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[Zantan]

Some of the upcoming (hopefully in two or so years) features that excite me most are the ones which involve interactions with the outside world via the caravan arc, such as starting outposts to gather resources and more realistic trading.  Outposts are wonderful because they would allow for more than one fortress in the same world, but the significance of both of these features depends on the relevance of the outside world.  In the current version, a fortress has no need for any resources or assistance from the outside world.  Ores are plentiful, agriculture and animal husbandry is ridiculously easy.  Right now the outside world provides breeding pairs of animals and basic supplies to fledgling fortresses, but mature fortresses only need sand (sometimes), wood (sometimes), and new dwarves to replace those lost to Fun.

In order for the outside world to be relevant, fortresses must have more pressing needs that can be met through interactions with the outside world.  Here are some thoughts:

• Resources should be vary greatly between sites, and those variations should be apparent when choosing sites.  Temperature, rainfall, and soil quality should dictate the crops available, and no site should have every metal
• Agriculture, especially underground agriculture should be harder, to make importing food more appealing.  Underground farms should require constant upkeep to maintain soil quality, animals should require food, and dwarves should appreciate varied diets
• Players should be given new reasons to embark on mountains.  This would make agriculture is more difficult, and according to the entity definitions, that is where dwarf fortresses belong.
• Different civilizations should have cultural strengths, and acting on these strengths should be an important part of the game.  Maybe your civ's dwarves are the best miners, but another dwarf civ has great metalsmiths, and a human civ has good glass makers.  Even if you train legendary craftsdwarves, they will not be as good as the ones from the other civs unless you send your dwarves to their civs to train, or bribe/kidnap the enemy crafters to come to your fort.  Maybe a requirement for becoming a mountainhome is either adding a specialty to your civ, or making other civs flock to your fortress for training or superior goods.
• Civs should guard their special resources carefully.  A civ with access to a rare plant or specialty should be very reluctant to allow access to seeds/experts, and obtaining them should require careful diplomacy or cause massive wars.

What role does everyone else think other civs should play in future versions?

[Soadreqm]

Tolkien dwarves never bothered with farming, and imported all their food. If farming was more of a hassle, trading would be a lot more appealing. Of course, if it's nerfed too much, the early game becomes even harder. Which is kind of the opposite of what would be ideal.

Why should it be rare to have both copper and iron? And do you mean those two specifically, or are you suggesting just making the mineral placement less generous? Right now, the game tosses you so many gold veins that paving roads with the stuff is pretty easy. This can be a bit silly at times, but on the other hand, if valuable minerals were found at realistic intervals (that is, not found), the whole digging aspect of the game might become really boring. What's the point of mining if there's nothing underground? Trying to balance it so that both iron and copper are so rare that you can't find them in a reasonably sized site would mean that really tiny forts, which are quite popular because of the higher framerate, would have basically no metals. And what if you're stuck with, say, nothing but nickel? I guess you could still make bars cheap and numerous enough that maintaining a healthy industry by trading vendor trash for iron is possible. The other option, just directly stopping the game from generating both iron and copper on embark, would be kind of hackish and really run against the spirit of the game. Why even have geology simulation if you're just going to place the minerals by hand?

I like the sound of giving civs jealously guarded secret technologies, if only for the adventure mode potential.

Maybe some kind of more sophisticated knowledge simulation? Make blind practice less efficient for getting skill, and rather emphasize studying, either from books and such or under other people. Then it becomes more likely that you will be able to import things that are better quality than what you make yourself. Of course, imported goods don't really have any quality modifiers yet, and quality really only matters for armour and weapons. And the fey moods would gloriously break the balance.

[ItchyBeard]

In order for the outside world to be relevant, fortresses must have more pressing needs that can be met through interactions with the outside world.

I disagree - this doesn't make a lot of sense. Why would cavern dwelling creatures who have developed a civilisation based purely on living underground have a need for interacting with the outside world? The underground contains food, plants, trees, water, metals, stones... it is a very rich environment easily equal to that of the surface world. It is not a collection of barren empty caves. There are forests down there. It sounds like you're trying to come up with artificial reasons for outside interaction.

