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[Fossaman]

I'd like to see dwarves avoid repeating engravings of specific events until a certain amount of time has passed, or a certain number of additional engravings have been made.

Mostly I'd like to avoid having 5000 engravings of my expedition leader being selected in my dining room. It's a little silly.

[AncientEnemy]

not a bad idea. A suggestion I've seen before that sort of encompasses this one (and I support) is having limited control of what gets engraved, i.e. being able to designate "engrave wall, imagery of war/food/diplomacy/ancient history" (various appropriately broad but thematic categories)

so you could have some say in the 'theme' of engraving (so as not to have dining rooms filled with images of spiders, or barracks filled with pictures of food) but still leave the specific images up to your dwarves' own preferences/ideas.

[SirHoneyBadger]

I like the idea of dwarfs doing individual works. Maybe based on a combination of what they've personally witnessed/experienced (main focus), and what they've only heard about? Filtered through their own personality and likes/dislikes.

There might also be separate styles of decoration, based on the rooms, themselves, and what they're used for. Public areas might demand historical and cultural engravings, and temples/crypts, religious motifs; shops may display (advertize) their arts and wares in the form of engravings, while personal spaces might better reflect the owner's tastes. Noble quarters may not have the same level freedom, however, and may be forced to decorate close to the current "fashion". Some of the Noble's personality would probably still show through, though, but maybe not nearly to the same degree as a commoner. The tradeoff there is quality, since Nobles would naturally tend to employ/patronage the very best artists.

Again, all these different styles might still be filtered through the artist in question's personality and life-experiences.

[Aquillion]

not a bad idea. A suggestion I've seen before that sort of encompasses this one (and I support) is having limited control of what gets engraved, i.e. being able to designate "engrave wall, imagery of war/food/diplomacy/ancient history" (various appropriately broad but thematic categories)

so you could have some say in the 'theme' of engraving (so as not to have dining rooms filled with images of spiders, or barracks filled with pictures of food) but still leave the specific images up to your dwarves' own preferences/ideas.

The problem with this is that it doesn't actually affect anything in the game, does it?  The game's interface is complicated enough already without adding additional options that have no practical effect.

Maybe just give the engraver certain automatic adaption based on the room(s) currently defined in the area?  So if they're engraving a dining hall, have them favor food.  If they're engraving a tomb or bedroom or whatever that is assigned to a noble, have them engrave things related to that noble, if there are any.

Of course, if the room later gets reassigned you might have some odd engravings...  but that's realistic.

[Silverionmox]

I'd like to see more personal input from the dwarves too when engraving. The hand of the master is not recognizable as it is now. A bit of thematic adaptation to the room they're in would also help.

As for player control, I don't think an optional menu for themes (on the right panel when "designate engraving" is selected) would violate their artistic integrity. At times you just want to engrave something specific in a place that doesn't hint at it (eg. you make portraits of your artificer dwarves in the entrance hallway, carve out road signs in the mountain rock, engrave the corridor floor between the royal quarters with only crowns, etc.), and in that case a specific menu would be a great tool. There can be a suitable mood penalty to avoid overusing it (although the long menu should discourage it on its own already); on the other hand, we can make them haul rocks for their whole lives and they won't complain either.

[varkarrus]

Better yet, if you engrave a mayor's room, the engraving will be of the current mayor, and he will only do one. Then, you can have a whole series of various mayors.

[Lap]

Engravings relevant to the room and limits on how often the same scene is remade seem like great ideas that wouldn't need any new interface options.

I'd also like to see increased amounts of totally random ones that come from the imagination of the artist, especially with young forts that have very history of their own.

Another option would be to have artists have a chance of creating scenes referenceing world generation history/events. So a young dwarf might draw out  how a Megabeast was killed, a great war between humans and elves took place, or how a Dwarven city was enslaved centuries ago by goblins.

[Rysith]

Another option would be to have artists have a chance of creating scenes referenceing world generation history/events. So a young dwarf might draw out  how a Megabeast was killed, a great war between humans and elves took place, or how a Dwarven city was enslaved centuries ago by goblins.

