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[MetalGear]

Hi everyone.
I'm playing my first fort and I found a large gold vein, so I have a bunch of gold nuggets lying around (I also found a tiny cluster of platinum ). I decided to make some golden statues and whatnot to spiffy up my fort a little. Unfortunately my  fort is also filled to the brim with gabbro and some other stone (it's green and called oli-something), so every time I tell my mason to make something, he makes it out  of gabbro. I can't get rid of the gabbro because it's pretty much on half the tiles in my fort (the other half is that green stone). I tried setting everything but gold as economic stones, but gabbro isn't even on that list.
I just wanna make some shinies , what should I do?

[Sizik]

I think it's better to make the gold nuggets into gold bars, then make the statues at a forge.

[Quietust]

Create an act(i)vity zone in the center tile of the desired workshop, declare it as a (g)arbage dump (and disable all other garbage dump zones you may already have), then mark some gold nuggets for dumping. Your dwarves will haul the selected items and drop them on the workshop and leave them forbidden. Use d-b-c to reclaim them (or use (k) and unforbid them individually), then set gold nuggets as non-economic stones (so your mason will use them) and queue up N+1 statues. Your mason will take the first nearby rock to make the first statue (which will probably be gabbro or olivine), but subsequent statues will use the nearest stones available - the ones already in the workshop.

Sizik: trouble is, statues made of gold nuggets take only 1 stone, but statues made of gold metal take 3 bars (which takes 3 nuggets). For "native" mined metals (gold, silver, copper, aluminum), the ore has the same value as the metal, so making them out of stone effectively gets you triple the value.

[twwolfe]

well, first off, gold is an ore, not a stone. you'll need to smelt it into bars at a furnace, then have a metalsmith make a statue out of it.

[The_Fool76]

Well first off, metal statues are made at a blacksmith shop not a mason's workshop.
(Though you can make the raw ore into statues if you want- see below)

This is good since you can actually specify what specific metal you want to use at a blacksmith shop.
(Unlike at the mason's workshop)

Smelt your gold into bars (need fuel made from wood or coal if you don't have magma) and then have a dwarf with the blacksmithing task make you some gold statues.

Now, say you wanted to use some random stone  for your statues at the mason's workshop.  There are several ways you can handle this. 

Here are two good ways:
Personally I prefer to just lock the mason in the shop with a small pile of the appropriate stone. 

Another good way to handle this is go into the stone menu under the stock screen (z) and mark all stone except the one you want to use as economic.  Mason's shops, Mechanic's shops and craft shops will only use non-economic stones.  (This is also how you would get them to use the raw ore for the statue as all ores are flagged economic by default.)

And here are two not so good ways:
Still another way is to go into your stocks screen (provided you have a book keeper) and forbid all stones of the wrong type.  This is a bit dangerous as it will also forbid the stones things are made out of so a bunch of your shops (including the mason's!) might suddenly stop working until you unforbid the stone they are made from. (Either in the stock screen again or through the (t) option.)

Last but not least, you could go through your fort and forbid every single piece of stone that you don't want used.  Even using the designate option (d-b-f) this could take a long time if you have a lot of stone lying about and you are likely to miss some.

One last warning about forbidding stuff, the forbid will only apply to existing stones.  If your miner digs out another rock it will not be forbidden and likely picked up for crafting. 

[Doppel]

Still another way is to go into your stocks screen (provided you have a book keeper) and forbid all stones of the wrong type.  This is a bit dangerous as it will also forbid the stones things are made out of so a bunch of your shops (including the mason's!) might suddenly stop working until you unforbid the stone they are made from. (Either in the stock screen again or through the (t) option.)

Thats why i use logs to make workshops, and later on blocks.

[Grendus]

Everything else has been covered, but you could lock your mason in a room with access to nothing but gold and let him work. Put a door to his crafting area (this assumes that you're putting each workshop in a dedicated room), stock it with ore, and when he goes in seal the door. Dwarves will use the nearest non-economic stone they have a path to that isn't already queued up for another task, so you'll get your nice native gold and native platinum statues.

[Albedo]

If you go into z-stocks to forbid a stone, be aware - if you forbid gabbro, then every workshop you made with a gabbro stone will also become forbidden to all dwarves! 

Not something you want to overlook, tends to slow down industry.  <d, b, c> will high-light what's what, and allow a visual check and point-click reclaim.

well, first off, gold is an ore, not a stone. you'll need to smelt it into bars at a furnace, then have a metalsmith make a statue out of it.

Um... an ore is a stone. Just a subset. Anything a mason can do with stone, he can do with ore. Without the intermediary hassle (and the practice material for a mason is much cheaper, so they tend to be better trained.)

trouble is, statues made of (ore) take only 1 stone, but statues made of (metal) take 3 bars (which takes 3 ore). For "native" mined metals (gold, silver, copper, aluminum), the ore has the same value as the metal, so making them out of stone effectively gets you triple the value.

This.

[Satarus]

You'll have to go in your stone menu in the z-menu to allow general usage of your native gold.  Otherwise they won't use it.

[AtomicPaperclip]

You'll have to go in your stone menu in the z-menu to allow general usage of your native gold.  Otherwise they won't use it.

This.

You might consider the economic stone mod sometime.

[Wolfius]

Create a dump zone in the middle of your masons shop(yes, inside it - middle tile. Yes, you can do that. No, it doesn't clutter the workshop, iirc) and dump the native gold you want to work with, making sure you've deactivated other dump zones. Then reclaim the ore and set it for general use in the Z->Stone menu.

The relocated native gold ore is now the closest stone in the fort, and should generally be selected over all others for stone tasks issued to that shop.

Just be mindful that you don't have an ore stockpile, or haulers might make off with it first.

You might consider the economic stone mod sometime.

http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=18944.0

Best. Mod. Ever.

Pity you have to gen a new world, tho.