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[GavJ]

Sorry to triple post, but no other threads were bumped between anyway...

Also, a convenience feature for embark map hunting would be to just list the metals etc. that are available, and possibly the layer types (e.g. igneous extrusive, sedimentary, etc) at embark. There's not even a roleplaying reason not to do this -- how are the dwarves supposed to somehow know that there are "deep metals" but yet not even know what the metals are, or the basic geology of the rock strata is that is clearly visible right near the surface?

Either they're prospecting or they're not. The weird "Well we know some info but inexplicably don't know other info that would be obtained in the exact same way" business doesn't add anything to the game other than frustration and lots of unnecessary map loading and abandoning.

I'm sure this detail has been suggested many times, but it goes along with the rest of the thread.

[Nostrolo]

Regarding the graphic. I like the one on the right, and think it would be neat to see that kind of topography in the game, but you shouldn't be able to just paint your embark site. Dwarf Fortress is about surviving in a harsh and deadly world, not the world bending and shaping itself to compensate for the skill of the player.

[Zanzetkuken The Great]

It is under my understanding of the devlogs that Dwarf Fortress is aiming not to be a fantasy game, but a fantasy world simulator.  While this idea does sound good, it does not fit within the goals of the development effectively.

[Dirst]

First of all, 3/4 of the idea CLEARLY isn't inconsistent, as simply having a finer grained terrain customizer has nothing to do with whether the world has a greater context or not. You might say that the manicured embark site is "unrealistic to occur in a world," but be that as it may, it can still just exist anyway and function just like any other embark site in world context. The dwarves just happened to stumble upon a garden of Eden (or a garden of Pain, depending how you designed it...), simple as that. The only complaints you could have here are role-playing ones, not code inconsistency or feature-limiting ones. And roleplay is in the eye of the individual player.

It'd be funny to check in Legends mode and see that your Perfect Embark Site™ has a Goblin Tower on it... which has changed hands via conquest about 800 times in a 500 year history.

[GavJ]

Regarding the graphic. I like the one on the right, and think it would be neat to see that kind of topography in the game, but you shouldn't be able to just paint your embark site. Dwarf Fortress is about surviving in a harsh and deadly world, not the world bending and shaping itself to compensate for the skill of the player.

*eyeroll* It has nothing to do with skill. I've been playing long enough to easily survive on a 5 layer aquifer glacier or whatever with no metals at all and a single pick and some pigs, if I have to.

The issue is that once you learn how to do that, "harsh environments" almost instantly lose all their charm, because there's nowhere to go from there, other than very icnremental silly self-restrictions that just feel arbitrary and unfun to me personally. In fact, ironically, the LACK of realism at the limits of the game are precisely what stop harsh environments from progressing into further challenges. For example, the fact that undergroudn tiles are always 10,015 urists of temperature makes it pretty much irrelevant what the surface temperature is. You can embark on a fat boilingly hot map, and as long as you can dig a tile before you die, you're good for the rest of the game, and it's no longer any different than any underground only fortress after the first 5 seconds... You can't even mod the game to MAKE it different if you want to.

Now, I just want to build cool forts, elaborate traps, megaprojects, and !!science!! labs, and tediously trading for 5 bars of iron per year does not lend itself to being able to do those things without severe, unfun annoyance. Or, for example, going to the boring trouble (to me) of buildign the same old hum drum pump stack or piston EVERY stupid map. It's always the same. That's boring. Just give me a volcano and let me try out my new magma experiments right off the bat.

For NEW players, they'll have fun building their first pump stacks, etc. Hence I'm not suggesting changing any default situation. Only a fairly high end world customization non-default tweak.

It is under my understanding of the devlogs that Dwarf Fortress is aiming not to be a fantasy game, but a fantasy world simulator.  While this idea does sound good, it does not fit within the goals of the development effectively.

Your premise does not lead to your conclusion, in my opinion.

What is it about painting my own embark map that is NOT simulating a fantasy world?  I'm painting my fantasy world (or a portion thereof, the rest being generated according to Toady's fantasy)... and then simulating it... Thus, I'm still simulating a fantasy world.

It's not even any compromise to roleplaying -- I'm simply ensuring that a location exists that I like. Once embark begins, it's just part of the world like any other. And, being a FANTASY world, there aren't really any rights or wrongs.

[Manveru Taurënér]

I'm sure it's something that might eventually get implemented when the game is feature complete and all, but seeing as that's going to take another 20 years minimum I wouldn't hold my breath tbh :>

(really, looking at how Toady seems to prioritize what to put in when there's no way something like this would be anywhere but bottom of the pile)

[Zanzetkuken The Great]

It is under my understanding of the devlogs that Dwarf Fortress is aiming not to be a fantasy game, but a fantasy world simulator.  While this idea does sound good, it does not fit within the goals of the development effectively.

Your premise does not lead to your conclusion, in my opinion.

What is it about painting my own embark map that is NOT simulating a fantasy world?  I'm painting my fantasy world (or a portion thereof, the rest being generated according to Toady's fantasy)... and then simulating it... Thus, I'm still simulating a fantasy world.

I probably could have com up with something longer, but school was messing with the class period length to take an online test they weren't adequately prepared for, so all people not in the classes taking the test were not allowed online and one of the periods I could have posted from being allowed online ended earlier than I expected, so I just a sent horrifically simplified form off.  Now that I am home, I'm too far into 'meh' to adequately frame a response.  I'll post a more detailed response later on, if I remember to do so.

[neblime]

I feel like this kind of thing belongs as an option not as the default, all new players should generate a random world to at least see how glorious it is before they start customizing.  as such this probably lies in the infinitely distant realm of past 1.0 features.

