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[puke]

Also because the last time DF had a market economy

I really miss that.  With the little shops and merchants that you had no direct control over, the guilds and unions demanding jobs for their industries, and bizarre features like "dwarf slot machines" where under-employed haulers could earn enough to pay rent by pulling a lever a few times.

Really, your forts did transform from what was pretty much a communist paradise into some bizzare union run capitalist monarchy with strange and byzantine behaviors. 

People usually ran communist forts on purpose by never minting coins.  You could get around the single-coin-lag by locking your coin stacks away in a vault, and your economy would basically run on credit... but there were too many other strange behaviors for most people to want anything to do with the economy.

I miss it, but it will probably be a few releases (one to five years, I'd guess) before something like those features go back into the game.

[Gukag]

Well, it's not like noble genocide is unheard of either...
Shouldn't be too much of a problem unless your civ is dead, making you automatically the mountainhome, or your civ sites getting obliterated with invasions midplay.

[Drewigi]

Ignoring discussions about political realities, you would need to mod dwarf fort to get communism, for the simple reason that nobles exist and demand that their living conditions be better than the others, and their labors be lighter. Other than those two things you're set up well for communism, since there is little personal property anyway. Give all dwarves equal quarters and equal access to food and drink, and you're pretty much there.

Deny them rooms and offices, if they demand shit, then just use vampires to accuse them of murder. You can't let the wall collapse.

[Prudent Viper]

I'd love to see people like this visit eastern european formerly communist countries one of these days, so they can explain to any anti-marxists there "No, you don't understand, it wasn't REAL communism. Real communism can exist in a fantasy world generator computer gamer where individuals are nothing more than a simplistic arrangement of code all under the complete telepathic control of an intelligence exterior to their own, so obviously the only reason it doesn't work in RL is because of like, capitalist false consciousness or something."

There you go again, just dismissing a legitimate argument, without giving your reasons why. Just because you don't personally agree with something doesn't make the concept as ludicrous as you think it is.
I feel we're overstaying our welcome here. Back onto the forums original topic now, (though really OP, what did you expect with such a provocative title?) I personally feel that the opposite social structure to a "communist" fortress is far more interesting. A caste system is far more intriguing, where one faction is oppressed by another. Vampire fortresses have the potential for doing this very well, but as seen with Bravemule, it is possible without. An "Animal Farm" fortress is the one I like.

[clinodev]

Clearly we need an 'Aristo-fascist Fortress' thread. There 's a surprising amount of micromanagement needed to ensure the peasants aren't eating up masterwork meals and rare booze instead of the plumphelmet wine and cat biscuit Armok has ordained.

[wierd]

Herein lies the actual crux of the issue with communism.

Humans are NOT wired psychologically for it.  Humans seem to have this intrinsic drive to compete, and gain "status". In a communist setting, (like the REALLY  REAL thing Marx wrote about) there is no room for this. There is no such thing as "Status"-- everyone has equal rights and equal access to resources.

So, to PREVENT people from hoarding resources, and INVENTING something to have status over, ("I have the biggest X!!" / "I have the most Y!" / "My inventions are so much better than HERS, so I'm the ELITE one!" etc) which is often a completely arbitrary thing-- (It's basically what is underneath racism-- something as absurd as skin color used to define status.) a new caste must be created to enforce that equality--- And yes, THIS IS ABSURD. IT DEFEATS THE PURPOSE. (You create a government sanctioned/empowered demographic that really DOES have unequal power and access to resources, for the express action of trying to prevent such a group from forming! ASININE!)

It is this latter, unholy perversion that is what prevents communism as marx envisioned it from working.  It is why communism is synonymous (in the public eye)  with totalitarianism-- without the secret police, the people in the society will not uphold the foundational tenets, and the society collapses --With the secret police, it is no longer true communism.  Humans just cant have nice things.

This does not mean that dwarves have the same "OMG, I just GOTTA be the PRETTIEST PINK PONY OF THEM ALL! The PRETTIEST Gawd Damnit!" neurosis that humans seem to have burned into them at birth. As such, dwarves may well be capable of having true communism. (However, as pointed out by others, the existence of nobles basically demonstrates that they indeed DO have this issue, and therefor, CANNOT have true communism.)

Kobolds, of all things, seem to have the most earmarks of being truly  communist of the races presented in DF-- No leaders, no concept of ownership, no government, no laws, and yet very little if any in-fighting. They have the system already, and do not require regulation to sustain it-- Naturally Communist. The real deal.

Dwarves strike me as favoring fascism, with a strong dictatorial executive center, coupled with strong, state-run industrial power base.

