system claiming altruism, you will always find a profit motive, or you will find resource depletion and collapse.
If you want a system that doesn't result in dead civs, you need to make that system discourage profitless trading. It's an unfortunate reality.

...
I don't think we're talking about the same thing.

How so? They deal with a world that responds over geological time. They have a biological clock with the hour and minute hands missing. They don't die of old age, and don't appear to suffer any age related decline, so they shouldnt get senile. 

They do, however, die. They live longer than humans, but certainly not for millenia--something *cough*dwarvesorgoblinsorsomething* always seems to cut their lives short.

The world in their retreat is like a timewarp. Days pass, but little changes. As such, the 'last time' the logging happened would seem like yesterday, especially if the elves only visit friends and family every century or so, and consider the passing of years like we consider the passing of days.

It depends on the psychological makeup of the elves, and how we want them to be in that respect, which comes back to my original argument: their nature will play a profound role in how their culture develops. How we define that nature is supremely important!

Just because you live for centuries doesn't mean that a century isn't a century to you. It just means you know you're likely to be around in the next century.

Yes, goblins are going to behave differently from some standpoint, as they have natural distrustful and violent tendencies, but you know what?  That's not culture.  Elves loving nature isn't racial, it's cultural.  Elves raised in human cities really are mostly just pointy-eared humans, but for some emotional and physiological differences.  The respect for nature part, however, is not genetic, it's cultural

They are culture influenced dirrectly from biological differences

That's possible. It's also possible that it's not. We're getting to nature vs. nurture here; come back in a few centuries, maybe we'll have an answer to that conundrum by then. Until then, there's not much point arguing it.

First, I want to reiterate that you not only can't consider one's "racial" culture nothing but a starting point, so that a dwarven nation that is isolated from all other races will have a different culture than a dwarven nation that has contact and intermingling with all other races, but that all cities/forts/whatever within those nations will also have their own cultures

The Dwarven Isolation is caused by their biology. Exactly what would happen if it was an entire race of Albinos.

How so?

An elf among dwarves (especially an elf-king among dwarves) may have higher agility, and maybe a talk-with-animals ability (which may or may not change, I've seen Toady talk about changing that so that it's part of following the druidism thing) but they are not in connection with the druidic spirit of nature that runs elven cultures

Their connection to nature is bestowed to them by the nature of their very being and not because of any higher being's allowance. It is as inherant to them as humans have arms.

Then explain Cacame.

Meanwhile, a dwarf in an elven culture does follow those teachings, which includes the whole not cutting down trees thing and not using metal

An Elf wouldn't follow all the resulting culture from Elves. I already distilled what I thought was the fundemental aspects of a elven society that cannot change due to their biological makeup. Which was that their connection to nature skews the line between sentients and animals.

Why is it part of their biology? That's like saying that bacon and eggs for breakfast is part of Western culture because of Caucasian biology.

The way I would implement it is, if a dwarf is so inclined to research (or a research job is created), then at the appropriate workshop (smelter for instance) and if they have the appropriate skill (in this example some form of smithing

My personal oppinion is that research is something that occurs outside fortress mode. mostly because research is a vague concept. If it was something like studying bodies, with a doctor, so you can use medical proceedures on them in the not so distant future... I can see that.

Why couldn't a played fortress discover stuff?

If it is "You armorsmith, RESEARCH!". Technology should be a concequence that naturally occurs within a fortress otherwise.

Agreed.

Goblins, by the nature of the way they act, are more likely to follow the whims of a single "great leader", for better or for worse.  Their Might Makes Right dogma means that any time the infighting is quelled, there is a relatively strong central power that can greatly influence the direction of the culture, but at the same time, this quelling may be nigh-on-impossible without some sort of powerful unifying force (like a demon or massive external threat). This can mean pretty massive social changes in a short period of time one way or another, similar to the potentially quite destructive changes wrought by the changing of an emperor of China

It mostly means that goblin society and even their form of leadership is very unstable even when a strong leader occurs. Where how stable it is depends entirely on its leader.
I made a suggestion a while ago that Goblin attacks should occur less frequently after you slay a leader because of infighting to become the new leader.