[GavJ]

I feel like this kind of thing belongs as an option not as the default, all new players should generate a random world to at least see how glorious it is before they start customizing.  as such this probably lies in the infinitely distant realm of past 1.0 features.

You are aware that this customization tool already exists? Go to advanced world gen, tap "e" then tap "p" - there's a huge complicated hand drawn world painter tool that lets you paint all your own elevations and blah blah. Already in the game with a UI and everything. You can choose which ones override the associated steps at world gen. CLEARLY Toady cares or cared about this level of customization quite a lot to put that whole thing in, and as an early alpha feature.

I am mostly simply asking to have a brush size that goes smaller on an already existing painting tool - down to embark tile instead of the smallest brush which is world tile.

[WJLIII3]

I totally agree with the OP. To everyone saying "it's not the way a game is meant to be played" I can only offer "welcome to PC gaming, guys." There's only one right way to play a game, and that is "the way you most enjoy it" If I want to play Kobold Camp, or play Assassin's Creed as a sociopathic murderer with no allegiance to the cause, I can, and I will, and I should. FURTHERMORE, as a PC gamer, I don't even care if the game actually allows me to do it, because I have every right to abuse and manipulate any code I find on my own computer, as long as I don't distribute it for profit. It's like you're telling me I can't hit you with a shovel because they're made for digging. A) I can too, and B) I even sharpened one edge, so maybe YOUR shovel is for digging, but mine is for digging and hitting.


However, on the other side, if you want it, make it yourself, guy. Toady doesn't have time to waste on designing yet another feature he'll have to change every time he changes any other feature. That's "finished product" stuff, not Alpha 0.3... stuff.

tl;dr, great idea, but you'll have to do it yourself or wait a decade.

[GavJ]

However, on the other side, if you want it, make it yourself, guy.

Sounds great! As soon as he makes the code open source, or makes worldgen have a modding API, I'll get right on that.  Otherwise, how?

I'm not aware of any utilities that can reach in and stop worldgen and manipulate elevation etc. during that process. If you know of one or somebody who has figured out the binaries enough to know how, lemme know and I will seriously look into doing this. I doubt anyone has, though, as that would be a lot of effort for something you probably couldn't legally distribute later on.

Otherwise, you can already change the state of tiles in open games, like dfHack's layer changing tools, etc. But it seems to still have odd limitations, and this is making it way more difficult than it needs to be, since you'd then also have to redo all the layering of grass and soil and rock and blah blah blah. Hence you'd want to get to it during worldgen, after elevation but before it does the other stuff, so that it would just fill all that in realistically on its own.

[Melting Sky]

No, this suggestion undermines concepts behind Dwarf Fortress.
1: You aren't supposed to be given everything you'll need for a site, otherwise all forts would play out the same way.
2: This is supposed to be a generator, not a canvas. Dwarf Fortress will eventually be greater than almost any person at making fantasy worlds, so why should a mere human influence anything beyond blunt topology?

I was about to make a similiar comment. The whole point of the world generator is to throw the player into an unknown and unique situation to which they must adapt and become part of the greater story of the world. There are already some significant cheat tools for custom building worlds for those who wish to do so. I definitely don't think it really gels well with the core gameplay to include these sorts of tools in the main game. Tinkering with the advanced world gen is a game in and of itself to me. It's a bit like playing sim earth.

To me it just seems a bit like suggesting that Toady add a button to the game that kills every enemy on the map. Sure it could be added but it just undermines the entire game play mechanic behind having hostile units as part of the game to begin with. I think cheat tools are best left to the modders rather than being added to the core game. If somebody doesn't like some aspect of the game like enemy units, or world generation then they can always mod these things out themselves without it affecting the core game play for everyone else.

[GavJ]

There are already some significant cheat tools for custom building worlds for those who wish to do so. I definitely don't think it really gels well with the core gameplay to include these sorts of tools in the main game.

Okay, that's nice, but I, and more importantly Toady, disagree with you -- He has already included one of those tools you're talking about in vanilla dwarf fortress, so obviously he does consider it an important aspect of the core game, since it was added pretty early on in Alpha. And it looks like it took a significant amount of coding effort and consideration, at that.

Perhaps you are not aware of it, but go open up your game, choose "advanced world generator," then hit "E" and then hit "P" and it will take you to the tile-by-tile custom world painter, where you can make precisely the elevations and rainfall and everything else you want. In fact, most of the third party tools you are referring to (like perfectworld) are essentially just plugins or GUI upgrades for TOADY'S world painter tool.

The problem is merely that the resolution only goes down to the world tile, whereas fortresses exist more on embark tiles. I am quite simply asking for a finer grained resolution on an existing world editing tool in the game. Not asking for any sort of significant new feature...

[MDFification]

I though the World Painter currently wasn't functioning. Anyway, it is in the Development Arcs to improve the players ability to make custom maps, although I see nothing about specifically improving the resolution that the painter can use.

As for this being against the spirit of the game - well, I'm personally all for being forced to adapt to challenges, but as it currently stands an experienced player will already gen a world specifically to create the kind of sites they want, search for those sites, and settle exactly what they already had in mind. So people who want a specific site at the expense of immersion already have the power to create that specific site, but it's a bit hit and miss and rather more time consuming than it needs to be.

On another note, regarding the suggestion of modders getting rid of enemy units or world generations - you might not be aware of this, but Toady included the option to easily toggle on/off invaders in the init file. Worldgen is something I really like and would prefer to keep, but I see no reason to refuse making already existing in-game options more finely tuned, although it probably won't be worked on until worldgen itself is in a more complete state.

[GavJ]

World painter works fine, I use it almost every day in the most recent promoted build.

as it currently stands an experienced player will already gen a world specifically to create the kind of sites they want

This is a pretty crucial point here. I WILL play on the site I want. It's just a matter of me genning 50 worlds vs. 1 world to get it.