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[Dragonslayerelf]

Picture a fortress that has slain a plethora of megabeasts, raids of every race, has legendary squads of warriors that can thanos snap a forgotten beast out of existence and are ready to take on the circus. You get close to that candy, however, you want to build infrastructure to make it possible for your warriors to fight one clown at a time, so you build a winding series of hallways. Somewhere along the line, one of your haulers you didn't even bother to notice was getting a bit stressed because the cook has been building instead of cooking lavish meals, the alcohol's been running dry and he hasn't prayed in a while. Suddenly, he throws a tantrum and beats another dwarf to near death. Now that dwarf is stressed because he almost died, so he throws a tantrum and beats several dwarves up, who themselves become stressed. Then, the original dwarf goes berserk and one of your military dwarves has to kill him, and now that military dwarf is stressed because he just killed another dwarf. Soon, more dwarves are becoming depressed, looney, and going berserk. One of your legendary military dwarves with masterwork steel armor and weapons goes berserk in the middle of your meeting hall and slaughters half your fort before the other military dwarves can take him down: However, they are stressed about killing other dwarves too and seeing all that death, so some of them go berserk. When the dust clears, you have a few military dwarves - if you're lucky - who are all depressed and experiencing traumatic flashbacks every 5 seconds and peasants with miles of corpses to clean. Your fort of 200 was rapidly reduced to 12 lucky dwarves who have 188 corpses to clear out. That, Toady, is the problem with stress. It stacks too much and too quickly.

Not to mention, there's also the memories of a sentient being that died in front of someone years ago haunting them forever and causing them to stop whatever they're doing for a while. I once had a dwarf who was attacked by a cat when he was gelding it and that became a 'traumatic memory' for him, so every 5 minutes or so (50 fps, 30 gfps) he'd just stop doing everything was doing and 'experience horror' for a while.

tl;dr it lasts too long and can pile up quickly. Ntm all this puts a deadline on your fort and usually the average DF player can run a fort for 15-20 years before it collapses due to a stress spiral. I've had forts where I was reckless and killed bards and tantrummers in front of people last shorter, up to 5.

[Lord Snow]

Most of these people don't bother giving us any feedback, which is understandable.  The game just sucks and why play?

Sorry.
If you haven't noticed complaints that the game is getting less and less playable with every new feature on the same old clunky interface since at least the military revamp update, you have been listening to only the same 5 people.

It's slow and getting slower yet.
World Gen parameters are all but useless (hello 23000 living historical figures in 8000 popcap world)
You're getting too many dwarves too soon with no chance to identify with any.
Dwarves have more needs but less use.
A lot of jobs have very little impact.
Training military is a dance on a knives edge between having 30 dwarves get chopped up by a single properly equipped goblin because they kept their training swords on vs. dwarves slicing each other up with real weapons in the barracks barely gaining any skill.
Forgotten Beasts syndromes are getting too many shots off.
Dwarves are still horrendously stupid about cleaning/getting cleaned up as well as avoiding obviously contaminated areas.
Blaaa bla bla

A couple of versions back i coped by atom-smashing 75% of each migration wave, walling in and building traps. Lately i just don't play anymore.
For all the interesting detail in DF worlds, other games let me actually experience fun stuff and lose in interesting and comprehensible, in-the-future-avoidable ways. DF .28 was a lot more accessible than what we have now.

[PlumpHelmetMan]

Not sure why the aggressive and accusatory tone of your post is necessary, but I guess if Toady and Threetoe took the time to create these threads for player feedback then they're obviously ignoring people as you say.

[Telgin]

Training military is a dance on a knives edge between having 30 dwarves get chopped up by a single properly equipped goblin because they kept their training swords on vs. dwarves slicing each other up with real weapons in the barracks barely gaining any skill.

I agree with a lot of what you said, but is this actually true?  Last few times I played you didn't even need to make training weapons because dwarves trained safely with real weapons.

Of course, that highlights a separate issue - why are training weapons still in the game if they have no use and only introduce liabilities?

