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[Evonix]

Steel is way too easy to make for what it is, you just need some rocks, iron and charcoal and you get a metal that's worth it's weight in gold and in a tactical class all of it's own, it just seems a bit cheap. How about when a dwarf does the task there's several possible results like quality levels in other tasks and based on the furnace operator skill level of the dwarf? Something like Normal=pig iron again but some material is lost, Well-crafted=wrought iron which is not weapons grade but does have a higher value than iron, Finely-crafted=brittle steel which is worse for armor but a bit better for edged weapons than iron, Superior quality=Steel but it's a bit worse than current steel and finally Exceptional/Masterful=Dwarven steel which is the same as the steel we all know and abuse.

Allowing furnace operator skill to effect things opens new possiblilities as well perhaps less skilled operators might tend to get less out of the ore and not separate the more valuable materials, for example a newb melting down some galania might just get lead, or not get anything out of gold ore.

On a different yet related note the metal density in ore vairys greatly depending on the type of ore, it seems strange to get as much gold out of a rock as you get iron out of hematite, to make the rarer metals more balanced(seriously, if you set up on a gold mine you can just buy out every caravan from the second year onwards) and make mining logistics more difficult you could get different grades of ore independent of vein size(perhaps a gradient from the outside of the vein in?)and have different ores tend towards different qualities. I think it'd also add a bit of depth and complexity which Dwarf Fortress obviously needs more of.

Also mabey make building up skills slower? Esspicaly with the later levels like the master levels. It just feels a bit weird for them to go through to legendary in a year. Perhaps also have a bit of a penalty for dwarves new to the skill like wasting materials or making xLow qualityx items.

[Bumber]

Steel is way too easy to make for what it is, you just need some rocks, iron and charcoal [...]

You need two boulders of flux stone, and two bars of iron. Flux stone isn't found on every embark, so if you don't have it you can only order 5 of each flux type (that your civ has access to) per year from your caravan. You need double the amount of iron compared to regular iron equipment. Each piece of equipment requires a few bars. Just getting a steel breastplate is 6 bars of iron and 6 flux stone, compared to 3 bars of iron for an iron breastplate.

Allowing furnace operator skill to effect things opens new possiblilities as well perhaps less skilled operators might tend to get less out of the ore and not separate the more valuable materials, for example a newb melting down some galania might just get lead, or not get anything out of gold ore.

The only ore of gold is native gold. To say that you'd not get any gold out of what is literally solid gold is ridiculous. Galena makes more sense with fractional amounts of silver being overlooked as slag.

[...] (seriously, if you set up on a gold mine you can just buy out every caravan from the second year onwards) [...]

That's kind of the big thing about striking gold, isn't it? Economy is a bit broken in that you can do it with prepared meals and glass trap components, too.

[Evonix]

Steel is way too easy to make for what it is, you just need some rocks, iron and charcoal [...]

You need two boulders of flux stone, and two bars of iron. Flux stone isn't found on every embark, so if you don't have it you can only order 5 of each flux type (that your civ has access to) per year from your caravan. You need double the amount of iron compared to regular iron equipment. Each piece of equipment requires a few bars. Just getting a steel breastplate is 6 bars of iron and 6 flux stone, compared to 3 bars of iron for an iron breastplate.

I knew that and I don't think that makes it even near balanced, flux stone's common and you can see if you're gonna get it when you embark.

You do have a point with the other two though.

[thompson]

A metallurgy overhaul is definitely something I'd like to see. Personally, I'd like to see ductility and malleability used to determine how difficult a metal is to work with. These values can be estimated from current material properties. Easy materials like brass would be faster to make stuff with and have a higher chance of higher quality items. Difficult materials like iron and steel would require additional processing steps (in a similar manner to what you describe) before they can be used.

I'd probably make the additional steps done by the metal worker rather than the smelter, as that is how it would have been historically. Also, there should be a minimum metal quality required to make certain items (represented by a tag in the raws).

For the player you would just issue a "forge steel breastplate" command. The dwarf then works the metal, but if the "tempered steel" quality is too low the job fails and you get x units of scrap steel, which can be remelted for no loss beyond time and fuel. If the quality is sufficient, the job automatically proceeds to the next step.

The skill used for the intermediate step should be the highest metalworking skill of the dwarf, irrespective of the item being worked on.

This way, non-weapon metals will differ in more than just value:

- Soft metals are easy to work, so are used in jewellery and crafts that require high-quality heat treating
- Hard metals are used in doors and other furniture that requires lower quality heat treatment
- Hard weapon-grade metals are difficult to work with for novices, but are superb once you have a sufficiently skilled work force.

[Miles_Umbrae]

How about making the ability to melt/forge/craft different types of metals/alloys at all dependent on the skill-level of the dwarf; copper and bronze as low-tier metals all dwarves are able to smelt/forge/craft, then as they become more skilled they can start to understand how to do iron, then steel, and so on.

[GoblinCookie]

Why aren't all metals quality dependent?

[Bumber]

Why aren't all metals quality dependent?

What's high quality lead like?

[Ninjabread]

What's high quality lead like?

Pure lead is silvery with a slight hint of blue, high quality lead would be like that on the inside where it hasn't oxidised