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[Alfrodo]

To the whole debate on skill and books: Hasn't Toady already talked about how he wants to differentiate between knowledge and skill sometime in the future?

That's what we discussed with Booktype E, B and C.

E) Provides you with basic knowledge of the profession. (Lets a dwarf start metalcrafting.)
B) Provides you with knowledge on the construction of an item. (Weaponized Stop Signs, Querns, etc.)
C) Provides you with knowledge on a profession, if you have the prior knowledge to understand it. (Urist's Guide to Calculus.)

Academy / Guild Libraries will be filled with all three types.

[NW_Kohaku]

Considering how much wealth a successful fortress can create, and how greedy dwarves can be, it wouldn't surprise me if they decided to go a little more independent, demanding actual pay for their work having he fortress share it's vast hoard of gold, silver and gems to the citizens who helped to build it! Especially if your fortress is, in fact, the administrative capital of a vast surrounding population, with thousands of deep dwarves living under them in the caverns,and thousands more living as peasants in hillocks. Maybe they'd even go for a completely coin based economy if you're wealthy enough, and accumulated enough precious metals.

Well, there are a mountain of problems with economics in the fortress, currently.  For example, I can buy a caravan full of gold bars for the price of a single *rat weed roast*. It's not hard for a legendary cook to start spitting out 50k☼ roasts regularly, and with some luck and pricey ingredients, 200k☼ roasts are entirely possible.  Then, of course, there's the problem of trap components made from metal tend to cost hundreds of thousands of dbs, but the food one is probably the worst.  It makes a basic bite to eat cost more than a dwarf's annual income.  Your legendary cooks actually hurt your fortress, rather than help it, and your non-legendary dwarves go scrounge for rats to eat because they can't afford the ☼prepared llama brain roast [51]☼.

This is a problem that needs fixing before anything else in the economy can make sense.  6000☼ is a joke when I can make a single roast worth 40k☼ in my first Summer.  By year three, my kitchen has a higher GDP than the entire rest of the world combined.  If I cared, my metalsmiths would be capable of spitting out steel trap components that might start to rival that, but why bother when the world cannot ship goods worth buying to my door fast enough as it is?  The activation wealth of Titans, by default is merely 100k☼, which is two or three roasts, and you can't even push it up past 2M☼... Food prices literally break the cap. 

In any event, historically, most smallish towns not only didn't use metal currency, they didn't need to.  In fact, metal currency is historically tied in with either international trade, militaries, or crime.  Those are the only three things that really needed hard cash. 

I was writing up a much longer post about this, but this is getting off-topic enough and long enough that it's clear I need to break off and write a whole separate thread on the topic. 

Was this discussed in your class warfare thread? You really should update it , it's an interesting topic and it seems to have made you more knolwedgeable about medieval society. I'll take a look some other time

Yeah, still meaning to do that...  Once I put my currency thread up, I'll try to finish out the last few paragraphs.   That said, a lot of what I was arguing in Class Warfare now seems in some parts to be part of the plan.  That said, I also inferred from the old dev pages/Threetoe stories and asked Future of the Fortress questions to try to probe what Toady felt about specific topics, and built what I was suggesting do cater to my read of his intentions, so I may have just been throwing down flags where he happened to be going already. *shrug* In any event, it feels like a portion of that thread is obsolete. 

Okay. So let me try to sum this up. So I can understand

Let's just use another in game example, using a random dorf and a different founding type.

A Wealthy Noble appears at the walls of Appleaxe in year 63, he offers a few goods with a total value of 6000☼ in exchange for his Armoring/Philosophy* academy to be built.  He and Ezum Eribgitnuk, a non-local legendary armorsmith, are appointed headmasters.*

Ezum's values and personality and how it influences policies:

A lot of that is going in a direction not particularly where I've been arguing.

For starters, I'm throwing most of this personality stuff aside, since I find it more an afterthought to the whole system that just tweaks some numbers at the edges.

