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[GoblinCookie]

Storage space isn't really an issue. Stockpiles are just zoned areas, so any free accessible tile can be one.

We don't really want just to have items strewn about over the whole site do we?   Also by building stuff up or down, we make more space as it were.  But when we retire the fort our fort, it's architecture is not on-loaded anymore.  The game cannot calculate the storage space and other things based upon it when the site is offloaded, because there is nothing there for it to calculate from.  So basically we end up having to upload the data involving storage space when the fort is uploaded.

The other side of the problem is that unless we are happy simply having stuff strewn about the place we are going to have to build actual stockpiles for the retired site if the player retires the game without a suitable stockpile already existing.  Problem is that there is a near-infinite number of possible fortresses and the game is going to have to be able to add in said stockpiles appropriately for the fortress that the player has actually built.  It is quite possible for instance to create underwater fortresses, tree fortress, surface fortresses and all of this is quite a headache for an AI to understand. 

The solution I came up with is to have the data stored abstractly upon retire, taking advantage of the fact that we don't actually exist to run the whole economy without needing to edit the actual save game.  When we load up the save game (in either mode) we run the AI to turn any modified data into actual consequences for the player site.  The tricky part is that we need an AI capable of dealing with this task, or else we will need a minigame where the player manually edits their own site and which can only be 'won' when the new site corresponds to the abstract data. 

Well, as I wrote earlier, you need to factor in sites resources, workshops and workforce. For realistic economy you need to keep database, which is tracing all transactions. For unrealistic economy you conjure from thin air with help of rule-set, but one based on dev's common sense. AI is regulated by ethics (an economy of the race) like players, so same economy/regulations apply to both. If player couldn't build high boots, then AI won't either. Even if player traded cups and mugs with caravan to get weapons and armor and build some sort of farm plot, brewery, kitchen and build tavern. AI is not obligated just to maintain those production lines, given there is overflow of migrant population. AI should go for balancing act, so site will not have massive emigration to new player's embark. DF is not a trade game. Only few embarks missing some resources.

Also, if you don't want always to play with one rule-set for goods, when conjuring from thin air, you can let AI to shuffle some ideas of products. Player maybe was producing 500 chairs to be thrown to lava, but AI can stop all production chains in when surplus of 10 items. Factor in rest of available untapped resources on site, create new workshops as needed and workforce available and conclude that there could be 10 further items of each sort to be in stockpile for the rule-set.

Ultimately player from another embark can add changes to the rule-set as well with existing mechanics of tender offer, by requesting some items (or groups of items, that would be an improvement to the existing system though) in larger amounts then those 10. Right now request goes in 1-5 stages, so how sounds +3,+6,+12,+25,+50? Though it would be conjuring from thin air, without database, specially in case of mining. Database searches and transactions could be speed up and be very fast. It just takes to learn few SQL phrases, which you inject into your programming. AI could take advantage of database to set up its own choices (clustering of examples you know?), besides the ones based on rules and react more intelligently. However you would need to put entire world in the database first to play with it from start too.

The thing is to let lose the site-2-site trades instead of civilization trading caravans. Here my suggestions about dedicated Trade Depots factor in, as solution. You see? Even if you conjure from air items, which are on a list.

The player was not producing 500 chairs to throw into the lava; the player was buying 500 chairs to throw into the lava  .  If it is just the player's own fortress behaving irrationally (according to the AI) then the problem can be solved with no problem.  If large chunks of world's economy develop rationally upon the basis of the player's irrationally however, then there are potentially devastating consequences from the player retiring. 

In the long-run the player site should behave rationally, but that has to be done gradually.  That would mean reducing the irrational consumption and production every so often, every year the player's ex-fortress throws 50 less chairs into the volcano, until it behaves as an AI site would in the circumstances.  It is fine to have disasters disrupt the economy, but the player's retiring should not have the force of a disaster. 

I see. This is not implemented yet in DF. This is true. Warehouses and Treasuries, which I propose, instead of stockpiles could magically take care about this QS future issue, solving it permanently. AI would need just have some free space and some blocks or logs to build some more of those magic QS-Depots. Stockpiles could be still useful for linking production chains. However QS-Depots would be required now for some refined items like prepared food barrels. Preventing vermin from spawning inside of them or entering into them for example. Alike Trade Depot does right now.

These new buildings do not operate using QS do they?   

Since they are basically just stockpiles anyway, what do they add to the game save more micromanagement?

Currently only economy differences in DF, between races, are those based on moral ethics. Those do restrict which civ can build what workshops. Nothing else. So each set of regulations = an economy.

Not exactly, the economic differences are actually based mostly upon tokens and allowed professions, ethics have quite a small role in it. 

Why would you want to model player's impact on economy? Economy is economy no matter by whom or what it is resolved. In worst case scenario you have site bankruptcy and you just factor that case in.

Abstract model of economy is non-functional. Conjuring from thin air patches its gaping holes and makes it workable. So you are best with making the economy by setting up those regulations for each civilizations. At least then abstract economy model will be less fake. You will still need to conjure item from air to make it work, but it will feel to players more realistic, then right now with what goods Trade Caravans are offering.

To kick start world economy, you need just send in tax collectors. Let mountain-home collect yearly tributes from local sites. That's it. You don't need anything else really in DF. Just taxation. Trade Caravan already has existing donation system in it. There, whole economy was born like in real life.

About the rest of economics, which you may want in economy DF release:
-Dwarves using dispensaries instead of stealing items from stockpiles
-Dwarves earning money as wages/shares
-Embark creating currency and storing it in vaults
-Embark manufacturing requested and desired by Dwarves items at highest quality to get some of that coinage back.
You just use double book keeping here for check and balances. Store unsold goods in QS-Depots, stockpiles while with sold goods in chests, bags, coffers, cabinets and such. You keep on Dwarves info how much fortress owns them in wages and if it goes over the top (lets say 12 months worth?), then Dwarves will revolt or go to strike, unless receiving from dispensary owned them coins or desired items. You keep unspent coins in vault instead of dispensary btw. Keep in mind, that some goods like cloths, food and alcohol are workplace privileges for workers. They don't need pay extra for them. Rooms either. Though own personal chests/coffers/bags would make here some sense.

Interesting side effect of Dwarves owning coins. They can buy goods from Trading Caravans as well, so here having local shops for each embark, even your own, could be also an option. Metal can be rare, so financial flow should be bound to metal coins imho.

Caravans instead of traveling shop, could become just another safe goods transportation method. Then you can allow wagons and even ships in adventure mode to be bought by players. That would rise some fun.

Unless you strive to create ultimate multiplayer DF with player-driven economic system, then you can get away with conjuration from thin air using sets from lists. Else you need seriously consider using database. Actually you could create economy. Then create multiplayer. Then release some items from being conjured and allow them to be manufactured and consumed by players themselves. This is how Eve-Online step by step liberating items from their conjuration, created rich and thriving economic system. Both those steps of development would move DF to entirely new level of gaming. DF could start compete with big mmorpgs out there.

Though I would suggest always allowing for simplest graphics, which could allow DF multiplayer to be played even on mobile or tablet without much fuzz. Big AAA titles go for flashy graphics and limit their player base.

PS. Unless you want just freeze with the rest of the world player's embark, after retirement. With all its oddities. I advise against that. Let AI think through and sort local economy first. Patch it and balance it as best it can. Then freeze the result. Though you would need to go through rules for AI, so no crazy stuff results from AI actions like 1000 Dwarven merchants, wagons scattered everywhere and such mayhem. Though, you always could try to consider imitating economy and even keep open gates for future development like multiplayer and real player-driven economy. So long you keep modular architecture and keep track of their interfaces, then there should be no programming chaos either.

No, an abstract model of the economy (by this I mean one which does not actually model the actual production or location of actual goods) is quite functional.  Recall that if nobody is around to see it, then it does not matter that it is missing.  Whenever the player comes along, in either mode we simply set things up according to the abstract values and the player's own actions can directly effect those abstract values.  Why this does not work in DF is because there are more than one form of economy going on at the same time, taxation is a different form of economy to trading things. 

