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[Wavey54]

I feel its completely in line with Normal Dwarf Behavior.

Lets walk down the ages and see what our dwarven ancestors have done.

Back in the days of patches gone by, a marksdwarf was that other name for for a rail gun.
Talking was done with your fists; socializing gave you superior stats.
Pumps were legitimate ways to up all your strength abilities.

War dwarves Owned. Seeing your Hammerdwarf walk out meant songs would be sung and sieges slaughtered.
They were not like today's dwarves.
Why?

Because todays dwarves are soft. Because they are spoilt. Because their pets live.
Because they have not been pushed to become what dwarves must be.

Danger rooms are Dwarf rooms.

Dwarven soldiers NEED a room, where each tile hides 10 training spears. They NEED to be stabbed repeatedly. They NEED to see their foolish pets DIE in front of their own eyes.

This needs to happen to them over and over again, till they realize that this will never stop.
Till they realize that they have to beat that room. Till they realize that pets are useless worldly attachments. Till they realize that they are the will of the fortress made flesh, Its mailed fist which can never waver, nor break.

Danger rooms, because dwarves need to be reminded, This Is Dwarf Fortress.

Word is born.

[Greiger]

Well really if you have a stance part on a danger room it would probably be difficult to type on a intertubez forum.  Unless of course you are already legendary and wanted a new challenge.

Really my big driving reason for not liking danger rooms is that so many folks talk about it like it's the only way to train a military.  Yes it is probably the easiest way, and most effective.  but it seems to me that new players often come in and see danger rooms as the only way to train up a military.  Either believing the military training is bugged into uselessness which some people still seem to believe, or that danger rooms are intended behavior, which I highly doubt they are.  Sure they may be the result of a number of systems behaving as intended, but I would be very surprised if Toady intended for danger rooms to be viable, or even thought about such a possibility.

Yea, if they aren't experienced with the game yet they probably should use that method for a time.  The military screen is extremely complicated.  But once they have experience working with a skilled military then they may know more about what is necessary for the training of one and should make an attempt without a danger room.  It's not like it's impossible, and the bugs in the system have been mostly if not completely eliminated by now.


tl;dr Wanna use a danger room?  Go ahead.  But it seems so prevalent and a matter of course that newbies may end up thinking it is the only way to get a competent military within 10 ingame years.

[Minnakht]

i've learnt a lot in my life, i know i know how to learn, don't try to tell me i don't, dude!

eh, now seriously, my opinion reflects my experience as an artist(and martial artist). i really don't think you learn anything by repetition, in my experience, one learns by doing it wrong, paying attention, doing it wrong again, noticing what we're doing wrong, then not doing it wrong.
an example of the system in work: dwarves that could evade the weapon traps 100% of the time wouldn't learn anything new, they'd just repeat the same choreography over and over again, dwarves that get hit 90% of the time have much to learn, and would gain skill much faster. seems realistic to me

That's learning the method, then there comes improving.

I have solved a Rubik's Cube severalty times so far, maybe. My best time is 118 seconds. My friend has solved it severalteen times, her best time is 148 seconds and she got quite lucky with the last layer. My other friend has been training for months, with utter repetition and thousands of solves, his best time is 20 seconds.

The dwarves, similarly, could get to the point when they can dodge all 100% spears - then they would keep improving, learning to dodge spears with less effort and/or block them with a shield. Over time, they would expend less effort and less attention when dodging, while keeping the success rate at 100%.

[rojiru]

The flaw is in the title.. it should be, "Your opinion on danger rooms"

If you have a "stance" on danger rooms, you need to get a life hehe.

I see so many people comment on this that I have to truly begin to wonder why they would do such thing. Could it possibly be that stance and opinion are very nearly the same exact thing? Boy howdy.

[agatharchides]

My stance over a danger room?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Yeah, I can't draw. Hopefully the idea is clear.

[BurnCruise]

The one on the right looks like the soldiers starting armor from Demons Souls.

[Cotes]

The flaw is in the title.. it should be, "Your opinion on danger rooms"

If you have a "stance" on danger rooms, you need to get a life hehe.

I see so many people comment on this that I have to truly begin to wonder why they would do such thing. Could it possibly be that stance and opinion are very nearly the same exact thing? Boy howdy.

Except one makes it kinda sound like you are talking about your favourite colour and the other about abortion.

[devek]

My stance over a danger room?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Yeah, I can't draw. Hopefully the idea is clear.

I LOL'd

[Sutremaine]

Really my big driving reason for not liking danger rooms is that so many folks talk about it like it's the only way to train a military.  Yes it is probably the easiest way, and most effective.  but it seems to me that new players often come in and see danger rooms as the only way to train up a military.

It's a little like the forum situation with elves, and to a lesser extent magma (since that's not so easy to set up). It's one way of going about things. But it's not the only way, and people who start out seeing only one way of doing things are starting with a limited point of view. This is a bad thing in the long run.

Well really if you have a stance part on a danger room it would probably be difficult to type on a intertubez forum.

I type with my grasp parts, it's not a problem if the stance parts don't leave the danger room when I do.

