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[Boatsniper]

No, not audio volume. Physical volume. Length, width, height.

Why suggest such a simple thing? Take a look at a single tile. Open space, up ramp, down ramp, cavern floor, whatever, as long as items and creatures can traverse it. That single tile has so many inconsistent properties, its very existence should be physically impossible. Every open tile has no volume and is essentially a pocket dimension, capable of holding an infinite amount of objects and creatures, regardless of apparent size. Forgotten beast corpses, boulders, clothes, ingots, bags, barrels, bins, whatever, a single tile can hold all of them without a problem.

However, according to dwarven physics, two creatures, regardless of size, cannot stand up at the same time while occupying the same tile. One creature will be standing atop all other creatures within that tile. Dwarves themselves cannot seem to comprehend these tiles as infinite pockets of space (unless it's a Garbage Dump zone), and will only ever place one item inside a square with a stockpile designation. Bins/Barrels/Bags fall into the same category, as they are a single item simply holding many at a time.

Yes, I am aware of the Quantum Stockpile exploit. The same can be done with DFHack using the auto-dump command. It all stems from the single tile not having a basic physical volume limit.

Bins/Barrels also have no volume, but instead hold a fixed number of individual items/item bundles (bolts, arrows, etc.).

So yeah. This has been annoying the absolute !!FUN!! out of me with just how inconsistent a simple tile can be. I had to get this off my chest. My adventurers have been forced into a prone state far too many times just by walking down a street.

[Salmeuk]

Unsurprisingly, you aren't the first to want to get this off your chest, but you might be the first to not suggest an alternative at the same time. [/snark]

I imagine whenever he gets around to multi-tile creatures or item piling mechanics we would see these inconsistencies somewhat leveled out. Until then there isn't much point.

[Putnam]

Bins/Barrels also have no volume, but instead hold a fixed number of individual items/item bundles (bolts, arrows, etc.).

i'm pretty sure they're volume-based

[Boatsniper]

Bins/Barrels also have no volume, but instead hold a fixed number of individual items/item bundles (bolts, arrows, etc.).

i'm pretty sure they're volume-based

You're right. My mistake. Edited OP.

Although, this doesn't really change anything. If a single tile is an infinite pocket dimension, then a bin is a finite box within that space, still utterly arbitrary.

[NW_Kohaku]

You might want to look into the Volume and Mass thread, which is on this exact topic.

Incidentally, since then, Toady has taken some steps towards fixing this problem.  It's just that, like so much else, it's a very slow process for anything to get implemented in DF.

Also, barrels and minecarts and such are now volume-based, as previously stated.   Barrels have a volume of 5000 (the unit of measure is a cubic centimeter, by the way), while large pots are 10,000.  (And you can mod even larger pots if you so desire...)

[Boatsniper]

You might want to look into the Volume and Mass thread, which is on this exact topic.

Incidentally, since then, Toady has taken some steps towards fixing this problem.  It's just that, like so much else, it's a very slow process for anything to get implemented in DF.

Also, barrels and minecarts and such are now volume-based, as previously stated.   Barrels have a volume of 5000 (the unit of measure is a cubic centimeter, by the way), while large pots are 10,000.  (And you can mod even larger pots if you so desire...)

You and I think a lot alike, it seems.

I quickly read through that thread and agree with the need for a robust volume system. Not so much on mass; allow me to explain.

In the thread, you mentioned an example with a copper earring requiring 0.1kg (100g) of copper. While this may be true for copper, what about a gold earring? Platinum? Lead (lol)? Will it still require 0.1kg of that metal to make one earring, even though each of these metals greatly varies in mass? To make that earring, the same volume of material is required, completely ignoring material mass. 1 cubic cm of copper has less weight than 1 cubic cm of gold.

So what about the single ingot? The volume of a single ingot would vary depending on the material, quantity of material, manufacturing difficulty, and the furnace operator's skill. For plentiful metals, like copper and iron, their ingots could be extremely large (up to 1 cubic meter, perhaps larger) in ideal circumstances. Rarer metals, such as silver, gold, and platinum, would have extraordinarily small ingots (5 cubic cm at most) due to their precious value and manufacturing difficulty.

On the topic of created items, furniture, weapons, tools and everything else, they should be manufactured in terms of volume and not individual, whole number materials. If you wanted to, you could order the construction of a door with 99% iron and 1% gold, assuming doors have a minimum required volume calculated with the above variables for smelting ingots.

Mass does indeed have its place, but not necessarily for manufacturing. Mass becomes relevant when dealing with weight, momentum, force, and combat in general, where it already holds plenty of sway. As it stands right now, mass has (relatively) the least amount of problems with it. Volume, however, is practically non-existent within most facets of the game.

[NW_Kohaku]

I quickly read through that thread and agree with the need for a robust volume system. Not so much on mass; allow me to explain.

In the thread, you mentioned an example with a copper earring requiring 0.1kg (100g) of copper. While this may be true for copper, what about a gold earring? Platinum? Lead (lol)?