If there was only trade (or only taxation) then you can simply model the whole world by simply adjusting abstract values that represent the prevalance of things.  I buy lots of wooden stuff, then I increase the 'carpentry' value so that magically there are more carpenters and carpentry related stuff when the player turns up to see.  Games like Eve online can be developed in the fashion you described because there is only one economic system in the game, which is unrealistic but nobody cares because it is ideologically acceptable to have only trade but only taxation would not be ideologically acceptable hence people would complain about realism were it to exist. 

It is only the existence of competing economic systems in the game that forces us to keep track of the different items so we know which system any given item is presently operating under.

[Sarmatian123]

The player was not producing 500 chairs to throw into the lava; the player was buying 500 chairs to throw into the lava  .  If it is just the player's own fortress behaving irrationally (according to the AI) then the problem can be solved with no problem.  If large chunks of world's economy develop rationally upon the basis of the player's irrationally however, then there are potentially devastating consequences from the player retiring. 

In the long-run the player site should behave rationally, but that has to be done gradually.  That would mean reducing the irrational consumption and production every so often, every year the player's ex-fortress throws 50 less chairs into the volcano, until it behaves as an AI site would in the circumstances.  It is fine to have disasters disrupt the economy, but the player's retiring should not have the force of a disaster.

RL.
Economic bubbles due human ingenuity and invention will always be occurring in one way or another. For last 100 years there was put a tremendous effort to limit their effect with financial controls, governmental regulations and also with new investments into economy. When worst happens failed capital investors are being generously rescued by grey masses of tax payers and the biggest victims are allowed into soft bankruptcy.

DF.
Every embark, every settlement and so on has what we call "self sufficiency in strategic resources". Even on maps utterly deprived from clay (meh!), sand (very handy to have) and metal (have to have), you have always lava, tree terraforming bug and adamantine. Water could be initially an issue on some embarks, but there always is some in one of the caverns and you don't need water for much of the game's industrious processes. Not like in the real life. So every site should and probably is being run with its own economic abstract model. The trade gets only surplus of created on site goods. So if player is managing to purchase 500 metal chairs to be dropped into lava, which btw makes sense, then it is logical that 500 metal chairs is logical free surplus of produced goods on a site.

Thing with metal and gems in DF is, they are limited. Resource like logs, obsidian and rain/river/aquifer/sea water are unlimited. Populations of animals and FBs are limited, but vermin is unlimited. Therefore in trade items composed from limited resources, should be more expensive in their base value. Like factor of 10x-100x to what it is now offered in caravans and this is on just hello. (Historically there was time, when iron was 5x more expensive then gold). Furthermore every substantial drop in sites resources, due trade with player, should mark equally substantial hike in price. There should be some limits what site need in the way of limited resources to be self sustainable and there should be simply a stop in trade of those goods, when this mark is hit.

So, abstract economy model, needs this trade embargo option. This is trade caused imbalance after all. You just slap an embargo on that. DF economy saved and player need to fight HELL to get adamantine scraps.

Further conclusions to game mechanics.

This brings me to another concept which needs mending with those waffles. Adamantine is mined like 1 stone for 1 tile, instead like other ores with 1 stone for 4 tiles. They all should be synced so 1 stone = 1 tile. Alike gems. They all are finite resources and should be taken with equal care. By default adamantine is remade into wafers due its material type, but instead of wafer it should become just adamantine bar. Then you go smelting 1 mined ore/adamantine into 1 bar and that would make 1 block = 1 metal bar, which makes sense for folks who want to create an adamantine fortress impervious to breaches in sieges. I know this is huge fps harassment to trace 10x more material, but wafer should become 1/10 of bar in all considerations. This would bring entire smelting and metal working mechanics into functioning order. Also, it would make making metal clothing out of adamantine wafers a more viable option as well. Way more wafers out of adamantine this way for clothing. Making adamantine items, armor and weapons out of adamantine bars makes more sense imho.

Instead of smelting goblinite and merchantite, players would need to bother more into digging after ores and be more bold with HELL and caverns.

These new buildings do not operate using QS do they?   
Since they are basically just stockpiles anyway, what do they add to the game save more micromanagement?

Well, thing with those is, you can remove in DF tracking of items inside of those buildings. So technically they simply vanish. Of course at first Trade Depot, QS Warehouses and so on remove lots of micromanagement, which makes them way easier to adopt for new players. Building carefully track stop and defining hauling route, may be quite complicated for unseasoned players. And yes, they are still stockpiles, but with Trade Depot mechanics. For example master quality prepared food [140], which is stored in such SQ Warehouse is entirely impervious to any vermin. So you don't need to keep 20+ cats, which eats into your cpu. Maybe 10 cats will do then?

However the most desirable, due item tracking and fps fortress death is, the black hole vanishing of stored items inside. Besides listing them, there is no need for other operations on them, unless they are taken out. This could add new mechanics of automatically splitting stacks and joining stacks. So Dwarf fetching stack of 10 bronze coins is not going around with 10 items, but only 1 item. Dwarf fetching 3 metal bars to make some item from QS Metal Workshop is not making 3 rounds for 3 different bars, but taking 1 item -> bronze bar [3] or bronze wafer [30]. You see?

Also storing wine in barrels is fine, but WINE CELLAR, can have huge vats to store alcohol. Here adding/removing on stacks could be huge improvement. You still need free barrels to make alcohol, pour it out into vat in WINE CELLAR or fetch alcohol for trade. Also you need cup to fetch a drink from it. Cups could be emptied into those vats too instead of alcohol being thrown out on floor. There could be some storage limit of course and for example WINE CELLAR could store just one sort of alcohol. It surely would save a lot of stockpile space that currently 3600 units of alcohol need inside of fortress. Like 22x22 at least.

- more fun for players to set things up in fortress
- less micromanagement hassle
- easier on DF noobs to use more advanced mechanics of play
- automatic stack adding/splitting mechanic, which is currently outside of trade entirely missing
AND THE MOST IMPORTANT
- higher fps, due less objects being actively tracked by game.

The abstract economy model already factoring stuff in like workshops, taverns, temples and Trade Depots. Why not throw into it just few more buildings, which do not change mechanics or economies in the game. Just some more buildings for abstract economy model to spawn into life, when in need. I don't think it is drag on economy or on fps. Just stockpiles++.

Only shops and trade depots would change a little in their function, if they were the "caravan" accessed by fortress broker, instead of trading caravans, which could be busted to pure logistics of moving goods around, either conjured from thin air or actually manufactured by player.

Not exactly, the economic differences are actually based mostly upon tokens and allowed professions, ethics have quite a small role in it.

Well, aren't those tokens and allowed professions chosen on basis of morality in civilization? Elves for example. Unless, you mean like personal individual ethics? Then yes.

No, an abstract model of the economy (by this I mean one which does not actually model the actual production or location of actual goods) is quite functional.  Recall that if nobody is around to see it, then it does not matter that it is missing.  Whenever the player comes along, in either mode we simply set things up according to the abstract values and the player's own actions can directly effect those abstract values.  Why this does not work in DF is because there are more than one form of economy going on at the same time, taxation is a different form of economy to trading things. 

If there was only trade (or only taxation) then you can simply model the whole world by simply adjusting abstract values that represent the prevalance of things.  I buy lots of wooden stuff, then I increase the 'carpentry' value so that magically there are more carpenters and carpentry related stuff when the player turns up to see.  Games like Eve online can be developed in the fashion you described because there is only one economic system in the game, which is unrealistic but nobody cares because it is ideologically acceptable to have only trade but only taxation would not be ideologically acceptable hence people would complain about realism were it to exist. 

It is only the existence of competing economic systems in the game that forces us to keep track of the different items so we know which system any given item is presently operating under.

Still economy abstract crutch is a crutch. You can't expect this crutch will perform miracles like real economy. However crutches is how we beat some simple issues in programming. Just don't expect to beat with a crutch complex economical problem too. It will not work. It will simply bug out. However, the key word here is... SIMPLIFICATION. Abstract by definition is simple presentation of complex thing. So what you need for abstract economy models is a further simplification.

Trade is causing issues? Restrict it! Put tariffs in! Put embargo in!