Once a leader who can keep the position is chosen, his/her absolute power can cause great changes, in one direction or another.

Goblins are, ultimately, unlikely to ever be a trading partner

Ehh, I could see it. They would be a temporary trading parter and prone to betrayal, afterall there really is no such thing as loyalty to the goblins only favortism, but it could be done.

Unlikely, not impossible.

Elves are a much harder sell, since the most defining aspect of their culture is still fairly vague.  That is, the Nature Spirit

To me the nature spirit is not the requirement for Elves to function, nor is it dramatically different then other dieties other then it is a diety of a land mass (It is also why I consider Titans to be true incarnate gods)

The "nature spirit," the biggest aspect of their culture which is different than the other races', is pretty undefined at this point. Is it a deity? A philosophy? A demon/titan/elf in disguise?

This may, again, be eventually made part of culture/entity, not race, by Toady.  That would mean humans raised in elven lands might eventually start talking to animals, and elves completely cut off from their heritage, or who have completely sunk into decadence or otherwise shun their nature cult would lose it.

Honestly my view of it is that it is inherant and more stemming from the Elven existance and any "source" is purely in world mythology no different then saying the Human intelligence was given to them by Kukomando the god of Wind. It isn't something that can be divorsed from an elf and removing it would be similar to removing a major trait from an entire race or animal as it is deeply seated in their psychology.

Certainly the ability could be magically given to others... but in the same vein you can give intelligence to an animal or life to a corpse.

And you can make a human unintelligent or a living thing into a corpse, even both of those have biological bases and would therefore be harder to "undo" than talking to animals...assuming that it wasn't an entirely learned trait.

Though this is all interpretation really.

Agreed.

[wierd]

*WILL NOT RISE TO THIS BAIT A THIRD TIME.

[Neonivek]

Then explain Cacame

He existed before the current Elves, Threetoe's stories do not hold absolute dominion on the game (hense the parts where it deviates), a

[NW_Kohaku]

Strategically speaking, I chose to ignore that last post rather than litigate it, as there is more chance of my position being understood just going past those points than trying to force the issue.  Since we're already past this point, it's better not to force a return to it.

I always just assumed the gods had given steel making as a gift to the dwarves. It's not supported in game right now but the kind of thing I expect to see in the future. If innovation does get added it could at least be used to form the basic level of technology in the world. It could even spice things up later.

This is a good part of why I think there should be varying "flavors" of iron and steel, as it creates a chance for "technology improvements" that are really just refinements of the steel-making process to make a more refined form of steel. 

That is, you can make a "god's steel" at year 1, but it's a cruder form of steel, a little more brittle, doesn't quite have the edge of "true steel" and then a "fine dwarven steel" might come after that as a technological advancement. 

(This would also allow for humans to create a "crude steel" rather than just pure iron, and would also allow for different iron ores to have different impurities that would change what final steel you wind up with.)

Considering as we're talking about magic, there's also the possibility of including alchemical dwarven technology that lets them create some pseudo-magically superior metal.

That would apply to this:

I'm using the method of building up infrastructure in Fortress mode, to simulate technological growth and innovation.

This applies both to constructing a series of gradually more advanced, and more specialized, buildings, and also individual items, where you may have to mine, smelt, and forge different types of iron, and collect different fuels, and other necessary materials, before combining, and then recombining them, to make artisanal steel.

I specifically refer to the Japanese swordsmithing method as a baseline, since that's the method I'm most familiar with, but I'm researching and planning on adding a wide variety of high-end steels, and other intricate metals (Every metal currently in the game will get an overhaul, so that each is as interesting, and hopefully useful, as possible. Even lead will have unique and valuable use as a component of training-weapons.), that will aim to simulate techniques from around the world, and around history, as well as more fantastic methods.

This will be labor-intensive, and make it challenging to set up production of high grade steel on a large scale, but that should make trade much more interesting, create a "labor-sink" for excessive migrant waves to fall into, and give you several Fun choices on whether to equip a fairly large defensive force of dwarfs with lower quality gear, or to focus on a small but elite squad of shining knights.

