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Topics - Shurikane

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1
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Project Superbowl II: Project Gloryhole
« on: September 19, 2016, 10:03:21 pm »
It took a year to do.  And it is complete, at last.

My first shot at Project Superbowl had been a structure a few Z-layers high, set around a magma pipe.  I only realized much, much later into the project that I had grossly mis-designed the structure, and it was far too ugly and ill-shaped to be looked at.  In disgust, I abandoned the fortress.

With a renewed vigor, I set out on a bigger, better version.

This should do.

And if it doesn't, I took pictures.

Happy visiting.

2
DF Gameplay Questions / Spam of "Job item lost or destroyed"
« on: September 06, 2016, 08:43:30 pm »
SITUATION
I'm making green glass.  I have a large amount of Magma Glass Forges.  Some are set on a repeating Collect Sand job, and the others on a repeated Make Green Glass Blocks job.  I have about 200 bags used solely to fill up with sand, and then consume.

PROBLEM
Several times a minute, a dwarf will cancel his Collect Sand job on the grounds that the "job item was lost or destroyed".  If I zoom in to the site of the event, my cursor lands on a perfectly normal-looking empty bag, sitting in its stockpile as it should.

What the heck is going on?   ???

3
DF Gameplay Questions / How To: Pressure plate & gear assembly?
« on: May 08, 2016, 06:35:33 am »
Consider this.

I placed a pressure plate inside a cistern, and set it to trigger once magma touches it.  I linked this pressure plate to a gear assembly, which in turn is linked to a screw pump elsewhere.

I want the gear assembly to start off disengaged.  This way, the screw pump will activate when magma touches the pressure plate, instead of the opposite.

To that end, I linked the same gear assembly to a lever, and pulled it.  My understanding is that then the pressure plate, once pushed, will keep the mechanism engaged.

Makes sense?  That's gonna work?

4
DF Gameplay Questions / [40.24] Dwarves refuse to store wood
« on: April 23, 2016, 01:08:39 pm »
EDIT: Nevermind.  Code 18.   :-X

5
DF Gameplay Questions / Before I dig my volcano: magma refilling
« on: April 04, 2016, 07:49:33 pm »
SITUATION
I created a large reservoir, into which I pumped magma.  The reservoir surrounds my magma pipe, so I dug into the side of it to speed up the process.  Because the magma spread quite quickly, I was only able to mine out one square on either side of the pipe.

The pipe drained at a very slow rate.  Once the reservoir was full, the pipe simply refilled itself back up to its former glory.

WHAT I'M TRYING TO DO
I want to purposely drain part of the pipe.  To do so, I will dig out its topmost layer, and funnel the magma elsewhere.  I will repeat the process for each layer on the way down.  The idea is to tear down part of the magma pipe, and turn it into usable areas for my dwarves.  Hopefully, I can go as far down as my magma reservoir, so that everything above can be used to the benefit of my fortress.

WHAT I'M NOT CERTAIN OF
I have a suspicion that the pipe will attempt to refill itself too quickly for me to be able to manage it, and that I'll simply end up with unsightly gutters that I can't condemn because of the magma flow.  I don't know how the game figures out how high a pipe is supposed to go.  Does it define a "refillable pipe" as what the embark started with, or does it eliminate parts if they get altered or destroyed?  I don't know, and I can't find an answer to this right now.

People experienced in pipes, what has been your experience?  Were you able to artificially decrease a magma pipe's content without necessarily the use of pumps?

6
DF Gameplay Questions / [40.24] Possible sources for a crash?
« on: March 07, 2016, 09:38:40 pm »
Synopsis: I have a fortress that's on cruise control.  Most of the time is being spent hauling things to stockpiles and cleaning out rocks into a quantum pile.  There's not much building going on, and only some occasional mining.  RAM usage immediately after loading the game is about 1740 MBs.  FPS is between 5 and 10 depending on what's going on.

I know about that "building a wall into a tree" crash thing - no, I'm fairly sure it's not that.

The game crashes like mad.  I can't figure out why exactly.  However, I ran into instances where it's perfectly reproducible.  I have a save lying around where the game will crash like clockwork a few minutes in, if I unpause after loading and I give the game no further input.