For another, I don't think we need a formal academy system at all.  I think we can get by with individual dwarves that take on apprentices as part of a more low-level system, and from there, you can purposefully start attracting would-be apprentices into an expanded system of apprenticeship if and when your fortress becomes famous for turning out excellent craftsdwarves.  This merely requires a record of what the change in skills were for a character that stayed at your fortress for a time.

Dwarf Harvard and rejection rates are all mechanics of a far more stiff and formal system than I see this game has any reason to require.  Dwarf Fortress is the game it is because it does not rely upon stiff and formal mechanical systems that are fully enclosed within itself, it relies upon sets of mechanics that interplay with one another, where the boundaries between one and the other get blurred.  (Imagine what the game would be like if minecarts or fluids couldn't interact with mechanisms...)

If you have a system where individual dwarves take on apprentices, and you have special apprentice workshops set up for them, and a "out of state tuition" for travelers that wanted to learn without first being a part of the fortress, you could then start making money off of it, but it wouldn't require any formal declaration, and could be a natural outgrowth of taverns, themselves.  (Set up your craftsdwarf workshop making bone or stone crafts right next to the tavern to entice more travellers with watching their souvenirs made before their eyes, and maybe some of them will be interested in trying it out for themselves at your conveniently located apprentice craftsdwarf workshop...)

An "Academy", then, is not a formally defined thing in the game. It's simply when a player purposefully develops the reputation of a fortress by attracting lots of apprentices, then training them well before sending them back on their way.  There might be a lot of infrastructure that would go along with that, but it wouldn't need to be specially declared "campus grounds" or anything like that, and would be up to the player to simply set up dormitories or housing for rent for long-term visitors or the like. 

Your fortress reputation for various skills you teach for travelers for what pay and depending upon whether you have species bias should probably take a new page, but your fortress reputation page could encompass far more than just academies, and probably include the likes of goods exported, soldiers that have been sent off-map, sieges defeated, and other reputations. 

[Alfrodo]

so...
The fortress itself is the academy, rather than the academy being an independent organization, with apprentices coming and going to learn at your workshops, rather than in special areas or classrooms.  The only "teachers" or "headmasters" are dorfs with lots of students?

The economy is broken, but tuition is still a way for the fort to make money. (Because a ☼Plump Helmet Roast☼ stack is worth more than entire civilizations.)

[NW_Kohaku]

Incidentally, writing that other thread in another window...

so...
The fortress itself is the academy, rather than the academy being an independent organization, with apprentices coming and going to learn at your workshops, rather than in special areas or classrooms.  The only "teachers" or "headmasters" are dorfs with lots of students?

The economy is broken, but tuition is still a way for the fort to make money. (Because a ☼Plump Helmet Roast☼ stack is worth more than entire civilizations.)

More-or-less, yes. 

The question is what, physically, does a teaching space actually require? 

Military dwarves already have a teaching space, which is basically just an area defined by an armor stand which may or may not have further furniture.  Demonstrations and drills don't really require anything beyond that. 

Presumably, different jobs, if you are performing teaching activities for jobs beyond the military will involve workshops or at least tools relevant to the job. (For most jobs, however, these don't exist outside the workshop itself.)

The question is, do we need a classroom, or would we just have an apprentice sitting at a specific workshop while a master stands within one tile and invisibly does some tutoring, or have a master performing the craft while an audience observes? If we have a classroom, do we enforce a table-and-chair per student plus blackboard room designation?

[Alfrodo]

Incidentally, writing that other thread in another window...

so...
The fortress itself is the academy, rather than the academy being an independent organization, with apprentices coming and going to learn at your workshops, rather than in special areas or classrooms.  The only "teachers" or "headmasters" are dorfs with lots of students?

The economy is broken, but tuition is still a way for the fort to make money. (Because a ☼Plump Helmet Roast☼ stack is worth more than entire civilizations.)

More-or-less, yes. 

The question is what, physically, does a teaching space actually require? 

