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[Aquillion]

Mandates can be fun as a challenge at first, but they rapidly get boring.  There are several reasons for this.  Partially, nobles tend to spam the things they like over and over again in mandates -- it isn't a problem to satisfy them (unless like something something really weird), but it's repetitive and eventually gets unrewarding.

Which leads to the second problem -- you don't really get anything from mandates.  I mean, yes, they're a challenge, but I'm not even talking about fabulous rewards -- there's just no payoff to the player in terms of making the game world more interesting.  You complete a mandate for a suit of platemail, you end up with a generic suit of platemail, just like every other suit of platemail you ever made.  Boring.

So here's my suggestion:  Replace mandates with 'commissions' that are almost like mini-artifacts.  Instead of simply producing mandate for a generic item and throwing it at the player, the noble chooses a specific dwarf with the right skills, holds a meeting with them, and assigns them a mandate to produce their desired item.

This item would be a 'normal' object in most ways (it wouldn't be unnaturally high quality or made of strange materials or anything, like a real artifact), but the noble would include requests for engravings and decorations, as with an artifact.  The assigned dwarf would do all of this.  They would produce the commissioned object like a normal job, but would take longer than usual, and would be treated as having a slightly higher skill than they actually do for that one job (dwarves are honored by commissions from nobles, and put more effort into the things they request.)

Most importantly, when viewing the completed object, it would note that it was produced as a commission for noble XYZ, by dwarf XYZ.  This would help work commissions into the history and legends of Dwarf Fortress, especially if the commissioned object itself ended up being used for important things -- a sword that was commissioned by the king is something interesting, and it shouldn't just get dumped into the pile of generic swords and become unrecognizable.  It should have some fancy decoration on it, at least.

Dwarves would get a small happy thought from having a commission assigned to them, and another for completing it; they would get an unhappy thought if they failed (which would have the penalties it does now, although obviously the dwarf who gets punished would be the one it was assigned to.)  Nobles would perhaps try reassigning the job a few times if it got dropped or interrupted -- maybe they'd even try a different dwarf, though they'd get madder and madder as they do (this would be helpful if the dwarf who initially got it assigned was injured, say.)  Once / if their temper finally blows, of course, they assign punishment to all the dwarves that failed them.

Commissions would perhaps be somewhat rarer than mandates are now (because they're likely to involve more materials, what with the decoration requests.)  They'd also be somewhat harder, for the same reason.  But I think it would be interesting.

[Thanshin]

Right now the difficulty is based on the possibility of actually making the object (glass statue in a sandless region).

I think it would be better to limit demands to possible things but I think idea removes the implication of the player.

My suggestion would be to have commissions as you say, but directed to the player. The difficulty would then be to liberate from other labors the correct dwarves in the correct order.

For example: "I want a platinum statue with two small diamonds for eyes and dressed with a golden armor and a cloak made from silk and leather from four different animals."

You might receive that commision having just discovered some platinum ore, having three uncut diamonds and two kinds of leather on your inventory, a caged animal of a third kind and a live animal of the fourth kind outside.

You'd then have to carefully manage your inventory to avoid using the leathers, diamonds, metals, in other tasks.

The requests would be more reasonable than as is right now, and the noble would really know who to punish (the one in the chain of jobs that made it impossible to finish the job by making a mistake, building another object with the material, or whatever else).

[bjlong]

Let me try to refine this excellent idea.

First, a noble will "post" a commission... somehow. The dwarf with the appropriate labors and skills will take this if and only if he thinks there's "time" for it--i.e., the jobs that currently need to be done will be done without him in a reasonable amount of time. He won't take commissions during a siege, for good measure. The dwarf would list the materials and workshops needed for a commission, so that you can approve this material but not that, this workshop but not that, with an option to change it later.

When the economy kicks in, the commission will be very, very high-paying.

If the noble wants something done that falls outside the dwarf's expertise, then he can take the commission to another dwarf. They'd split the wealth after the commission is completed. They get no mention in the ledgend, but don't get punished if the commission isn't completed. Though I'd imagine the head dwarf would yell at them if he gets beaten.

Commissions give double, perhaps triple the normal amount of experience, since the dwarf is working as best as he can.

[rylen]

Cool idea.

Here's a negative, non-failure way it can play out.  Mr. Noble asks for a set of marble mugs, engraved, with gold inlay.  Mr. Part Time Stonecrafter is honored by the request, but only turns out some average mugs.  Noble and Stoney might get negative thoughts for not meeting expectations.  Or, since Stoney is at the start of the chain, he keeps turning out mugs until he has some worth the rest of the work.

Nepotism.  Mr. Professional Stonecrafter is a far better worker.  But Stoney is Mr. Noble's son and gets the nod.  In a high drama fortress, Pro gets upset he is passed over for a less skilled worker.

It might need a different term, but shop keepers could use this to tell us what high demand items are.  A lot of people want pig-tail clothes, we get requests.  Dwarves need socks; we get told.