Humans are more feudal society, with a monarchy, but with competing industrial power that works independently of the monarchy (and may even subvert it on occasion!)

And elves are a straight up theocracy, where religion and law are combined into one practicing body with absolute authority.

Due to this, To me, an ideal fortress (for dwarves) consists of a strong nationalist identity, (A civilization), that has strong affiliations with industrial power, (State-mandated and controlled guilds, who maximize government efficiency within their realms of expertise, and who directly influence policy decisions), a strong national military machine,  very strong nationalist pride, and rigid divisions between tiers of society and power hierarchy.  Such a fortress will by necessity have a strong fortress guard that secures and maintains these divisions, and the creation and maintenance of this guard will not be anti-thetical to the underlying ideology behind their form of government.  Naturally, they will believe that their way of doing things is without question "the best there is."

[In so many words, dwarves appear to be fascist, not communist, as pointed out earlier.]

This is why I view the "The underbelly of fascism, when it all goes to hell" type scenario, with the state police holding people against their will inside the nation, and hyper-inflating the nationalist propoganda and nationalist militarism in the face of systemic urban unrest, complete with brutality by the fortress guard for people who would DARE question or countermand the central authority as the ultimate DF fortress challenge.

Such a challenge would:

1) Eagerly take *ALL* migrants, as long as they were from the *RIGHT* civilization. (All aliens are killed on sight for being pollutants.)
2) All migrants that arrive MUST STAY INSIDE THE WALLS, or be shot for being disloyal.
3) All disagreements with central authority on these matters is a sign of festering disloyalty to the nation, and is met with capital punishment.
4) Due to the fusion of industrial power with government power, workers who do not meet requirements for quality and time vs resources consumed, are punished-- where those that can exceed expectation are rewarded-- within the boundries afforded to them by their station.
5) Mandatory service in the national military machine is mandatory. As above, poor performers are penalized.
6) To demonstrate the CLEAR superiority of the nation, militaristic actions are routinely carried out to secure advantage for the CLEARLY BETTER people of their civilization, at the detriment of all other nations.
7) Some arbitrary metric for deriving status must be blown completely out of all sensible proportion, and be used exclusively to determine social status stratification.

[Thormgrim]

Clearly we need an 'Aristo-fascist Fortress' thread. There 's a surprising amount of micromanagement needed to ensure the peasants aren't eating up masterwork meals and rare booze instead of the plumphelmet wine and cat biscuit Armok has ordained.

I try to run my forts like this.
I have widely separated ghettos around my fort.  Each one houses a certain group of Dorfs who usually work in the same industry.  Dorfs that are related by blood are placed in the same ghettos.  Each ghetto has its own dining hall, food stockpile, booze stockpile, clothes stockpile, hospital, etc.  I don't use burrows to restrict movement between ghettos (too buggy) but once they're established movement between them is rare except for the haulers who are always keeping them replenished.

I need to work on making sure that the masterwork stuff only goes to those members of my fort that do the least manual labor and that the lowest quality stuff goes to the ones who do the most manual labor, of course.  I should rename my nobles as "Investment Bankers", too, I suppose.

[notquitethere]

No social order is ever destroyed before all the productive forces for which it is sufficient have been developed, and new superior relations of production never replace older ones before the material conditions for their existence have matured within the framework of the old society. Mankind thus inevitably sets itself only such tasks as it is able to solve, since closer examination will always show that the problem itself arises only when the material conditions for its solution are already present or at least in the course of formation.

Communism properly understood requires capitalism to have reached its full productive capacity: full automation, robots, 3D printers etc., after which there won't be a need for money or a state or employment etc. This isn't so much possible in a fort.

[Drewigi]

Herein lies the actual crux of the issue with communism.

Humans are NOT wired psychologically for it.  Humans seem to have this intrinsic drive to compete, and gain "status". In a communist setting, (like the REALLY  REAL thing Marx wrote about) there is no room for this. There is no such thing as "Status"-- everyone has equal rights and equal access to resources.

So, to PREVENT people from hoarding resources, and INVENTING something to have status over, ("I have the biggest X!!" / "I have the most Y!" / "My inventions are so much better than HERS, so I'm the ELITE one!" etc) which is often a completely arbitrary thing-- (It's basically what is underneath racism-- something as absurd as skin color used to define status.) a new caste must be created to enforce that equality--- And yes, THIS IS ABSURD. IT DEFEATS THE PURPOSE. (You create a government sanctioned/empowered demographic that really DOES have unequal power and access to resources, for the express action of trying to prevent such a group from forming! ASININE!)