With such an unfortunately small stack of information to go on, I ask this: what the heck is making my game crash so often?   :o

EDIT
A few of the measures I take:
  • I keep Task Manager open, and save my game when it hits 1900 MB of RAM usage.  I quit entirely and reload.
  • Just now, I tried out NTCore's 4GB patch.  I'm running the game again now, no noticeable performance impact as the wiki article claims, but at least I shouldn't have to watch over the RAM usage anymore...

7
DF Gameplay Questions / The Water Wheels That Didn't Start
« on: January 27, 2016, 10:33:25 pm »
The situation: I dug up a very long, 5-tiles wide tunnel designed for a water wheel project.  The tunnel twists and turns this way and that, before coming down progressively down some Z-levels, thereby linking two underground caverns together.  Water flows into the tunnel, gets past a de-pressurizer (consisting of diagonal walls), through the water wheels, and finally into an already existing water basin in the next underground.  I assume the basin is connected to the map edge.

It's worth noting that among the design are several pipe sections linking together water wheels that would've rotated in opposite directions in the real world.  If I remember correctly, DF doesn't take that into account.

OK, so ready to go??

...The whole setup produces a measly 1300 power.  Sometimes it jumps to 1500 or even 1700 - but the thing is that the entire setup has a starting power requirement of 12,000.  That gives you an idea how many damn wheels I've put together.

I'm not sure where I screwed up.  Water flows through the tunnel as far as I can tell, though no animation indicates so.  The water level is always 7/7.  I can see it spread around when it arrives into the lower cavern layer, however I do not have any visibility on the map edge to prove the water ultimately flows off the map.

Is that off-the-map flow what I'm missing to make the setup work?

8
DF Gameplay Questions / (40.x) Removing constructions without deaths
« on: January 02, 2016, 09:59:56 am »
I built a large structure via my usual method of making a scaffolding of up-down stairs around which I then built up my walls.  Due to the construction's design, I made the scaffolding on the inside.

I'm at the part where I must remove that scaffolding, and I can't seem to get that accomplished without losing a ton of dwarves in the process.  No matter what I do, they are hellbent on standing on the tile they are trying to remove, thus plummeting to their deaths soon as that job's accomplished.

It's gotten to the point where I mark tiles one by one and carefully watch what's going on.  Even if the only way to access the tile to remove is from the bottom, dwarves LOVE to go and stand on it anyway for no apparent valid reason, and so I'm left micromanaging the task for hours on end.

Is there a detail I'm overlooking here?  Am I hopefully tearing my hair out for nothing?

9
DF Suggestions / Personal Weapons for Civilians
« on: December 28, 2015, 01:17:06 pm »
This is largely an improvement on "enable mining for everyone so they carry picks".

In this suggestion, a non-military dwarf will carry a small, personal weapon with him at all times.  Nothing heavy or unwieldy, but rather a short sword, a knife, a small hand axe, or other portable object that he can use to defend himself should he fall under attack.

10
DF Gameplay Questions / My kingdom for migrants!
« on: December 27, 2015, 09:59:51 am »
The situation: My fort's been running for almost 40 years now.  My population cap is 150.

I stopped getting migrants after about the 20th year of my fortress.

My civilization still exists.  I have no reason to believe it's in trouble.  In my case, I've had trouble with all sorts of beasts and accidents, and so my population numbers have dwindled to a mere 80.  I get caravans yearly, and conversations with the diplomat.

Still, no migrants.

At this rate, I feel like my fort's going to slowly whittle away, and the amount of work to be done on it is difficult to do in a timely miner.  Usually, I barely have the time to clean up the mess left from the previous siege, that another one begins!

Am I stuck, here?  I don't know what I could be doing wrong to have completely stopped attracting migrants despite the fort having space for at least 70 more dwarves.

11
DF Suggestions / Military: "Follow This Man!"
« on: December 26, 2015, 10:45:25 am »
This order functions the same as a kill order, except that the squad does not attempt to ruin the target's day.  Rather, they simply trail after the selected target.  Possible uses include:

  • Escorting the caravan and/or its liaison.
  • Shadowing a dwarf suspected of being a vampire or were-creature.
  • Acting as bodyguard for a noble or important administrator.
  • Keeping tabs on a moody dwarf in case he goes berzerk.

12
DF Suggestions / Designation: Force-Clean
« on: December 26, 2015, 10:20:42 am »
Since automatic cleaning has been iffy for a long time, I propose a manual variant.

