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[TaintedWalrus]

Alright everyone, I had a super fun tiny idea that can be pretty cool (at least it seems pretty cool in my head). Say the caravan comes and you look at the items they have, and you see a crate. You buy it and there is an option to open. When you look inside you can get all different sorts of items, could be very bad stuff, or could be very good stuff. It could give the game a chance that you can get some amazing stuff in the very beginning of the fortress.
Well that's the tiny idea that I had and I just wanted to put it up here and see if it is a good idea, or a really bad idea.
Cheers!
-The Walrus

[Tristan Alkai]

My opinion is that this sounds a little too gamey.  A "mystery crate" (read: inexplicable treasure chest) probably weakens the simulation, and at least weakens my suspension of disbelief. 

It also goes against most of the current behavior of caravans.  When I am considering buying something from a caravan, I know what I'm getting, or at least will know after I look it up on the wiki.  I might have trouble predicting in advance what the caravan will bring, but I can know with great confidence what they did bring after they are at my depot. 

A related issue is the logic behind the contents.  If it's awesome, why are the merchants not trying harder to sell it for what it's really worth?  If it's junk, why should I buy it?  A crate would always be a gamble, and this one is guaranteed to hurt someone's pocket book. 

I am not against the idea outright, but my opinion is that it contrasts too sharply, and (more importantly) in the wrong ways, with current behavior. 

[Salmeuk]

As Tristan has thoroughly explained, a mystery crate would be a highly illogical good for traders to carry. With DF intending itself as a sort of fantasy-simulation, where your meant to dive deep into the reality of the generated world, such a player-oriented object would break immersion for a lot of people.

You would probably be hired at valve in a heartbeat, however.

[Captinfannin]

I agree with the two statements above.

Possibly something like this could be done if it was presented differently. For an example, a bad example that I have the same problem with as I do the crates, there could be a lottery that you could apply to for trade goods every year that would come back the next year with your prize. Like, I said that was a bad example, it still interferes with the immersion. FLEDGLING FORTRESS LOTTERY!! The Ring of Fishes is doing a HUGE giveaway! For only a ☼gabbro scepter☼ your fortress could win 1,000,000 Dwarfbucks and a Artifact Adamantine Short Sword! Only available at select caravans. Many will enter, few will win.

Another idea, much more deviant from the original idea, would for the king to send semi-randomized gifts to your fortress on the dwarven caravan based on how much offerings you gave to him last year?

[AceSV]

I don't know, if you've ever played a rogue-like with beatitude or unidentified items, you've probably sold merchants a lot of unidentified merchandise hoping that it's junk.  If Dwarf Fortress were to enter an era where the whimsy of gods caresses the crafts of mortal hands where only the dumb and the brave would dare to touch a potential artifact with their bare hands, then it would make perfect sense to receive such goods in caravans, or at least from tavern visitors.  And indeed, it seems that an upgrade to religion looms near on the horizon.  But I admit, it wouldn't make sense for normal items. 

Unless we're introducing dwarven mafia.  "Look, buddy, when the mountain-don asks me to get rid of a crate, I got the good sense not to ask "why, what's in it?"  I got no idea what's in the crate.  But hey, if you want the crate, you can have the crate.  50 thingies.  Maybe it's something good, maybe it's something bad.  As long as the mountain-don doesn't find out, it's good for me.  You want it or what?" 

[kontako]

I'd imagine this to be something more for adventure mode, where the players choices impact their character directly.
I feel as if it would make more sense if individual merchants attempted to gamble your dwarves out of their hard earned money with the random items, that is after things such as gambling and the economy is introduced as gameplay mechanics.

[dudlol]

I saw the title and imagined immovable bins that needed to be constructed within stockpiles but could hold loads of stuff >.>

[FrankMcFuzz]

This could be an alright idea for when traders can be solitary individuals, rather than representing a site or civilisation. Hopefully an eccentric businessmen update is planned (This is a joke, edit because I was worried people would take me seriously. Solitary individual traders that offer unique goods and eccentric businessmen who offer strange deals is an okay idea though.)

[Zarathustra30]

I am not a proponent of selling mystery crates as mysteries, because, as previously said, it would be too gamey.

However, selling a crate full of "golden trinkets" that, in reality, were spray painted sounds like a Fun thing, especially if caught. What is fantasy without a good swindler?