Military dwarves already have a teaching space, which is basically just an area defined by an armor stand which may or may not have further furniture.  Demonstrations and drills don't really require anything beyond that. 

Presumably, different jobs, if you are performing teaching activities for jobs beyond the military will involve workshops or at least tools relevant to the job. (For most jobs, however, these don't exist outside the workshop itself.)

The question is, do we need a classroom, or would we just have an apprentice sitting at a specific workshop while a master stands within one tile and invisibly does some tutoring, or have a master performing the craft while an audience observes? If we have a classroom, do we enforce a table-and-chair per student plus blackboard room designation?

So. On classrooms. Then?

A classroom would have some nobly requirements, like value, some storage, possibly? But It should depend on what's being taught.

A Blacksmith academy would need a few metalsmith's forges.
A Kicker Academy wouldn't need anything.

Academies would rely mostly on "hands on" and observation. With out-of-class reading occurring only occasionally.

So I guess a classroom for this hypothetical blacksmith academy would consist of a few metalsmith's forges for the hands on, a few chairs for the observation, and perhaps a small bookshelf, for reading. 

[NW_Kohaku]

So. On classrooms. Then?

A classroom would have some nobly requirements, like value, some storage, possibly? But It should depend on what's being taught.

A Blacksmith academy would need a few metalsmith's forges.
A Kicker Academy wouldn't need anything.

Academies would rely mostly on "hands on" and observation. With out-of-class reading occurring only occasionally.

So I guess a classroom for this hypothetical blacksmith academy would consist of a few metalsmith's forges for the hands on, a few chairs for the observation, and perhaps a small bookshelf, for reading.

Well, how many of those things do you really need in a designated area, and do you need a designated area at all?

I'm reminded of threads that argued workshops should be replaced with areas that have constructed tools, which would combine well with a "classroom as a zone" idea... see here or here. (Oh, and someone posted a duplicate idea recently with more pictures, yay.) It's also part of a long-term bloat and such that seems to be coming "soonish".

Such workshops-as-zones would make things easier, as all you need to do is designate more space for the audience. 

If reading is done out-of-class, it raises the question of whether it even needs to be part of a workshop/workshop zone with education functionality/education zone at all, and could simply be available in the reference section of a fortress library.  A bookshelf with a designated set of relevant books might be designated there, like a barracks might be designated with beds, but they aren't strictly required. 

In essence, if we're talking about weaponsmithing class, is there any need for it to be anything other than a couple extra forges in an area where a single master can oversee them? Can it simply be a function added onto basic workshops without the need to even designate anything special in addition to the workshop besides turning a "Can be used for class: Yes" flag on?

[Ribs]

Incidentally, writing that other thread in another window...

so...
The fortress itself is the academy, rather than the academy being an independent organization, with apprentices coming and going to learn at your workshops, rather than in special areas or classrooms.  The only "teachers" or "headmasters" are dorfs with lots of students?

The economy is broken, but tuition is still a way for the fort to make money. (Because a ☼Plump Helmet Roast☼ stack is worth more than entire civilizations.)

More-or-less, yes. 

The question is what, physically, does a teaching space actually require? 

Military dwarves already have a teaching space, which is basically just an area defined by an armor stand which may or may not have further furniture.  Demonstrations and drills don't really require anything beyond that. 

Presumably, different jobs, if you are performing teaching activities for jobs beyond the military will involve workshops or at least tools relevant to the job. (For most jobs, however, these don't exist outside the workshop itself.)

The question is, do we need a classroom, or would we just have an apprentice sitting at a specific workshop while a master stands within one tile and invisibly does some tutoring, or have a master performing the craft while an audience observes? If we have a classroom, do we enforce a table-and-chair per student plus blackboard room designation?

While military dwarves have a teaching space, certain commanding skills like military tactics are currently not possible to train. Yeah, I know we discussed that this is something you wouldn't be able to learn solely through books, but again, having lectures and reading about historical battles and tactics would definitely help in the training of future officers.

