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[gunpowdertea]

I meant telepathy in the "can view things at a distance" way. I know telepathy isn't really the right word for it, but I can't remember what the correct word is.

Television ("far-looking")? ;p

[Matoro]

There's always a question wheter or not the dwarves actually get as much information as we do. We can check description to see what is engraved there, but we can also see thoughts and feeling of the dwarves.

What if little details in the engravings are known only to the artist (and thus to us, since we as overseers know everything our dwarves know)? If there's a engraving with human Human McHuman striking down Goblin McGoblin, different dwarves understand it very differently. Some of them know history and thus might know the persons decipted in the art - others might have heard things from the artist himself. And some poor uneducated dwarves probably see just a human striking down a goblin.

Quite simply, if we - as an overseer - get the details, it doesen't mean that dwarves do get the same details too.

[Vilkku92]

I meant telepathy in the "can view things at a distance" way. I know telepathy isn't really the right word for it, but I can't remember what the correct word is.

Television ("far-looking")? ;p

Clairvoyance?

[Larix]

How detailed the engraving descriptions are in fort mode is governed by the init option [SHOW_ALL_HISTORY_IN_DWARF_MODE:YES/NO]. If you switch it off, you presumably get exactly those vague descriptions, like "this is an engraving of a dwarf. The dwarf is burning." with no further mention of who the dwarf was and why (or whom) they were burning.

[Dwarf4Explosives]

I meant telepathy in the "can view things at a distance" way. I know telepathy isn't really the right word for it, but I can't remember what the correct word is.

Television ("far-looking")? ;p

Clairvoyance?

Yup, thanks. It was on the tip of my tongue and I just couldn't remember it.

There's always a question wheter or not the dwarves actually get as much information as we do. We can check description to see what is engraved there, but we can also see thoughts and feeling of the dwarves.

What if little details in the engravings are known only to the artist (and thus to us, since we as overseers know everything our dwarves know)? If there's a engraving with human Human McHuman striking down Goblin McGoblin, different dwarves understand it very differently. Some of them know history and thus might know the persons decipted in the art - others might have heard things from the artist himself. And some poor uneducated dwarves probably see just a human striking down a goblin.

Quite simply, if we - as an overseer - get the details, it doesen't mean that dwarves do get the same details too.

This makes a lot of sense.

[TheHossofMoss]

I always thought they drew in hieroglyphics to some capacity. As it always seems to say "This is a masterwork engraving: It depicts __________ happening." At least with engravings. Memorials may be different, I can't remember what exactly they start off with, at the moment.

[Max™]

I was pretty sure they carve a little multidimensional diorama depicting exactly what happens, down to sub-microscopic scales, and "read" it with their beards as they are the only tools fine enough to probe all the details.

An engraved wall which is 1x4 urists in size doesn't have engravings on all sides, it just has four engravings, each taking up 1 urist of space.

Now, various testing has shown that a room is more valuable when engraved from inside than outside, so the engraving themselves have an orientation, presumably looking from the wrong side loses some of the effect, but yeah, I don't think of them as simple wall carvings.

[SixOfSpades]

Anybody that has the labor to engrave memorial slabs can write apparently, but no dwarf has the "reader" skill you need to read things in adventure mode.  It's just not consistent now.  I'm not sure when that will change.

Definitive Answer Obtained. Dwarves are 100% literate . . . with the possible exceptions of children, lazy nobles, and those lacking hands.

[Urist Tilaturist]

Please tell me why dwarves need hands to read. They do to write, but that is not the same skill (some people can read but not write).

[SixOfSpades]

Please tell me why dwarves need hands to read.

Per Toady's quote, guaranteed literacy seems dependent on the ability to write, not read. I haven't yet had a handless dwarf, but I assume that they can't engrave slabs. In fact, strictly interpreting Toady's quote, no dwarves can read . . . but the vast majority of them can be given permission to write.

[Urist Tilaturist]

To fix this, just make the reader skill trainable in some way. Dwarves then need to learn to read, which would give the children something to do (apprenticeships and education should be greatly expanded in future).