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[Footkerchief]

also, i dunno it this is answered somewhere: any chance a fully customizable dwarf description is in the works? basically for adventure mode, but maybe for special dwarfs in dwarf mode? it would be nice to model a dwarf after my looks and/or personality, or others that "sponsor" a dwarf in my fortress.

This came up in the old List thread:

Will be possible to edit the adventurer apperance or at least know about his apperance?

You can look at yourself and others.  Changing the appearance would be an interface to write, which isn't the end of the day.  You should certainly be able to customize yourself later on, at least in one version of the start setup (versus historical scenarios or whatever), since it's good to be able to be whatever you want to be.  It'll probably depend on prodding or just me eventually doing it.  Since you pick out where you are from first, it'll probably be constrained by the entity/race settings, with options to break convention or something.  Breaking reality (ie making a blue-skinned human) is more difficult because of how the appearance variables are indexed, and there might even be some issues there with breaking out of entity stylings, though I don't think there are.

[Rayc]

After my mayor mandated the construction of piccolos for the tenth time, I got to wandering:  With Taverns being put in, will instruments become playable?

[Footkerchief]

After my mayor mandated the construction of piccolos for the tenth time, I got to wandering:  With Taverns being put in, will instruments become playable?

This has come up before with regard to taverns:

I see no mention of parties, musical instruments or toys in the new short-term goals.
Are behaviours involving this type of item going to be put on hold, or will the new inns and such include them.

I don't specifically have a timeline for these, although I've been wanting to do them for a long, long time, and the musicality attribute is just sort of sitting there.

It also came up in DF Talk 12:

Toady:   It should be entertaining, and it's good - even independent of all the visitors - giving the dwarves something finally to do with those instruments they've had for years just sitting there. And it's like there's all these attributes, like musicality ...
Capntastic:   Musicality, and kinetic sense.
Toady:   Yeah, all that stuff that they don't use at all, like musicality: there's zero use for it ... and also the language abilities don't get used that much and we can have people telling ... it would be cool, like the historical information sometimes it gives you on engravings, you can have a dwarf say 'Now I will tell you of the story of the time that I carved cheese pictures in my room' or something, and they'll sit there ...
Capntastic:   Gather round.
Toady:   So you have these really funny dwarf parties where ... more like the way, it'll probably use the same stuff - that was the point - of the military stuff where it says exactly what they're doing during their training exercises and that kind of thing. You know you'd have these activities that pop up at parties, like there's a storytelling activity going on, or there's a musical activity and then people can join in as participants in different ways, and just kind of hang out in the meeting hall doing this different stuff, and the same with the games that they play.

[Rockphed]

Great, now I foresee an artifact being decorated with a picture of the time an engraver went off on a bender and told a story about how he engraved pictures of himself engraving pictures of cheese in the mayor's bedroom.

Which would not be a half bad thing to find on an artifact come to think of it.

[tps12]

Something like "On siege, wait 50 steps, pull lever 11." Lever 11 being the level that seals the fort.
...
Personally, I would like something like that for the sole purpose of removing some micromanagement. If it were extended with a large list of events to trigger it, and potential actions, you could have a mostly automated fortress.

Scripting dwarves is micromanagement.

[Matz05]

But it is EFFICIENT micromanagement.

Actually, if->then standing orders sound perfectly logical.

If a seige arrives, everyone comes inside, all guards are activated and stationed inside the main gate, and the gate is closed with lever 4 in X steps.

Real buildings have posters with evacuation/emergency procedures...

[EmeraldWind]

But it is EFFICIENT micromanagement.

Actually, if->then standing orders sound perfectly logical.

If a seige arrives, everyone comes inside, all guards are activated and stationed inside the main gate, and the gate is closed with lever 4 in X steps.

Real buildings have posters with evacuation/emergency procedures...

DwarfBASIC for all your dwarf programming needs.

[Dradym]

i dont think if>then statements would be a realistic option for continuation of the fort after retirement. while it may be very dwarfy to see what people can come up with, it just wouldnt be a good option. the next logical step would be to take battles from the one-on-one scenario to the army-on-army event that it should be. starting out with very few elements-the populations, strength of equipment. then moving to more complicated things like: tactics, leadership, different unit types, morale-becoming more of a squad-on-squad series of skirmishes in the larger battle, which can then finally include environment factors and terrain and technology.

at least this is how i would evolve the combat system

[counting]

I am thinking to make logging human input as MACRO to incorporated with the human-undestand-only operation. It doesn't have to be as complex as language, just as simple as what commands is taken at what order. If the usage of macro becomes too hard/much/big to log for a fortress to function properly, I guess the fortress itself is already over-complex for players to control as well, and may collapse by itself even human players control the fortress themselves.

[Dsarker]

What would also be good is to have the different leadership skills stay at the level they are generated at for the dwarfs after you leave it to itself. Then those orders you give might be misunderstood, delayed, etc. Eventually, the fort would stagnate, and if you couple this with mechanical failure, eventually the fort would end anyway, but it would be very amusing.

[irmo]

I'm not sure why anyone thinks "retired" forts will be simulated at the Fortress Mode level of detail, including things like mechanisms and exact positioning of dwarves. Your computer is not powerful enough to run two fortress simulations at once.

[Mephansteras]

I'm not sure why anyone thinks "retired" forts will be simulated at the Fortress Mode level of detail, including things like mechanisms and exact positioning of dwarves. Your computer is not powerful enough to run two fortress simulations at once.

This issue, I think, is not that the fort needs to be simulated while you're running another fort except in high level detail. The issue is that it needs to be simulated correctly if you visit as an Adventurer. Basic things like: What state for various levers has the drawbridge up or down so you can actually get in? If there is an airlock system, what levers have to be pulled to open the inner doors after travelers have entered through the first set of doors?

It's those more complicated structures that Toady is concerned about. Players do all sorts of interesting things in their fortresses, and sometimes there isn't a decent 'default' state to leave it in that'll keep the fortress working properly if it's loaded during visiting. We can debate about how much of an issue that is, but from what Toady has said he would like these issues to be handled properly.

[Neonivek]

When I think about I am surprised no one's questions (EVER) are just really tough math questions.

What state for various levers has the drawbridge up or down so you can actually get in? If there is an airlock system, what levers have to be pulled to open the inner doors after travelers have entered through the first set of doors?

So then the clunky solution would be to allow designations.

[Mephansteras]

So then the clunky solution would be to allow designations.

Yes. But I think the issue here is more that Toady doesn't feel particularly compelled to add in a clunky solution. There are lots of clunky solutions, but I get the impression that he's holding out for a more elegant one. Or at least having a bunch of other aspects of the game coded so that he doesn't have to go back and touch the fortress simulation code multiple times.

[Neonivek]

So then the clunky solution would be to allow designations.

Yes. But I think the issue here is more that Toady doesn't feel particularly compelled to add in a clunky solution. There are lots of clunky solutions, but I get the impression that he's holding out for a more elegant one. Or at least having a bunch of other aspects of the game coded so that he doesn't have to go back and touch the fortress simulation code multiple times.

I am not asking for clunky solutions.

Though... a Dropgate designation wouldn't be so bad...

The dwarves would automatically raise and lower gates to accomidate travelers (or other dwarves) and refuse to lower them if an enemy comes forth.