It is this latter, unholy perversion that is what prevents communism as marx envisioned it from working.  It is why communism is synonymous (in the public eye)  with totalitarianism-- without the secret police, the people in the society will not uphold the foundational tenets, and the society collapses --With the secret police, it is no longer true communism.  Humans just cant have nice things.

This does not mean that dwarves have the same "OMG, I just GOTTA be the PRETTIEST PINK PONY OF THEM ALL! The PRETTIEST Gawd Damnit!" neurosis that humans seem to have burned into them at birth. As such, dwarves may well be capable of having true communism. (However, as pointed out by others, the existence of nobles basically demonstrates that they indeed DO have this issue, and therefor, CANNOT have true communism.)

Kobolds, of all things, seem to have the most earmarks of being truly  communist of the races presented in DF-- No leaders, no concept of ownership, no government, no laws, and yet very little if any in-fighting. They have the system already, and do not require regulation to sustain it-- Naturally Communist. The real deal.

Dwarves strike me as favoring fascism, with a strong dictatorial executive center, coupled with strong, state-run industrial power base.

Humans are more feudal society, with a monarchy, but with competing industrial power that works independently of the monarchy (and may even subvert it on occasion!)

And elves are a straight up theocracy, where religion and law are combined into one practicing body with absolute authority.

Due to this, To me, an ideal fortress (for dwarves) consists of a strong nationalist identity, (A civilization), that has strong affiliations with industrial power, (State-mandated and controlled guilds, who maximize government efficiency within their realms of expertise, and who directly influence policy decisions), a strong national military machine,  very strong nationalist pride, and rigid divisions between tiers of society and power hierarchy.  Such a fortress will by necessity have a strong fortress guard that secures and maintains these divisions, and the creation and maintenance of this guard will not be anti-thetical to the underlying ideology behind their form of government.  Naturally, they will believe that their way of doing things is without question "the best there is."

[In so many words, dwarves appear to be fascist, not communist, as pointed out earlier.]

This is why I view the "The underbelly of fascism, when it all goes to hell" type scenario, with the state police holding people against their will inside the nation, and hyper-inflating the nationalist propoganda and nationalist militarism in the face of systemic urban unrest, complete with brutality by the fortress guard for people who would DARE question or countermand the central authority as the ultimate DF fortress challenge.

Such a challenge would:

1) Eagerly take *ALL* migrants, as long as they were from the *RIGHT* civilization. (All aliens are killed on sight for being pollutants.)
2) All migrants that arrive MUST STAY INSIDE THE WALLS, or be shot for being disloyal.
3) All disagreements with central authority on these matters is a sign of festering disloyalty to the nation, and is met with capital punishment.
4) Due to the fusion of industrial power with government power, workers who do not meet requirements for quality and time vs resources consumed, are punished-- where those that can exceed expectation are rewarded-- within the boundries afforded to them by their station.
5) Mandatory service in the national military machine is mandatory. As above, poor performers are penalized.
6) To demonstrate the CLEAR superiority of the nation, militaristic actions are routinely carried out to secure advantage for the CLEARLY BETTER people of their civilization, at the detriment of all other nations.
7) Some arbitrary metric for deriving status must be blown completely out of all sensible proportion, and be used exclusively to determine social status stratification.

It's funny really, A. I had a solution about nobles wanting more throwing them in prison for not conforming to communism, And B. just make your post about this challenge into a separate thread.

[Prudent Viper]

Herein lies the actual crux of the issue with communism.

Humans are NOT wired psychologically for it.  Humans seem to have this intrinsic drive to compete, and gain "status". In a communist setting, (like the REALLY  REAL thing Marx wrote about) there is no room for this. There is no such thing as "Status"-- everyone has equal rights and equal access to resources.

By that logic feudalism wouldn't have been possible either. Talk to the illiterate serfs of pre 1700's Russia. How would they "gain status"? In addition, you forget that primitive pseudo-communism has already been achieved by our hunter gatherer ancestors, and the later farming communities.
Finally, you're missing one crucial point of communism. "To each according to his need".   Theoretically,there wouldn't be a point in having status, because no benefits would come with it. Everyone wouldn't have equal resources, everyone would just have access to having their wants and needs fufilled. Just because my neighbour has a flashy car, doesn't mean I need one. In a communist society, If I do need one, I could always borrow his. Because it's not his. Material goods wouldn't be owned by anyone. Note that this is all theory.

No social order is ever destroyed before all the productive forces for which it is sufficient have been developed, and new superior relations of production never replace older ones before the material conditions for their existence have matured within the framework of the old society. Mankind thus inevitably sets itself only such tasks as it is able to solve, since closer examination will always show that the problem itself arises only when the material conditions for its solution are already present or at least in the course of formation.

