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[Zombie]

I actually think that farming just needs to have more realistic yields and more crop variation. I like the paddy idea, but perhaps you could build one and farmhands could fill it manually.

I really think the kitchen needs to be overhauled. Yeah, the still is fine. Stuff gets brewed, yea, it's stored. What the hell is up with the kitchen, though? Roasts just sitting around for months on end? Eww! I think a staffed kitchen (or several for large forts) right off of your main feasthall would be a great idea. Dwarves grab the ingredients and your chef cooks them there so they get a hot meal instead of a rank, disgusting *plump helmet roast* that's been sitting around in a stockpile for over a year. Of course, this wouldn't be too terribly viable until you have a larger fortress, so we might want to have a Grocer and revised Butcher plan. The grocer would prepare plants for eating without cooking, specifically to store them for a long time in the stockpile. The butcher would perform its same functions, as well as preparing meats for eating without cooking and for storage. We could also have a Curer, who would cure meats with charcoal to make jerkeys and smoked meats. These would be excellent for troops and cooking alike.

Also, a little off topic but can the bickering stop please? I liked the idea for this topic I don't know what is going on or why, but collectivist farming or capitalist farming has little to do with dwarves. Even less so if you turn economy off in the init options. If economy is on, they presumably should get paid for doing what work they do. Or nothing, because I never mint coins. Although, and this is a topic for ANOTHER thread and NOT THIS ONE:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

TANGENT: I think dwarves, when the economy kicks in, should attempt to unionize according to labour and complain to your nobles for more pay. I admit, I really just want to see the nobles constantly deny the mining guild pay increases... This would lead up to "Urist McPantybunch, Paymaster has been struck down!" "Urist McTightwad, Public Relations has been struck down!" "Urist McCrabapple, Baron has been struck down!" "There has been a coup de'tat! Viva la revolucion!" "Urist McHeavypick has been elected Baron by Miners Local 428!"

[Atanamis]

I actually think that farming just needs to have more realistic yields and more crop variation. I like the paddy idea, but perhaps you could build one and farmhands could fill it manually.

Exactly, there are 3 things farming needs. The first two have already been documented in the top of the thread, and are realistic yields and labor requirements. Having 20% of my dwarves tending 8-12 times as many plots as there are dwarves would be great. Beyond that, having more variety available and demanded completes what I think farming needs. I do think that making water and fertilizer available to the farmers should be required after the first couple years (or move the farms every couple years), but with bucket watering and automated fertilizing by dwarves with the farmer labor the concerns from earlier in the thread about player micromanagement shouldn't be an issue.

[ManaUser]

Unless some innovation drastically reduces FPS problems in the future, the absolute last thing the game needs is another 30% of fluff dwarves in every fortress.

[Zombie]

You already have those dwarves. If 20% of your dwarves are farmers, that means that out of 100 you have 20 farmers making food. That isn't too crazy. For 10 dwarves, that's 2 dwarves farming. This doesn't mean we inject extra dwarves to tend your farms.

In short, the CPU is already being used for their "JOB?! NOPE! STANDIN' HERE THEN! JOB?! NOPE! STANDIN' HERE THEN! JOB?! NOPE! STANDIN' HERE THEN! ... <AD INFINITUM>" tomfoolery. If you slow down at 100 dwarves, you slow down at 100 dwarves no matter what jobs they are doing.

[Canuhearmenow]

I already know a lot of people that really want to get into this game, but get confused by the new "bugged" irrigation system to just get food.

This would lower the potential market of newcomers even more.

[ManaUser]

You already have those dwarves. If 20% of your dwarves are farmers, that means that out of 100 you have 20 farmers making food. That isn't too crazy. For 10 dwarves, that's 2 dwarves farming. This doesn't mean we inject extra dwarves to tend your farms.

No, but it means I need an additional ~20% dwarves to accomplish the same amount of <anything other than farming>. Having a large chunk of the population engaged in the same task doesn't provide much if any extra entertainment (speaking only for myself, of course) but they would be just as big a resource drag as the 80% dwarves who might be doing something interesting. I feel like I wouldn't getting the same bang for my ☼, so to speak.

