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[NW_Kohaku]

Yes I knew that, But i was wondering if there is anything more detailed. apparently there isnt.

I think it's pretty detailed. It tells you what their stats are, what more do you want?
Do you seriously need numbers?

Yes, I want numbers.  What else would be useful?!

[Mason11987]

Yes i read that, but it doesnt say how to navigate to the stat screen.

It now explains how to get to the screen that has the right information. Thanks for pointing out that omission.

[Oglokoog]

Yes I knew that, But i was wondering if there is anything more detailed. apparently there isnt.

I think it's pretty detailed. It tells you what their stats are, what more do you want?
Do you seriously need numbers?

Yes, I want numbers.  What else would be useful?!

But it never was and never is going to be shown as numbers. Skills, item qualities, attributes... everything is displayed in text and that's how it should be.

[NW_Kohaku]

But it never was and never is going to be shown as numbers. Skills, item qualities, attributes... everything is displayed in text and that's how it should be.

Sure there is! I get direct, exact numbers from Dwarf Therapist all the time.

Also, item qualities may as well be exact numbers, because there are no integer values between quality levels.

[breadbocks]

Use runesmith then.

[Mason11987]

But it never was and never is going to be shown as numbers. Skills, item qualities, attributes... everything is displayed in text and that's how it should be.

Sure there is! I get direct, exact numbers from Dwarf Therapist all the time.

Also, item qualities may as well be exact numbers, because there are no integer values between quality levels.

There won't be numbers on those sorts of screens, just like there isn't "experience" and such because it appears that Toady thinks that sort of thing might ruin the immersion.  There are very few times when there are numbers actually in game:  Level of fluid, weight of items, price of items, and the stocks screen.  All of which we could argue are things that have a "number" in real life.  Your ability to carve engravings IRL isn't based off of a "number" same with your speed and memory.  Obviously the game has to have numbers in the background, but the amount that is obscured by "flavor" seems about right to me.  Personally I wish item qualities weren't numbers, but had varied more, so you could have things anywhere between tattered and masterwork as your dwarf could make.

[Oglokoog]

But it never was and never is going to be shown as numbers. Skills, item qualities, attributes... everything is displayed in text and that's how it should be.

Sure there is! I get direct, exact numbers from Dwarf Therapist all the time.

Also, item qualities may as well be exact numbers, because there are no integer values between quality levels.

You are confusing the game itself with the underlying mechanics. Everything is based on numbers, conputers just can't do it any other way, but in the context of the game, having anything but item quantities and similar stuff represented by numbers just wouldn't make any sense.

[NW_Kohaku]

You are confusing the game itself with the underlying mechanics. Everything is based on numbers, conputers just can't do it any other way, but in the context of the game, having anything but item quantities and similar stuff represented by numbers just wouldn't make any sense.

You're right, having an omnipotent view of the surrounding land, and direct access to the thoughts of a dwarf only makes sense if it is in text form, not mechanical numeric form![/sarcasm]

Look, sometimes I need to make decisions based not upon some general zone of potential numbers, but upon direct comparisons between two unlike things.  When I have things like different castes with different base values for stats, and want to compare them, I'm not going to get that out of this all-text system, because it is only described relative to their own caste.

When I want to know if training is faster when I set up one configuration versus another, I need to be able to make comparisons.  I need to know more than "this dwarf right now is in a kinda-sorta above average", I need to be able to compare and contrast.

I need more information than the game, in its vanilla form, is willing to provide.

[Mason11987]

You are confusing the game itself with the underlying mechanics. Everything is based on numbers, conputers just can't do it any other way, but in the context of the game, having anything but item quantities and similar stuff represented by numbers just wouldn't make any sense.

You're right, having an omnipotent view of the surrounding land, and direct access to the thoughts of a dwarf only makes sense if it is in text form, not mechanical numeric form![/sarcasm]

Look, sometimes I need to make decisions based not upon some general zone of potential numbers, but upon direct comparisons between two unlike things.  When I have things like different castes with different base values for stats, and want to compare them, I'm not going to get that out of this all-text system, because it is only described relative to their own caste.

When I want to know if training is faster when I set up one configuration versus another, I need to be able to make comparisons.  I need to know more than "this dwarf right now is in a kinda-sorta above average", I need to be able to compare and contrast.

I need more information than the game, in its vanilla form, is willing to provide.

That's not really a "this game" kind of thing.

Most games don't have this level of detail.  You don't get the exact speed/strength attributes of units in most RTS games.  You don't get the exact rate of fire in game for guns in FPSs.  You don't know exactly how efficient various buildings are in simulation games (sim city/the sims/Civ/etc).  Obviously DF isn't like most games, but this is the sort of thing that many people think should be obscured and it commonly is in most games.  Obviously you would be able to make more perfect decisions if you had more exact information but in my opinion if the game was less description and more numbers it might take away from the "game" part of it and turn it more into an interactive spreadsheet.

That's not to say I wouldn't enjoy playing an interactive spreadsheet (many browser-based MMOs are basically that), but I think DF-vanilla would lose a lot of it went in that direction.

[Oglokoog]

Well yeah, if you need that, then that's what you have utilites for. The game itself, though, does not (and, in my opinion, should not) display these stats in number form.

