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[Starver]

The way I see it (hopefully as intended) is that the gap either side of the left thread is the 'dipping' end (and will be transparent to the background that represents the liquid-or-lack-of-it that it will be pumping from from under/around that end) and when in operation the 'enclosed' screw to the right would carry the liquid hue between the threads (and whatever liquid-sloshing graphic there is will effectively show the outpouring, according to the basic nature of the pumped-to third tile, be it full, filling, over a drop, etc).

I suggest the 'with three frames more' animation under (and orientated correctly to) the top-handled version but every other/every third thread (with frame multiplication to loop properly). The handle on the off-one-end version looks linear waggling back and forth, but that's hard to repress the perception of with such small distance 'travelled' and not enough pixels to make over and under travel past the centreline look different. Impractical as it might be IRL as a windlass¹ for practical extended manual winding , can I suggest a top-down handle (clearly rotating head on to the 'viewer') with as much hint/suggestion as you can imbue into the pixels to suggest a bevel-gear set translating the into-screen axle/face-one cog meshing with the pump-length axle/edge-on cog that chain-drives the screw.

There's also a question of how the chain/belt drive works, but it's handily hidden. I'm going to assume that the upper axle, handle or bevel-gear driven, has a chain that passes around the entire width of the rotting screw, within the pipe housing.

Code: [Select]

