Hey, cool thread!
And fun ideas. I'd love more useful nobles.
I agree with whoever thought the "division based on color" was too simplistic, at least the current division. I'd love if color correlated with guild, but right now it would just be odd - brown "farmer" dwarves do way to many different things, and several different kinds of craftsdwarves could probably be merged into one. A division based on output (i.e. "food", "cloth/leather products", "trading goods") might be more intuitive.
A few more thoughts:
New immigrants and other eligible dwarves will be asked to a meeting by the GM to discuss joining. Failing to join damages the social standing of that dwarf with all guild members. Invitational meetings will be scheduled each time the dwarf rises in a guild skill. The negative social impact is cumulative.
This is a little unclear to me. What should affect a dwarf's chance to join? Also, if non-guild members are still allowed to practise their craft (in fact
required to), why would the guild want to reject anyone? Traditionally guild were all about establishing a monopoly. Forcing everyone to join and then seperating them between Masters and Apprentices would make more sense, imo.
The Craftsdwarves Guild - House Rigoth (Craft) - Light Blue - Adds a CRAFT tab to the Stones menu. This guild needs more abilities.
Perhaps the ability to define more exactly what kinds of crafts to produce? So you can maximize your profit when the humans are willing to pay 160% for earrings, for example. Although this is perhaps almost strange in its absence already.
The Military Orders - Order of the ____ (Weapon) - varied - Serve as instructors, leading their squads in training (improved skill gain, less injury)
Isn't this already kind of covered by the Captain of the Guard? Although I guess it might make some sense to seperate the Fortress Guard (police force) from the rest of the military (defensive army) I can't say I'd be a huge fan of the idea. However, one thing I'd
really like is for the Captain to be able to give me a report on the current state of the forces.
Suppose I have three squads of 5 each - A, B and C. I order everyone in A to equip crossbows, leather armor and waterskins, everyone in B to equip axes, plate armor, backpacks and waterskins and everyone in C to fight unarmed in plate armor and with shields. The Captain would keep track of how his troops are supplied and would be able to tell me stuff like the following:
"15 dwarves are ordered to sleep in the barracks, but there are only 8 beds.
10 dwarves are ordered to carry water, but we only have 6 waterskins.
5 dwarves are ordered to use crossbows, but we only have 4 quivers.
5 dwarves are ordered to equip plate armor, but we only have 1 helm.
5 dwarves are ordered to equip plate armor, but we have no greaves.
We are running low on practice bolts, we only have 28 bolts left.
We have run out of rations."
This kind of smart reporting would help
enormously when managing an army and would make it easy to figure out deficiencies and shortages. Furthermore, you should be able to specify "exceptional steel plate or better only" to stop dwarves carrying (turtle shell helm) and (bronze battle axe) and stuff like that. Or they could just be smart enough to upgrade their equipment on their own..