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[knughax]

Hi.

I do not know if anyone has given this suggestion but I read the latest update on the main page about the justice system and that a court system would be impossible to have because of the difficulty of having specific dwarves to gather to one point at one time. I realized a solution to the problem although it is probably very complicated and hard to implement.

Implement a work hour system where the dwarves work after a schedule rather than after a list of orders, this would make it possible to schedule in a court date and various other things. This could be achieved without to much UI confusion by having the manager make the schedule for all dwarves or having helper to assist him with it. That way it becomes easier for the player to overlook and customize when the dwarves work or the squads train for higher efficiency. As well as making the justice and meetings work more like in the real world

I am sure this would be a true headache to do programming-wise but it is a way to make it work and seems to me as a natural evolution of the program.

Thanks for your time!
//Knughax

[peskyninja]

I don't support this, people in the medieval era didn't had a lot to do besides working, so they lived to work.

[coolio678]

I'm currently building a rather large dining hall, with 4 large "tables" made with 12 tables each. I have one done, but only 3-4 dwarves eat at a time, so it's rather pointless for me to keep building, until my population is extremely high.

edit: oops! I forgot to even mention what I wanted to.

So I would like if there were "shifts" groups of dwarves would take, so then 20 or so dwarves would eat dinner together. It could help dwarves be more social, which may mean more fun when someone has an "accident" with the volcano.

[astaldaran]

in midieval society people did work all the time--but at night they went to bed, drank by the fire, etc... now our dwarves don't really have the sun but it does seem something similar would develop. A rational creature would go insane with no structure.

I support the idea--even if I don't know the exact implementation.

[Deimos56]

A rational creature would go insane with no structure.

Well, I believe we have finally figured out what's wrong with these dwarves.

[Doomchild-]

if i remember correct, the days in dwarf fortress are very short so a daily routine would completely ruin productivity since a miner going to mine would turn around halfway there because it's already time to quit. weekly routines would suffer similar problems.
what might be possible would be a monthly or once-per-season gathering but then it should be long enough for distant dwarves to gather and short enough to not completely shut down a fortress.

in theory i support your idea, but time is too vague a concept in dwarf fortress to use it as a basis for such an important aspect of the game.

[RabidAnubis]

Interesting.

How about it depends on the civ to make what the people are comfortable with?  Maybe size?  Maybe tied in with the fortress economy?  I think that's what we really should be asking ourselves, is what would decide it.

So for instance you could pick one.....

1. Schedule Based.  (You eat then, sleep then, work then)
2. Job Based (As it is now)
3. Season Based.

Any others?

[astaldaran]

these could also tie in with burrows, classes, and guilds..


so maybe you only have an all fortress meeting everything 3 years and elections take place then or some ceremonies or something

but then other groups have meetups fairly often---grouped by jobs, social position, wealth, etc.

[knughax]

I don't support this, people in the medieval era didn't had a lot to do besides working, so they lived to work.

That is not quite true... Since medieval time our society have abolished about 2/3 or at least half of all holidays that were prominent during those days so they did have free time and lives outside work. Although the work was so highly time inefficient that it could not have been much free time, but that is a sidenote (I study history at the university...). Besides, the fortress does work rather differently than the prominent family based medieval economy so the problem of historical accuracy does not really arise, does it?

if i remember correct, the days in dwarf fortress are very short so a daily routine would completely ruin productivity since a miner going to mine would turn around halfway there because it's already time to quit. weekly routines would suffer similar problems.
what might be possible would be a monthly or once-per-season gathering but then it should be long enough for distant dwarves to gather and short enough to not completely shut down a fortress.

in theory i support your idea, but time is too vague a concept in dwarf fortress to use it as a basis for such an important aspect of the game.

You do have a point there, daily routines would disrupt things in civilian work. However many "social" and military bits in the game would flow much better if you could make appointments or schedule in a time when training begins in a barrack and when it ends. By "social bits" I mean stuff like a couple of days long party if you notice your dwarves being more morose than usual, or a monthly festival or religious ceremonies. It might also give a foundation for political frameworks, like elections, debates and such.

It is not as if I am saying that it should change this instant, but it might be time to start thinking about how to facilitate such a change in the future. Maybe the days need to be longer and maybe an other system would be better suited for the game as it is now.

The largest gain with a schedule based system is the ability to gather groups of dwarves (specific or general) at a certain place at a certain time, and I can not really see an other way to make meetings with specific dwarves possible.

Interesting.

How about it depends on the civ to make what the people are comfortable with?  Maybe size?  Maybe tied in with the fortress economy?  I think that's what we really should be asking ourselves, is what would decide it.

So for instance you could pick one.....

1. Schedule Based.  (You eat then, sleep then, work then)
2. Job Based (As it is now)
3. Season Based.

Any others?

It might be a better plan to make a combination, have season based for larger gatherings and farming, schedule based for organising eating and sleeping and job based for the work to work actions.

[Veylon]

Daily/Weekly/Whatever scheduling shouldn't be needed to have court dates or elections. Just have "Urist McPeasant cancels Haul Item: Jury Duty". Anyone who isn't injured, fighting, insane or performing life-saving surgery could run off to whatever social function is so danged important.

An alternative to scheduling might be a system akin to firefly synchronization. If a Dwarf knows that a friend is On Break, he'll tend to slack off sooner in order to spend time with him. If one dwarf yawns in a room, it makes everyone else slightly more drowsy. That way they'll naturally drift into doing things at the same time unless the workload is really hectic.

[astaldaran]

as for the middle ages...during the winter they had loads of free time since they couldn't grow crops and they didn't really have a good way of staying warm outside in order to do other things (like build)...so most crafting took place in the winter and lots of things like that, that could happen indoors. Cloth making ,etc often then did too.   We don't really have this mechanic in DF

[SuicideJunkie]

An alternative to scheduling might be a system akin to firefly synchronization. If a Dwarf knows that a friend is On Break, he'll tend to slack off sooner in order to spend time with him. If one dwarf yawns in a room, it makes everyone else slightly more drowsy. That way they'll naturally drift into doing things at the same time unless the workload is really hectic.

I like it.

At the end of each task, before continuing on with the next item in the queue or becoming available for a job, check to see if Urist's friends are on a drink/eat task (and Urist is thirsty/hungry), and join them.