Bay 12 Games Forum

But what utilities do I use so I can control everything? For example, I want to try making a machinima of this. I'd need to be able to move elves where they wouldn't normally go.

Drop magma squares until the obsidian island reaches the surface, then drill a hole down the center into the ground below.

I want to try making machinima. I'm using a mac. What utilities should I download?

Two problems with your idea. First, the hatches on the top and on the bottom both need to be closed when emptying a cistern. Second, I don't think you can rig a lever to open one set of hatches and close another. It's all open or all closed.

Your mistakes cancelled each other out.

This works a lot better than my way.

By the way, how will filling up areas make anything more accessible? Will it be so you have to swim to it?

If you do a water-themed level, you should probably have something somewhere where water moves something. Maybe have the entrance a series of ramps and smooth floors with water going down them acting as a water slide, and have it end dumping you down a z-level into a pool.

By the way, everyone talks about feeding dwarfs to animals in order to make them named so they'd still be there when you adventure. How about having ways to herd the new animals? Say you want a carp-pool. You could have a waterfall empty from a river into the pool, and have the pool go through bars so the carp don't come back out.
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The way water pressure works should keep the water level at 7/7, but keep it from overflowing.

Edit: Fixed a problem in my design. The water entry should be larger than the water exit. Come to think of it, this could be used for the whatchamacallit this comment was started talking about. Just make a hatch on each z-level and a waterfall pouring in. It will fill to the lowest open hatch. This would have the added bonus that you can have floodgates controlling specific parts of z-levels that will fill, and it will still work right.
aquifier
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xpCynic, The way Mondark did it involved pressure plates, which don't work. You're probably best off to have one lever for fill and one lever for empty and have it right next to the place the water comes from, so it's obvious what it does, and next to a spot where you can see how deep the water is.

By the way, you can use long series' of pumps to move water in faster. Also having a waterfall so the PC can get the hint would be a good idea.

If you do want to have it so you pull levers to specify how many level of water:

Build each layer so they have exactly the same number of tiles.
Build one cistern with that many tiles for each layer.
Make a series of pumps that allows each cistern to take water from the bottom layer and and water to the top layer.
Give each cistern a single lever. If it's pulled one way, the pumps leading to it are on and the ones leading away are off. If it's pulled the other way, it's switched.

By the way, you can turn pumps off by connecting a gear to something that uses too much power. See Mechanical Logic for details. Also, rather than having two sets of pumps for each cistern, you can use one set of pumps and a hatch, so when the hatch is open the water drains one way, and when it's closed, but the pumps are on, it pumps the other way. Finally, if you want to make sure there's no evaporation, build all of the floors out of bars so the water's not just on the floor, and make each cistern two z-levels deep, but only use the top z-level. Since all of the bars have to be connected to walls, you'll have to make sections like this:
(= means bars, O means wall)
====O==
==O====
O====O=
===O===
=O====O
====O==
==O====


This is a cool thread, but I'm too much of a noob to join. I am allowed to give ideas though, right?

Have a lever that, when pulled, drops a donut shaped area around the PC to make them fall a z-level. Someone already suggested that part. Make it so this places them in a room with a floodgate and a lever, but no other way out. When they pull that lever it opens the floodgate, leading into a partially drained magma vent, with a bridge over it. It also opens a floodgate on the opposite side of the bridge, opens a cage on the other side of the door, and opens the retracting bridge that was keeping the magma vent from filling. This will leave the PC forced to fight a monster on a bridge over a slowly-filling magma vent.

As an added bonus, if the PC survives, try and distract them after they leave for long enough that the magma vent fills and the lava spills out of the opened floodgate.

The dwarves and elves have been at war for the past three years. A dwarven outpost has asked to let the war end, and has requested a group of elves to join them at the opening of the Colosseum.

The elves are given the seats up front, but there isn't enough room for the dwarves, so they stand in an area farther back.

"The seats aren't full. Why don't some of the dwarves come down here?" asks Lethiro, the elven liaison.

"No offense, but they'd rather stand and watch with their families and friends than sit with complete strangers. Besides, you'd block their view," replied Noshtath, a dwarven usher.

"Still, It seems like a waste having all these empty seats," Lethiro responds. "Why the iron grates on the floor?"

"The arena was built on top of a magma vent. The top is closed off with what's essentially a giant valve. They can open the valve to allow magma to slowly come up from vent if fight takes too long," answers Noshtath.

"Nice," says the elf. "Are they going to do it this time?"

"I don't know. I'm just an usher. Anyway, the fight's going to start soon. I'd better get back," says the dwarf as he hurries away.

A few minutes pass.

"For the grand opening of the Colosseum," yells an announcer, "We will witness a battle between..." a huge door opens and a "...Bronze Collusus..." walks out. "...and..." The elves watch the door on the other side of the arena in anticipation. "...unarmed elven civilians!" Water pours through the doors to the front seats, washing the Elves into the Colosseum as the Dwarves cheer.


The story takes place in an arena. Many players build them, but the game itself doesn't currently use them. The room would have to be different then normal and would have to have an inner section, where the fighting takes place, and an outer section, for watching. Visibility would be required. The arena would likely span multiple z-levels, so the game would have to allow for that.

The player must be able to coordinate parties, or at least the arena would have to allow you to designate a lever to be pulled for it to begin.

The story has a group of elves who are invited to come as a peace offering. It would be nice to have this sort of thing allowed when talking to liaisons.

It also uses Meaningful Names, but that was just because I have too much time on my hands. I'm not suggesting it.


Edit: I changed the hatches to doors. It wouldn't make much sense to have hatches when the floor is covered in grates.

If you want to make zombiehood spread like a virus, that wouldn't be enough. Not unless you want to have an infinitely long tag like
[EXTRACT_ADD_TAG:"[EXTRACT_ADD_TAG:/"[EXTRACT_ADD_TAG:/"[EXTRACT_ADD_TAG,/"[EXTRACT_ADD_TAG:/"[EXTRACT_ADD_TAG:/".../"]/"]/"]/"]"] . That being said, the idea seems pretty cool. You could even change [EXTRACT_PARALYZE] to [EXTRACT_ADD_TAG:"[SPEED:2147483647]"]. Also, you'd need a way of taking tags away. A way of changing a tag to a function of another tag would be nice to, for example, using [EXTRACT_ADD_TAG:"[SPEED:(SPEED*2)]"] to make a creature half as fast. That last part would probably make this idea a lot harder to implement, but I figure it's up to Toady to decide what's too hard.