[Zombie]

I suppose this is another realism vs fun discussion.

[Andeerz]

I suppose this is another realism vs fun discussion.

Heh heh.  Yeah.  I'm all for realistic farming.  The arguments posted against it so far do not, in my opinion, provide very compelling reasons.

However, I think the only way to do realistic farming is to have the ability to control lands above and below ground outside the immediate vicinity in addition to making the land and labor requirements of farming realistic.  This would necessitate people to change play-style to accommodate this new dimension of realism (which I think would be fun!), and would certainly require the option to somehow relegate the micromanagement to an automated system (THIS IS KEY!  Without it, the game becomes a job!).  With this, farmland and surrounding lands would have to be protected giving another purpose for the military, and making it more difficult to just turtle up inside a mountain (as it should be ).  Not only are these introduced challenges realistic, they would also be fun (to me, at least).

Also, if trade and political stuff gets worked out a bit better, I could imagine eventually being able to arrange an agreement to have dedicated food caravans travel to the fortress regularly, which could allow a fortress to have its labor shifted away from farming to focus on other things.

[Shades]

I suppose this is another realism vs fun discussion.

Is only have one dwarf farming realistic then? Cause I know it's not fun, more would be fun as it would be a challenge.
Personally I'm all for fun in games and only thing realism is good when it doesn't reduce fun. In this case I think we should move away from the realistic model and have more farmers.

[Zombie]

I think this could be fixed via init settings. Toady could set, with the new material quantity system being what it is, a value that would function as 100%. We could then change the setting in the init to ramp down food production per tile or ramp it up, based on personal preference. That's what this boils down to, anyway. I want a rough 10% split of food production wheras some people like the current rough ~2% to ~5% split and some people want a 20% split.

If it's in the init, then everyone can be happy with whatever amount of fun they chose.

[Silverionmox]

I suppose this is another realism vs fun discussion.

Heh heh.  Yeah.  I'm all for realistic farming.  The arguments posted against it so far do not, in my opinion, provide very compelling reasons.

However, I think the only way to do realistic farming is to have the ability to control lands above and below ground outside the immediate vicinity in addition to making the land and labor requirements of farming realistic.  This would necessitate people to change play-style to accommodate this new dimension of realism (which I think would be fun!), and would certainly require the option to somehow relegate the micromanagement to an automated system (THIS IS KEY!  Without it, the game becomes a job!).  With this, farmland and surrounding lands would have to be protected giving another purpose for the military, and making it more difficult to just turtle up inside a mountain (as it should be ).  Not only are these introduced challenges realistic, they would also be fun (to me, at least).

Also, if trade and political stuff gets worked out a bit better, I could imagine eventually being able to arrange an agreement to have dedicated food caravans travel to the fortress regularly, which could allow a fortress to have its labor shifted away from farming to focus on other things.

This is the point really. Every manufacturing, political, religious or military center in history has been supported by farmers elsewhere, usually in the surrounding region.

[Pilsu]

There's really no reason why dwarves would need surrounding farmland seeing their agriculture takes place underground.

We could always make dwarves require meat to survive, making the surrounding grazing lands quite important. The caverns don't have much to graze on and it'd be unlikely you'd be able to support livestock there, especially if yields become more realistic (i.e. no more magical farming skill.) Medicinal plants not growing underground is also an option.

[Andeerz]

If land requirements and yields were realistic, then underground farming would still ultimately require finding more land outside of the immediate area for the same reasons above-ground farming would.

EDIT:  Unless farming occurred on multiple levels, which would be possible underground...  hmmmm...

[Pilsu]

Even if it required more acreage, you could just dig a bigger cavern. Same end result.

[Shades]

If land requirements and yields were realistic, then underground farming would still ultimately require finding more land outside of the immediate area for the same reasons above-ground farming would.

EDIT:  Unless farming occurred on multiple levels, which would be possible underground...  hmmmm...

I don't know, what with one square holding an acre* or so of farmland it doesn't seem too unreasonable to have a small plot feed everyone.

*Abusing the fact squares don't have a size a little