It's based upon volume, not mass.  Basically, it would take, say, 1 cubic cm of metal, or 1 unit out of the 150 units of volume that bars now take up.  (Since that thread was written, bars have gone into being 150 units, although you can never use bars in lots of less than 150 except when they have been put into a container in a hospital.)

It's kind of odd.  In real life, density is derived from mass and volume, but in DF, mass is derived from volume and density.   In any event, all materials have density, while all items have volume.  All doors have the same volume, for example, and the material they are built out of has a density, and mass is derived from that.  All warhammers are the same volume (unless you raw-define a new type or something...) so material density (along with other properties) determine power. 

Anyway, the game is now partway there, it has the capacity to recognize fractions of a normal bar in some senses, but not to actually have split bars or to merge partially-consumed bars, either. 

Most critically, there is no capacity to actually form stacks of identical materials.  Such a thing would greatly help with FPS and general accounting in the game. 

[Dirst]

Mass (or more properly weight) will be important when cave-in physics are reworked.  At the moment, a strip of sand floor can support an entire fortress from the side.  Mass and weight start to have distinct effects when we talk about differing levels of gravity, which sounds like it might be a feature of the envisioned planes-of-existence thing.  So, it's worth keeping things in mass for the time being (i.e., kilograms not newtons) and deriving weight only when needed.

I'd like to go one better from volume and have some kind of shape data in the items.  It wouldn't need to be precise vector descriptions of anything, but a bounding box would add some flavor to the straight cubic centimeters.  It would distinguish a squat anvil and an airy weapon rack.  In a stockpile, you can pack things tightly using the true volume, but out in habitable areas your item uses up its whole bounding box.  Or maybe some specific percentage of its bounding box, but never less than its true volume.  A container, of course, needs to include enough empty space within its "occupied space" to accommodate the volume it contains.

A couple off-the-cuff examples:

Barrel with true volume 2000, bounding box 16x16x30, occupied space 7680, maximum potential capacity 5680, actual capacity 5000.
Toy boat with true volume 250, bounding box 20x10x10, occupied space 2000.

The toy boat could theoretically float on water if it was made from a material of density 8 or less, but that's not a generic property of normal items.  It would require some kind of tag, and probably not anytime soon.

[BoredVirulence]

Every open tile has no volume and is essentially a pocket dimension, capable of holding an infinite amount of objects and creatures, regardless of apparent size. Forgotten beast corpses, boulders, clothes, ingots, bags, barrels, bins, whatever, a single tile can hold all of them without a problem.

However, according to dwarven physics, two creatures, regardless of size, cannot stand up at the same time while occupying the same tile. One creature will be standing atop all other creatures within that tile. Dwarves themselves cannot seem to comprehend these tiles as infinite pockets of space (unless it's a Garbage Dump zone), and will only ever place one item inside a square with a stockpile designation. Bins/Barrels/Bags fall into the same category, as they are a single item simply holding many at a time.

Can we just stop and marvel the visual depiction of this. I'm imagining walking as a series of dimensional phases. And each tile has its own occupier. Its beautiful really.

[NW_Kohaku]

Every open tile has no volume and is essentially a pocket dimension, capable of holding an infinite amount of objects and creatures, regardless of apparent size. Forgotten beast corpses, boulders, clothes, ingots, bags, barrels, bins, whatever, a single tile can hold all of them without a problem.

However, according to dwarven physics, two creatures, regardless of size, cannot stand up at the same time while occupying the same tile. One creature will be standing atop all other creatures within that tile. Dwarves themselves cannot seem to comprehend these tiles as infinite pockets of space (unless it's a Garbage Dump zone), and will only ever place one item inside a square with a stockpile designation. Bins/Barrels/Bags fall into the same category, as they are a single item simply holding many at a time.

Can we just stop and marvel the visual depiction of this. I'm imagining walking as a series of dimensional phases. And each tile has its own occupier. Its beautiful really.

The stockpile thing is more an artifact of not comprehending the concept of stacking until much later in development.

The walking is actually a decent approximation, even if the game has yet to really properly handle creatures that have wildly differing sizes.  A tile is 3m tall, and something like 2.5 m wide, and all but the largest creatures fit in it, although a cat obviously takes far less than a full tile, and could easily walk inside the same space as a dwarf.  (Although considering my history with cats, they will cause the dwarf to stumble and not move at full speed because they keep wanting to brush your leg while you are in full swing...)

Either way, they enforce an important concept of Interface, which is that only one thing can be shown per tile, so the rules of crawling encourage players to make wider hallways.

In games where you don't have such rules, for example, Gnomoria or Towns, especially, you can have whole armies of hundreds of creatures fighting every citizen of your town, all of whom are crammed onto two tiles in a giant pair of stacks that constantly mash into each other until one side runs out of critters. 

[Bumber]

It's kind of odd.  In real life, density is derived from mass and volume, but in DF, mass is derived from volume and density.