Communism properly understood requires capitalism to have reached its full productive capacity: full automation, robots, 3D printers etc., after which there won't be a need for money or a state or employment etc. This isn't so much possible in a fort.

There is no such thing as "full productive capacity". There is always more. Capitalism is all about never ending expansion.

[IRON_GAUNTLET]

Can't we just post funny pictures of dwarfs beeing held in confined 1x1 spaces and beat up by the secret police? d:

[wierd]

Herein lies the actual crux of the issue with communism.

Humans are NOT wired psychologically for it.  Humans seem to have this intrinsic drive to compete, and gain "status". In a communist setting, (like the REALLY  REAL thing Marx wrote about) there is no room for this. There is no such thing as "Status"-- everyone has equal rights and equal access to resources.

By that logic feudalism wouldn't have been possible either. Talk to the illiterate serfs of pre 1700's Russia. How would they "gain status"? In addition, you forget that primitive pseudo-communism has already been achieved by our hunter gatherer ancestors, and the later farming communities.
Finally, you're missing one crucial point of communism. "To each according to his need".   Theoretically,there wouldn't be a point in having status, because no benefits would come with it. Everyone wouldn't have equal resources, everyone would just have access to having their wants and needs fufilled. Just because my neighbour has a flashy car, doesn't mean I need one. In a communist society, If I do need one, I could always borrow his. Because it's not his. Material goods wouldn't be owned by anyone. Note that this is all theory.

This is a misidentification; Ancient hunter/gatherers are NOT communist, they are feudal. They are local "Strong man" derived governments, usually secured through physical domination. (linky)

From what we have been able to determine using the limited archaeological means at our disposal, (since such groups predate the use of written language in most circumstances, and thus leave no direct records other than through the nature and types of artifacts they leave behind), many also appear to be local theocracies, where the strongman is also a religious figure.  Again, most certainly not something to confuse with communism.

As for your rebutting argument, I fail to see how pointing out what communism *IS*, and how it differs from feudalism, which it most certainly *IS NOT*, in any way shows that feudalism is impossible;

Typically, a feudalist society comes into being through incremental capture of smaller, "Strong man" based civilizations, as these groups come into contact with each other.. Within the local groups "The pinkest of the pink ponies" clash over who is the absolute pinkest pony of them all-- and that pony becomes the ultimate dictator. This is usually accomplished by force, and where "pinkest" is usually "Strongest (physically".  It typically coincides with a religious component, but this isn't strictly necessary. ("Divine right of kings, other nonsense.)

The argument I made was that because humans are hardwired to fight over who is the pinkest pony of them all, rather than just living near other people because living near other people has certain advantages that come naturally (less predators, reliable access to potential mates, extended social support structure from social interaction, etc)-- that they are unable to achieve true communism.

This in no way prevents the creation of feudalist social hierarchy.  On the contrary-- it basically demands it from such early structures. SOMEBODY has to have final authority when it comes to otherwise intractable social issues, such as issues surrounding the tragedy of the commons.

No social order is ever destroyed before all the productive forces for which it is sufficient have been developed, and new superior relations of production never replace older ones before the material conditions for their existence have matured within the framework of the old society. Mankind thus inevitably sets itself only such tasks as it is able to solve, since closer examination will always show that the problem itself arises only when the material conditions for its solution are already present or at least in the course of formation.

Communism properly understood requires capitalism to have reached its full productive capacity: full automation, robots, 3D printers etc., after which there won't be a need for money or a state or employment etc. This isn't so much possible in a fort.

There is no such thing as "full productive capacity". There is always more. Capitalism is all about never ending expansion.

Except of course, when it physically CAN'T, because resources are NOT infinite.

[Prudent Viper]

We'll have to agree to disagree then. It's late, and I'm weary of this discussion. Let's drop it, ok?

[Samarkand]

All it really comes down to is that people suck. Whether its in communism or capitalism, they always dick around and make a perfectly good system fall to pieces. Luckily, with dwarves we don't have to worry about motivation in different systems, or greedy dwarves hoarding resources and impoverishing other dwarves. Yet. I'm sure Toady has it planned, and then you all can have the same discussion, only actually about a communist fortress.

[CaptainLambcake]

> Right wing Americans not understanding anything outside of their Republican comfort zone

Glad to see even the DF community, which I believed to be one of great intelligence, is succumbing to a zombie siege.
Shame a FTL device can't apply here.

Their parents were raised on the ideals of the right winged, and they taught it to their kids.  Communism=Bad
Only America is free country!