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Author Topic: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?  (Read 6789 times)

jcrites

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A dwarf just went into a mood.  He's asking for:

"I must have rock!"
"I must have body parts!"
"I must have rock bars!" - knowing this to be a typo, I've created plenty of metal bars.  My smelter has plenty of copper bars.  There are tons of stones around.  I just slaughtered two animals in my butcher's shop.  I furthermore checked my stockpiles menu, which shows me that I have 12 bodyparts.

Still the dwarf sits in his mood.  Why doesn't he get the items?  Is this a bug?
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alexwazer

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #1 on: May 05, 2010, 09:31:50 pm »

Dwarves will gather material in a specific order, so knowing what he got so far would help to know what is the issue.

The most troublesome requirements in 0.31, as far as moods are concerned, are usually shells (which are included in "body parts"). You can try catching turtle/cave lobsters and cleaning them. You might be out of luck in your embark area doesn't support fishes; a -very well- known bug.
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jcrites

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #2 on: May 05, 2010, 09:40:01 pm »

Inside the workshop there is diorite, and a diorite block.  But I don't think this dwarf brought it there -- he's been camping out there since he claimed it.

How can I figure out what he needs?
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alexwazer

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #3 on: May 05, 2010, 10:01:38 pm »

Check if either the stone or block are tasked (TSK) or forbid everything already in the workshop and see if he goes grab anything else. If he does not that means he cannot find/path to the first items he wants, which is probably the stone.

Check his preferences and try to have whatever he prefers available. Forbidding anything he cannot path to might help, although I have yet to see a dwarf claim something he cannot reach unless the path was "broken" after he claimed said item (did you block anything since he got in a mood?).

Burrows can also cause an issue, but I don't think they are in cause here since the "issue" is usually the opposite. Then, there's the possibility of some messed up pathing. Try building a wall next to the workshop to see what material is available. If pathing is messed up, try saving/reloading and/or replacing ramps by stairs.
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rodya_mirov

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #4 on: May 06, 2010, 12:04:21 am »

What was hinted at but perhaps has not been precisely stated is that the dwarf will say all the item types he needs, but only has one in mind at one time.  Which is to say, you can have a billion rocks and rock bars, but if he can't find body parts (which, in practical terms, means turtle shells), then he won't pick up the others, either.
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Psieye

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #5 on: May 06, 2010, 01:07:06 am »

Wait, rock bars doesn't mean he wants metal bars. He wants one of Soap, Ash or Coke I think.
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Osmosis Jones

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #6 on: May 06, 2010, 01:14:25 am »

Rock bars can mean metal bars. If that's the case, check his preferences; if he likes a metal, there is a very good chance that is what he is holding out for. It shat me to tears when my weaponsmith who likes swords turned out to also like electrum :(
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jcrites

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #7 on: May 06, 2010, 02:31:56 am »

It's happening again with another dwarf.  Sketching pictures of:

  • stacked cloth
  • skeletons
  • a quarry

I just made some plant cloth from my loom, and I just butchered an animal for skeletons.  Stone is everywhere.  Why isn't the guy collecting the ingredients?

This sure feels like a bug to me, or poor game design -- if the dwarf needs some specific kind of stone (for example), that I don't have, then the game should indicate that.  From what the dwarf says, I would expect his mood to be satisfied by the ingredients I have.  If the game requires some specific kind of cloth, or some specific kind of stone, or the skeleton of a certain animal -- well, I think that's poor game design.  The player needs to do something specific to succeed, but the game doesn't say what.

The mood mechanic is fun as long as I know what the items are, even if I can't obtain them.  It's not at all fun to have no clue what the dwarf needs.

At this point, with the second apparently broken mood, I guess I'll just wall them all in and wait for them to die.  I also don't believe it's reasonable to expect game players to rely on wikis or external sources of information; I shouldn't need to know that "skeletons" actually means turtle shells, for example.  If this is by design, then I argue the design is unclear; I'm hoping this is a defect.

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jcrites

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #8 on: May 06, 2010, 02:47:16 am »

I also traded for some cloth from merchants, in case the dwarf doesn't like the cloth from my loom.  No luck.  Sigh.
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EnragedFilia

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #9 on: May 06, 2010, 03:22:06 am »

If he's not using the plant cloth, that means he wants silk cloth. Even though the message just says cloth, it wants one or the other.
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JmzLost

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #10 on: May 06, 2010, 03:27:48 am »

I also had a problem with a moody dorf wanting 'skeletons'.  I butchered a raccoon, he grabbed the bones, then just sat there until I butchered another raccoon.  The older version had the message display longer if the dorf wanted more than one of an item, the new version seems to display the message for the same amount of time whether he wants 1 or 10.

JMZ
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BubbaBrown

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #11 on: May 06, 2010, 04:08:46 am »

This has been one of the bigger thorns in my side.  It would be nice to have more specific requests.  I mean they are the only ones that know what they want in the end, so tell me, dammit.  Also, not having to acquire items in a specific order and not requesting things they already have would be a nice addition.  There's no need to keep on harping about wanting something... they already have.

Also, if you can't, reasonably, acquire something in the environment... whatever the hell possesses these dwarves shouldn't be expecting to find it.  Whatever function that is using rand() * int on an array to index choices needs to be reworked to something decent.  I'm getting tired of having to either to resign to loosing a dwarf or reloading when they start asking for stuff I can't feasibly produce or remotely acquire.
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JanusTwoface

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Re: Dwarf taken by mood not using the items he wants, are available?
« Reply #12 on: May 06, 2010, 09:02:24 pm »

You don't have burrows set up, do you? If the claimed workshop is not in the dwarf's burrow he will keep collecting resources rather than moving on (a la Planepacked).
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