Refine trade to logistic issue rather then economy issue. Let each economy run a surplus it can spare into trade and have economy abstract crutch handle how much it is to be max conjured from thin air. Then instead each caravan dragging in 500 metal chairs every year to be dropped into lava, the number of those chairs conjured out of thin air will go down to 200 next year, 10 third year... and then total embargo on all metal things will be enacted unless player starts to sell those shiny things back. Simple enough solution? Maybe it should not be so drastic, but it won't ruin economy for other settlements. After all some embarks have tones and tones of multiple metal ores...

Player loves to dump gazzilion mugs and cups in trade? Make yearly limits how many of those can be sold. Put limit based on caravan/shop home population and economy size. You will need to change trading mechanics in Trade Depot (and shops), but then player will go and encrust those mugs, make sure to sell only master quality mugs and so on to fetch highest possible size. The trade from quantitative mechanics will turn into qualitative. I think the abstract will have easier time dealing with artifact price level few items, then flood of mass produced junk. Add in workshop option for training skills, so it is not available only through education, because education in real life won't get you there without some practice either.

Taxation is an issue? It is in game mechanic of putting tribute with caravan. However do you need to change economic abstraction to handle it?

I would suggest just adding a new crutch! Tax Office crutch! Yeah, sad but in real life people using those crutches too . When first crutch kicks all dust up, it needs to kick. Apply this new crutch on top. Let it request metal coins as yearly tribute. Let embark have grace period of 2 tax free years. Coins have no quality, so you can have 1 adamantine coin [500000] stored in mountain home, when you need to spawn Treasury, because player came in adventure mode to visit Mountain Home and stir on the listing of the whole loot he was robbed by this game mechanic. Economics a01. LOLZ! Mountain king is the Uncle Scrooge McDuck. Joke besides. Those coins are basically the resource on the site. So abstract should add them to available metal resources. The conjured Treasury then can have some token coins in it. After all, spending coins on training army and armaments, makes always sens, doesn't it.

The smelting mechanics is better then the mechanic for gems, because you never lose this metal in the game. Trashing gem encrusted items, pretty much removes gems out of the game. Like animal species, which die out. You want master quality encrusting? Why not allow jewelry workshop to remove encrusting from items? Too much item tracking maybe? Oh well, but it would make some sense.

PS. When programming you can use modular architecture to make sure it will be possible in future to use database and real economy, which with server-client architecture for multiplayer makes this a viable option for further development in future. Leaving open door for mmo just makes pragmatic sense. Even if game is now all about using crutches.

[GoblinCookie]

@Sarmation123: I know this may be percieved as 'pot calling the kettle black' but your responses are very, very long and convoluted + I am not entirely sure we are talking about the same subject again.

RL.
Economic bubbles due human ingenuity and invention will always be occurring in one way or another. For last 100 years there was put a tremendous effort to limit their effect with financial controls, governmental regulations and also with new investments into economy. When worst happens failed capital investors are being generously rescued by grey masses of tax payers and the biggest victims are allowed into soft bankruptcy.

DF.
Every embark, every settlement and so on has what we call "self sufficiency in strategic resources". Even on maps utterly deprived from clay (meh!), sand (very handy to have) and metal (have to have), you have always lava, tree terraforming bug and adamantine. Water could be initially an issue on some embarks, but there always is some in one of the caverns and you don't need water for much of the game's industrious processes. Not like in the real life. So every site should and probably is being run with its own economic abstract model. The trade gets only surplus of created on site goods. So if player is managing to purchase 500 metal chairs to be dropped into lava, which btw makes sense, then it is logical that 500 metal chairs is logical free surplus of produced goods on a site.

Thing with metal and gems in DF is, they are limited. Resource like logs, obsidian and rain/river/aquifer/sea water are unlimited. Populations of animals and FBs are limited, but vermin is unlimited. Therefore in trade items composed from limited resources, should be more expensive in their base value. Like factor of 10x-100x to what it is now offered in caravans and this is on just hello. (Historically there was time, when iron was 5x more expensive then gold). Furthermore every substantial drop in sites resources, due trade with player, should mark equally substantial hike in price. There should be some limits what site need in the way of limited resources to be self sustainable and there should be simply a stop in trade of those goods, when this mark is hit.

So, abstract economy model, needs this trade embargo option. This is trade caused imbalance after all. You just slap an embargo on that. DF economy saved and player need to fight HELL to get adamantine scraps.

You are not getting the problem.  The problem is not that there are sudden shifts that cause economic mayhem, this actually needs to happen or the game will settle down into utopian economic perfection leaving nothing for the player to deal with.  The problem here is that is only the difference between how the AI runs the site economically and how the player runs the site that caused the cataclysmic economic meltdown. 

What we are talking about here is economic gearing.  The world economy of the game world is geared up (imagine a pocket world here  in order that the player gets his 500 chairs to melt in the volcano but as soon as the player goes away there is no more 500 chairs being bought because the AI calculates rationally that it does not need so many chairs.  It is basically the main problem with Brexit (which presently preoccupies my country and I voted in favour of), leaving the EU might be desirable but the UK is presently geared up for a place *in* the EU economically.  That means there is an economic cost since the present economic gearing does not fit with the new conditions (not being an EU country) and it is a problem that nearly scared everyone into not voting to leave (48%) despite how much most folks hate the EU. 

Again, it is not a problem to have shifts that cause economic costs.  But they should be things that actually *exist* in the game, not the player not agreeing with the AI as to how to run the player's own site.

Further conclusions to game mechanics.

This brings me to another concept which needs mending with those waffles. Adamantine is mined like 1 stone for 1 tile, instead like other ores with 1 stone for 4 tiles. They all should be synced so 1 stone = 1 tile. Alike gems. They all are finite resources and should be taken with equal care. By default adamantine is remade into wafers due its material type, but instead of wafer it should become just adamantine bar. Then you go smelting 1 mined ore/adamantine into 1 bar and that would make 1 block = 1 metal bar, which makes sense for folks who want to create an adamantine fortress impervious to breaches in sieges. I know this is huge fps harassment to trace 10x more material, but wafer should become 1/10 of bar in all considerations. This would bring entire smelting and metal working mechanics into functioning order. Also, it would make making metal clothing out of adamantine wafers a more viable option as well. Way more wafers out of adamantine this way for clothing. Making adamantine items, armor and weapons out of adamantine bars makes more sense imho.

Instead of smelting goblinite and merchantite, players would need to bother more into digging after ores and be more bold with HELL and caverns.

Ores are already something that makes trade worthwhile, the problem is actually that the short traveling times mean that any site with miners would not realistically need to buy ores because it could just send it's dwarves off to a location that has those ores and have them dig those ores up.  It is not that embark areas have all the necessary materials, it is that it only takes a short while to travel to the places that have the materials from the places that don't.

The scarcity of adamantine does not presently make sense.  It is supposed to be found next to the lava sea (the mantle in RL), which means that it ought to cook any dwarf that actually went down that war, indeed getting to the magma should be pretty much impossible on non-volcano maps because it gets too hot as you approach the magma to survive.  There is also the issue of pressure, the further down you go the greater the weight of all the rock above you becomes and hence the stronger supports you start needing to hold the roof up.  We end up with a situation where it takes adamantine to mine adamantine, since the structural beams have to be made of adamantine in order to hold up the tunnels that are needed to mine adamantine.  As for the miners, we would need golems made up magma-resistant materials to mine down there without being burnt to a crisp, which gives us something to do. 

At the moment nothing keeps you from effortlessly digging all the way to the bottom of the embark in about a week.  This in effect means that ores are far more abundant they should be, since in RL it is not just the presence of ores but how deep down they are that matters expense-wise. 

Well, thing with those is, you can remove in DF tracking of items inside of those buildings. So technically they simply vanish. Of course at first Trade Depot, QS Warehouses and so on remove lots of micromanagement, which makes them way easier to adopt for new players. Building carefully track stop and defining hauling route, may be quite complicated for unseasoned players. And yes, they are still stockpiles, but with Trade Depot mechanics. For example master quality prepared food [140], which is stored in such SQ Warehouse is entirely impervious to any vermin. So you don't need to keep 20+ cats, which eats into your cpu. Maybe 10 cats will do then?