[Pilsu]

Commissioned items should be claimed by the noble, not just arbitrarily commissioned just so we get more neat stuff

[Granite26]

I was thinking... A halfway point towards this would be:  When a craftdwarf goes to make an item, there's a check made to see if it fulfills a mandate (happens already, so NBD there)  If this item would fulfill a mandate, it is created with the Noble's preferences in mind rather than the craftdwarf's.  For most cases, this probably won't matter, but for cases where preferences matter, the Noble's should be used.

(Specifically, the new statues code brings this up, because engravings are heavily preference based, and statues can be mandated.)

[Slogo]

What if commissions could (but not always) deteriorate into mandates if not fulfilled. The ones that don't deteriorate would still give the noble an unhappy thought.

So a noble makes their commission and if it's not fulfilled within X time it has a chance to become a mandate with penalties and no reward.

[Grendus]

I would change it a little. The noble makes a commission, demanding say a platinum statue with diamonds for eyes with images of various animals sewn into the base with leather. The statue's name would be dictated by the noble. In the applicable workshops a new task shows, in order. For example, at all the forges and magma forges you would get the task to forge the statue's base. After the base is constructed, the jeweler's workshop would have a new task to set the diamonds into the statue's eyes. After that, the leather works would have the task of sewing the images into the statue.

Commissioned pieces would sit in value somewhere between masterwork and artifact. Failing a commission would result in multiple punishments, achieving it would make the noble ecstatic, give each of the dwarves who worked on it a substantial money bonus and happy thought, and a fair amount of experience (100-500 possibly). The commissioned piece wouldn't be completed until it was in the noble's possession, be it by putting the statue in the nobles room or the noble collecting his new sword from the jeweler who set the gems (collecting a commission would need to be a high priority task so you don't end up failing a commission when the noble spends a season harvesting Plump Helmets).

Commissions would be a substantial challenge, but they would be 'fun', a good way to spike your fortresses value without artifacts, and would make nobles actually useful for a change.

[Kashyyk]

I liike this idea.

I just can't rid of the image of a dwarf sewing leather onto a metal statue though.

[Mephansteras]

I like the idea, it has an interesting depth to it.

Just had a thought on it, too. Now that we can have uniforms, I could see nobles commissioning specific uniforms for their person guards. Maybe royal guards normally have Red tunics over their Bismuth Bronze chain mail. Well, Bomrek von Noble decides that HIS person guards should also have an image of clouds sewn on the tunics, so he commissions a set of specialized tunics. When they're done, they get assigned to his Royal Guards.

[Granite26]

imagine a marble statue of a dwarf with a real smithing apron... Could work

[Rowanas]

A way to make nobles NOT a waste of time? EGAD!

I personally prefer the idea that the noble commissions an item and picks a dwarf randomly or out of his friends/loose acquaintances (with the weighting going towards close friends and partners). This dwarf then drops all other tasks, much like a fey mood, and proceeds from shop to shop crafting this mini artifact, taking over one shop at a time until it is all done. At the end they receive about 100-500 xp in each of the applicable skills (making them probably novice in a wide variety of skills) and deliver it to the noble in question.

A successful commission would boost happiness of both dwarves and transfer cash from noble to crafter.

An unsuccessful commission gives both of them an unhappy thought with additional punishment to the crafter.

What do you guys think?

[LordDemon]

I think the general idea is good, but I would rather see the different tasks of commision split with different professionals if possible.

It would make sense, that if the Count wants a fine desk, he would ask your best carpenter/metalsmith/mason to build it (depending on the material he wants it made), and then ask your best leather worker to put in a leather surface, before asking the best get setter to decorate it with fire opals instead of asking the carpenter/metalsmith/mason to do it all.

Of course, the Counts definition of "best" is not absolute, he could choose friends over unknowns even if they are lower at skill. But I doubt he would choose his dabbling son who works on farm to do it, if the fortress is full of Legendary workers.
Also, if he knows no-one of the required profession, the (possible future) guilds could be used to assign the work.

Commisioned items should likely be requested from materials/decorations the noble likes, or that are generally valuable. They could be useful in diplomatic matters. Count talking with the human diplomat, sitting in commisioned chair by a commisioned desk should show the wealth of the fortress.

I'd also like it if foreign diplomats could also commision things for themselves, or on behalf of their rulers in exchange of treaties, or simply some other goods agreed on advance.

Imagine after civil war the new king sends a diplomat to discuss the local dwarf fortress about new crown. Diplomat comes, negotiating with someone (count/king/mayor/???). They agree that in one years the dwarfs will provide the diplomat a mastercrafted golden crown, which is studded with platinum and encrusted with red and clear diamonds on it (all decorations finely crafted). In exchange the diplomat promises the dwarfs 50 cows and 100 barrels of booze.

One year later, diplomat comes in with convoy holding 50 cows and the booze, and the exchange is done. Word of dwarf craftmanship travels far, and soon others will want to commision items from the fortress.

I think the idea has a lot of potential. Finely crafted gifts, special trades, etc.

[Rowanas]

ooh. I hadn't been thinking of future advances, but yeah, that would be cool, and having it handled by the guild system would be awesome. That means this would kind of have to wait until the guild system comes in for it to be handled best. I think craftsmanship should be handled just like artifacts, with commissioned goods being of "commissioned" quality, or being of automatically masterwork quality.

[Pilsu]

Why would a noble put his friends in jail?