Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Aqizzar]

I've got a common problem.  My fortress is home to a legendary stonecrafter and a legendary engraver.  The crafter is the cornerstone of my economy, the engraver is making everything pretty.  They both crank out masterpeices, hence influencing each other.

Almost every tile in my fortress is either a masterpeice engraving of a dwarf holding a masterpeice mug, or a masterpeice depiction of a masterpeice engraving of a dwarf holding a masterpeice mug.  My entryway is a hall of mirrors.

So my suggestion is, removing the creation of masterpeices from the list of picture-worthy events.  Whatever the weight given to different possibilities, if any, is quickly crowded out with just two legendary makers.

If I can make a further point from this, it would be giving more weight to making pictures of historical events.  With the vast new world-gen system, dwarves engraving events from the past would really add to the whole living world feel.

Yes, alterations to engraving have been brought up before, but I think this one is straightforward enough to suggest.

[Puzzlemaker]

How about a limit to the amount of times it can be referenced, or something like that?

[Joseph Miles]

And not having masterwork engravings "Engrave worthy"

[Derakon]

And not having masterwork engravings "Engrave worthy"

Ahh, imitating the masters is a common way to learn. Plus it's funny.

I do think, though, that any given subject should have a relatively limited scope, both in number of engravings and in timeliness of those engravings. So right after an artifact is made, yes, get a half-dozen or so engravings of it. But if I make engravings right after the siege in which a dozen dwarfs fought off six dozen goblins and a dozen trolls, I damned well want to see cowering goblins and laughing dwarves, not that same artifact again.

The other problem with engravings is that so many of them are of dwarves surrounded by other dwarves, either laboring or traveling. While these engravings have more meaning in adventurer mode, most of the game is in fortress mode. It'd be nice if the meanings were provided in fortress mode too.

[Erk]

But showing the deeper meanings in fortress mode would take out one of the interesting parts of adventure. I do wish that rather than "a dwarf" the look tool specified precisely WHICH dwarf it was a picture of.

I rather like masterpiece depiction flood. Get a few more legendary dwarves making masterpieces and it becomes quite colourful.

[Joseph Miles]

I've yet to get an engraving of an artifact in any timely fashion. I waited for a mood, not engraving ANYTHING until then. Then, once I got an artifact, I turned EVERYONE to ONLY engrave, set every engravable( I know its not a real word) tile to be engraved. Checked ALL of them. Nothing of the artifact. Plenty of plump helmets. Had quite a few legendary engravers after that, no artifact engravings.

"This is an image depicting the depiction the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of a dwarf engraving the depiction the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of the depiction of a kitten and a dwarf. The kitten is striking down the dwarf. The kitten is laughing."

[qwertyuiopas]

If it isn't already in, it would be nice if events were engraved less often based on how many times they already have been, and related engravings shouldbe more likely to occur together, but identical ones should occur less often nearby.

This would make for some interesting results such as a wall devoted to the story of some dwarf hero in their tomb.

Of course, this is assuming something like this is not already in the game.

[Puzzlemaker]

Mayhaps the history culling could help with this...

As time passes, it becomes less important, unless it becomes part of the folktales.

AKA, a masterpiece mug would get attention for awhile, then fade away or something.

Same with, oh, lets say, a masterpiece hammer.  Then, lets say that hammer is used to disembowel several goblins.  Normally the hammers data would be culled, but it stays around and becomes part of the folktales, so there are a lot of engravings about it.

[Derakon]

Joseph: part of your problem has to do with the skill of the engravers involved. I don't think you can get engravings of history for anything less than Exceptional engravings. Below that, you get abstract stuff and basic objects. Thus my forts tend to have one engraver, who trained up to Master or so by smoothing things and then spends the rest of his time smoothing and engraving the entire fort.

Sadly, this means that a lot of the engravings are of a dwarf engraving, but oh well...

[Leerok the Lacerta]

Perhaps engravable subjects should be given ratings internally. A recently engraved subject would have its rating lowered, and therefore a lower priority and likelyhood of being engraved again.

Or maybe one could have a "total engravings" statistic for each engravable subject and lower numbers would receive higher priority. Perhaps this can be used in conjunction with a fixed rating for each subject.

I just don't like hard caps, they seem rather unnatural.

[Draco18s]

[Duke 2.0]

 Dwarven Anime: All the creepiness, none of the cuteness.

 But yes, I would like if more engravings resembled those of temples in towns. Tose things are great.

[Align]

I recall there being a note in the dev log before the release we're currently playing about stolen masterworks causing less and less of an unhappy thought in the creator as he makes more of them, so the dwarf with 1 masterwork tantrums instantly, while the legendary is just a little sad for a moment, and then it passes.
Perhaps the same could be done for their engraving-chance? So if there's 20(x3) masterwork mugs, it's no longer worth depicting.

[Domini0n]

I seriously hope that we can engrave historic events. One in three of my engravings are of dwarves engraving. Another third of them are engravings of my artifacts. The majority of the last third are of dwarves surrounding a single dwarf.  I only have two legendary engravers so you must assume some lack in variety, but still. Who wants to have their tomb filled with pictures of other peoples great accomplishments and the artists who portrayed them?

[perilisk]

I would think (dwarf psychology may be different from human psychology) that proximity would tend to -decrease- the desirability of some legend in engraving, not increase it. If you went to work with Paul Bunyan everyday, surely he'd be a little more mundane in your eyes than in the eyes of a folktale audience. It makes more sense that artifacts and legendary dwarves in your fort would have their legend travel and distort the farther away from your fort the tale goes, and (possibly) be attributed every more implausible properties ("I heard Urist McLegendaryMiner is 70 feet tall and carves passages by shouting!" "There is no theory of evolution, just a list of creatures Urist McRanger has allowed to live.")