The same goes for several other professions. Like architects learing about the history of asthetics and theories on the subject etc and that could give them some sort of bonus. I think of academies as places of higher learning, and not necessarily there to teach the basics of anything. Maybe your officers would go to the barracks to train, and then to the academy to learn about more "scholary" martial practices.

I definitely think classrooms are necessary. In fact, I was thinking of academies as being completely separated from your fortress, almost like monasteries. They could even have their own mess halls and dormitories, so the students can live inside it most of the time. NW, I guess we differ a bit in our points of view regarding this, but I'd say that even if the academies are in fact integrally part of the fortress, just like Inns, the 'guests' should be able to live in it as if it were a semi-independent structure (the way taverns will have their own separate living rooms attached to them). That's my personal take on it

[GoblinCookie]

I am pretty sure this idea would be implemented soon enough given that books/learning is already in.  I am pretty sure though that the basic idea of this thread is actually better done through having a starting scenario *for* an academy and having students/teachers visit from elsewhere than it is having an autonomous academy district created by outside entities because the fortress profits in the short term. 

The widespread idea of the accumulation or teaching of academic knowledge as a means rather than an end in itself is basically a 19th Century idea.  We now study knowledge on the rationale of our belief that it will reward us with some kind of power or technology or economic advantage.  This however prior to modern times was only really applicable to vocational knowledge since technology orientated sciences had not really been developed.

So basically the districts should be districts of an academy, the academy would be a starting scenario but the same systems are there in other types of fortress.  Meaning that we can choose to become an academy in a minor sense but that is not our focus.

[Ribs]

I am pretty sure this idea would be implemented soon enough given that books/learning is already in.  I am pretty sure though that the basic idea of this thread is actually better done through having a starting scenario *for* an academy and having students/teachers visit from elsewhere than it is having an autonomous academy district created by outside entities because the fortress profits in the short term. 

The widespread idea of the accumulation or teaching of academic knowledge as a means rather than an end in itself is basically a 19th Century idea.  We now study knowledge on the rationale of our belief that it will reward us with some kind of power or technology or economic advantage.  This however prior to modern times was only really applicable to vocational knowledge since technology orientated sciences had not really been developed.

So basically the districts should be districts of an academy, the academy would be a starting scenario but the same systems are there in other types of fortress.  Meaning that we can choose to become an academy in a minor sense but that is not our focus.

High-learning instututions did exist in the pre-modern era, and they did teach things like law, military science and medicine:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_higher-learning_institutions

I do understand the idea of having start scenarios where you would build an academy from the beginning and having it as the very reason for the existence of the site, just like we'll apparently have starting scenarios dedicated for the construction of taverns/inns.

Still, I like the alternative of having a classical fronteer settlement style fortress(like the ones we've been building so far), where you'd be able to make a smaller, less specialized version of all these things in a single site.

[Alfrodo]

Looks like we have a bit of a rift with "Semi-Independent from fort organization" and "fort organization"

What I initially had in mind is that a classroom was a "Room." Which belonged to an active headmaster noble. Rather than a "zone," which is designated. The Headmaster would require a classroom and dorm at minimum, but could also have libraries, mess halls, and offices.

[Ribs]

Looks like we have a bit of a rift with "Semi-Independent from fort organization" and "fort organization"

What I initially had in mind is that a classroom was a "Room." Which belonged to an active headmaster noble. Rather than a "zone," which is dedicated. Who also required a "Library room" (If he needed an Academy library, the public one will work most of the time.) and a "dorm room" for his students. (Not a bedroom?) And possibly a mess hall room.

It could work like that. It could also be like the ancient greek academies (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platonic_Academy) , with no real 'teachers' but more like a system where the senior (or more skilled) members teach the junior members (similar to the way military training currently works). Plenty of possibilities there.