[dudlol]

To make a more useful reply here, it doesn't always make sense that a trader would be willing to break up the contents of a bin to sell you. Perhaps you can buy crates of specific items (which might read [crate of iron bars]) for less cost than individual items, but at the cost of being forced into buying many of the thing at once.

Crates of stuff like that would likely be limited to food and some crafting materials. Possibly also low quality weapons (a crate of iron swords or bolts or whatever), but nothing fancy.

Edit: It could also justifiably be slightly less specific. A crate of bronze toys for example. Or a crate of decent quality swords (which would contain swords of a couple different materials and of a small range of mid tier qualities).

[Naryar]

That's a stupid suggestion.

When people trade they trade for something, they (most of the time) don't trade for the fun of it. They just don't buy random stuff, especially when they don't know what there is inside.

Sure there is this modern concept of surprise packs and stuff, but this is just a violation of trading customs.

Trading is about being honest about the merchandise. Otherwise it's called a scam.

Of course there SHOULD be dishonest traders, but that's not the point of this threa.

Besides I know if some asshole trader sells me a mystery crate worth 1000 urists and all there is inside is a bunch of wooden musical instruments, I'd just sic my militia on him. Well, if only i could put my militia on nonlethal and lethal settings...

[Tristan Alkai]

I saw the title and imagined immovable bins that needed to be constructed within stockpiles but could hold loads of stuff >.>

I would totally use something like this.  This wouldn't even need a special new item, just a button in the (B)uild menu to place the current barrels (or pots) and bins.  Like everything else in the Build menu, this would provide the ability to control exactly which tile the container wound up in, and the material it was made of, rather than leave those decisions up to the fickle whims of whichever hauler failed to shirk the task of placing it.  I can already think of several situations that would be simplified immensely by this ability. 

1. Ensure that a stockpile intended to hold trade goods uses only Elf-safe containers (that usually boils down to excluding wooden barrels in favor of large pots of ceramic, glass, or stone).  I can do this with drinks using stockpile give and take commands, but goods hauled to barrels, rather than placed there by a reaction, (flour, for example) are unreliable at best. 

2. From the wiki page on "Using Bins and Barrels"

Metal barrels are supposedly better for food stockpiles because they resist vermin; unfortunately there is no good way to convince your dwarves to allocate metal barrels for food storage aside from using them exclusively.

3. I'm not so sure about the individual items, but containers still seem to be placed in typewriter order.  Placing one or two workshops near the northwest corner of whatever stockpile they take from is probably not too much of an issue, but doing it consistently is another story.  Containers in the build menu would allow me to place containers next to the workshop, rather than the other way around, and still avoid watching my dwarf walk to the far side of the stockpile to find things that should be closer. 

4. When using magma-safe containers near the magma workshops (just in case something goes wrong), heavy metal bins placed by a build order will not be hauled away from their stockpile (a recurring problem in my current fort, most obviously when I wind up emptying my dye stockpile).  They would simply be hauled into position once, then left in place, so their greater density (and thus weight) is a lot less of an issue. 

Selling a crate full of "golden trinkets" that, in reality, were spray painted sounds like a Fun thing, especially if caught. What is fantasy without a good swindler?

I think I could get behind this idea, on the condition that only solitary "eccentric businessmen" (as covered by FrankMcFuzz) tried to pull the stunt.  I expect a bit more reliability from merchants that do represent a site or civilization. 

To make a more useful reply here, it doesn't always make sense that a trader would be willing to break up the contents of a bin to sell you. Perhaps you can buy crates of specific items (which might read [crate of iron bars]) for less cost than individual items, but at the cost of being forced into buying many of the thing at once.

As far as I can figure out with the interface, everything stored in barrels already displays the "won't break up the contents" aspect of this behavior.  I actually find it rather annoying (import and export).  Especially since I also can't figure out how to designate one flour bag for trading short of designating the whole mill barrel.  Or, even worse, one full seed bag when I have a second bag, of the same seed type, adequately filled and would rather avoid the complications that come from running into the seed cap.  Or maybe it's a bag of seeds I can't plant, like plum pits. 

[LordBaal]

Random crates, nope.

But what if someone sell you a crate of "candles" but within them is zombie dust that will contaminate your fortress? That's it, sells you with malice in order to bring you down.