Can you really say that, though? Density may be harder to measure than the other two, but it's generally a constant based on material (ignoring temperature.) The other two describe situational quantities (how much matter, how much space.) Given knowledge of the density of the materials you're working with and the dimensions of a schematic, you'd be able to figure out it's mass. It's not possible to weigh something you haven't built yet. In the end it's just a relationship between properties.

[BoredVirulence]

Every open tile has no volume and is essentially a pocket dimension, capable of holding an infinite amount of objects and creatures, regardless of apparent size. Forgotten beast corpses, boulders, clothes, ingots, bags, barrels, bins, whatever, a single tile can hold all of them without a problem.

However, according to dwarven physics, two creatures, regardless of size, cannot stand up at the same time while occupying the same tile. One creature will be standing atop all other creatures within that tile. Dwarves themselves cannot seem to comprehend these tiles as infinite pockets of space (unless it's a Garbage Dump zone), and will only ever place one item inside a square with a stockpile designation. Bins/Barrels/Bags fall into the same category, as they are a single item simply holding many at a time.

Can we just stop and marvel the visual depiction of this. I'm imagining walking as a series of dimensional phases. And each tile has its own occupier. Its beautiful really.

The stockpile thing is more an artifact of not comprehending the concept of stacking until much later in development.

The walking is actually a decent approximation, even if the game has yet to really properly handle creatures that have wildly differing sizes.  A tile is 3m tall, and something like 2.5 m wide, and all but the largest creatures fit in it, although a cat obviously takes far less than a full tile, and could easily walk inside the same space as a dwarf.  (Although considering my history with cats, they will cause the dwarf to stumble and not move at full speed because they keep wanting to brush your leg while you are in full swing...)

Either way, they enforce an important concept of Interface, which is that only one thing can be shown per tile, so the rules of crawling encourage players to make wider hallways.

In games where you don't have such rules, for example, Gnomoria or Towns, especially, you can have whole armies of hundreds of creatures fighting every citizen of your town, all of whom are crammed onto two tiles in a giant pair of stacks that constantly mash into each other until one side runs out of critters.

You aren't marveling it properly. Imagine, you're a dwarf. You don't walk, you don't run, you poof from existence into another dimension. Now make every tile the picture of a pocket dimension. Make it dark, and boundless, without stars or sky, just a boundless black across everything other than a floor. The world is filled with an eerie glow that originates from nothing, that is if the tile is exposed to light. Otherwise its dark.

Imagine the way they can see enemies in nearby tiles. Its like a 6th sense, they can feel their presence in nearby worlds, just a poof away.

I think I prefer the game this way.


We can now continue trying to make it more accurate. I just wanted to think about the implications and imagery of a world where its a series of pocket dimensions.

[Mel_Vixen]

So its essentially a version of erfworld?

I like Dirst bounding box idea in a way since it could carry over to the raws for bodyparts which could give us stretched bodyparts (atm they are iirc all virtualy round blobs). What i see though is that this could be a mayor hassle for the raws (boundingbox far greater or smaller then actual volume) and the ingam representation. For example how do you display a pile of objects ment to blockade a door from a similiar pile that strewn throughout the tile?

[Dirst]

Body parts are cubes that can be modified with attributes like length and width.  The outermost layer faces the weapon, and any internal organs are stuck to the back of the "innermost" layer which is actually on the far side from the weapon.

It's possible to give a length of 300 and a thickness of 33 to simulate an arm shape, but the game doesn't do anything with that info other than multiply them to get the body part's size.  For example, a creature doesn't have a real height or reach.  This has more to do with how bodies are connected, and an initial release of the feature would probably just put a bounding box on the entire creature.

[NW_Kohaku]

Body parts are cubes that can be modified with attributes like length and width.  The outermost layer faces the weapon, and any internal organs are stuck to the back of the "innermost" layer which is actually on the far side from the weapon.

It's possible to give a length of 300 and a thickness of 33 to simulate an arm shape, but the game doesn't do anything with that info other than multiply them to get the body part's size.  For example, a creature doesn't have a real height or reach.  This has more to do with how bodies are connected, and an initial release of the feature would probably just put a bounding box on the entire creature.

Well, don't forget that there's the much larger problem of body parts only being connected abstractly. 

If I throw a punch in real life, the mass of my whole arm goes into it.  If I lean into the punch, I put some of my whole body's mass into it.  In DF, only the mass of the palm matters.  (Even the fingers are separate entities.) 

Likewise, if I make a shiv, it only carries the weight of the metal object, not the whole body thrusting behind it.  Hence, tiny weapons are disproportionately weak.

To compensate for this, Toady just kludges the speed of these different attacks to be ludicrously fast such that most people don't notice the massive lack of mass.  Hence, people are basically throwing supersonic punches like it's Dragonball Z or something. (Legendary fighters can punch people's heads clean off with a straight palm-strike.)