[Alfrodo]

Looks like we have a bit of a rift with "Semi-Independent from fort organization" and "fort organization"

What I initially had in mind is that a classroom was a "Room." Which belonged to an active headmaster noble. Rather than a "zone," which is dedicated. Who also required a "Library room" (If he needed an Academy library, the public one will work most of the time.) and a "dorm room" for his students. (Not a bedroom?) And possibly a mess hall room.

It could work like that. It could also be like the ancient greek academies (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Platonic_Academy) , with no real 'teachers' but more like a system where the senior (or more skilled) members teach the junior members (similar to the way military training currently works). Plenty of possibilities there.

I guess that's another possibility, what I had in mind is that some students might stay at the academy post-graduation and become a teacher themselves (Recall Armoring/Philosophy example, I guess they could qualify as "senior" students) I guess that could also depend on the personality of the headmaster.  (An independent one is less likely to allow that, and hence is likely to have a smaller academy.)

[NW_Kohaku]

It's starting to look like this alternate thread on currency is going to be a multi-day thing...

Anyway, while I agree we should have them as starting scenarios, there is no reason they should be confined to starting scenarios any more than a military-centric starting scenario fort can't engage in commerce if the player chooses to do so. 

Again, if you set up how academies work in general, you can just tie on a royal decree declaring, "You must export <number> of <skill rank> <labor> <civilization members> by <year number>" afterwards.  A more flexible system would also allow it to tie into other mandates or trade deals, as well.  (A peace offer with a human civ might involve training and allowing the safe departure of 5 proficient masons in the next two years.  If you have the capacity to do different things for diplomatic offers, you can give the player choices between "exporting training" and exporting goods or possibly doing other services, like sending out military dwarves as a mercenary company.)

I definitely think classrooms are necessary. In fact, I was thinking of academies as being completely separated from your fortress, almost like monasteries. They could even have their own mess halls and dormitories, so the students can live inside it most of the time. NW, I guess we differ a bit in our points of view regarding this, but I'd say that even if the academies are in fact integrally part of the fortress, just like Inns, the 'guests' should be able to live in it as if it were a semi-independent structure (the way taverns will have their own separate living rooms attached to them). That's my personal take on it

Well, why is that your personal take on it?

What advantage is there in such a system compared to a more bare-bones set of hands-on activities clustered around a workbench?

What, for that matter, is lost if there isn't as much game "infrastructure" in setting up complex sets of independent structures?  In a system like I am describing, you could absolutely set up largely independent structures within your fortress that are dedicated academies if you so chose, just as many people set up elaborate facilities for their military dwarves, but there is no explicit requirement in the game for players to do such things for military barracks, either.

For that matter, the same can be said with hospitals...  There are several components to a fully-functional hospital, but you don't need any of them to designate a hospital, or perform medical procedures, although having a specialized area for access to clean water, beds, tables, traction benches, dedicated thread containers, etc. are all good ideas to have.

I would say that a system with less "infrastructure" is possibly easier to code, and also likely better to scale than a strict and formal system.  With an informal system, there's little difference between having a system to educate my own workers and having foreigners come in from far and wide to learn from my wide array of fantastic teachers but the skill and reputation of said teachers.

For that matter, you're saying "a classroom", but you're not defining what "a classroom" is in-game.  Do I simply designate it as another type of zone, like a hospital is? Is it a "room" that is created by furniture, like a dining hall or study? If so, which furniture type? (Keeping in mind that rooms typically only need one piece of furniture.)  Regardless of whether it is bundled into some academy designation or not, there will need to be inn-like rooms available for guests staying for classes, so wouldn't that accomplish the same goals of having dedicated housing for an academy without needing to go through the specific extra interface hurdle of specifically attaching them to some other vague designation of an overall academy-space?

All of this isn't to tear you down, but it seems like you're simply going with an idea you have in your head about what an academy should feel like, rather than what it will actually do in-game. 