However the most desirable, due item tracking and fps fortress death is, the black hole vanishing of stored items inside. Besides listing them, there is no need for other operations on them, unless they are taken out. This could add new mechanics of automatically splitting stacks and joining stacks. So Dwarf fetching stack of 10 bronze coins is not going around with 10 items, but only 1 item. Dwarf fetching 3 metal bars to make some item from QS Metal Workshop is not making 3 rounds for 3 different bars, but taking 1 item -> bronze bar [3] or bronze wafer [30]. You see?

Also storing wine in barrels is fine, but WINE CELLAR, can have huge vats to store alcohol. Here adding/removing on stacks could be huge improvement. You still need free barrels to make alcohol, pour it out into vat in WINE CELLAR or fetch alcohol for trade. Also you need cup to fetch a drink from it. Cups could be emptied into those vats too instead of alcohol being thrown out on floor. There could be some storage limit of course and for example WINE CELLAR could store just one sort of alcohol. It surely would save a lot of stockpile space that currently 3600 units of alcohol need inside of fortress. Like 22x22 at least.

- more fun for players to set things up in fortress
- less micromanagement hassle
- easier on DF noobs to use more advanced mechanics of play
- automatic stack adding/splitting mechanic, which is currently outside of trade entirely missing
AND THE MOST IMPORTANT
- higher fps, due less objects being actively tracked by game.

The abstract economy model already factoring stuff in like workshops, taverns, temples and Trade Depots. Why not throw into it just few more buildings, which do not change mechanics or economies in the game. Just some more buildings for abstract economy model to spawn into life, when in need. I don't think it is drag on economy or on fps. Just stockpiles++.

Only shops and trade depots would change a little in their function, if they were the "caravan" accessed by fortress broker, instead of trading caravans, which could be busted to pure logistics of moving goods around, either conjured from thin air or actually manufactured by player.

Workshops are already a placeholder.  The whole building system works on QS, having buildings without QS means you basically need to have buildings as large as their contents, which means you are basically talking about we would nowadays call stockpiles and rooms.  Proposing new buildings for the Economy makes no sense, since by that point buildings will likely have been gutted in any case, replaced by actual rooms that exist in the game.  In that context, all the dispensaries or whatever you propose are just a form of stockpile, so the distinction becomes rather a moot point. 

Well, aren't those tokens and allowed professions chosen on basis of morality in civilization? Elves for example. Unless, you mean like personal individual ethics? Then yes.

Mostly not.  They are just a list of tokens that define what the civ can do economically.  There is no difference there between "can't do" and "won't do"; the civs don't have something but there is no explanation as to why.  When we get into technological developments (fairly soon, almost certainly before economy) then I suppose the difference between can't and won't will have to be defined but for the moment with techno-statis this is not needed. 

Still economy abstract crutch is a crutch. You can't expect this crutch will perform miracles like real economy. However crutches is how we beat some simple issues in programming. Just don't expect to beat with a crutch complex economical problem too. It will not work. It will simply bug out. However, the key word here is... SIMPLIFICATION. Abstract by definition is simple presentation of complex thing. So what you need for abstract economy models is a further simplification.

Trade is causing issues? Restrict it! Put tariffs in! Put embargo in!

Refine trade to logistic issue rather then economy issue. Let each economy run a surplus it can spare into trade and have economy abstract crutch handle how much it is to be max conjured from thin air. Then instead each caravan dragging in 500 metal chairs every year to be dropped into lava, the number of those chairs conjured out of thin air will go down to 200 next year, 10 third year... and then total embargo on all metal things will be enacted unless player starts to sell those shiny things back. Simple enough solution? Maybe it should not be so drastic, but it won't ruin economy for other settlements. After all some embarks have tones and tones of multiple metal ores...

Player loves to dump gazzilion mugs and cups in trade? Make yearly limits how many of those can be sold. Put limit based on caravan/shop home population and economy size. You will need to change trading mechanics in Trade Depot (and shops), but then player will go and encrust those mugs, make sure to sell only master quality mugs and so on to fetch highest possible size. The trade from quantitative mechanics will turn into qualitative. I think the abstract will have easier time dealing with artifact price level few items, then flood of mass produced junk. Add in workshop option for training skills, so it is not available only through education, because education in real life won't get you there without some practice either.

Taxation is an issue? It is in game mechanic of putting tribute with caravan. However do you need to change economic abstraction to handle it?

I would suggest just adding a new crutch! Tax Office crutch! Yeah, sad but in real life people using those crutches too . When first crutch kicks all dust up, it needs to kick. Apply this new crutch on top. Let it request metal coins as yearly tribute. Let embark have grace period of 2 tax free years. Coins have no quality, so you can have 1 adamantine coin [500000] stored in mountain home, when you need to spawn Treasury, because player came in adventure mode to visit Mountain Home and stir on the listing of the whole loot he was robbed by this game mechanic. Economics a01. LOLZ! Mountain king is the Uncle Scrooge McDuck. Joke besides. Those coins are basically the resource on the site. So abstract should add them to available metal resources. The conjured Treasury then can have some token coins in it. After all, spending coins on training army and armaments, makes always sens, doesn't it.

The smelting mechanics is better then the mechanic for gems, because you never lose this metal in the game. Trashing gem encrusted items, pretty much removes gems out of the game. Like animal species, which die out. You want master quality encrusting? Why not allow jewelry workshop to remove encrusting from items? Too much item tracking maybe? Oh well, but it would make some sense.

PS. When programming you can use modular architecture to make sure it will be possible in future to use database and real economy, which with server-client architecture for multiplayer makes this a viable option for further development in future. Leaving open door for mmo just makes pragmatic sense. Even if game is now all about using crutches.

It's all abstraction.  At no point are we actually going to be directly keeping track of the 100k+ beings going about their daily lives producing stuff.  There are however levels of abstraction, the existence of different sites producing things as numbers and moving the numbers around is a lower level of abstraction than having the whole economy simply as a set of values representing the strength of different things and then creating a different experience for the player when they actually turn up depending upon those values.  The only reason we need the former rather than the latter is that we have different economic systems at work in the game at the same time. 

Trade is unlikely to be a problem in the game, actually under present conditions the economy would realistically actually get rid of most trade in any case.  You mention tariffs a lot, tariffs are TAXES and taxes are a different economic system to trade.  As a result of tariffs goods get taken from the traders (the trade economy) and places into the government treasuries (the taxation economy) and these economies do not work on the same principle.  Without actually taking into account where the goods are physically going, you cannot determine how much of the goods end up in the taxation economy as opposed to remaining in the trade economy.  That in turn means you cannot simply deduce the effect of the player on the world in general based simply upon the nature of the player's own action. 

To try to explain this tricky concept; the difference is this.  In the more abstract model the player destroys 500 wooden chairs, this means that the world's economic value of carpentry demand goes up and there hence there are fewer chairs (and more carpenters) in AI sites when the adventurer turns up.  In reverse the player dumps 500 wooden chairs onto the world market and hence there is a reduction of the worlds economic value of carpentry demand goes down, meaning that when the adventurer turns up there are more chairs and fewer carpenters. 

In the less abstract model the player sells 500 chairs, they turn into a number for 500 chairs which then travels from site to site, until all the chairs end up in the hands of those who have use for them (use includes throwing them into a volcano  .  The reason we need the latter model is solely because we have multiple economic systems in the game, a lot of games get by with only the former model because there is only one economic system in play.  Things like taxationVStrade coexisting in the same society are thought of as different economic systems here, even if by different economic systems we generally think of different social orders (Communism VS Capitalism).

[Bumber]

The scarcity of adamantine does not presently make sense.  It is supposed to be found next to the lava sea (the mantle in RL), which means that it ought to cook any dwarf that actually went down that war, indeed getting to the magma should be pretty much impossible on non-volcano maps because it gets too hot as you approach the magma to survive.  There is also the issue of pressure, the further down you go the greater the weight of all the rock above you becomes and hence the stronger supports you start needing to hold the roof up.  We end up with a situation where it takes adamantine to mine adamantine, since the structural beams have to be made of adamantine in order to hold up the tunnels that are needed to mine adamantine.  As for the miners, we would need golems made up magma-resistant materials to mine down there without being burnt to a crisp, which gives us something to do.