They do this already, with the history of the area that the fortress is settled in and the history of their parent civ. It just has a tendency to be buried under engravings of the mayor coming to power, legendary craftsdwarves making masterpieces, and cheese.

[Drake1500]

Another option would be to have artists have a chance of creating scenes referenceing world generation history/events. So a young dwarf might draw out  how a Megabeast was killed, a great war between humans and elves took place, or how a Dwarven city was enslaved centuries ago by goblins.

They do this already, with the history of the area that the fortress is settled in and the history of their parent civ. It just has a tendency to be buried under engravings of the mayor coming to power, legendary craftsdwarves making masterpieces, and cheese.

If this is the case, then maybe what needs to happen is simply increasing the probability of referencing world gen history/events.

Overall, I think the best idea so far is the simplist one - put a timer, which counts both days/months and number of engravings, and don't repeat any engravings until that timer has finished. Well, the OP put it better, but this is pretty similar. Naw, just read the OP.

[Sowelu]

Another option would be to have artists have a chance of creating scenes referenceing world generation history/events. So a young dwarf might draw out  how a Megabeast was killed, a great war between humans and elves took place, or how a Dwarven city was enslaved centuries ago by goblins.

Which will be even more fun once it's possible for dwarves to believe untrue accounts of historical events.

[G-Flex]

not a bad idea. A suggestion I've seen before that sort of encompasses this one (and I support) is having limited control of what gets engraved, i.e. being able to designate "engrave wall, imagery of war/food/diplomacy/ancient history" (various appropriately broad but thematic categories)

so you could have some say in the 'theme' of engraving (so as not to have dining rooms filled with images of spiders, or barracks filled with pictures of food) but still leave the specific images up to your dwarves' own preferences/ideas.

The problem with this is that it doesn't actually affect anything in the game, does it?

• Just because it doesn't affect anything now doesn't mean that it shouldn't, or won't in the future, so the idea is still good to have around.
• They already do affect things sometimes. If your mayor hates roaches and somebody engraves roaches in his room, he won't like it very much, for instance.

[Bunny]

I heartily endorse this idea.  Personally, I think I would favour more being able to select for engravings myself, whether general or specific.  Perhaps engravings could be applied to a wall using a similar function to the b/C/(wall floor whatever) list;

build>engraving>food (then set the dimensions of the engraved area with UKMH, then select the area to be engraved over).

It does get frustrating when my dwarves decide to engrave a wall, shortly after a massive siege in which a dozen dwarves died, lava was pumped in front of the fortress and many gobbos burned to death, with images of clouds, circles and socks.  And it seems a little sad when a mighty dwarf dies and his tomb is decorated with images of purring maggots.

I suppose a simple method could be to make engravers be more inclined to engrave a recent event than just random stuff if the event left an emotional impression...  but damnit, I'm a control freak and I want my micromanagement!

[Neonivek]

Some of these "Repeats" arn't actually repeats but an event that happened multiple times in a row.

A Mayor generally gets re-elected for the rest of their lives.

[DennyTom]

I also like this ...

system I would love to see:

engrave
     -> decoration (repeating ornaments - geometric, natural, abstract, etc chosen engraver, only one style in one room)
     -> scenes, symbols (clasical engraving as we know it today)

Today´s engraved rooms look to ... overdecorated. I tend to smooth all walls and engave on special places only.

[Fossaman]

Some of these "Repeats" arn't actually repeats but an event that happened multiple times in a row.

A Mayor generally gets re-elected for the rest of their lives.

Right, but the Fortress of Fencedbrightness was only founded once in the year 215, and four out of 13 engravings on one of the earlier engraved walls in that fort are of that event. The next wall over has 6 of 13 engravings of that.

That is a single event, not one that has been repeated. It gets better as time goes on, but that's because the engraver starts making engravings of masterful engravings of masterful engravings instead. (My current fortress has lots of pictures of elves getting killed too, but I'd like to see less repetition nonetheless.)