It will also make it much more vital for you to carefully manage your most skilled artisans, since a Legendary weaponsmith or armourer is going to be extremely valuable when you're forging some ridiculous Neutron Slade uber-breastplate for 'The Emperor of All the Dwarfs, Defender of the Bat-Man Faith, and Protector of the Gnomish Territories' that took 3 years for your entire Fortress to prepair.

Most of the "more interesting" steel and industrial metal alloys require metals that dwarves are very unlikely to be able to produce... like vandium, titanium, aluminum, chromium, manganese, magnesium and the like.

For instance, "stainless" steel is made with chromium in it. Chromium is highly reactive as a free metal, and somewhat difficult to refine.

Here's a valuable resource for chemical compositions of many industrially used alloys.

Dwarves could use some sort of alchemy to learn a trick to creating nickle-steel, or even some exotic alloy like many mods already allow players to forge that isn't based upon reality at all.  (I recall at least one that involved using a hundred blocks of microcline as just one ingredient in making a special type of steel...) Especially if we're talking about a "gift from the gods," then some sort of slightly magical steel makes some sense (next to the cotton candy...) although care should obviously be taken with keeping things from being ridiculous (like 100 boulders of microcline to make one bar of metal) and ruining the mood of DF. 

In fact, I also remember that Toady previously talked about making all metals procedural at some point.  We would then be throwing all real-world history out the window at that point, and could start making "Wicked Doormousium" alloyed with "Cave of Pantsium" to make the technologically unlocked super-metal "Jubilant Wicked Pantsdoormouseite".  (Assuming, of course, that our procedural language scripting remains as amusing as ever...)

[NW_Kohaku]

I like this idea, because it provides a way for fort mode contribute to innovation, but still allows innovation to be rare.

However there are two problems:
A, inventing something should be tied to using something similar.
B, Inventions should be realistic, and not just +1 armor streangth or something.

Actually, I think we need to look at innovation from a different perspective.

Generally speaking, "technological progress" comes not from some lone genius inventor guy getting some world-shaking idea, but from gradual improvement of the tools and techniques you already have, as well as producing the funding and will to apply old technologies in new ways.  (I.E. Stonemasonry doesn't improve in the Middle Ages without people willing to spend tremendous sums of money on castles and cathedrals. In fact, the whole reason so much technological progress, such as the Internet, came out of military research spending isn't because weapons inherently make great pacifistic technological advancements, but simply because that's where all the funding for research that the governments, the only spenders willing to dump that kind of money into future development, put all their money, and the rest of the world has to live off the accidental side-benefits of defense spending.)

Or, in other words, Research and Development often produces much more on the development side.

Consider, if you will, the nature of computer processing power, and it's actually fairly reliable for decades development of doubling in power/speed every couple years while dropping in price - that wasn't a new invention every few years, that was mostly just refining the tools they already had.

Hence, I again go back to my model of breaking every advancement up by what industry they are related to, and making demand for that industry give rise to more specialists in that industry, and making technological development a matter of having a dense enough concentration of trained specialists working in that field with enough demand to fund innovation.


We also need to work on what it means to be "skilled" at jobs in this game.  Part of the problem is that we have this absurd system where a legendary in a job can instantly produce whatever the finished product is.

SirHoneyBadger, notably, has that mod that makes producing anything obscenely roundabout and a little too micromanagement-heavy for most people, and it won't be adopted for general gameplay for certain, but there is also something worth pointing to in that model, if emulated only in part, since we can also look at ways to break out of strict integer math where one boulder equals one stone earring. 

I wrote a thread specifically on the topic of breaking down integer boulders and logs, although it really needs stacking rules written before it can become implemented.  (Although I still don't understand why Toady drags his feet on that topic...)

If we start working from a position where legendaries don't work significantly faster than novices, and instead focus more on ideas to make wood burning into charcoal take less wood for more charcoal if you are a legendary. 

Technological progress could then be something along the lines of improved looms that produce cloth faster without Legendaries rendering such improvements moot.  Or, they could have less waste of material, or produce a greater number of products from the same material.  (TWO earrings from a giant boulder!)