I don't think the DF world's magma sea is entirely equivalent to the Earth's mantle. If you had that kind of pressure, the third cavern layer would be flooded with magma, not hollow. Instead, it's more like a lava sea that is kept hot via the semi-molten rock below it.

Furthermore, you probably wouldn't need supports because pressure causes the rocks to be more dense. You'd just dig your tunnels with round ceilings to distribute the load. This is a moot point, however, since the air pressure would crush you.

Maybe the dangerous convection heat in the air around magma will be modeled someday. We could have dwarves in asbestos or dragon leather suits. The heat transfer from magma itself is relatively slow.

[GoblinCookie]

I don't think the DF world's magma sea is entirely equivalent to the Earth's mantle. If you had that kind of pressure, the third cavern layer would be flooded with magma, not hollow. Instead, it's more like a lava sea that is kept hot via the semi-molten rock below it.

Furthermore, you probably wouldn't need supports because pressure causes the rocks to be more dense. You'd just dig your tunnels with round ceilings to distribute the load. This is a moot point, however, since the air pressure would crush you.

Maybe the dangerous convection heat in the air around magma will be modeled someday. We could have dwarves in asbestos or dragon leather suits. The heat transfer from magma itself is relatively slow.

It does not matter to what extent the magma sea is similar to the earth's mantle or not.  The reason is that magma is not a heat source, the magma is magma because it is hot rather than it being the case that it is hot because of all that magma.  It is because the earth gets gradually hotter as you get deeper that magma exists, that means if you dig downwards to get to the magma you will end up cooked long before you ever get there.  That is why magma forges are not generally a thing in real-life, if you tried to dig down to deep enough to get to the magma you would simply roast long before you got that deep. 

If the rocks are denser, then they are also heavier.  You are long past the point where you have to worry about the tunnel collapsing due to shifting of the material (only a problem if you are talking sand or soil) and instead you have to worry about how heavy the rocks that the tunnel is made of actually are.  The problem is that the tunnel itself, regardless of what is constructed of will collapse because of the sheer weight of the compressed materials.  Or something, I am not an expert in mining but I wish I was at this point. 

The point is that a more realistic (more difficult) mining system helps to encourage the economy to develop in the desired way since you can access veins of resources that are scarce on the surface by specializing in mining. 

[Bumber]

It does not matter to what extent the magma sea is similar to the earth's mantle or not.  The reason is that magma is not a heat source, the magma is magma because it is hot rather than it being the case that it is hot because of all that magma.  It is because the earth gets gradually hotter as you get deeper that magma exists, that means if you dig downwards to get to the magma you will end up cooked long before you ever get there.  That is why magma forges are not generally a thing in real-life, if you tried to dig down to deep enough to get to the magma you would simply roast long before you got that deep.

Magma does not exist exclusively in the mantle. Pressure drives it to the surface. There are all sorts of branching magma tubes underground that we don't see.

If the rocks are denser, then they are also heavier.  You are long past the point where you have to worry about the tunnel collapsing due to shifting of the material (only a problem if you are talking sand or soil) and instead you have to worry about how heavy the rocks that the tunnel is made of actually are.  The problem is that the tunnel itself, regardless of what is constructed of will collapse because of the sheer weight of the compressed materials.  Or something, I am not an expert in mining but I wish I was at this point.

Sufficiently dense rock should resist the compression. You can direct the forces from above the tunnel around it using the same technique that makes stone arches so sturdy. I'm not sure, but I think a perfectly circular tunnel would also deal with the forces from the sides?

[GoblinCookie]

Magma does not exist exclusively in the mantle. Pressure drives it to the surface. There are all sorts of branching magma tubes underground that we don't see.

I know.  Most of those however are sufficiently far down to be too hot to handle.  Magma is only really accessible in active volcanoes, which come with their own problems. 

Sufficiently dense rock should resist the compression. You can direct the forces from above the tunnel around it using the same technique that makes stone arches so sturdy. I'm not sure, but I think a perfectly circular tunnel would also deal with the forces from the sides?

To a certain extent, but not infinitely.  There is also the issue that with dwarf-tech digging a perfectly circular tunnel is far more difficult than it is today with huge mining drills.

[Sarmatian123]

Sufficiently dense rock should resist the compression. You can direct the forces from above the tunnel around it using the same technique that makes stone arches so sturdy. I'm not sure, but I think a perfectly circular tunnel would also deal with the forces from the sides?

To a certain extent, but not infinitely.  There is also the issue that with dwarf-tech digging a perfectly circular tunnel is far more difficult than it is today with huge mining drills.

If you want the perfectly drilled tunnel in a hard rock (not a sedimentary rock) in a mine 1-2km bellow ground to withstand nuclear explosion above, then circular tunnel and reinforced concrete coating alone will not do. You'll need to install metal springs in this insulation too. Reinforcing rock layers above could also be advisable. More horizontal entry should be used also instead of vertical hole.

Currently modern mining activity takes often place on 1km-2km depth. Even in Sweden, in Kiruna, where magnetite veins used to peak out to the surface. Now, it takes quite a while for a track to drive down there in Kiruna to bring rock and ore back. Coal mines share the same fate like iron ore mines, though usually lifts are still used in there.

Dangers with deep Earth mining is pressure indeed, but not because of rock itself, as of gases and liquids compressed inside of it. The recent USA energy independence in gas and oil production, came from turning this realization into profitable use. Still methane gas explosions, due poor mine shaft ventilation, is huge danger in traditional mining despite using all kinds of technological countermeasures. Prolonged living underground also due same mechanic exposes human beings to another potentially lethal danger, which is a prolonged exposure to deadly dozes of radiation. Some issues with radiation happens in housing constructed out of rock and concrete too, but on way smaller scale.

[Sarmatian123]

@Sarmation123: I know this may be percieved as 'pot calling the kettle black' but your responses are very, very long and convoluted + I am not entirely sure we are talking about the same subject again.

You can't blame me with coming with new ideas for the new issues you keep on pointing out. But I will try to keep it shorter this time around.

What we are talking about here is economic gearing. [...]
Again, it is not a problem to have shifts that cause economic costs.  But they should be things that actually *exist* in the game, not the player not agreeing with the AI as to how to run the player's own site.

I understand economic gearing, as an issue. However in an anti-liberal capitalism, like in "American Dream" capitalism for example, we can prepare shifting of entire economy from oil-based transportation to electric transportation by government investment into building a network of charging batteries stations. However no matter how carefully you prepared ground, GEARING ALWAYS TAKES TIME AND CAUSES ISSUES. There is no going around gearing. You have to give it a time to balance things out. When player retires fortress, you need to simply allow Dwarf Fortress to break the frozen state it received upon world creation and have world creation process to run again. Then freeze game again and let player continue after this world re-creation due gearing. Let's call that a cost of gearing. AI has to sort economically embark out. This is gearing process indeed. Unless there are reasons, you can't run the world creation process after freezing. Then you need to create a new additional world creation process, which you can run on DF after fortress retirement for example to sort player's settlement out.

[...]This in effect means that ores are far more abundant they should be, since in RL it is not just the presence of ores but how deep down they are that matters expense-wise.

Still, in DF metals and gems are finite resources like artifacts. No matter how more abundant they are from artifacts. So whatever economy you put in, the metal, gems and artifacts should be their financial cornerstone. Not just a mere material/items for use.

Workshops are already a placeholder.  The whole building system works on QS, having buildings without QS means you basically need to have buildings as large as their contents, which means you are basically talking about we would nowadays call stockpiles and rooms.  Proposing new buildings for the Economy makes no sense, since by that point buildings will likely have been gutted in any case, replaced by actual rooms that exist in the game. In that context, all the dispensaries or whatever you propose are just a form of stockpile, so the distinction becomes rather a moot point.