• Resources should be vary greatly between sites, and those variations should be apparent when choosing sites.  Temperature, rainfall, and soil quality should dictate the crops available, and it should be rare for a site to have both copper and iron

Possibly. It would be nice to be able to set up an outpost which digs up various ores. More boring maps would be well... more boring though.

• Agriculture, especially underground agriculture should be harder, to make importing food more appealing.  Underground farms should require constant upkeep to maintain soil quality, animals should require food, and dwarves should appreciate varied diets

Where do you think dwarves dispose of all their waste? In a closed system, they're not going to have a lot of problems farming. Try putting a sandwich in the fridge for a few months and see what grows on it in that cold, barren cave . Now imagine what's going to grow in a hot, damp, muddy cave with frequent animal activity.

Being able to fertalize with blood & bone would make a great deal of sense however - but it shouldn't need to be a regular thing. Making food production a pain in the behind doesn't sound like a fun situation. Dwarves already appreciate varied diets.

• Players should be given new reasons to embark on mountains.  This would make agriculture is more difficult, and according to the entity definitions, that is where dwarf fortresses belong.

The only good reasons I can think of for this would be political reasons. Humans/elves would not like dwarves building forts in their farmlands and forests, and would kill them if they set up camp there (because they're competing for resources in terrain where the humans/elves have a physiological advantage). The reason dwarves build their forts up in the mountains is so the lowland creatures don't get annoyed and kill them. Likewise, humans trying to set up camp in the caverns are going to be at a natural disadvantage when the dwarves get annoyed. More human/elf diplomatic problems for lowland forts would be the solution here, not agricultural hobbling.

• Different civilizations should have cultural strengths, and acting on these strengths should be an important part of the game.  Maybe your civ's dwarves are the best miners, but another dwarf civ has great metalsmiths, and a human civ has good glass makers.  Even if you train legendary craftsdwarves, they will not be as good as the ones from the other civs unless you send your dwarves to their civs to train, or bribe/kidnap the enemy crafters to come to your fort.  Maybe a requirement for becoming a mountainhome is either adding a specialty to your civ, or making other civs flock to your fortress for training or superior goods.

I disagree. A legendary dwarf is a legendary dwarf. Perhaps you could bias what a civ is good at (and thus get more migrants with a particular skill set rather than the randomness you get currently), but I'm against the artificial hobbling you suggest. Your suggestion is akin to saying that an Indian engineer can never be as good as one from Germany. You're also implying that dwarves can't get better without teaching, which is silly. Dwarven wares are more akin to art than engineering. You can't really teach art past a certain point.

• Civs should guard their special resources carefully.  A civ with access to a rare plant or specialty should be very reluctant to allow access to seeds/experts, and obtaining them should require careful diplomacy or cause massive wars.

Yep, that makes some sense. But again, there shouldn't be a lot of required special resources.

What role does everyone else think other civs should play in future versions?

Axe dwarf training.

I want less dependencies on other civs. More dependencies leads to peace, which is boring. You're not going to annoy the elves if the elves have the only cure for the all-my-limbs-rotted-off-and-it-hurts disease.

I'd much rather any interactions with other civs focused on the diplomatic side of things rather than forcing interactions based on resource limitations. e.g.
"You ordered 100 bronze axes off us and now won't pay. We're going to siege you and take what you owe."
"We demand tribute of 100 golden goblets for setting up a fort in our lands!"
"The goblins are laying waste to our towns. The dwarves have helped us in the past - will you send help now?"
"We don't know anything about kobold assassins outfitted in steel armor... what are you talking about?"
etc, etc.

[Igfig]

• Players should be given new reasons to embark on mountains.  This would make agriculture is more difficult, and according to the entity definitions, that is where dwarf fortresses belong.

The only good reasons I can think of for this would be political reasons. Humans/elves would not like dwarves building forts in their farmlands and forests, and would kill them if they set up camp there (because they're competing for resources in terrain where the humans/elves have a physiological advantage). The reason dwarves build their forts up in the mountains is so the lowland creatures don't get annoyed and kill them. Likewise, humans trying to set up camp in the caverns are going to be at a natural disadvantage when the dwarves get annoyed. More human/elf diplomatic problems for lowland forts would be the solution here, not agricultural hobbling.