   •¬    Handle/input
  /_\    Chain/belt drive passing from handle to screw with large mechanical advantage.
 ( \ )    Around a rimmed part of the screw (rim+belt snug-enough to the unshown pipe housing, without catching)
  ~~~     The liquid sloshing up, and presumed base of the screw-rim with belt and (still unshown) pipe.

Sending it via a more 1:1 pair of belt gears would require a split in the screw which would compromise the through-flow and backflow protection, somewhat.

Not that I think this needs drawing in, I'm just musing out loud how it might be engineered to (purely coincidently!) look like how the dorf design must look.

[Meph]

That's a bit (a lot) over my head.

It a screw, a tube section and a block. That's it, according to DF. Even the handle I invented, because it's on pictures of old RL archimedes screws. Certainly no chain or belt involved.

[Rose]

Dwarfs run on top of the tube like a treadmill.

[Bumber]

Remember, this is the size we are using: (red shirt, brown vest, brown skirt, green/farmer sash)

Hmm... How about as a belt around the waist, instead? Or maybe you could make the sash thinner without sacrificing visibility?

[Cruxador]

That's a bit (a lot) over my head.

You bike, right? Imagine the chain of your bike, with a gear at each end. Well, in this case instead of powering a wheel, it powers the screw. And instead of going forward parallel to the ground, it goes up, and receives power from a handle rather than peddle (the only difference being that it's powered by hand, rather than ped, or foot). That's the basic mechanism he's discussing.

And then instead of receiving the power from the handle directly, it receives it from a gear which is powered by a perpendicular gear to which the handle is attached, so that the path of the handle looks circular from above, to dodge the waggling appearance of the handle in the previous animation.

He's saying pop that mechanism on a thingamajigger like what Manveru made, and you'll have something that would work in real life, is consistent with its function in the game, and visually you can tell more or less what's going on.

It a screw, a tube section and a block. That's it, according to DF. Even the handle I invented, because it's on pictures of old RL archimedes screws. Certainly no chain or belt involved.

Like forging tools with no hammer or tongs, lot of things have to be thought of as abstracted. A chain might be going a bit too far since you'd think that would be hard to manufacture at dwarven tech level, but the items needed to construct something can't be much more than a guideline. Still, with regards to the chain specifically, you could also just have two connected gears, one connected to the screw (presumably at the end, by means of a short axle) and another above, interlocking directly without the aid of a chain.

[Meph]

Minecarts, Wheelbarrows and traction bench.

[mifki]

Traction bench doesn't quite look right.

[Jiri Petru]

How do you show a duke using a sash? And distinguish him from a baron? How do you show the mayor, the bookkeeper, the captain of the guard, a bard, a priest, the chief medic, the dungeon master?

You keep talking about professions but professions aren’t that important. It’s the unique positions that are crucial and need to be seen at glance. And their in-game clothing isn’t any different.

[Cruxador]

Minecarts, Wheelbarrows and traction bench.

Minecart and wheelbarrows look good, although I'm not sure if that kind of pipe-based wheelbarrow would be period accurate. Based on the contemporary images I can find, it seems like the most common depiction is of a wheelbarrow where two staves, often curved, stretch wheel (usually just one, but sometimes two on an axle) to the point where they become handles, and between the two are slats to make a surface on which to pile things. Many examples of this type of wheelbarrow don't even have sides, much less that relatively difficult to produce (with pre-industrial tech) pipe frame.

I don't know what a medieval traction bench should look like, but I agree that doesn't look well suited to its in-game function.

How do you show a duke using a sash? And distinguish him from a baron? How do you show the mayor, the bookkeeper, the captain of the guard, a bard, a priest, the chief medic, the dungeon master?

You keep talking about professions but professions aren’t that important. It’s the unique positions that are crucial and need to be seen at glance. And their in-game clothing isn’t any different.

I don't really agree that it's important to recognize unique positions at a glance; I think seeing a purple sash should be enough to judge if you have some reason to loo[k] more closely. However, I also think it wouldn't be too hard to put some one or two pixel badges or metals on such a sash, or for very important positions such as king, lots of gold edging or embroidery or whatever looks good.

[Meph]

I don't really agree that it's important to recognize unique positions at a glance

I don't even know what to say anymore.

[LordBalkan]

I don't really agree that it's important to recognize unique positions at a glance

I don't even know what to say anymore.

LMAO
that's all I have to say about this
Can only read and laugh. The good think is, at the end, no matter what, we all gonna play this game as we always been doing.

I do liked the minecarts, wheelbarrows and... well never used tractionbench don't know what they're good for, nor used minecarts as well though but I know how the look, even if they do not look "period accurate" 

[Cruxador]

I don't really agree that it's important to recognize unique positions at a glance

I don't even know what to say anymore.

Well, not as important as Jiri is saying, at least. And why should it be? If you need them for something, it's not like you're going to comb your fort for them manually. That's what the unit list is for. If you see them in the dining hall or tavern or whatever and you happen to care about their position at that time, but don't generally care about them enough to recognize their faces in the new system, you can [v]iew them, and you'll have plenty of info right there. They pretty much all either do their job with little player input (the leadership positions) or else you tell them what to do specifically on rare but specific occasions (book keeper, military leaders, broker) and you'll find them individually and check them then. Unless you do something silly like drown your fort in bards, then it's not such a big problem. I think little modifications to the sashes are totally adequate for that.

I also suspect some people care more about individual dwarves than I do in general, but that tendency should be both addressed and enhanced by visually unique faces.

[funkydwarf]

The period changes with every new world. There is no "period". Sure, same "level" construction techniques in similar physics will tend toward  similarity. However a dwarf can make a lava tube from a lava safe hunk of rock. Ie don't discount thin diameter pipes and bars and staves used as construction elements.


Traction bench is used to treat (some?) broken bones in game.

[Cruxador]

The period changes with every new world. There is no "period".

I mean the pre-1400 tech level to which Toady roughly limits the game. I know details can vary depending on actual implementation, and there's also the whole scholarship system (which doesn't tie all that directly to tech) but more modern industrial type designs should still probably not be a source of primary inspiration for the vanilla graphics.

[Starver]

I don't really agree that it's important to recognize unique positions at a glance; I think seeing a purple sash should be enough to judge if you have some reason to loo[k] more closely. However, I also think it wouldn't be too hard to put some one or two pixel badges or metals on such a sash, or for very important positions such as king, lots of gold edging or embroidery or whatever looks good.

Frogging. Braid. Trim. Something a mere pixel (the current 'edge' line, or the next pixel in?) in size, 'gold' in hue (whichever off-yellow RGB you prefer) or silver (a light grey) or just a good colour to contrast with the base 'field' of the sash (defined as "XOR what's below with White", in the code, a possibly useful feature to build into the sprite-generation engine - though exceptions to make an override so low-saturation grays 'contrast' by the most distant no-saturation and hueless luminosity level), and intermittent in proportion to the hierarchical rank (solid for monarch, widely spread individual pixel spots for Expedition Leader).

Or indeed badges/pips (or smudges representative of them, given the resolution being worked ) along the centre-line, contrasting as above. Or 120° rotated round the colour-wheel where that means anything at all under the chosen core shade.