Despite workshop employing QS, they are not employing encrusting mechanics to fuse together stacks of same items stored inside into one item. Vanishing items' quantity and rising FPS is not a moot point, which has no sense with current stockpile system. If 20000 blocks [1] will drop frame rate from 50 to bellow 10, then how huge lag on game will cause 1 block [20000]? I perfectly understand your objection with economy, but it is logistics improvement and not economy improvement. You want to keep simplified situation with those placeholders, it is understandable. Currently DF is missing mechanics with joining stacks. This is new functionality and it helps with fps issues.

You will ask, why special placeholders here? We could avoid those storage workshops then, if you hate them so much. If you can have besides barrels put an item like "gigantic vat" for storing one type of alcohol, eg Dwarven wine. Gigantic vat should be acting like joining stacks of items. Probably game will be more fun with more items to be constructed too. For Treasury Workshop alternative item would be a... safe? There you go! An item again. Not all items have quality like cloths and they can be safely joined together.

So what you think about that?

My point of view is, the "cheese [1]" issue, wasn't bug patched this far in DF. Years go past, so special solutions have to be advised and suggested. Feature alike those special storage workshops. Because for sure smelters alone, not only convert item types, but even keep track of fractions! So lets have more of those buildings then like Wine Cellars and Treasury Vault.

It's all abstraction.  At no point are we actually going to be directly keeping track of the 100k+ beings going about their daily lives producing stuff.  There are however levels of abstraction, the existence of different sites producing things as numbers and moving the numbers around is a lower level of abstraction than having the whole economy simply as a set of values representing the strength of different things and then creating a different experience for the player when they actually turn up depending upon those values.  The only reason we need the former rather than the latter is that we have different economic systems at work in the game at the same time. 

Trade is unlikely to be a problem in the game, actually under present conditions the economy would realistically actually get rid of most trade in any case.  You mention tariffs a lot, tariffs are TAXES and taxes are a different economic system to trade.  As a result of tariffs goods get taken from the traders (the trade economy) and places into the government treasuries (the taxation economy) and these economies do not work on the same principle.  Without actually taking into account where the goods are physically going, you cannot determine how much of the goods end up in the taxation economy as opposed to remaining in the trade economy.  That in turn means you cannot simply deduce the effect of the player on the world in general based simply upon the nature of the player's own action. 

To try to explain this tricky concept; the difference is this.  In the more abstract model the player destroys 500 wooden chairs, this means that the world's economic value of carpentry demand goes up and there hence there are fewer chairs (and more carpenters) in AI sites when the adventurer turns up.  In reverse the player dumps 500 wooden chairs onto the world market and hence there is a reduction of the worlds economic value of carpentry demand goes down, meaning that when the adventurer turns up there are more chairs and fewer carpenters. 

In the less abstract model the player sells 500 chairs, they turn into a number for 500 chairs which then travels from site to site, until all the chairs end up in the hands of those who have use for them (use includes throwing them into a volcano  .  The reason we need the latter model is solely because we have multiple economic systems in the game, a lot of games get by with only the former model because there is only one economic system in play.  Things like taxationVStrade coexisting in the same society are thought of as different economic systems here, even if by different economic systems we generally think of different social orders (Communism VS Capitalism).

Tariffs are not taxes, though they work the same way. Tariffs are trade inhibitors and functionally work alike embargoes. Trump will levy the border tax on steel 25% and aluminium 10% from Europe, then you will see how it works in practice. It is not just a tax. Taxes are not killing economy or workplaces. Civilizations should have set limits to trade with other civilizations. Unlimited trade should take place only in borders of same civilization. This is foundation of abstract economic system models you're searching for.

Currently world creation in DF is using one economic system with token limits for particular civilizations. This is the abstraction, which needs to change to enable economy? Right? Define borders of each economy first. Then with borders defined, you can pin point the civilization, that economically went under because player dropped 500 metal chairs into lava and failed then to retrieve these bars (due fortress retirement). This economical collapse should impact only one civilization with its unique own economic abstract model. Right?

If you need to study a case, then do look for Dutch Tulips market crash. Very educational imho.

[Bumber]

I know.  Most of those however are sufficiently far down to be too hot to handle.  Magma is only really accessible in active volcanoes, which come with their own problems. 

Again, this is an Earth-specific issue. Nothing I'm aware of prevents the existence of large magma seas in the lithosphere of an Earth-like planet.


The Hawaiian islands have nice, non-explodey volcanoes. Lava tubes extend all around the surrounding area.

If you had wide-spread low-pressure magma reservoirs all over the planet, that would basically be DF's magma sea.
Essentially, the eruptions mostly happen underground instead of reaching the surface, because there's sufficient relief of pressure.
Of course, DF happens to have literal hell underneath it instead of a proper mantle. Adamantine doesn't exist otherwise.

Despite workshop employing QS, they are not employing encrusting mechanics to fuse together stacks of same items stored inside into one item. Vanishing items' quantity and rising FPS is not a moot point, which has no sense with current stockpile system. If 20000 blocks [1] will drop frame rate from 50 to bellow 10, then how huge lag on game will cause 1 block [20000]? I perfectly understand your objection with economy, but it is logistics improvement and not economy improvement. You want to keep simplified situation with those placeholders, it is understandable. Currently DF is missing mechanics with joining stacks. This is new functionality and it helps with fps issues.

The 20000 blocks in the given example were part of constructions. Obviously you can't go stacking those in a workshop. Stacking is planned (Req112), and there's no reason you need a special building for it.

[GoblinCookie]

I understand economic gearing, as an issue. However in an anti-liberal capitalism, like in "American Dream" capitalism for example, we can prepare shifting of entire economy from oil-based transportation to electric transportation by government investment into building a network of charging batteries stations. However no matter how carefully you prepared ground, GEARING ALWAYS TAKES TIME AND CAUSES ISSUES. There is no going around gearing. You have to give it a time to balance things out. When player retires fortress, you need to simply allow Dwarf Fortress to break the frozen state it received upon world creation and have world creation process to run again. Then freeze game again and let player continue after this world re-creation due gearing. Let's call that a cost of gearing. AI has to sort economically embark out. This is gearing process indeed. Unless there are reasons, you can't run the world creation process after freezing. Then you need to create a new additional world creation process, which you can run on DF after fortress retirement for example to sort player's settlement out.

The world creation process run again?    The state is not frozen if you are talking economically because we are talking about the future when the economy is in. 

Still, in DF metals and gems are finite resources like artifacts. No matter how more abundant they are from artifacts. So whatever economy you put in, the metal, gems and artifacts should be their financial cornerstone. Not just a mere material/items for use.

At the moment those things are not meaningfully finite, because it is so easy to mine them.  Money should be whatever we or the RNG decides to make money in the raws. 

Despite workshop employing QS, they are not employing encrusting mechanics to fuse together stacks of same items stored inside into one item. Vanishing items' quantity and rising FPS is not a moot point, which has no sense with current stockpile system. If 20000 blocks [1] will drop frame rate from 50 to bellow 10, then how huge lag on game will cause 1 block [20000]? I perfectly understand your objection with economy, but it is logistics improvement and not economy improvement. You want to keep simplified situation with those placeholders, it is understandable. Currently DF is missing mechanics with joining stacks. This is new functionality and it helps with fps issues.

You will ask, why special placeholders here? We could avoid those storage workshops then, if you hate them so much. If you can have besides barrels put an item like "gigantic vat" for storing one type of alcohol, eg Dwarven wine. Gigantic vat should be acting like joining stacks of items. Probably game will be more fun with more items to be constructed too. For Treasury Workshop alternative item would be a... safe? There you go! An item again. Not all items have quality like cloths and they can be safely joined together.

So what you think about that?

My point of view is, the "cheese [1]" issue, wasn't bug patched this far in DF. Years go past, so special solutions have to be advised and suggested. Feature alike those special storage workshops. Because for sure smelters alone, not only convert item types, but even keep track of fractions! So lets have more of those buildings then like Wine Cellars and Treasury Vault.

I was trying to explain why it is redundant to propose buildings for the economy.  The problem is that buildings as we understand them are totally built upon QS, there is actually no limit to the number of items that can be stacked inside them.  A stack of 20000 items is going to take up as much space ultimately as 20000 individual items, so I don't understand the relevance of your talk about stacking to anything. 