One thing that makes mountains different from other biomes is that it's often much easier to get at the deeper metamorphic and igneous stone layers.  That's no great advantage right now, since sedimentary layers are currently the richest ones, but if things were changed so that ores got more valuable the deeper you went, mountains would be much more attractive.

• Different civilizations should have cultural strengths, and acting on these strengths should be an important part of the game.  Maybe your civ's dwarves are the best miners, but another dwarf civ has great metalsmiths, and a human civ has good glass makers.  Even if you train legendary craftsdwarves, they will not be as good as the ones from the other civs unless you send your dwarves to their civs to train, or bribe/kidnap the enemy crafters to come to your fort.  Maybe a requirement for becoming a mountainhome is either adding a specialty to your civ, or making other civs flock to your fortress for training or superior goods.

I disagree. A legendary dwarf is a legendary dwarf. Perhaps you could bias what a civ is good at (and thus get more migrants with a particular skill set rather than the randomness you get currently), but I'm against the artificial hobbling you suggest. Your suggestion is akin to saying that an Indian engineer can never be as good as one from Germany. You're also implying that dwarves can't get better without teaching, which is silly. Dwarven wares are more akin to art than engineering. You can't really teach art past a certain point.

What if a civ's mastery of a craft were represented not by a higher cap, but by a faster rate of skill gain?  And perhaps immigrants from that civ would be more likely to have a few ranks of that skill.  That way, a civ well-known for, say, its potash makers would have more legendary potash makers, more potash makers overall, and their potash makers would be more skilled than a potash maker from another civ who put in the same number of hours.  More potash makers would also mean more artifact potash (well, it would if there were such a thing).

• Civs should guard their special resources carefully.  A civ with access to a rare plant or specialty should be very reluctant to allow access to seeds/experts, and obtaining them should require careful diplomacy or cause massive wars.

Yep, that makes some sense. But again, there shouldn't be a lot of required special resources.

Very true, but what about optional ones?  Again, consider potash.  You don't need to fertilize your crops, but it's nice to be able to.  Or as Zantan said, rare plants and animals would be cool.  I love dyes, and if I couldn't make them myself I would totally import the ones I needed.  Ditto stuff like gnomeblight.

I guess what I'm talking about is luxury items.  Stuff you want, but don't need.

[Kogan Loloklam]

"We don't know anything about kobold assassins outfitted in steel armor... what are you talking about?"
etc, etc.

"What, a dwarf-stamp of quality? It must have been stolen. Tailor-made to fit them you say? Oh, it must have been one of our ornamental suits for our statues. You aren't saying KOBOLDS hurt you, are you? Surely you aren't that weak... *thumbs his hammer thoughtfully...*

Seriously though, I don't think that requiring interaction is the way to go. People already WANT interaction with the outside world. With caravan arcs and other things, the desire will only increase because it is more useful. Some places already don't have all the resources someone wants. The problem is, you cannot import them currently. Trade agreements to import specific items handles that problem (none of this "I want lots of rock crafts!). If trade worked like mandates (I want 7 stone goblets next season, and I'll offer you 2100¤ for it) then you'd have a much better system. Maybe some random items available for trade, and maybe with dwarves having the ability to buy the random items themselves, but definitely a more robust system for the primary trade.

Everything else is diplomacy.


I would, however, like to see farming take up more SPACE (but the time aspect is fine)
A area smaller than a room allocated to a human is adequate for feeding 20 dwarves with decent farmers. No backyard garden I know can support 20 people, no matter how good the gardener.

[Soadreqm]

I would, however, like to see farming take up more SPACE (but the time aspect is fine)
A area smaller than a room allocated to a human is adequate for feeding 20 dwarves with decent farmers. No backyard garden I know can support 20 people, no matter how good the gardener.

