Do you, the community, like where the mod is going ? Do you like the latest changes, from 1.7 to 1.9 ? What is good, what is bad, what would you have done differently ? Anything you like to see added, changed ?
I really love the things that Masterwork does to close economic cycles - things like the crematory, which allows trash to be burned to make useful ash, or the boneyard allowing us to make flux out of bones.
I love the things Masterwork does to make things convenient. Having the ability to make obsidian in a building, rather than a complicated fps destroying obsidian farm, is the one that ranks the highest for me. The clutter reducing efforts of Masterwork are also notable for the convenience they add.
I also like the flavourful things that Masterwork adds. Libraries for training skills adds in a nice dimension of literacy to dwarven society, which makes them more "dwarfy" to me. (Dwarfs without books just seemed wrong to me.) More interesting trading and being able to buy blueprints, special materials, pets etc. from each civ makes me more engaged with the other civs. Now I really work hard getting worlds with surviving elf and drow civs in them. Golems, armoured pets, frost giants, carp cultists, and the ability to make things out of slade are also very flavourful things.
Overall, I like the way Masterwork is going. In the time I've been following the mod, every release has managed to include something that makes me say "yeah, I have to have this!"
I think the biggest thing that I dislike about Masterwork is the clutter it adds to the game. For example, there are alot of enemies that it adds in that are eminently forgettable. I would like to see some of these culled out, and more energy focused on a few enemies that could challenge your fortress at different levels in interesting ways. Another example is the wealth of iron and steel substitutes in the game. For me having ironwood, steeloak, iron, steel, ironbone, bloodsteel and meteoric, which are all basically iron and steel under a multitude of names, just cheapens the importance of good dwarven steel.
I would love to see Masterworks try harder to achieve realism. One of my favorite things about Dwarf Fortress is the way it tries to make a real and believable world (albeit a world with warped and twisted logic to it). For example, it bothers me that the arc furnace needs no electrical infrastructure to make it work - it's just a special sort of magma furnace. I'd love to see the arc furnace instead need power from waterwheels or windmills, magnets, copper wire, ball-bearings, etc., on top of the normal furnace requirements, to represent the furnace having a mighty electrical generator as part of it. The same with the stone grinding reactions - it seems wrong that grinding a boulder does not need mechanical power (though considering how well dwarfs can pump, a single dwarf probably is strong enough to grind up a whole boulder in a few ticks). I'd also like to see alchemy having more actual chemistry in it, rather than being a basically magical process as it is currently.
I also dislike how "magical" Masterworks is. This one is surely about my personal taste as I know plenty of people want more magic in their dwarf fortress games, but I would really love some options in the GUI setup for Masterworks to remove more of the magical fluff than one can currently remove. High on the list for that is magical alchemy and the overabundance of magical metals (which from a thematic point of view, mostly have the effect of making steel less interesting, and less worthy of producing - particularly since steel has a complex production chain). The magical temples and dwarven magicians are also things that I just find un-dwarfy.
I would like to see the magical things in Masterworks tied with things you have to get from enemies or other civs. For example, making slade more like birfrost, so a player has to dig down to hell and kill some demons in order to harvest their bones and forge weapons of ultra-heavy EPIC would add alot of flavour to what is otherwise just a fairly simple reaction in a magma smelter. This would also link back to making enemies more interesting - if looting the corpses of warlocks to steal their unholy artifacts is the only way of making alchemy labs or temples of the deep, it makes a warlock siege that much more engaging.
Other things I'd like to see:
*Simplified clothing - I'd clothe my dwarfs in one-piece jumpsuits if I could, but replacing trousers and socks with leggings would still be a huge step up.
*A use for toys - perhaps as something to train children in skills, or to just keep children or dwarfs busy.
*A low-powered option for dwarf religion and music. A temple and a music stage that just made dwarfs happy, and maybe had some special tantrum-calming abilities, would be a nice low-power alternative option for those of us who don't like the powerful magical effects dwarven music and religion currently have, but who like the idea of there being dwarven music and religion.
*Getting rid of boozebelly goats, and introducing the ability to brew milk like the mean, magma-riding rock-mongols that our dorfs are!
To sum up, I think Masterworks is a very interesting mod and I stand in awe of the vigor with which you go at it. What Masterworks already adds to the game is amazing, and I think really the biggest improvement that can be made is to refine what is already in your mod.
fasquardon
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Topic: ☼MASTERWORK-DF☼ V.3 - New release and old post. This will be locked later. (Read 1838656 times)