Things like safes are best modeled by a room with a safe-door which is defined as a safe.  Otherwise we end with a situation where we cannot make safes of whatever size we wish, but are forced to use multiple safes for the same purpose when a single larger safe will do. 

Tariffs are not taxes, though they work the same way. Tariffs are trade inhibitors and functionally work alike embargoes. Trump will levy the border tax on steel 25% and aluminium 10% from Europe, then you will see how it works in practice. It is not just a tax. Taxes are not killing economy or workplaces. Civilizations should have set limits to trade with other civilizations. Unlimited trade should take place only in borders of same civilization. This is foundation of abstract economic system models you're searching for.

Currently world creation in DF is using one economic system with token limits for particular civilizations. This is the abstraction, which needs to change to enable economy? Right? Define borders of each economy first. Then with borders defined, you can pin point the civilization, that economically went under because player dropped 500 metal chairs into lava and failed then to retrieve these bars (due fortress retirement). This economical collapse should impact only one civilization with its unique own economic abstract model. Right?

If you need to study a case, then do look for Dutch Tulips market crash. Very educational imho.

Tariffs are a definitely a form of tax, one levied on foreign imports.  Tariffs do not exist 'by default', they are something that a government has to implement; so there is no necessary reason why all civilizations would even raise any tariffs on foreign trade whatsoever.  If something is under tariff, it means the tax is added to the selling price of the item, so Donald Trump's steel tariff means that if anyone sells $100 worth of steel to the US, the US government will add $25 in tax to the price meaning that the buyer ends up paying $125.  The extra $25 does not go the seller but instead it goes to the US government, which is now $25 richer. 

That last part is why we have a problem.  The goods are not just moving about in our abstract commercial economy model which can model large chunks of tha economy as a unified whole, depending upon where the goods physically go we end up with stuff being transferred into a different economy model (the taxation one).  Goods are transferred from the trader model to the taxation model, according to their physical location, that requires us to actually keep track of where all the items are even when the player is not there. 

With only one economic system the effect of the player on the economy as a whole could simply be modeled directly and the only reason to have the Economy was so the player's own behavior can effect the prosperity of the wider world. 

I know.  Most of those however are sufficiently far down to be too hot to handle.  Magma is only really accessible in active volcanoes, which come with their own problems. 

Again, this is an Earth-specific issue. Nothing I'm aware of prevents the existence of large magma seas in the lithosphere of an Earth-like planet.


The Hawaiian islands have nice, non-explodey volcanoes. Lava tubes extend all around the surrounding area.

If you had wide-spread low-pressure magma reservoirs all over the planet, that would basically be DF's magma sea.
Essentially, the eruptions mostly happen underground instead of reaching the surface, because there's sufficient relief of pressure.
Of course, DF happens to have literal hell underneath it instead of a proper mantle. Adamantine doesn't exist otherwise.

As a said before, it is not hot because there is magma, the magma is magma because it is hot.  Therefore where the magma is in the rocks, how close to the surface matters not one bit because in order for the magma to stay as magma it has to be hot down there, wherever down there actually is. 

What matters is the direction of the flow.  If currents are carrying magma towards the surface then it possible for the magma to be surrounded by rock cold enough to dig through to get to the magma, which carries the heat from further underground with in.  In the vast majority of cases getting to the magma by mining is impossible, because since the melting point of rock is many, many times what it takes to kill you and destroy all your machinery long before you dug to the magma.  Hence only in active volcanoes does it become possible to actually dig into the magma, but you generally don't want to do that because of where it is headed.

However in DF, the dwarves could use golems made of suitable magma-safe material to actually dig into the magma even if the dwarves themselves would burn to a crisp. 

[Sarmatian123]

The world creation process run again?    The state is not frozen if you are talking economically because we are talking about the future when the economy is in.

Just to continue it for a wee and not from start. 1 or 2 seasons should balance gearing out.

At the moment those things are not meaningfully finite, because it is so easy to mine them.  Money should be whatever we or the RNG decides to make money in the raws.

I disagree. Not so fast! Not at start. First things need to be created first like treasury maybe.
1st, minting coins is player's choice and not RNG.
2nd, coins are forged out of metal exclusively.
3rd, coins choice add metal to expensive items list as candidates for treasury stockpile.
4th, most materials in DF can be conjured out of thin air, not by script, but by player with limits set to metal and gems. Player production is also limited on large gems and artifacts, so those are perfect candidates for treasury. Keep in mind that coin melting is an exploit.
5th, if you have economy, then you crafted in tariffs and border embargoes between civilizations even if they are using same economy system, and logically with taxes and trading you will need to create A NEED for treasury. Once as to stockpile all the candies (candy included) and secondly to provide reasons to use it.
6th. Only if you have treasury, then you can create paper money, virtual money, fraction currency forged coins and so on, all based on the items worth + treasury value adjustment.

I was trying to explain why it is redundant to propose buildings for the economy.  The problem is that buildings as we understand them are totally built upon QS, there is actually no limit to the number of items that can be stacked inside them.  A stack of 20000 items is going to take up as much space ultimately as 20000 individual items, so I don't understand the relevance of your talk about stacking to anything. 

Things like safes are best modeled by a room with a safe-door which is defined as a safe.  Otherwise we end with a situation where we cannot make safes of whatever size we wish, but are forced to use multiple safes for the same purpose when a single larger safe will do. 

New buildings are fun. New items are fun. No matter how you do it. Why not adding new buildings, new items and new rooms with their own dedicated location class on top?
Adding wine cellars for huge QS alcohol storage in limited space makes sense. Like in real life.
Adding treasury for huge QS on limited storage sense makes sense too. Like in real life.
Not to mention, the only stack combining mechanics currently in DF is kitchen. It can combine multiple stacks to create a new one.
FPS death is real issue in DF and ultimate barrier for playing continuity. It has to be factored in.

Example: LOCATION ANIMAL FARM with assigned 1-2 animal caretakers/animal trainers (other Dwarves barred from working in there). Defined to Alpacas, to keep 10 youngest grown females and 2 males, oldest get auto-butcher marking if more animals arrives due growing up or trade, monthly auto milking ON, yearly auto sheering ON. I-key defined pasture and assigned to ANIMAL FARM location. Chest build on in pasture zone to keep bucket for milking only. In zone build farmer workshop for sheering and milking animals only from that pasture.

Just go with your imagination. LOCATION TREASURY. LOCATION VINEYARD/CELLAR. Don't say it has no usability in economy. Why people create those, if those have no meaning in economy. Why there are pastures in DF, if there was no economical sense pasturing animals. It is not exactly limited to how you do it, just so you do it. Eventually even, if you take your sweet time for it.

Furthermore it all can be created without economy and ECONOMY IS NOT A REQUIREMENT. Like every workshop, every zone and every location, which are currently placed in the game. The smart play here is to make those things less of a harassment for player to build and use. Like the automatic QS with hauling schedules, trackstops and minecarts, which are too complex right now for new DF players to  enjoy. Improved Interface included, like the l-locations, which is a move in right direction imho.

When you crate economy, you will simply need to factor the economic activities performed by Dwarves into your model. Like tokens set for abstinent Dwarves forbidding them production of alcohol maybe? Go with your model economy nutz, but give us DF players those treasuries, winecellars/wineyards, automated pastures and other sweet sweet addons to play with around in DF.

Tariffs are a definitely a form of tax, one levied on foreign imports.  Tariffs do not exist 'by default', they are something that a government has to implement; so there is no necessary reason why all civilizations would even raise any tariffs on foreign trade whatsoever.  If something is under tariff, it means the tax is added to the selling price of the item, so Donald Trump's steel tariff means that if anyone sells $100 worth of steel to the US, the US government will add $25 in tax to the price meaning that the buyer ends up paying $125.  The extra $25 does not go the seller but instead it goes to the US government, which is now $25 richer.

That last part is why we have a problem.  The goods are not just moving about in our abstract commercial economy model which can model large chunks of tha economy as a unified whole, depending upon where the goods physically go we end up with stuff being transferred into a different economy model (the taxation one).  Goods are transferred from the trader model to the taxation model, according to their physical location, that requires us to actually keep track of where all the items are even when the player is not there. 