I also go back to what I said a few pages ago, and say that technology could also be much more important in worldgen cities than player forts, where it could determine what skill level the worldgen workers are going to have, and up their production rates dramatically, as well as enable, for example, aqueducts to be built when they have a certain architecture level in their city. 

Meanwhile, fortress "technology" of that kind would simply be when the player learns how to use the tools at their disposal properly, without needing some sort of progress bar to tell them that they can now start building pump stacks.

[kerlc]

Sooo.... In order to technologically progress to steel, you'd have to commision incredible amounts of iron to be smelted, and the dwarves would figure out that carbon-enriched iron is much harder and sharper, and would try to re-create the best possible way of enriching it with carbon again, leading to better and higher-grade steel?

[wierd]

Steel is not straight forward.

The conditions to discover artisinal steel would require that the fuel used be either premium charcoal, or be refind coke.

Natual coal usually contains far too much sulfur to allow steel creation, and produces very brittle iron goods instead.

(*My sister's hobby is blacksmithing. I can supply pictures of her forge on demand. We usually use black walnuts in place of quality coke or charcoal, because they have a similar energy density, and are sulfur free, and cost nothing in my area, being abundant and native. DF does not allow this as a fuel source option however. The problem with the walnuts is that they produce too much ash, and are not good for steel work. For iron work however, they are just fine.)

[Reelya]

I dunno, Egyptians managed to live through several thousand years without inventing anything that would change their lifestyle significantly. So did Romans.

This really isn't true at all. There was constant development all through the 1000's of years of classical Egyptian civilization and Roman as well. When you say "without inventing anything" you're making a categorical statement, which even one single counter-example disproves. One thing we have to remember is that the entirety of the state archives of Egypt were destroyed during the Christian era of Egypt (the burning of the Great Library), so we really lost the entirety of 1000's of years of accumulated Egyptian research. Even still, with what we know from archaeology it's not really accurate to say that Egypt around 2000BC had the same tech as ~1AD, completely not true.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Egyptian_technology

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

1500BC - glassworking invented in Egypt
~300BC - the water wheel invented in Egypt, from precursors developed over several centuries:
~300BC - Lighthouses invented in Egypt

Recent scholarship suggests that the water wheel originates from Ptolemaic Egypt, where it appeared by the 3rd century BC.[45][46] This is seen as an evolution of the paddle-driven water-lifting wheels that had been known in Egypt a century earlier.[45] According to John Peter Oleson, both the compartmented wheel and the hydraulic Noria may have been invented in Egypt by the 4th century BC, with the Sakia being invented there a century later. This is supported by archeological finds at Faiyum, Egypt, where the oldest archeological evidence of a water-wheel has been found, in the form of a Sakia dating back to the 3rd century BC. A papyrus dating to the 2nd century BC also found in Faiyum mentions a water wheel used for irrigation, a 2nd-century BC fresco found at Alexandria depicts a compartmented Sakia, and the writings of Callixenus of Rhodes mention the use of a Sakia in Ptolemaic Egypt during the reign of Ptolemy IV in the late 3rd century BC.[46]

One thing that comes to mind with these sorts of theories is the pro-European bias of scholars from the 17th - 19th centuries clouding textbook accounts of technological development in the ancient world (anti-african and anti-semitic/middle eastern in nature). One example is that it's claimed in some sources that Egypt only got iron tools ~200BC, yet more recent archaeology shows that Egypt was working Iron in large quantities about 1200BC, in similar quantities to the supposed-source of iron working, Anatolia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Age

[SirHoneyBadger]

Most of the "more interesting" steel and industrial metal alloys require metals that dwarves are very unlikely to be able to produce... like vandium, titanium, aluminum, chromium, manganese, magnesium and the like.

For instance, "stainless" steel is made with chromium in it. Chromium is highly reactive as a free metal, and somewhat difficult to refine.

Here's a valuable resource for chemical compositions of many industrially used alloys.