[Splint]

why are training weapons still in the game if they have no use and only introduce liabilities?

They're probably just relics from when it was an actual issue, but I'm sure some people use them as a stopgap to train their militias in metal-poor environments (we're talking those shit embarks that only have gold and zinc or some other militarily useless ore resources,) with new squads being given place-holder training weapons until actual ones can be imported or made from imported raw materials.

Wouldn't be shocking if they were also given to those problem dwarves who so very desperately want to practice a martial art but their stats (physical, mental, or both) are so terrible that they really have no business engaging in such at all. Basically something just to shut them up and train combat skills that are more efficient at dispatching intruders than crossbows, should a player be forced to call upon those... Less than ideal recruits.

[therahedwig]

Now now, it's also to equip your fort guard with so they hold back a little.

I think it's rather that they were going to be necessary back in the .31 release(when materials were rewritten to work as they do now and we got the current military), but then the escalation levels got introduced which made the AI smart enough to understand what is ok in specific escalation levels, such as sparring. Maybe they'll get recycled at some point to be children's toys?

[Splint]

Now now, it's also to equip your fort guard with so they hold back a little.

What, you mean I'm the only one who gives the police iron maces for doling out punishments?

[FantasticDorf]

Training military is a dance on a knives edge between having 30 dwarves get chopped up by a single properly equipped goblin because they kept their training swords on vs. dwarves slicing each other up with real weapons in the barracks barely gaining any skill.

I agree with a lot of what you said, but is this actually true?  Last few times I played you didn't even need to make training weapons because dwarves trained safely with real weapons.

Of course, that highlights a separate issue - why are training weapons still in the game if they have no use and only introduce liabilities?

My sheriff ripped out a formerly tantrumming cook's throat in the middle of a punishment beating with his teeth leading to fatal suffocation and bleeding, i think some more fine tuning is required of the escalation levels in general.

[Splint]

Training military is a dance on a knives edge between having 30 dwarves get chopped up by a single properly equipped goblin because they kept their training swords on vs. dwarves slicing each other up with real weapons in the barracks barely gaining any skill.

I agree with a lot of what you said, but is this actually true?  Last few times I played you didn't even need to make training weapons because dwarves trained safely with real weapons.

Of course, that highlights a separate issue - why are training weapons still in the game if they have no use and only introduce liabilities?

My sheriff ripped out a formerly tantrumming cook's throat in the middle of a punishment beating with his teeth leading to fatal suffocation and bleeding, i think some more fine tuning is required of the escalation levels in general.

Can't say I've ever seen that particular incident, but my own law enforcement deaths tend to be related to blows to the head causing torsion damage to the upper spinal tissue - the hit itself usually does nothing but bruise and stun which are boo boos that are perfectly survivable on their own, but the imparted force ends up essentially snapping the apparent law-breaker's neck.

The same also happens if they hit the criminal in the lower arms, legs, or feet: Imparted force leads to broken/torn bones and muscle, courtesy of a barehanded beating for some minor offense. While I'm personally fine with this since it encourages me to not faff about and ignore mandates, others probably consider this to be a bit... Much, on the part of law enforcement.

Obviously this is all bad because it can lead to: experiencing trauma, suffering a major/minor injury, potentially being shocked/panicked at being beaten, and if the lawbreaker dies, a nice healthy dose of "Horrified after seeing Urist McCriminal's dead body" for literally everyone who happened to be nearby without a wall in the way. And obviously, in the case of the criminal not dying, they're also going to be hit with restlessness/resentfulness a lot of the time at being imprisoned, if a prison sentence was on the docket for one of their offenses if they had multiple. All of which can potentially stack up to haunt the criminal and depending on temperment, cause them to become a violent repeat offender.

And speaking of the restless thought, that needs to go away for medical patients. Instead of being happy they aren't dead, they get a stressor more often than not, at least in my experience (so take it with a grain of salt,) about being restless because they're laid up while the doctors duct tape thier limbs back together and keep thier internal systems from becoming external. This is generally instead of  being happy and grateful that assuming the injuries aren't serious and/or the docs are quick, they aren't going to be taking a dirt nap because their fellow citizens were quick to help them.