I'd be all for Toady-made utilities, though

[NW_Kohaku]

That's not really a "this game" kind of thing.

Most games don't have this level of detail.  You don't get the exact speed/strength attributes of units in most RTS games.  You don't get the exact rate of fire in game for guns in FPSs.  You don't know exactly how efficient various buildings are in simulation games (sim city/the sims/Civ/etc).  Obviously DF isn't like most games, but this is the sort of thing that is pretty normally obscured.

Actually, many Civ-style games tell you exactly what buildings do (-2 polution or +50% industrial production or -50% food to next population up, for a specific production cost for any given building).

Likewise, I don't play RTS games too often, but I know plenty of them will tell you things like how many HP of damage the cannon can do, or how many hit points each unit has.  Even when they don't, they are hacked out of the game so that players can analyze what units are more worthwhile than other units (or since most such RTS games are actually RPS - rock paper scissors - what the ideal/minimum necessary ratios are in response to enemy concentrations).

How could you know what building to produce next in a civ game if you couldn't make a comparitive cost-benefit analysis?  You'd just be guessing.  That's not playing a game.

Likewise, you need to have an exact, comparative analysis of the effects upon your dwarves to understand how to properly manage them.  Otherwise, how could you make any informed decision if all you have is mere superstitions and hunches as to what works and what doesn't?  (See the thread where I proved that personality traits have nothing to do with what the probabilities of seeing any given engraving would be... or any of the hundreds of other "dwarven science" threads where people actually broke down the obfuscating wall of the interface to reach the numbers that govern the game.)

[Mason11987]

<snip>

How could you know what building to produce next in a civ game if you couldn't make a comparitive cost-benefit analysis?  You'd just be guessing.  That's not playing a game.

Likewise, you need to have an exact, comparative analysis of the effects upon your dwarves to understand how to properly manage them.  Otherwise, how could you make any informed decision if all you have is mere superstitions and hunches as to what works and what doesn't?  (See the thread where I proved that personality traits have nothing to do with what the probabilities of seeing any given engraving would be... or any of the hundreds of other "dwarven science" threads where people actually broke down the obfuscating wall of the interface to reach the numbers that govern the game.)

I think there is a difference between having no information, having "flavored" information, and having exact numerical information.

The first is the guessing you are referring to, the second is what DF does and imo it adds a lot to the "game" part of DF, and the third is what you would like which is really only necessary if you want to play a game as perfectly as possible.

You can still make good decisions even if you don't have numerical values, even if you can't make perfect decisions. 

I think it's great that they are hacked out, but again, personally I'd prefer Toady to focus more on flavor, and less on finding ways to display spreadsheet like details.

[NW_Kohaku]

I'm fine with 3rd party utilities giving me the information I need instead of Toady, although I do think it would be nice if he backed down on his position regarding making some effort to support 3rd-party UIs. 

Still, it's not a matter of making "perfect decisions", it's a matter of knowing fact from fiction.  Without having hard numbers, it would have been impossible to know that attributes were rusting.  If you are going to see whether one thing has an effect or not, you need to be able to measure that effect.

I don't see what the point in playing the game is when you have no control over the outcomes, and to have control over the outcomes, you need to have at least some idea as to what the consequences of your actions are, or you might as well decide by cointoss.

Superstitions like the idea that personality (such as creativity) affects what will be engraved are the result of simply taking wild guesses at the consequences of your decisions, and detract from the experience of the game.

Besides which, what is the point in playing a game that goes so far out of its way to provide so much detail if you simply can't see the detail, or understand what is going on?  You might as well play a simpler game that you can at least understand if that was the case.

[Cruxador]

Yes I knew that, But i was wondering if there is anything more detailed. apparently there isnt.

I think it's pretty detailed. It tells you what their stats are, what more do you want?
Do you seriously need numbers?

Well, but there are just simple numbers under those descriptions.

What about something that is at least navigable? Currently, you really have to read those two paragraphs while that information can be made rather easy to represent visually like this:

Code: [Select]

          Strength ---0------
           Agility ------0--- (rusty)
         Toughness --------0- (v rusty)
         Endurance 0---------
Disease Resistance ----0-----
      Recuperation -0--------

Which provides much faster ability to assess stats at glance.

While your sliders are somewhat revolting to me, I do like the idea that we ahould have some indicator of how rusty a dwarf's attributes are. Perhaps a series of simple text string variations for the things telling us attribute levels currently. (I'm one of the folks that greatly prefers a description to a spreadsheet).

[tps12]

Cosign the arguments against presenting raw numbers in the game. I like to imagine that the information available to the player represents the collective knowledge of your dwarves: they might know that one dude is strong and another likes trousers, but they aren't going to know how many experience points someone has in cheesemaking.

But it might also be cool to have something similar to how bookkeeping or appraising works, where you have someone with the specific job of checking everyone out and producing some harder data. A medical dwarf could give everyone an annual physical, someone with the teacher skill could administer IQ tests, &c.

But yeah, in general it seems like DF is about making stories, and although I haven't read one before I don't think even those D&D novels actually describe things in terms of hit points or experience levels (though that would be hilarious).