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[madjoe5]

Every other engraving being about "the rise to power by x dwarf on y date" or of symbols of "local dwarven governments".

Is there a way to make engravings a little more, unique? What do you guys do that shows up on engravings that is interesting?

Also, what init settings create the most variant engravings?

[Asmodeous]

Would you rather just have more pictures of cheese and triangles?

[Asmodeous]

Ok, less snarky: If you want more variety in your engravings you need a larger history file. Gen the world out to a later date and more random events and such will appear (based on regions and things). A 5000 year old world has a lot more history than a 200 year old world (the default).

Downside is you're going to be mostly out of megabeasts.

[Stargrasper]

Engravings reflect culture and history of your civ/fort.  If you want an interesting engraving, do something interesting.  Create an artifact ring and they'll engrave that for a few centuries.  Massacre a country and they'll engrave about that 'til time stops.  Build a massive megaconstruction that can be seen from anywhere in the world and they'll totally ignore it.  Flood the world with magma and nobody will live to engrave about it.

[madjoe5]

Ok, less snarky: If you want more variety in your engravings you need a larger history file. Gen the world out to a later date and more random events and such will appear (based on regions and things). A 5000 year old world has a lot more history than a 200 year old world (the default).

Downside is you're going to be mostly out of megabeasts.

Yea I see what youre saying. That kinda does apply to my fort (I stopped gen at year 15), but I don't remember much history in any of my other forts that I have stopped around later years (usually 300-500).

[Asmodeous]

I usually gen out to year 500ish. It's not a huge history, but it's better than otherwise. I get random engravings now and again of various things that give me interesting pieces of history I didn't know about.

Just recently I got something about a sasquatch killing one of the past kings of my civ along with the civ being founded by him on the same item, was pretty neat.

[SkyRender]

If you really want fascinating engravings, go on a one-Dwarf killing spree in Adventure mode first.  Your fort walls will be littered with references to your past adventurer's bold incursions into curbing the world's Elf population problem (that being that it's higher than 0).

[NW_Kohaku]

My fort was placed in an intersection between a large goblin empire and a large elf empire.  I can't seem to engrave ANYTHING but goblins murdering elves by the thousands.

I have no idea what it was, but I think I have about 100 engravings (each with unique deaths) about my personal favorite war name: "The Attack Of Stabbing"

[Jacob/Lee]

I feel this too, my walls are riddled with pictures of cheese representing my dwarf neighbors.

[Chaoseed]

My latest fort has about 100 engravings of a sasquatch killing a goblin.

...it's...like, historical, or something. >_>

[Jim Groovester]

Dwarves can and do engrave history about their nearby locales, so you might also try settling in an area where interesting historical events occurred.

If you settled on the site of a particularly bloody battle between humans and elves, you'd likely get tons of engravings of humans striking down elves and making menacing poses and laughing.

[Deimos56]

Alter the dwarven RAWs and the Shapes file. I assure you that, with the right combination of numbers, you'll start missing the relative normalcy that is cheese.

[Urist McOverlord]

My engravings tend to get a lot more awesome after my first siege or 2.
And up until that point I'm usually still training my massive numbers of engravers through smoothing before I lock the legendaries in the dukes room.

[assimilateur]

Would you rather just have more pictures of cheese and triangles?

Absolutely. Everything would be better than the old "foundation of fort_name" bullshit on every second tile.

Any deeper insight on how to get more variety in your engravings would be useful. While the recommendations of generating an older world or holding off with engraving until you've been besieged make sense, they don't quite seem to cut it. Even after having killed hundreds of goblins, I'd still see ridiculous amounts "dwarves laboring" or "dwarves traveling".

[Urist McOverlord]

Well, there is no accounting for the almighty RNG, I suppose. Maybe kill a family member or pet for every new engraving of the foundation... helpful? Unlikely. Catharsis? Probably. Fun? Hellz yeah!