Dwarf Fortress > DF Suggestions

Research and Skill Restrictions?

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AceSV:
So I've been playing some DF-inspired games lately, (RimWorld, Game of Dwarves and Oxygen Not Included), and they all have this idea of "research" that unlocks new abilities for a settlement.  This is also very common among 4X games, and I'm guessing Toady has heard of it at some point, but I don't know what he has said about it yet. 

For those who haven't heard about it, you might have a research branch called Metallurgy, that starts with Metal Smelting, then Iron Smelting then Steel Making.  Until you research Iron Smelting, your dwarves cannot smelt iron ores, and until you research Steel Making, you can't make steel. 

I do have one problem with the standard formula for research though, in that the other games have someone stand at a bench all day and magically come up with new technologies.  I don't think this would fit for dwarf fortress, but there are plenty of DF things that could be used to achieve research.  Libraries could contribute to research.  A dwarven scholar could pour over imported scientific texts long into the night and come up with new information for your fortress' smiths and craftdwarves to use.  Traveling scholars could increase your research level when they visit, maybe you could even kidnap researchers to force them to invent things for you.  Dwarves in strange moods might be able to invent new technologies, like a dwarf in a strange mood produces a long sword, and then your whole fortress can produce long swords.  I could also see you importing technology from traders.  Elves might share their technology for grown wood, or if you import enough halberds from humans, you'll finally be able to craft one yourself. 

Another thing they do is skill restrictions, where certain tasks require certain skill levels to attempt.  For example, smelting iron ores might require at least level 5 of Furnace Operating, while Steel Making requires at least level 10.  I know this isn't "realistic" for all things, but I've always been particularly bothered that any dwarf off the street can essentially perform brain surgery if asked, so something like that for the medical field would be appreciated.  I could see weapon makers needing to start with clubs, then working up to short swords, then long swords, etc.  You could also have certain tasks subtract from total skill.  So for example, if you can build a club at level 0, a short sword at level 5 and a long sword at level 10, a level 12 weapon maker would build clubs at 12 quality, short swords at 7 quality and long swords at 2 quality. 

This could also force dwarves to have some information about a task before they attempt it at all.  For example, maybe a furnace operator of level 0 would be unable to do any tasks, and they need to learn it from another dwarf first.  Or FUN things could happen when unskilled dwarves attempt a task, like a low level smith might accidentally burn himself, or a herbalist might bring back poison mushrooms.  I can think of a few ways for an untrained dwarf to gain knowledge.  First, a dwarf might just pick up information about a task by being near it, so for example, if your kitchen and still are right next to each other, your cook might learn a little bit of brewing and your brewer might learn a little bit of cooking, or a child who used to play near the forges might know a little bit about smithing when he becomes an adult.  Educational toys might give knowledge to children (or adults), like a toy axe teaches combat skills or a toy forge teaches smithing.  Skilled dwarves could give lectures in Libraries that raise the skill levels of anyone in attendance (might work like the training drills for squadrons).  You might be able to write or import training manuals that give dwarves skills in a particular ability.  I'm thinking that any dwarf set to perform a particular labor will attend lectures or seek out manuals about that particular labor and there might be some sort of "hunger for knowledge" that dwarves need to satisfy which drives their desire to attend.  Dwarves might also be assigned as apprentices for a particular dwarf.  I'm thinking this would work kinda like assigning guard animals, each dwarf has an apprentice slot that can be filled from a list of available dwarves. 

Miles_Umbrae:
How about reverse-engineering weapons armour and furniture.
Or how about trial-and-error where a dorf has an idea and it can either result in discovering how to construct something or you get a very low-value piece of art to display in your nobles bedroom...

pink_belt_dan_52:
I was about to make a new thread when I came across the above mention of reverse-engineering, so it seemed sensible to post here instead.

At the moment, a fortress is only able to produce the seven 'native' weapons, and not any of the foreign ones. This makes sense from a perspective of giving different civs flavour (which might be more pronounced in the future when which weapons are native to a given civ is presumably going to be less constant) so I don't think it would make sense to remove the distinction. However, we have mercenaries of different races, who often turn out to be skilled in a weapon that we can't produce for them.
Given that we can make different sizes of armour and clothing to fit different species, it seems odd to not be able to arm them, and I think being able to reverse engineer the design from the weapons they bring with them balances the two features: you still get the flavour of mostly having (say) hammerdwarves, but if a pikeman turns up you can make much better use of him.

AceSV:
To wit, the development of the Dwarf Fortress simulation is based on constructing a coherent narrative.  So the question is not whether reverse-engineering would be useful to the human playing the computer, but whether it makes sense for the dwarves to want or be able to do reverse-engineering. 

So the question then is if I were a weaponsmith in a dwarven fortress somewhere, and I've spent my life making hammers, and some human mercenary comes along with a flail, and says, "hey, could you make me a steel flail?" what would my response be?  I feel my responses could be very different.  "A what?  Never heard of it, try this hammer instead." or  "A hammer on a chain you say?  I guess I could give it a try." or "Oh, one of those weapons that the humans use?  I guess I could give it a try."  or  "A flail? A flail!?  How dare ye ask meh for a soddin' humy weapon!  Ah'm a dwarf!  Ah make dwarfen weapons!  If yeh plan to stay in this fortress, yeh'll use a hammer and yeh'll be soddin' proud to!"  But on the other hand, a dwarf wouldn't get this request from the human, he would get it from the player, and I like to think that all good little dwarves obey the voice of Armok when they hear it, so that would change the narrative dynamic. 

Another idea (which I thought I mentioned but I don't see it here, maybe it was in another thread) is that dwarves might have a specific skill bonus for a particular task.  So for example, a weaponsmith who makes hammers every day could have a special bonus to making hammers compared to other weapons.  There could also be a bonus for using specific materials, for example, a dwarf who has only ever made copper hammers wouldn't be as good at making a steel hammer the first time they get their hands on steel.  Conversely, that dwarf that knows his copper would have an advantage to making copper crafts, even if he's not a good metal crafter.  So in that kind of system, a dwarf that tries to make a flail for the first time would basically have a penalty because he's never tried to make a flail before.  I could also envision some kind of penalty for non-native weapons or other items, perhaps one that could be overcome by having these foreign items in your fortress or if the dwarf in question sees or owns them, or if there's some kind of "study" action taken upon the foreign item.  If there's also the idea of skill restrictions, it might be that the foreign item penalty makes the dwarf's effective weaponsmith level too low to even try making the weapon at first, until the research or reverse-engineering has been done to it. 

pink_belt_dan_52:
I'm just sort of thinking out loud here, but it seems like something that could be neatly associated with the values of either the civilization or the dwarf (or some combination of the two): if they value tradition it obviously makes sense for them to stick to their own weapons, whereas if they value military skill, they might prefer to have weapons better suited to their needs. In fact, if they are motivated by something along the lines of efficiency or pragmatism, learning about foreign production methods more generally might make sense to them; perhaps that could lead to producing goods that the humans or whoever think of as more valuable?
Something like a respect for crafting might go either way, maybe they enjoy the challenge of creating something new, or maybe they dream of forging the perfect axe and they flat out refuse to waste their time on anything else (as an extreme example obviously!).

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