Another thread regarding the quality of items you get from your crafters got me thinking, and I came up with this idea.
Instead of the item quality being based solely on a random distribution, give high-level crafters an "inspiration" score for certain types of items that affects the quality of the resulting items.
The general idea is that even a godlike sculptor, if forced to sit in a room and make statues for two months, will be turning out "Crafting Room Lamp In Marble," and "Brick from Crafting Room Wall XLII" after a while (and probably get a mood debuff, too).
On the other hand, if you let them participate in battles, view other legendary items, or witness the Epic Thrumbo Thwapping of 5506, they're far more likely to turn out something good themselves.
Essentially, each item would have a related inspiration score. When the score is around 0, they'd produce mostly normal-superior, with small chances of getting something better. At higher levels, you're almost guaranteed to get masterwork or legendary. Once it goes below zero, they'd get a "Not another $ITEM!" negative mood, and start turning out crap. Going too low could result in a mutiny: you tell him to make another chair, but end up with a statue instead, because that's what he really wants to make. (having a mental break with one of these thoughts active would give a good chance of them running off to smash up the nearest example of whatever it is they're sick of making, which might be really bad if, for example, their target is a statue in your common room, and they have a minigun equipped)
If they see a good bed, their inspiration for all furniture would go up a bit, and beds specifically a bit more. Every time they made a bed, all furniture would go down a bit, and beds down a lot.
Hopefully, the end result would be that if you have your high-level crafters make things when you need them, you're very likely to get something good, instead of having to grind out twenty of them, but trying to industrialize them would result in mediocrity.
Instead of the item quality being based solely on a random distribution, give high-level crafters an "inspiration" score for certain types of items that affects the quality of the resulting items.
The general idea is that even a godlike sculptor, if forced to sit in a room and make statues for two months, will be turning out "Crafting Room Lamp In Marble," and "Brick from Crafting Room Wall XLII" after a while (and probably get a mood debuff, too).
On the other hand, if you let them participate in battles, view other legendary items, or witness the Epic Thrumbo Thwapping of 5506, they're far more likely to turn out something good themselves.
Essentially, each item would have a related inspiration score. When the score is around 0, they'd produce mostly normal-superior, with small chances of getting something better. At higher levels, you're almost guaranteed to get masterwork or legendary. Once it goes below zero, they'd get a "Not another $ITEM!" negative mood, and start turning out crap. Going too low could result in a mutiny: you tell him to make another chair, but end up with a statue instead, because that's what he really wants to make. (having a mental break with one of these thoughts active would give a good chance of them running off to smash up the nearest example of whatever it is they're sick of making, which might be really bad if, for example, their target is a statue in your common room, and they have a minigun equipped)
If they see a good bed, their inspiration for all furniture would go up a bit, and beds specifically a bit more. Every time they made a bed, all furniture would go down a bit, and beds down a lot.
Hopefully, the end result would be that if you have your high-level crafters make things when you need them, you're very likely to get something good, instead of having to grind out twenty of them, but trying to industrialize them would result in mediocrity.