Dwarf fortress

[Artanis]

What about building a big dike and then dropping it into the ocean? You could then pump the water out and take your time making fort Atlantis as big and deep as you like.

Build the glass dome and then chip a hole in the dike when you're done :)

Doesn't work. If you cave-in a construction, the construction breaks apart into what it was built out of. All you'll get is a pile of rocks at the bottom of the sea. If you have magma you can make an obsidian dike, but otherwise, you're limited to pumping out water faster than it can flow back in, building a wall there, moving down a z-level, and repeating.

[Suicide Junkie]

Is it at all possible to construct downwards from an overhang?

[Destro_Yersul]

theoretically, yes. Would involve lots of stairs and whatnot, but it should be possible.

[AgentPaper]

I am using the mayday graphics mod. Does sound just not work with that?

[Justyn]

I am using the mayday graphics mod. Does sound just not work with that?

No, it does, it's just that the version of Dwarf Fortress that the tileset comes with has the audio turned off from the INIT files. You need need to turn it on from there. Just to check, you do know what the INIT files are, right?

[Suicide Junkie]

theoretically, yes. Would involve lots of stairs and whatnot, but it should be possible.

I was trying to build downwards over the ocean once, in order to make a nice fishing pier, but couldn't get the dwarves to actually do it.

[Artanis]

If by "build downwards" you mean build something on a z-level below the dwarf doing the construction (e.g. a dwarf on level 50 putting a stairs on level 49), I don't think you can. However, even if you can, that z-level is still going to be full of water, so you have to pump it out anyways before you can do anything more than dunking a few stairs into it.

[Arachu]

According to the wiki, it's possible to pump out more water than the rate at which it arrives. The page was about aquifers, but it could possibly apply in the ocean...

Well, if it does, a certain setup involving a lever and a waterwheel would mean that you could literally part the water itself whenever you need out (or something else needs in), and close it when something you want out tries to come in.

You could also drown sieges this way, in theory

As for building down... I haven't tried it yet, but I've been planning on it, so I should get to that eventually...

[Artanis]

According to the wiki, it's possible to pump out more water than the rate at which it arrives. The page was about aquifers, but it could possibly apply in the ocean...

Well, if it does, a certain setup involving a lever and a waterwheel would mean that you could literally part the water itself whenever you need out (or something else needs in), and close it when something you want out tries to come in.

It does indeed apply to oceans. And to rivers and such, for that matter. That's the way people make forts under the ocean: pumping it out faster than it can fill, one z-level at a time.

...or just dumping magma in it and carving the fort out of the resulting obsidian

[Arachu]

... Wait...

You have to move the water to build, but you have to build to move the water?

BZZZZERT!!! CH1CK3N-3GG FAILURE!

Press any button to continue.


(Just kidding; I built a screw pump at some point or another and I know the Z-level bit )

[Milskidasith]

I saw a video of it once. Essentially, to pump out the ocean he had a huge array of windmills aboveground powering everything, and a massive number of pumps.

I'd just use magma. But I never saw the point in super projects anyway. Except project "Screaming Eagles" where I put cage traps everywhere to trap a giant eagle. War giant eagles rock.

[Arachu]

I like building projects; probably because of my attention span...

[Lord Herman]

I've learned something useful today: if you want more trees to grow around your fortress, have your dorfs harvest shrubs. Apparently, a given patch of land can only support so many things growing on it, be they shrubs or trees. So if it gets overgrown with shrubs, you won't get as many trees there.

[Player_Zero]

I've learned something useful today: if you want more trees to grow around your fortress, have your dorfs harvest shrubs. Apparently, a given patch of land can only support so many things growing on it, be they shrubs or trees. So if it gets overgrown with shrubs, you won't get as many trees there.

So... You can't see the forrest for the shrubs?

[Artanis]

I've learned something useful today: if you want more trees to grow around your fortress, have your dorfs harvest shrubs. Apparently, a given patch of land can only support so many things growing on it, be they shrubs or trees. So if it gets overgrown with shrubs, you won't get as many trees there.

If you don't need the plants you get from harvesting, you can use dirt roads to get rid of huge swathes of shrubs real quick.

[Suicide Junkie]

If you don't need the plants you get from harvesting, you can use dirt roads to get rid of huge swathes of shrubs real quick.

Is one adult dwarf's time worth it when you could use a horde of children to clear the shrubs while gaining XP and attributes :)

I've recently discovered that children will also smooth walls... so now my magmaduct is 1500 tiles of shiny smooth tiles. And not even one of the children died doing it...

[Artanis]

They'll only do that if you use a cheat program like Dwarf Foreman

[Suicide Junkie]

You mean like this nice dwarf manager tool that lets you see everybody's skills and jobs in a chart, and toggle said jobs without hunting down each dwarf individually and having to remember who already does what in a 100 pop fort?
The kids aren't hardcoded to avoid doing it like most other jobs.

I've also been using the kids to pump magma a lot.
What with the leaky pumps and lack of OHSA regulations in this fort, there tends to be a lot of burned feet. Best to happen before anybody gets too attached.

[ObadiahtheSlim]

It's not like children are going to do anything for you. It takes what? 12 years for them to become peasents? Maybe if you're lucky, an immigrant kid will reach adulthood shortly after arrivng.

[Lord Herman]

I just thought of something very dwarfy. Champions are very tough, right? But are they tough enough to be launched by a bridge without sustaining any serious injury?

