Bay 12 Games Forum

It would be nice if the game could be set to generate more volcanoes than the bare minimum to not trigger a regen. Instead of generating exactly the minimum number of volcanoes specified I would like it tlo keep placing volcanoes until it either runs out of squares with 100 volcanism or reaches a seperately specified maximum.

It would be cool if there was the option to bring extra dwarves, and/or possibly mercenaries of any race (hired using embark points), to reclaims of ruined sites. So you'd have your seven regular dwarves plus maybe up to seven other soldiers and mercenaries.

I know I've had issues with reclaims with having insufficient personnell to get the fort up and running again. Plus there's a literary precedent for it (namely The Hobbit, the entire plot of which revolved around 14 characters trying to reclaim a dwarven stronghold. This may seemlike a poor argument to some other forumites, but for context bear in mind that the number of dwarves you bring to a new site is clearly derived from Snow White)

The squads menu is kind of wonky in that it is the only menu that does not pause the game when it is opened. I like the option to have the action continue while the menu is open (in fact, it would also be nice if we could unpause in other menus like the 'v' and 'q' menus), but having it behave differently than all other menus is somewhat disruptive, especially since this is arguably the menu where pausing is most necessary (as the subjects of the 'q' and 't' menus aren't going to move, but many targets are).

I would suggest making all menus autopause the game, including (s)quads. Furthermore, if possible it would be really nice if we could pause and unpause in other menus without closing them like we can with the squads menu now.

I've got a few suggestions about the interface

*In descriptions of skeletons, body parts, etc. of named creatures it would be nice if it stated what kind of creature the character was (ie. Dwarf, Goblin, Human, Elf, some kind of pet, etc) instead of just "This is a <NAME>'s skeleton"

*It would be great if we had the option to sort the Pen/Pasture menu by creature type, by grazers vs. non grazers, and by strays vs. pets vs. untamed

*Names could stand to be more consistent. The different screens seems to switch between the translated and untranslated versions of characters' names without rhyme or reason

*Any screen where you select between multiple creatures (ie. pasture menu, military menu, kill menu, animal stocks, et cetera) that doesn't have it already would be improved by the option to view the selected creature's description (and return to the previous menu and selection by pressing escape and/or zoom to the currently highlighted creature.

*It would be nice if we could resize activity zones

*It would be great if we could switch back and forth between animal stocks and animal units

*Any place where you select from a list would be greatly improved if we could select by text string (stocks, pastures, military, construction, etc.)

*Many things currently selectable by text string are hampered by the search only checking against the creature's untranslated name rather than titles, descriptors, or translated name.

*It would be nice if we could prioritize constructions like we can with designations

*It would be nice if Units->Other could be sorted/grouped by type (ie. Wild Animal, Diplomat, Guest (possibly further sorted by reason for visiting), Uninvited Guest, Merchant, etc.)

*A lot of things in the adventurer journal run off the side of the screen. They might benefit from being right justified.

*Constructions would benefit from an button to simply use the same material for the whole construction (rather than having to press enter for each square)

*It would be nice to be able to set up constructed staircases all at once instead of having to wait for a level to be built before setting out the next.

*It would be great to be able to switch freely between the (k), (t), (q), and (v) menus without having to exit and reselect the square.

*It would be nice to view unit description and stats from the petition screen

*It would be nice if we toggle the kill menu (s-a-k) to not show caged creatures, guests, or merchants.

*It would be nice to have the option to access the (k), (t), (q), and possibly (v) readouts without pausing.

*It would be nice to view stocks by material

*It would be nice if descriptions of things told you their color.

I think it would be neat if it were possible for a civilization to have different ETHIC standards for what they do vs what they judge other civilizations for doing (for example they might find it ACCEPTABLE for their own people to TORTURE_ANIMALS but find it APPALLING for other civilizations to do it)

It would be very nice if we could view the descriptions of built furniture (especially statues, etc.) directly from the look (k) menu, instead of having to switch to view items in buildings (t) and go through several submenus. There is so much detail in this game but so much of it is inconvenient to access.

As the interface is now pressing tab during fortress mode shows or hides the minimap and hotkey list. I would like to suggest a slight addition to this functionality.

Pressing tab once would replace the minimap with the loo(k) screen information for whatever square the cursor is on, which would be displayed to the right of whatever menu or readout is currently actually active (the way the minimap usually is when it's on), pressing tab again would replace this with the i(t)ems in buildings readout, and pressing it a third time would expand the key list as currently happens with a single press of the tab key.

(I would suggest also adding the (v)iew creatures readout to the cycle, but that has too many sub-views to be useful without its controls active)