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[hermes]

Looking forward to historical migrations

Me too, but I'm not sure if this isn't going to exponentially increase the chances of tantrum spirals 

Following from this quote...

One of the nice things about that is that the relationship pages start out with plenty of family members scattered around the world

I'm curious, does this diaspora of dwarven families arise from children or parents actually migrating from fortress to fortress in worldgen, or is this movement abstracted?

The new release is getting near, I'm getting pretty excited about it.  It's lucky that we've had so much training in waiting, DF forum membership should be a prerequisite for those wishing to attain Buddha like patience

[finka]

What are the obstacles to just assembling the starting seven dwarves as if they were a migrant wave (and possibly replacing their skills)?

[Caldfir]

What are the obstacles to just assembling the starting seven dwarves as if they were a migrant wave (and possibly replacing their skills)?

Probably the reasoning behind not doing it it mainly because the "seven ideally chosen dwarves at embark" thing is a tested formula for dwarf fortress, and that adding historical figures to the mix results in a bit of ugliness.  If you're just replacing their skillsets, then why bother making them historical at all?  If you aren't replacing them then how does it work?  Do you do searches through historical populations for candidates or what?  Would you need a bunch of new screens for looking at entity poulations filtered by skill/social attributes/age/availability?  It is one of those things that on the surface is totally possible, but for Toady to do it now would set the release back a month, because doing it well would take a long time, because it would involve setting up all the embark scenario stuff. 

It is the same problem that has been mentioned about the player in adventure mode - they don't have any history.  There are potential fixes for this, but all of them are kinda bi picture things that would take a long time, and like anything with DF of substance, it needs to be scheduled a chunk of time for Toady to code it. 

As things stand, the starting seven aren't a complete lie, because your civ has plenty of non-historical dwarves anyway.  I'm looking forward to having the fully fleshed-out embark scenarios; especially getting a band together in adventure mode and then embarking that way. 

[finka]

What are the obstacles to just assembling the starting seven dwarves as if they were a migrant wave (and possibly replacing their skills)?

If you're just replacing their skillsets, then why bother making them historical at all?

 
Family ties?  General world richness?

If you aren't replacing them then how does it work?Do you do searches through historical populations for candidates or what?  Would you need a bunch of new screens for looking at entity poulations filtered by skill/social attributes/age/availability?  It is one of those things that on the surface is totally possible, but for Toady to do it now would set the release back a month, because doing it well would take a long time, because it would involve setting up all the embark scenario stuff. 

Well, you're probably right that Toady's answer would be "no reason to put in a stopgap now, as opposed to the real thing when we do embark scenarios".

But as for the skills stuff, implicit in my question was a question about what's being done with historical migrant skills.  We're familiar with migrant skills being selected to fill gaps in the fortress's skill roster.  Does this extend to historical migrants: are they also chosen because their skills are needed, or are they thrown in by an entirely separate method?  In the former case, it's not inconceivable that you might make a starting build exactly as you do now, DF would take your skill preferences and assemble a hist-fig-including set of seven with the migrant wave algorithm, and then replace their skills with your selections which would be expected not to be a large change.  This would be extra work, yes, but I don't know whether several weeks or a day.

[darkflagrance]

You might get more child immigrants in the youngest worlds before the population starts to level out.

New bug: when you play in worlds generated to year 20, after the first ten immigrants, the rest are all children!

[Cruxador]

The starting seven dwarves seem a little thin now that they don't fit into the world as much as the other dwarves you'll have arriving, but we'll have to wait a bit longer for possible solutions for that to be explored (start scenarios, the potential for historical figures to be used, etc.).

But wouldn't a lot of this be solved just by adding a mechanism whereby a list of relationships is generated for a dwarf, either retconned as long lost relatives to historical figures or just made up on the spot by assigning a name and relationship to mostly undefined ahistorical figures? This would be good in adventure too, if when you ask somebody of their family it generates some relationships for them to tell you about.

Not greened since it's sort of a suggestion question. But it seems like the obvious solution to the problem to me.

[Footkerchief]

Retconning historicality is not a one-day problem.  Historical migrants are cool, but I'm very glad he's not going further with it for this release.

[Areyar]

You might get more child immigrants in the youngest worlds before the population starts to level out.

New bug: when you play in worlds generated to year 20, after the first ten immigrants, the rest are all children!

I wouldn't consider that a bug, just the way things are. (and should be)

[EnigmaticHat]

So, we're getting dwarves with off-sight relations... I can smell a recipe for Fun here.  When people start dying outside the play area, will the dwarves be able to suffer bad thoughts for friends who died in distant lands?  If so, what will it take for them to be considered aware of the deaths?  Random uncontrollable bad thoughts because of the outside world would be interesting.  At the very least, it would give you a reason to care about the rest of your civ.

[Wirevix]

That presumes world-simulation actually continues at the same time as doing your fortress.  Given that historical figures like diplomats currently have a habit of not even dying of old age until they come onto the edge of your map, last I heard at least, I don't think any of their offsite family members would ever die, because all the world outside your fortress is basically in stasis.

Eventually, that'll become a thing, but hopefully the aspect of Justice where dwarves don't instantly know who killed who will by then be expanded to a general lack of hive-minded telepathy so that the only way they can find out is if someone sends them a letter.

[Dsarker]

World sim is going to be continued in this patch, remember.

[Footkerchief]

So, we're getting dwarves with off-sight relations... I can smell a recipe for Fun here.  When people start dying outside the play area, will the dwarves be able to suffer bad thoughts for friends who died in distant lands?  If so, what will it take for them to be considered aware of the deaths?  Random uncontrollable bad thoughts because of the outside world would be interesting.  At the very least, it would give you a reason to care about the rest of your civ.

No, incorporating off-site events into dwarves' thoughts would have been a bigger rewrite.  Off-site relations will not be qualitatively different.

World sim is going to be continued in this patch, remember.

No it won't.  That's Release 5.

[Willfor]

Actually, no, but he's going to start working on that in the next version most likely. Or rather, he has indicated that it is a strong possibility.

[irmo]

Actually, no, but he's going to start working on that in the next version most likely. Or rather, he has indicated that it is a strong possibility.

Meanwhile, farming continues to be horribly unbalanced.

[UltraValican]

So if I make a ton of human adventurers, and have them retire in dwarven sites.....will they become migrants as well?