What about cults ranging from the Manson family to the catholic church? I agree there should be deviation from the norm based on individual traits but don't underestimate the power of conditioning and - what all religions are essentially - propaganda.
I don't underestimate the power conditioning, I view all societal values as condition responses but conditioning like the Manson more strongly effects certain types of individuals and catholic indoctrination generally starts in childhood the later you start the process the harder it is to succeed unless the individual is susceptible to that kind of thing, this is why I said [DISDAIN_ADVICE] and [CLOSEMINDED] can be negative modifiers.
Although [DISDAIN_ADVICE] and [CLOSEMINDED] can also act as positive mod's when aligned correctly, my point is that the player should not be able to just select a dwarves and "reprogram" them to the player ideal, it should require careful consideration of the dwarf to be conditioned (are the strong-willed or independent?) and the one doing the conditioning (are they "Charismatic" enough?).
Danger rooming is what gets done to us all to fit into the roles our society needs us to perform.
What I was talking about wasn't danger rooming children but adults, children should start with very "neutral" values and be taught the values of their civ over their childhood but an adult with well defined beliefs should be harder and if their strong willed should be almost impossible without the right combination over personality facets and value in the one counseling them
- the younger a sentient creature is taught a morality the more it sticks;
Indoctrination definitely work better on children but do the parents "consent" to your indoctrination of them? and how should the game model the parent discontent if they oppose what you are trying to teach their children? or does the player just get free reign with the children?
- an indoctrinating/conditioning/brain washing skill for clergy people;
I don't think indoctrinating/conditioning/brain washing is purely a clergy skill and while I do think its possible for Toady to implement it as a separate skill (gelder/surgeon) I also think it possible to model it with the current
social skills, mostly because I think all those skill are used in the indoctrination process in one way or another.
- when contact happens between two cultures, the more developed one has more of an impact on the least developed one.
I'm not quite sure what you mean by "more developed", does more developed just mean a more extreme value? is it a specific progression path? or a type of "strength" check for the values?
Lets take the harmony value for example.
HARMONY
+41 to +50 would have the world operate in complete harmony without the least bit of strife or disorder
+26 to +40 strongly believes that a peaceful and ordered society without dissent is best
+11 to +25 values a harmonious existence
−10 to +10 sees equal parts of harmony and discord as part of life
−25 to −11 doesn't respect a society that has settled into harmony without debate and strife
−40 to −26 can't fathom why anyone would want to live in an orderly and harmonious society
−50 to −41 believes deeply that chaos and disorder are the truest expressions of life and would disrupt harmony wherever it is found
I don't know how could be considered more developed the the other based off of this alone, I think somebody could posses an underdeveloped view that [have the world operate in complete harmony without the least bit of strife or disorder] just feeling that its "right" and their opponent could have an extremely well developed view that [sees equal parts of harmony and discord as part of life] based off of their observation of the world.
Until we know how the game will handle philosophical propagation of values we can't know what value has been more developed or if that even a thing that will be tracked (knowing Toady I think it probably will).
This does however raise the question of how strong a value can be, is it just a measure of the extremity of that value? I personally hope not. I suppose it would be possible to attach something akin to the deity based belief system to individual values resulting in something like [is a faithful believer in that harmony and discord are equal parts of life] vs [is a casual believer that the world should/does operate in complete harmony without the least bit of strife or disorder] then the more developed value could be tracked and be harder for the player to change.