I would also suggest needing some kind of fertilizing, if only for the flavor. Either re-muddying farms, as I hear it was in the 2D version, using actual fertilizer, or maybe crop rotation. Oh, and some kind of water source. Being able to farm in a desert is kind of silly. Both of these would be fairly simple to provide, even in a newborn fort, especially if we also got some interface improvements.

[Soulbourne]

Don't forget, alongside various arcs, the colony arc expands you into a county.  I imagine with that, you may be able to work with your colonies to nab resources from other place.  With the army arc, these extra towns will also provide troops for armies that invade abroad.

Having trade encouraged would be nice, yes.  Having specialties would be nice too, but along the terms of luxury goods.  Have some civs/places able to make certain luxury goods that make your people happy to own.  Not necessary to run a fort, but items that can be sold in shops for good moods.  Have it where you can arrange for import agreements if you so wish of X material/item, where you pay so much for it and get regular shipments for your own projects, which can't be done with local supplies.  Having it able to get such supplies locally if you work at it should be, but for people who want to choose a fort where they can survive, but for extreme prosper need to work with the outside is nice.

So many fun things possible.

[Randomone]

On the resource note, what one could do is instead of limiting the metals, you could limit the fuel. What I mean in that you could still have coal and lignite, but it will take more fuel to smelt stuff. And to make charcoal, you could only use surface trees, instead of mushrooms. Your solution to the fuel problem would be to trade humans for fuel and wood.

To encourage other trade interaction, we should also make dwarfs need stuff like toys, instruments, clothes, and other junk which can be traded for.
Also other civs should be able to make higher quality stuff, mostly in non-metal stuff.

[Boingboingsplat]

On farming, I think the soil and climate should be a major issue. You shouldn't be able to plop a farm on sand in the middle of a desert and grow strawberries on it. But, this poses the problem of farming on stone. I mean, I don't think that dumping water on stone would ever produce enough mud (if any mud) to grow anything besides, well, plump helmets. One solution to this would maybe to allow importing soil and being able to move soil, but artificially placed soil should have to be fertilized periodically to be as productive as natural soil. I think that this is a pretty fair trade off.

More plants would be nice too, even if only for cultural flavor, and trade fun. For example, one dwarven civ has rare Cave Chili Peppers that go for a fortune if you gave them to humans, but if you traded with your local dwarven caravan they wouldn't care since they have access to them too. This also poses the idea of certain plants and such being available solely on geography instead of geology. This could be limited by oceans (If boats are ever implemented) or mountain ranges (Which could potentially be breached by goblin tunnels I suppose, but goblins aren't the trading types. Do Dwarves make underground roads? They should.) Plants should only be initially available in certain parts of the world, but if obtained they would be able to be grown in areas of similar climates. (See: Europeans bringing plants from the new world back to Europe to grow them, and vice versa.)

[Funk]

on farming differing crops for diffent climates,i.e. Lichens can grow on bare rock,but take a long time to grow so mountains and tundra, are a good places to grow them.

may be soils can have there pH and Nutrient levels.

[Hyndis]

Dwarves are very bad at producing a wide range of food.

There are only 4 edible crops dwarves normally grow: Plump helmets, cave wheat, sweet pods, and quay bushes.

While yes you can get by with only ever growing plump helmets, and you can brew up pig tails to add booze into the mix to get quite a range of ingredients, its still a limited menu.

Dwarves should import lavish and exotic meats for huge feasts.

There should be much more negative thoughts from eating the same meal or drinking the same booze. You only get 5 ingredients to work with. Yes you can mill/process those ingredients into several more, and the game treats them differently, but you only get 5 plants to work with.

Plump helmets
Plump helmet wine
Quay bush leaves
Dwarven ale (pig tails)
Dwarven beer (cave wheat)
Cave wheat flour
Dwarven rum (sweet pod)
Sweet pod sugar
Sweet pod syrup

So you turn 5 plants into 9 different ingredients, and dwarves treat each ingredient as a different food source, which means with just these crops you can forever prevent unhappy thoughts from this.

Its just not dwarven!

Dwarves should demand exotic brews and large quantities of meat. Vegetarian dwarves just don't make sense!




