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Author Topic: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu  (Read 1329 times)

Warlord255

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Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« on: September 04, 2009, 08:10:40 pm »

A simple interface request, but a simple "Allow metal bars in construction" option would be nice, because, frankly, I am sick and tired of searching through ten types of bar to find my stone blocks for a construction.

Barring that, having the last material you used be the default for your next construction.
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Lord Dakoth

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #1 on: September 05, 2009, 12:09:50 am »

Agreed.

Perhaps an option in the Stones menu to use for constructions. It annoys me that I have to take my manufactured Obsidian off of Economic stone to use it in constructions, then my horde of legendary Stonecrafters use it all before I can get to it.

Also, maybe a way to "rank" materials so that they appear in a custom order, rather than in order of distance.
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Granite26

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #2 on: September 05, 2009, 09:20:05 am »

I think a smart tree system would be the way to go, and could be generalized to figure out how to divide any selection options.

Bricks

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #3 on: September 05, 2009, 10:04:04 am »

I think a smart tree system would be the way to go, and could be generalized to figure out how to divide any selection options.

Wrestling, please. ><  Gouging eyes is way too laborious.
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Chthonic

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #4 on: September 05, 2009, 10:29:08 am »

I've usually got the opposite problem.  I'd like to be able to set a "favored material" toggle that would put my metal-or-stone-or-wood-of-choice at the top of the list, regardless of how far away the nearest material of that type is.
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Derakon

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #5 on: September 05, 2009, 10:46:46 am »

I think modifying the Stones menu is the way to go here. It should include each possible construction material, and you should be able to enable/disable them for crafting (including masonry, smithing, etc.), construction, and maybe even use in catapults. So if you want to make a massive chalk fortress, you can just disable the use of anything except for chalk in construction, for example.
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Warlord255

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #6 on: September 05, 2009, 11:43:31 am »

I think modifying the Stones menu is the way to go here. It should include each possible construction material, and you should be able to enable/disable them for crafting (including masonry, smithing, etc.), construction, and maybe even use in catapults. So if you want to make a massive chalk fortress, you can just disable the use of anything except for chalk in construction, for example.

This is probably the way to go, yea. The whole construction-menu thing is just really cumbersome.

As far as I know, however, next version has blacksmith-grade material selection available for masonry and the like, so hopefully that'll help some.
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bluea

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #7 on: September 05, 2009, 03:15:31 pm »

One other way to do this would be to allow different sort modes.

In my current fort, if I could sort on "Most used" (instead of the default "Distance"), I'd get essentially the exact order I'd -always- want to see.

I've used 99% mudstone, 0.5% green glass blocks, 0.1 of several other types of block, and a a handfull of iron bars (as vertical bars). Then an unending sea of everything else.

Another choice that might appeal occasionally would be sort-by-value. So the platinum bars are first, the mudstone is last.

The "s-menu" from the "Select stuff to send to the trade depot" menu would also address this problem. That is, I could type "s-mud" and all the mudstone and mudstone blocks would be the only things left. Switching to the extended view - I could pick my precise construction item without the sea of extraneous material. The s-menu allows you to essentially name anything directly.
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Draco18s

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #8 on: September 05, 2009, 04:03:44 pm »

Toggle charcoal, soap, tallow, and glass as well.  STOP BUILDING MY TOWER TO GOD OUT OF CHARCOAL, YOU DORFS, I NEEDZ IT FOR SMELTING.
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Rvlion

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #9 on: September 05, 2009, 04:32:05 pm »

I will give a short list of what I would like to be changed.
1. The stones menu to be renamed into Materials (or what ever)
2. Copy/Past the whole menu into looking like the current Kitchen tab.
3. Remove the amounts that are currently seen in the Kitchen tab
(maybe allow complete or general amount (depending on bookkeeping setting) per material through v (description) for those who really care about that of course).
4. Rename Cook into Const. And Brew into Craft.
(Const. = Construction without workshop and Craft = items build in workshops.)
5. Automatic update of the list whenever a new material is found (dug out, cut down, smelted, ect.). (Just like Kitchen tab)
6. Allow 2 different buttons to change availability of any specific materials on or off for either Const. or Craft or perhaps even both.

I do wish that this changed tab should hold EVERY material that can be used for construction.
1. Stones.
2. Metal
3. Wood
4. Glass
5. Soap
6. All previously mentioned as raw material (Stones, metal ore, logs, raw glass, ect.)
7. All previously mentioned as blocks and/or bars

I might have forgotten something, but I hope you understand what I mean.  :)

Personally I mostly build everything with 1 specific material (long live the economic stone mod)… Both const. and crafts (except material specific items of course like beds for example) and I would like to be able to switch Alunite, Orthoclase on for Const. without having to worry about having loads of crafts in those material when I want my dwarfs to ONLY use Obsidian.  >:(

It is possible by doing all b-C without un-pause the game, but it is a lot more bothersome.  ;D
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HammerHand

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #10 on: September 09, 2009, 08:23:11 am »

^

Very much this.

Also, it should be noted that making blocks should always always always count as part of "construction" and not "crafts."

... Perhaps a third option for "furniture," because while I don't want a whole lot of orthoclase, microcline, and olivine walls, I would very much like them made into tables, chairs, and doors.

... On the other hand, sometimes I like making workshops out of colored stone blocks, too.  Just so they stand out from the tiles around them.
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Lyrax

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #11 on: September 09, 2009, 03:57:24 pm »

^^

This sounds good.  It also sounds quite workable.  I don't know how much work it would be, but it could be done for certain.
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Niveras

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #12 on: September 09, 2009, 11:09:03 pm »

I think modifying the Stones menu is the way to go here. It should include each possible construction material, and you should be able to enable/disable them for crafting (including masonry, smithing, etc.), construction, and maybe even use in catapults. So if you want to make a massive chalk fortress, you can just disable the use of anything except for chalk in construction, for example.

Mayday's tileset includes an altered raw file (I think from someone else's mod) which adds all stone types to the stone menu, allowing them to be enabled/disabled so they are easily ignored while crafting constructions, and even so that your masons or stonecrafters use particular kinds of stone when making things. Updating the Stone menu (perhaps rename it to Materials) to use a sort of Stocks interface, with ore/mineral/stone/bar/block and, upon selecting a type, enabling or disabling specific materials within a submenu would be lovely. These selections could also apply to other crafting, such as disabling the use of a kind of wood, shell, bone, cloth, etc without simply forbidding it in the Stocks menu (metal is less important since forge jobs specify the kind of metal to use anyway, but useful for construction purposes).
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CobaltKobold

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Re: Toggle for Metal in Construction Menu
« Reply #13 on: September 10, 2009, 04:23:27 am »

3. Remove the amounts that are currently seen in the Kitchen tab
(maybe allow complete or general amount (depending on bookkeeping setting) per material through v (description) for those who really care about that of course).
Um...it's already sigfig-filtered on bookkeeping. I like it being there.

though I can see why you'd say- it'd be hell to open that menu when STONE was being counted in it.

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