[Blade Master Model 42]

My stance over a danger room?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Yeah, I can't draw. Hopefully the idea is clear.

I share this stance.

[BurnedToast]

Which gives me a pretty clear picture of who you are and how you behave. Which is to say, a authoritarian fascist with a poor grasp of logic and rhetoric.

o_0

I don't even know what to say to this. Did I insult you in a different thread or am I being trolled?

but I try to play the game as I believe it was intended to be played.

This is the problem. How do you know Toady didn't picture rooms surrounded by large contraptions that throw spears at you from every angle at all times when he put in Training Spears? Even if Toady didn't think of this when he put in Training Spears, what does it matter? Combos were a programming oversight in Street Fighter 2.
The only thing we know is that it is possible to make Danger Rooms and that they train your dwarves to godly in a short time, or that it is possible to combine a water pump with water wheels in such a way that more energy is created than consumed. If you don't want to use them because they make the game too easy, I won't stop you. I challenge myself in similar ways. But don't go crying that this is not how you want the game to be played.

I don't know for sure that this is not how he intended it to be played - maybe he created the 'danger room' mechanic on purpose. I don't think it's very likely considering how absurdly effective it is and how it lets you completely ignore the alternative method of training he clearly put a lot of effort into though, and how he never mentioned it in the dev log and he usually mentions all the features he adds. Maybe (like street fighter combos, or bunny hopping in quake, or so many other game features) Toady will see it and think it's a great mechanic that adds to the game, tweak it a little and make it official.

I'm not sure what you mean about crying that it's not how I want the game to be played. It's a thread asking people's opinion. My opinion is that it's an exploit. If you don't think it's an exploit (or don't care) then go ahead and use them, I don't care and I don't think it makes you a bad person or anything.

[NW_Kohaku]

For whatever my own opinion is worth, I like them more on principle than anything else - what else could be a better expression of dwarven training than throwing people in a room filled with a machine made specifically to slowly gnaw people to death with blunt instruments to train them to be more resistant to gnawing?

(And technically, it isn't totally unrealistic - iron body training exists, and is basically composed of standing in a stationary pose while someone else repeatedly beats you with two-by-fours every day until your skin and bones thicken and harden to resist being beaten by two-by-fours.  Extreme dwarfiness.)

Anyway, I don't think danger rooms were created on purpose, the way that dwarfputers weren't created on purpose, but that doesn't mean that dwarfputers are "cheating".  It's just an unintended consequence of the mechanics.

Besides, the REAL fastest way to train someone is to just give them crappy weapons and send them up against an enemy incapable of harming them (like a naked goblin from a cage trap).  That's what I did before 31.01 and danger rooms were introduced, anyway, as a way of crash-course training some new recruits. 

How is training someone by danger room any more "cheating" than training them by setting them up against an enemy they can defeat even at dabbling skill ranks (like sending the military after a wild goat), or training by just leaving them with their drills for a few months (it's not like you're doing anything to "earn" those skill upgrades), as compared to training by building a danger room?

Yeah, it's faster, but quarry bushes provide 5 leaves plus rock nuts for food, compared to just 1 unit of food from a plump helmet.  Does that mean quarry bushes are cheating?

[Korva]

Without danger rooms, I might not play the game anymore. The decrease in skill gains some ten versions back made it impossible to get a militia that isn't decimated by every ambush without spending decades or getting insanely lucky with migrants (7+ in military skills), and that simply isn't fun for me. I like using traps, yes, but they're not as fun as sending out the gals and guys with the axes and watching them cause havoc.

That said, I started setting some limits. Once the fastest-rising skills get to 10-12 I usually take that soldier/squad out of the danger room and let them train normally. That way they have a good fighting chance but aren't invulnerable one-dwarf wrecking balls yet.

I just wish I could stick with a fort long enough to see the militia get to Legendary from there just with normal training and live combat. 

I'd much rather have faster skill increases back, combined with obstacle courses, training dummies or other workshop/building-style solutions that aren't as overpowered, but unless or until that happens I'll use the danger rooms every time.

[SmileyMan]

If there was to be a cap, then perhaps it could be attached to all training weapons - after a certain level, practising against a trap or sparring partner armed with a training weapon just doesn't have any effect.  So people would have to move on to full weapons training/danger rooms and all that that entails...

[MrWiggles]

Without danger rooms, I might not play the game anymore. The decrease in skill gains some ten versions back made it impossible to get a militia that isn't decimated by every ambush without spending decades or getting insanely lucky with migrants (7+ in military skills), and that simply isn't fun for me. I like using traps, yes, but they're not as fun as sending out the gals and guys with the axes and watching them cause havoc.

If you bring a dorf on embark with points in teacher, and military skills, it doens't take very long to train up a military. Instead of giving random guys swords, when they've never handle one, and expecting them to get proficient in short order, they now get to have a boot camp from an instrutor.

For my play style, watching the Militia commander, doing demonstration, and instruction on weapons is way neater. Its quite nice, and then promoting one of the recruits, and having his own squad of scrubs, and him going through the same thing is also neat.