Dwarf Fortress systems, again, tend more towards the bare-bones types of implementation.  There isn't anything that requires specific items in a hospital, but there are emergent gameplay reasons to build your hospitals in specific ways.  Is there a way to encourage an academy-like "feel" that you're looking for without just strictly demanding that players designate large swaths of the map to being largely independent of player control? Or, for that matter, is being largely independent of player control a goal in and of itself? 

[Ribs]

Well, why is that your personal take on it?

What advantage is there in such a system compared to a more bare-bones set of hands-on activities clustered around a workbench?

What, for that matter, is lost if there isn't as much game "infrastructure" in setting up complex sets of independent structures?  In a system like I am describing, you could absolutely set up largely independent structures within your fortress that are dedicated academies if you so chose, just as many people set up elaborate facilities for their military dwarves, but there is no explicit requirement in the game for players to do such things for military barracks, either.

For that matter, the same can be said with hospitals...  There are several components to a fully-functional hospital, but you don't need any of them to designate a hospital, or perform medical procedures, although having a specialized area for access to clean water, beds, tables, traction benches, dedicated thread containers, etc. are all good ideas to have.

I would say that a system with less "infrastructure" is possibly easier to code, and also likely better to scale than a strict and formal system.  With an informal system, there's little difference between having a system to educate my own workers and having foreigners come in from far and wide to learn from my wide array of fantastic teachers but the skill and reputation of said teachers.

For that matter, you're saying "a classroom", but you're not defining what "a classroom" is in-game.  Do I simply designate it as another type of zone, like a hospital is? Is it a "room" that is created by furniture, like a dining hall or study? If so, which furniture type? (Keeping in mind that rooms typically only need one piece of furniture.)  Regardless of whether it is bundled into some academy designation or not, there will need to be inn-like rooms available for guests staying for classes, so wouldn't that accomplish the same goals of having dedicated housing for an academy without needing to go through the specific extra interface hurdle of specifically attaching them to some other vague designation of an overall academy-space?

All of this isn't to tear you down, but it seems like you're simply going with an idea you have in your head about what an academy should feel like, rather than what it will actually do in-game. 

Dwarf Fortress systems, again, tend more towards the bare-bones types of implementation.  There isn't anything that requires specific items in a hospital, but there are emergent gameplay reasons to build your hospitals in specific ways.  Is there a way to encourage an academy-like "feel" that you're looking for without just strictly demanding that players designate large swaths of the map to being largely independent of player control? Or, for that matter, is being largely independent of player control a goal in and of itself?

Maybe it came off the wrong way, but what I really meant was just that I defend several different narratives for the way certain features in the game can come about and/or work. In fact, I think what you describe as a flexible "bare bones" system like the way hospital works are fine. The way I was describing it does have a bit of a role-playing aspect to it, and maybe the way I was presenting it came off as needlessly restrictive and overcomplicated.

I just think that alternatives are interesting. I never said that you would have to accept having independent structures in your fortress. But I think the possibility of having them would be reasonable in some situations and I think it could be fun.

In fact, screw academies. Let me give you a different scenario:
Your fortress, being famous for it's prosperity and security, attracted a powerful wizard who is interested in building his lair within your halls. So it strikes a deal with you; it asks for you to build his little home (and could even ask for you to continuously upgrade it with laboratories, etc) and in exchange it would help your citizens with certain things. Maybe it would give them magical potions every once in a while, or help you to defend your fortress if needed. Being very powerful, he has no interest in becoming one of your regular citizens and submiting himself to dwarven leadership and wants to remain independent, so whatever structures given to him become somewhat out of the complete control of the player, but that's the price you'll pay to have him there.

That's how I thought of 'independent' structures within your fortress. In no way I am saying that every feature of the game needs to work this way. In fact, I'm saying that there could be several alternative for the player to build these systems. As far as it being more difficult to program, I really wouldn't know. So far the game hasn't taken many easy paths in terms of it's development, so it's not really up to us. I think Tarn and Zach could easily decide to develop systems even more complicated than what we all in the suggestions forum innocently ramble on about. DF has some crazy features, man!