The Clean designation applies to all surfaces with blood/vomit/etc, and dwarves treat those designations as they would digging, smoothing, and so on.  This allows to at least clean some specific parts of the fort that the player would want to pretty up.

13
DF Gameplay Questions / [40.24] Artifacts: Separating true value from sentimental value
« on: December 05, 2015, 08:07:02 am »
Situation: I have a long-standing military, which has given pet names to several pieces of its equipment.  Some of these brave souls also gave their life in the line of duty, leaving those named weapons without an owner.

I also have a special vault room in which I store artifacts.  The stockpile is set so that it accepts only a Core Quality and a Total Quality of Artifact.  All other stockpiles disallow a Core and Total Quality of Artifact, this way I'm guaranteed to have my artifacts in their vault room - at least in theory.

This is working too well.  Dwarves are moving too many items to the vault.

Right now, dwarves are stockpiling named weapons into the artifacts vault even though these pieces are just measly, ordinary copper shields.  I have to admit that even after reading the article on item quality in the DF Wiki, I'm still not quite sure how I should configure my stockpiles to get the result I want - and I don't want to go by trial and error since I noticed that after an artifact gets moved elsewhere into a bin, it takes forever to get them out.

Any insight into the matter will be very appreciated.

14
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / The Bellmouth, or Shuri Divides Magma By Zero
« on: November 22, 2015, 06:14:27 pm »
tl;dr: Somehow I don't think I've thought my cunning plan all the way through.

My current fortress is called Project Superbowl II.  I shall surround a pipe volcano with an artificial, circular bowl.

And I thought "why not make the bowl into a Division By Zero shape?"

Which is all fine and good, except I lack a blueprint.  :(

I could just wing it, but I figured it would be prudent to crowdsource the design a little so I don't screw it up.

So.  Here's what I know:

  • From the center, the distance to the closest edge of the pipe is 9 squares, diagonally.  Therefore, the very bottom of my bell-mouth will have a radius of 9.
  • I have 42 Z-levels of space to the top of the map.  This is shorter than the distance to the map edges, thus will be my limiting factor in how large the bell-mouth is.  I need one Z-level of leeway, as the very top will house some structures that I want to keep covered and sealed - thus, walls and top-flooring that's accessible by the dwarves to build.

I am not entirely certain how to approach the architecture of this, mathematically speaking.  Ideally, I'll have a plan for each Z-level so as to place my walls and my ramps at the right spot in order to have a structure that looks nice and remains as circular as a 3D-pixelated thing can be.  Perhaps drunkenness is speaking in my stead but anyway.  My geometry skills are lacking.  What do?

15
DF Gameplay Questions / The Sam Fisher Vampire
« on: November 17, 2015, 09:48:35 am »
Long story short, I knew there was a vampire in my fort, but I couldn't figure out who.  And I sure as HELL wasn't gonna k-select every single damn dwarf to figure out which one had the longest portion of blue text.

So, since biting people's necks is a crime, I figured I'd need witnesses.  I forbade the entire bedroom complex, constructed a handful of beds in a communal room, and stationed by military in there.  Should my vamp come around, he'll have 10+ people staring at him as he does the act.

Meanwhile I k-select a few dwarves on the off-chance I find my purchase, and bingo!  I nickname my prime suspect accordingly, and track him.  Sure enough, one fine day he goes 'On Break' in bright teal text rather than dark deal.  There's my perp!

He struts into the communal bedroom like he owns the place, gives a few pats on the back of my military, exchanges a few "Hey you o'ight mate", then proceeds to casually bend over and chomp down on the first sleeping dwarf, in plain sight of everyone.  And with the act done, he waltzes out without opposition.

Shuri: "Uh, guys, did you see anything unusual happening recently?"

Military: "Eh, naw, mate.  Nothin' to report."

Shuri: "And the dwarf who bit the other guy a minute ago, what about him, eh?"

Military: "What dwarf?"

Shuri: "...Oh fuck all you guys."

I'm not sure what I did wrong here.  I had every condition united to make "the fort" catch my suspect in the act, he did it in plain sight of well over a dozen dwarves... and nobody reacted.  At all.  Even stranger: the victim didn't die.

I'm at a loss.  I've officially given up on the vamp and prepared an unfortunate accident for him, but for next time, what more am I supposed to do to get the fort's population to point out who the vampire is, fairly and squarely, without me resorting to god-almighty-player tactics?

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