With only one economic system the effect of the player on the economy as a whole could simply be modeled directly and the only reason to have the Economy was so the player's own behavior can effect the prosperity of the wider world. 

It is called "tariff" and not "tax" and this form taxation is only performed on border of civilization economy. You don't need invent taxation system for tariff system. It is like inventing a new sale tax, when you plan to perform income taxation. So what if it is just another tax? It is not some mere tax. It is a tariff. You need to have it together with embargo already around, when making your economic system. When Dwarven civilization goes to war with Goblin civlization, then there is need for embargo. Not for tariff.

[Bumber]

Adding wine cellars for huge QS alcohol storage in limited space makes sense. Like in real life.
Adding treasury for huge QS on limited storage sense makes sense too. Like in real life.

These terms don't magically add unlimited space to an area.

[GoblinCookie]

Just to continue it for a wee and not from start. 1 or 2 seasons should balance gearing out.

 

I disagree. Not so fast! Not at start. First things need to be created first like treasury maybe.
1st, minting coins is player's choice and not RNG.
2nd, coins are forged out of metal exclusively.
3rd, coins choice add metal to expensive items list as candidates for treasury stockpile.
4th, most materials in DF can be conjured out of thin air, not by script, but by player with limits set to metal and gems. Player production is also limited on large gems and artifacts, so those are perfect candidates for treasury. Keep in mind that coin melting is an exploit.
5th, if you have economy, then you crafted in tariffs and border embargoes between civilizations even if they are using same economy system, and logically with taxes and trading you will need to create A NEED for treasury. Once as to stockpile all the candies (candy included) and secondly to provide reasons to use it.
6th. Only if you have treasury, then you can create paper money, virtual money, fraction currency forged coins and so on, all based on the items worth + treasury value adjustment.

You provided no reason why coins would have to be minted out of metal, or even why money would have to be coins.  Or even what the purpose of money even is! 

I know what the purpose of money in my economy is.  Money is simply the top of a list of items ranked backwards according to necessity, food and water are at the bottom of the items list and money is at the top.  The difference between money and all other items is that when we get enough money to meet the demand for money we simply generate another demand for money on top of the existing money demand forever.

What is considered money is decided at a civilization level.  If something is specifically defined as money in the raw files, then that is what they will consider money, but if nothing is defined then as soon as the economy develops to the point that all demands have been met by at least some economic entity within that civilization, an item that can be produced by the civilization is defined as money.  There some limitations on the nature of that item, it has to be an item that is under a certain size and it's material has to be of a sort that does not naturally decay over time (so excluding most food). 

Coins are originally just metal gemstones.  A civilization will mint coins if it does not have enough gemstones to decorate items and the item will be decorated with coins. 

It is called "tariff" and not "tax" and this form taxation is only performed on border of civilization economy. You don't need invent taxation system for tariff system. It is like inventing a new sale tax, when you plan to perform income taxation. So what if it is just another tax? It is not some mere tax. It is a tariff. You need to have it together with embargo already around, when making your economic system. When Dwarven civilization goes to war with Goblin civlization, then there is need for embargo. Not for tariff.

Okay, I already understand that you are not from an English-speaking country.  In English, if something is called something different it does not mean it is not simply a particular type of something else. Taxes are a 'higher-level' word to tariff, tariffs are a type of tax and not something on the same level as taxes.  There are other kinds of taxes, income-tax, sales-tax, value-added tax and so on, in this case all of them are 'lower-level' words that represent forms of taxation. 

It is a quirk of the language that sometimes some of the lower-level words refer to the thing they are an example of but sometimes not.  So tariffs are the same as income-taxes in being forms of taxes, but unlike with income-taxes they do not directly refer to the thing they are a form of in the name.  Your response implies you think that all the forms of something have to include the name of the thing they are form of, that is not how English works.

So yes, if you invent tariffs you have invented taxation.  Embargoes on the other hand are the cessation of trade in general, since tariffs are a tax on trade you cannot actually have tariffs if there is no trade between two parties. 

[Sarmatian123]

Just to continue it for a wee and not from start. 1 or 2 seasons should balance gearing out.

Alternatively, you will need to write a clean-up script and run it on the site after player retired it, so the retired embark is conforming to standard rules governing AI site management. 

You provided no reason why coins would have to be minted out of metal, or even why money would have to be coins.  Or even what the purpose of money even is! 

I know what the purpose of money in my economy is.  Money is simply the top of a list of items ranked backwards according to necessity, food and water are at the bottom of the items list and money is at the top.  The difference between money and all other items is that when we get enough money to meet the demand for money we simply generate another demand for money on top of the existing money demand forever.

What is considered money is decided at a civilization level.  If something is specifically defined as money in the raw files, then that is what they will consider money, but if nothing is defined then as soon as the economy develops to the point that all demands have been met by at least some economic entity within that civilization, an item that can be produced by the civilization is defined as money.  There some limitations on the nature of that item, it has to be an item that is under a certain size and it's material has to be of a sort that does not naturally decay over time (so excluding most food). 

Coins are originally just metal gemstones.  A civilization will mint coins if it does not have enough gemstones to decorate items and the item will be decorated with coins. 

Yup, gem/large-gem coins make sense alike metal coins. I think some rare shells used to be a sort of coins in some ancient civilization.

Money is just another merchandise, but it is special due legislation, as you are noting.

However, you missed to factor in one essential issue-solving ability of coins. Imagine a snake oil salesman selling you a wonder-paper, which will cure all your issues of hauling heavy and big load back, which is equal in value of goods you just sold to very hostile negotiating partners, who will certainly go to war  with you very soon. Like Dwarf-Goblin trades. The wonder-paper the snake oil salesman is pushing on you are traveling bonds and in border of in-civilization trading legislation can legitimize those. However in between-civilization trading, you do not have such legitimacy. Your trade partners may try paying with glass coins for your goods. Valid in their civilization, but utterly useless in yours. This is why modern fraction value monetary system is so depended on having foreign currencies in their treasuries, as reserve.

So, what ingame raw materials, have highest value for their weight and size, if not precious metal bars, gems and diamonds? Imho, inter-civilization trade should even ignore coins and what civilization assigned them for value. In inter-civilization trade such coin should be worth only as much as the material they are made of. So coins=bars and bars=coins really. If you couldn't smelt the coins into bars, then there wouldn't be a point in trading in them. Then I would suggest only metal bars, gems and limited in production items like large gems and artifacts.

Isn't oil and other raw resources traded on modern day goods stock exchanges? Isn't metal like oil in Dwarf Fortress currently? A strategic resource and commodity. Gems maybe rare and more valuable, but are gems a strategic resource really? Can army survive without gem-helmets, gem-shields, can embark survive without gem-tools and diamond cutters? I think they can.

Okay, I already understand that you are not from an English-speaking country.  In English, if something is called something different it does not mean it is not simply a particular type of something else. Taxes are a 'higher-level' word to tariff, tariffs are a type of tax and not something on the same level as taxes.  There are other kinds of taxes, income-tax, sales-tax, value-added tax and so on, in this case all of them are 'lower-level' words that represent forms of taxation. 

It is a quirk of the language that sometimes some of the lower-level words refer to the thing they are an example of but sometimes not.  So tariffs are the same as income-taxes in being forms of taxes, but unlike with income-taxes they do not directly refer to the thing they are a form of in the name.  Your response implies you think that all the forms of something have to include the name of the thing they are form of, that is not how English works.

So yes, if you invent tariffs you have invented taxation.  Embargoes on the other hand are the cessation of trade in general, since tariffs are a tax on trade you cannot actually have tariffs if there is no trade between two parties.

I guess you are right about my non-English perception. From my point of view tariff is not a tax. Tariff is more like a ticket. Usually payed on some bridge or gate, you need to pass through. Drop the coin <bang!> and gate opens before your car to drive on. For example in DF currently you pay some value of goods with merchant caravan, as gift to mountain home, to have then the mountain home with its currently useless monarch moved to your embark. This is from my point of view an already working entire complete tariff system in DF and still no economy system on horizon.