Because the plan is this. My fortress is surrounded by a wall and moat, so it's quite safe, but sieges still pose a problem to trade caravans. What if I built a dwarfapult, so when I get attacked by goblins, I can drive them off by launching a squad of champions at them, without even having to open my gates? It'd be like dwarven paratroopers, only without the parachutes!

[Gralamin]

I just thought of something very dwarfy. Champions are very tough, right? But are they tough enough to be launched by a bridge without sustaining any serious injury?

Because the plan is this. My fortress is surrounded by a wall and moat, so it's quite safe, but sieges still pose a problem to trade caravans. What if I built a dwarfapult, so when I get attacked by goblins, I can drive them off by launching a squad of champions at them, without even having to open my gates? It'd be like dwarven paratroopers, only without the parachutes!

To Dwarfapult, you need a drawbridge. And according to the DF Wiki:

Anything standing on a drawbridge when it raises will be flung anywhere from zero to one Z levels upward and up to 10 units in any other direction

So be sure to build it with that in mind.

Now, having test fired a few, I found normal dwarves end up stunned from a Dwarfapult on a flat plain. I however haven't tried dropping the dwarf multiple Z levels at the end, so test before using!

[ObadiahtheSlim]

Champion has nothing to do with it. Its all on the toughness stat.

[Artanis]

You mean like this nice dwarf manager tool that lets you see everybody's skills and jobs in a chart, and toggle said jobs without hunting down each dwarf individually and having to remember who already does what in a 100 pop fort?
The kids aren't hardcoded to avoid doing it like most other jobs.

I've also been using the kids to pump magma a lot.
What with the leaky pumps and lack of OHSA regulations in this fort, there tends to be a lot of burned feet. Best to happen before anybody gets too attached.

Yeah, programs like that. Dwarf Manager makes it really handy to handle dwarves' jobs, but when you use it to control the jobs of dwarves you normally can't - like nobles and children - it crosses over into cheating territory.

[Lord Herman]

I just had a very funny thought. It went like, "Wait, is it really worth all the trouble of building a huge water reservoir and pump system just to be able to flood my craftdwarf's workshop whenever a moody dwarf is threatening to go berserk because I can't get him any shells?"

The answer, of course, was yes.


Edit: How many caravans can you drown before the elves declare war on you? I've been meaning to test my trade depot flushing machine, but I don't want to get into a war right now.

I could of course just claim one of my dorfs accidentally pulled over the lever, but then we'd get into inconvenient questions as to why the flushing system was there in the first place.

[Suicide Junkie]

Yeah, programs like that. Dwarf Manager makes it really handy to handle dwarves' jobs, but when you use it to control the jobs of dwarves you normally can't - like nobles and children - it crosses over into cheating territory.

The thing is, tho, that children and nobles will refuse to do most things no matter what options you use.
And children will already harvest, haul, fill ponds, remove constructions and such without prompting.
Gathering plants, smoothing stone and running pumps seem to match up with those pretty well.

The nobles still seem to be entirely useless regardless. I think I need to put some bauxite thrones in the magmaduct, and hang a "no slackers" sign up over the front gate.

[Rockphed]

The thing is, tho, that children and nobles will refuse to do most things no matter what options you use.
And children will already harvest, haul, fill ponds, remove constructions and such without prompting.
Gathering plants, smoothing stone and running pumps seem to match up with those pretty well.

The nobles still seem to be entirely useless regardless. I think I need to put some bauxite thrones in the magmaduct, and hang a "no slackers" sign up over the front gate.

I am fairly certain that if you have "All Dwarves Harvest" nobles will harverst. I would have to check though. Also, philosophers, Counts, count consorts, and tax collectors will fill ponds. The Tax Collector and Hammerer will trade. The Hammerer does a bang up job of killing goblins.

Then there is the Dungeon Master, who can do all the Metal related tasks by himself, though he might not burn wood. He also does a bang up job of training animals.

[Artanis]

The thing is, tho, that children and nobles will refuse to do most things no matter what options you use.
And children will already harvest, haul, fill ponds, remove constructions and such without prompting.
Gathering plants, smoothing stone and running pumps seem to match up with those pretty well.

The nobles still seem to be entirely useless regardless. I think I need to put some bauxite thrones in the magmaduct, and hang a "no slackers" sign up over the front gate.

Children don't haul, unless it's hauling a booze barrel they've just used back to the stockpile.

And yes, the nobles are useless. They're useless, and you can't do a damn thing about it ingame. That's why it's cheating to use an outside program to make them work.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it's bad or anything. It's totally understandable, and I would probably do it myself if I ever got around to d/ling one of those programs. But it's still cheating: you can't make kids or nobles smooth, gather plants, or run pumps via ingame commands, thus using an outside program to make them do so is, by definition, cheating.

[Lord Herman]

I just remembered a dwarfy thing I did when I just started out my fortress of Axemurdered. I had just built the wall and moat, but a few goblin archers got up on the hill behind me, just high enough so they could target the enclosed area, and started shooting at my dorfs. So after eliminating the goblins, I did what any sensible dorf would do: I had my dorfs grab their shovels, and they shaved two z-levels off the top of the hill.

As General Urist Tsu said: When at a terrain disadvantage, remove the terrain.

[Suicide Junkie]

According to the wiki, they do... hauling stuff to the depot at least.

In the end tho, it is a single player game, and having fun is the most important part :).

[Artanis]

Indeed, fun is the most important part