I'm well aware of the level of metallurgy and chemistry involved, and the required technological sophistication and infrastructure (and even the safety issues, which I'd like to address), and that some of what I want to mod into the game simply wouldn't be possible for a medieval smith, but I quite honestly plan to handwave some of what will be possible as "Dwarfs can do supernatural things with metal".

I don't want to make it easy for the player to do the improbable or impossible, and most things will be done in a way that sticks closely to realism and science-based (atleast logic-based) methodology, but I will be including metals and ways of manufacturing and alloying them that a 15th century human smith  just couldn't produce or replicate, and that other species in the game will not be able to duplicate.

Some of this will be done through alchemical processes (I plan on doing a lot with alchemy), while others will be just be magic, plain and simple.

The main concern is making the game more interesting, more varied, more Fun, in a sensible but not obsessively accurate, way, with the goal here being, not to pile on variety for it's own sake, but to add more situations and choices of how to play/how to run your Fortress, and ultimately, to maximise replayability.

Balanced gameplay will always be a priority. You won't see whole armies of tungsten-clad dwarf legionnaires running around with molybdenum pikes, or anything similar, coming out of even a very mature Fortress, although even the cheapest dwarf metal products will always have a slight quality advantage over most other species in the game.



NW_Kohaku: Actually, I'm just in the process of making a series of mods--4 of them are in the works so far--that I guesstimate will maybe take 20 years to complete.

And I don't want production to become so nightmarishly intricate, or need so much micromanagement, that it takes away from the enjoyment of the game. Building up infrastructure and going off in new technological directions should be something you can choose to explore and focus on, but in the meantime you should still be able to survive and do lots of interesting things, without having to invent a steam powered trip-hammer, or distill sulfuric acid. It's only as you achieve more and more financial success, that you will start to need to put greater thought into defending your Fortress, which may in turn steer you towards more effective measures, but I want most of the new techniques I want to add to the game to be something you can disregard and still have an entertaining experience.

I also don't think I want there to be a time when you feel like you've stepped into the dwarfen industrial revolution, or anything like that, so volumes of production will be carefully restricted. 

I want players to be able to do some fairly amazing things, but only a fraction of everything that's possible in a single game, and even then you should only be able to do or create really powerful things in small quantities, for limited times, or atleast very sporadically (like those intermittant waves of early Chinese porcelain production). But, if you make good decisions, and manage to survive and flourish, then when you get your Fortress to some sort of vague pinnacle where you decide you've "won", I want you to have, not only a sense of success and accomplishment, but a feeling that dwarfen creativity and determination can be every bit as powerful and magical as a dragon in flight.

[kerlc]

Steel is not straight forward.

The conditions to discover artisinal steel would require that the fuel used be either premium charcoal, or be refind coke.

Natual coal usually contains far too much sulfur to allow steel creation, and produces very brittle iron goods instead.

(*My sister's hobby is blacksmithing. I can supply pictures of her forge on demand. We usually use black walnuts in place of quality coke or charcoal, because they have a similar energy density, and are sulfur free, and cost nothing in my area, being abundant and native. DF does not allow this as a fuel source option however. The problem with the walnuts is that they produce too much ash, and are not good for steel work. For iron work however, they are just fine.)

Huh, I didn't know that.

Blacksmithing sounds like an awesome hobby to have.

So, to create something resembling steel, you'd need high-grade charcoal (produced by your skilled charcoal-makers), and making charcoal something that needs to be revamped.
edit: I see charcoal has its own topic. So, i removed my rant on what making charcoal should look like in DF.

[Neonivek]

Generally speaking, "technological progress" comes not from some lone genius inventor guy getting some world-shaking idea, but from gradual improvement of the tools and techniques you already have, as well as producing the funding and will to apply old technologies in new ways.

Well remember that mythology often had a way of giving credit to single inventors.

For example the creator of the loom was Archimedes (As well as Talos, the Crete Maze, and mechanical wings)

The inventor of the flute was Apollo. (gods bestowing technology should be a possibility)

The difference though is that Dwarf Fortress allows the same events to take place but treats them realistically.

A Genius inventor who created something far outside the technology of the current civilisation... could never catch on because the building blocks simply do not exist.

Not to mention that forgetting advances is also a possibility.