[NW_Kohaku]

Maybe it came off the wrong way, but what I really meant was just that I defend several different narratives for the way certain features in the game can come about and/or work. In fact, I think what you describe as a flexible "bare bones" system like the way hospital works are fine. The way I was describing it does have a bit of a role-playing aspect to it, and maybe the way I was presenting it came off as needlessly restrictive and overcomplicated.

I just think that alternatives are interesting. I never said that you would have to accept having independent structures in your fortress. But I think the possibility of having them would be reasonable in some situations and I think it could be fun.

In fact, screw academies. Let me give you a different scenario:
Your fortress, being famous for it's prosperity and security, attracted a powerful wizard who is interested in building his lair within your halls. So it strikes a deal with you; it asks for you to build his little home (and could even ask for you to continuously upgrade it with laboratories, etc) and in exchange it would help your citizens with certain things. Maybe it would give them magical potions every once in a while, or help you to defend your fortress if needed. Being very powerful, he has no interest in becoming one of your regular citizens and submiting himself to dwarven leadership and wants to remain independent, so whatever structures given to him become somewhat out of the complete control of the player, but that's the price you'll pay to have him there.

That's how I thought of 'independent' structures within your fortress. In no way I am saying that every feature of the game needs to work this way. In fact, I'm saying that there could be several alternative for the player to build these systems. As far as it being more difficult to program, I really wouldn't know. So far the game hasn't taken many easy paths in terms of it's development, so it's not really up to us. I think Tarn and Zach could easily decide to develop systems even more complicated than what we all in the suggestions forum innocently ramble on about. DF has some crazy features, man!

Actually, I find that DF has oftentimes much more simple mechanics than most people give it credit for.  There isn't really any math in this game besides basic addition, subtraction, and a little multiplication.  Almost everything is integers.  Things like hunger to eyelash growth are just incrementing every round.  It relies upon things like A* and perlin noise at the more complex, which generally are well-documented and well-understood mechanics.  You can basically boil the "game" part down to fulfilling the three S's, as well: Survival, Sustainability, and Stability.  (That is, eliminating military threats, replacing consumable items that satisfy needs, and preventing tantrums.)

What makes it complex are the sheer number of systems that overlap one another, and create emergent gameplay mechanics.  (Well, that and the severely obtuse interface, which make understanding what happens far more difficult, and therefore more apparently complex.)  Hence, I try to focus upon pushing ideas towards that which most can interfere with other mechanics, and create more emergent gameplay.  Complex self-contained mechanics tend not to allow for emergent behavior, while the simple reliance upon a shared physical space tends to itself tremendously foster emergent behavior.  This Errant Signal video, which is nominally on violence, covers topics of why physical space in games is the most powerful tool a game has for creating deep gameplay, especially emergently. 

In any event, I don't mean to be harsh, but I wanted to challenge what it was, precisely, you were after in this suggestion.  Abstract ideas are soft and amorphous, and can grow detailed and far more intricate with a little challenging.

If I read your response correctly, however, and what you're really after is the simple act of having a mostly-independent organization within your fortress, and the notions of training and academies are merely vehicles for that end goal, I'd again suggest you look at the way that I was suggesting social/religious/government structures behave within the Class Warfare thread. 

(Of course, my personal goal of that was specifically to shift the focus of a developed fortress into managing internal social stresses while simultaniously abstracting away player control of the more mundane micromanagement as gameplay went on, rather than independent entities for their own sake. In fact, of all things, Class Warfare started as a thread about adding ceramics/kilns to the game, and then realizing that, without changes to the economy, there would be little to no value in luxury goods like porcelain to justify the difficulty of properly implementing the higher degree of difficulty the Chinese actually had in firing kaoline.  Incremental pushes to improve an initial idea can eventually lead to strange places...)

In any event, what are these other role-playing scenarios you want players to wind up landing upon? If you begin from the goal, it's not hard to reverse-engineer the path it takes to get yourself to a starting point.