Basically, dwarves export metal objects encrusted with gems while dwarves import food. Lots of food.

[Ralith]

But first it has to be made reasonable to live off of imported food.

[Exiledhero99]

No backyard garden I know can support 20 people, no matter how good the gardener.

I once grew a patch of tomatoes in which each plant yielded AT LEAST 60 tomatoes, some well over 100. The area was about that of a hallway closet. Draw your on conclusion from this.

[Boingboingsplat]

No backyard garden I know can support 20 people, no matter how good the gardener.

I once grew a patch of tomatoes in which each plant yielded AT LEAST 60 tomatoes, some well over 100. The area was about that of a hallway closet. Draw your on conclusion from this.

The difference in Dwarf Fortress is that one tomato would fill a dwarf up for a while. (See: Dwarves are no longer hungry after eating one wild strawberry.) In real life it takes more than one tomato to make a meal.

[Kogan Loloklam]

No backyard garden I know can support 20 people, no matter how good the gardener.

I once grew a patch of tomatoes in which each plant yielded AT LEAST 60 tomatoes, some well over 100. The area was about that of a hallway closet. Draw your on conclusion from this.

My conclusion, you can feed 1 person for about 40-50 of the 365 days in a year with a space about 4' square. That means, picturing perfect conditions, you could feed ONE person with a large backyard garden. Now we only need to cram 19 more into that space and we'll be set!

Dwarves are very bad at producing a wide range of food.

There are only 4 edible crops dwarves normally grow: Plump helmets, cave wheat, sweet pods, and quay bushes.

While yes you can get by with only ever growing plump helmets, and you can brew up pig tails to add booze into the mix to get quite a range of ingredients, its still a limited menu.

Dwarves should import lavish and exotic meats for huge feasts.

There should be much more negative thoughts from eating the same meal or drinking the same booze. You only get 5 ingredients to work with. Yes you can mill/process those ingredients into several more, and the game treats them differently, but you only get 5 plants to work with.

Plump helmets
Plump helmet wine
Quay bush leaves
Dwarven ale (pig tails)
Dwarven beer (cave wheat)
Cave wheat flour
Dwarven rum (sweet pod)
Sweet pod sugar
Sweet pod syrup

So you turn 5 plants into 9 different ingredients, and dwarves treat each ingredient as a different food source, which means with just these crops you can forever prevent unhappy thoughts from this.

Its just not dwarven!

Dwarves should demand exotic brews and large quantities of meat. Vegetarian dwarves just don't make sense!




Basically, dwarves export metal objects encrusted with gems while dwarves import food. Lots of food.

You neglect an important source of Dwarven diet... Cats.

Dwarves lovingly plant the cat-seeds in cages. The Cat-seeds grow fractically in the cage-matrix, where they are extracted by careful dwarven harvesters and taken to the shell-cracking plant. Then via a complex process, the furry shell is opened and the delicious fruit inside made available for the delight of the dwarves. This also has the benefit of allowing catproduct materials to be used to remove such threats as goblins, as well as be traded to humans and other dwarves for valuable metals.

Besides, plump helmets are the primary source of grown food because they grow all year long. It is a good, reliable source of food which is easily processed.

Tokin's dwarves may have required tons of food imported at the cost of metals, but Salvatore's dwarves never did.

I would like to see more "food" bushes for underground food though. I imagine we'll see more of that when farming gets more attention in the future. Probably around the time that Adventurers can gather plants.

Still, I think artificially forcing people to require imports is stupid beyond all reason. I think that the site and player whim should make import needs, and ensure players have the ability to import what they want.
Also, before we go any further, we need improvements in how it works. If it were up to me, I'd import all my clothing and leather goods rather than make it. This is because I don't like dealing with those industries and associated supporting industries. If these things could be imported to the degree that makes them functional, I'd have cause to import them. Taking away that choice arbitrarily does no good.
(Actually, I'd import quite a few things if I could count on it being stable, and focus on just a few different crafts. As it is, I have to setup EVERY industry or my fortress has some critical problem. Importing only reduces strain on an individual industry right now, and can't reliably be counted on to solve any major need.)