[Egan_BW]

I dunno, it's pretty reasonable to be unhappy about being stuck in a hospital.

[Splint]

I dunno, it's pretty reasonable to be unhappy about being stuck in a hospital.

For an extended period of time, certainly. Anyone would be grumpy if they ended up stuck in traction for months because both thier legs got broken by a rampaging enemy mount or something.  But they get the stressor as soon as they get put in bed, not after long stays stuck in the broken bone ward (injuries to soft tissues tend to be in-and-out cases.) While this makes sense for the energetic and maybe the prideful who aren't given to accepting help, most I imagine would be happy to have somewhere presumably safe to go to get patched up instead of a medic having to make a damned house call or treat them in the field where they're at the mercy of the elements, enemies, and wildlife.

With the less serious injuries though, this means usually no food or water reception destressors to balance it out, and it seems like being restless is more common than it it should be. They get one for being hospitalized, no matter how minor the wound(s) in question are, one for the injury itself which varies in strength, and potentially one for being attacked, and others if they were wounded in a battle. It basically throws an additional negative thought on an already potentially heavy pile.

[wierd]

Devil's advocate:

Dwarven Healthcare is not this.

It is totally this.

[nautilu]

It would be neat to have an order where the mayor/king/leader of the fort could call a court meeting. All dwarves must attend, all jobs are postponed, dwarves who defy the order to go for one reason or another are punished for breaking the law (those in prison either are exempt or are brought by guards),  children are exempt.
The purpose is it gives a boost in mood to all who attend, maybe the leader can also use skills to make peace between dwarves or lighten their mood with an inspirational speech. The effects lasting depends on the skill level. A leader with no skill whatsoever might even make it worse or cause riots, so as to make it a risky order. This would make leadership more important in the current build.
Also, the player would have to design a courtroom big enough to hold everyone, or the dwarves that dont fit wont get the benefits. Maybe even have a "too crowded" modifier?
Maybe other civ diplomats can attend and get a relations boost or end a war.

I can imagine this becoming an important game milestone. When to call your first council, with risks and benefits and also how soon to call a council after bad events or prior to battle so that the survivors will have a mood boost for the hard times ahead. LOTR is full of examples.

[FantasticDorf]

It would be neat to have an order where the mayor/king/leader of the fort could call a court meeting. All dwarves must attend, all jobs are postponed, dwarves who defy the order to go for one reason or another are punished for breaking the law (those in prison either are exempt or are brought by guards),  children are exempt.

The purpose is it gives a boost in mood to all who attend, maybe the leader can also use skills to make peace between dwarves or lighten their mood with an inspirational speech. [snip]

I can imagine this becoming an important game milestone. When to call your first council, with risks and benefits and also how soon to call a council after bad events or prior to battle so that the survivors will have a mood boost for the hard times ahead. LOTR is full of examples.

Linking it implicit to or require the attendance of important fortress nobles like [MANAGE_WORKERS] to enable more features would be cool.

Sort of like having a liason visit but quarterly during the civ's active season to update on what events have happened, which would be useful for comprehending also any particular meta-concerns that can be raised such as unhappy guilds, and as you said milestones of mayors & monarchs could help give a fortress wide good mood thought like justice about having competent leadership if there isn't actually any room to hold bystanders.

[nautilu]

Yeah. Leaders should do more and the more complex the fort becomes the more dedicated the rulers have to be to their job. Maybe it could lead to a faction system where a greedy ruler will extort citizens, etc. If the ruler is skilled and popular enough then they have support, or if not then maybe a real civil war could happen, with each side wishing to install its leader to the throne.
Imagine a scenario where the king keeps taking a dwarfs socks because they are his favorite item, but the dwarf happens to be an elite guard in the kings throne room... And so goes the tale of Urist "The Headless" Longhose....

Or religious wars... "What do you mean you dont want to join the vampire kings religion??? Infidel!!"