Sorry if it's been suggested before, a search didn't get anything QUITE like this...
The main idea of this suggestion is that items would have parts which could be engraved (and exist for no other purpose). This would be as an alternative to 'on the item is...', instead it would be 'on the _____ is...'. Any item (cabinet, weapon, armor) would have any number of 'parts' that work like prefstring tags. In example:
If a sword was given [PART:HILT][PART:BLADE][PART:SHEATH]
Then the engravings might look like:
"On the blade is an engraving of a fire imp in bauxite. On the hilt is an engraving of an elf in microcline. The elf is melting. On sheath is an engraving of a pump in Tigereye."
And so on and so forth, including things that aren't in the raws (cabinets have drawers, sides, tops and backs, so forth).
A steel weapon or armor engraved with any other metal (choosable not random) or gems would be fine, how ever I am not so sure about the whole stone or wood adding thing.
To add a little to your idea I would like to be able to choose my carving/engravings before or after construction of the item.
Also a new (o)rder command that enables you to allow the use of additional metal for the carving/engraving or not.
Allowing to add causes : no damage loss for weapons or increased damage taken for armor due to extra used material, 0.1-0.5 bar/stone/block or 1 gem per item.
Not allowing to add causes : slight reduction of damage of weapons and slight reduction of damage absorbed by armor due to the carvings.
Also I would like to see added to the (z) screen a screen were we are allowed to choose which materials (stone?, metal, gems, wood?) are to be used for the engraving of equipment similar to the way we are allowed to select usable stones.
I however don’t want the carvings on the items to be random. I want to choose carvings for weapons and armor, so that I could give all those in for example the Royal Guard similar armor and weapons as a sign of their job. Maybe even a happy thought for the members because they all wear the same nicely engraved/carved armor and weapons.
The carvings to choose from should in my opinion be randomly chosen by the game due to specific world events or due to diversity of animals and mega-beasts either alive or extinct as long as the players fortress or home civilization had dealings with them in the present or past.
Just had an idea, if 'parts' are implemented, mod the blade to be [HOMOTHERM:1000000000000] and the handle to be safe, so you can hold it and burn things with it.
You do understand that you also burn to a crisp when the burning creature touches or comes to close to you and considering that a burning dwarf likes to run through the entire fortress before finally dying a lot more casualties will probably be reported. Isn’t the wealth increase enough?
