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Topics - The Architect

Pages: 1 2 [3]
31
DF Suggestions / Player-set delay in DF mechanics
« on: November 14, 2009, 01:59:12 pm »
I am a huge fan of mechanics in DF, and improving them to allow for more versatility is something I would love to see. My suggestion is very simple, will not unbalance the game in any way, and will allow all kinds of wonderful things that are currently impossible:

Allow players to set the delay for triggers. The amount of control a player has can be limited by the quality of the mechanisms they use, if necessary to maintain game balance. For example:

You want a trap that will trigger 20 frames after a pressure plate is stepped on. You set the delay to 20 frames, and now you have a dependable, realistically consistent mechanical trap.

Or, you want a lever to operate two bridges, and/or multiple mechanisms, but you want the connections to take effect at different times. You can set it so one bridge closes at 10frames, the next closes at 30frames, and create the effects you want.

Of course all kinds of great things would be possible with this, including vast improvements to all kinds of traps, player-made mechanisms, and logic computers. And of course building amazing things like clocks would be possible.

32
DF General Discussion / Employing Mechanics in DF (mazes, computing, repeaters, etc)
« on: November 13, 2009, 11:28:14 pm »
Alright, I have some questions and I'd like to know where the DF community currently stands on some things.

DF has some nice mechanical capabilities allowing a lot of free reign with setting up technical systems, usually employed in the form of defense systems. So, I have some questions. Some of these are things I am experimenting with right now:

1) Can a waterwheel be arranged to run off an artificial waterfall, resulting in the normal 100 power (which would also allow it to be pumped back to the source, with your power gain growing the more z-levels you drop it through waterfalls without it hitting a reservoir). And/or: will arranging it so that an artificial water supply flows under a waterwheel before dropping again result in power?

2) Has anyone employed logic computers to a purpose in DF? Is it even possible to do so without devices being more fine-tuned (such as Toady allowing us to set the delay on them)?

3) Does anyone have some functioning labyrinths to show off? One method I heard suggested was employing a repeater and/or pressure plates to open and close doors, allowing enemies to walk the maze.
A) I was thinking it could be done so that the exits were stairs leading to other z-levels and freedom, with the dead-ends are constructed by doors/bridges connected to pressure plates blocking an exit. You start with some exits open, and when an enemy enters the dead-end and triggers the plate, the door closes, forcing them to find another path.
B) Another feature I plan to implement is placing some glass walls (windows) in a maze, then placing some creatures hostile to each other (such as a tame dragon when mazing orcs) as a type of trap which will be triggered when an enemy walks in front of a glass wall and hits a pressure switch (causing the dragon to be released, see them through the glass wall, and begin pursing them through the maze).
C Another feature I plan to implement is spike traps and hatches hooked to pressure plates. With the hatches, I am hoping to drop enemies onto a pressure plate in a room below with an exit back to the maze. This will be used as another form of dead end, but if they fail to get to the exit quickly enough the spike traps in the room will go off (having been activated by falling onto the pressure plate). The power of the traps could decrease in a radius from the plate, so that almost getting there results in merely a wound. Other options for the trap room will of course include flooding from reservoirs of specific volume with a recycling drain hooked to a liquid pressure plate.
D Yet another option involves a pressure plate next to a fortification with a creature behind it with no path to the enemy (so it won't attack until the plate is triggered). Once the plate is triggered, the exit  to the pillbox is opened and the creature, now with a path to the enemy, begins making ranged attacks and/or pathing. Before it reaches the exit to its pillbox, another pressure plate closes it. From what I have read, creatures won't attack without a path.

I could go on, including having levels which enemies can fall down into, taking them backwards one level from their exit. Also useful are cave-ins and recapture traps to be dropped onto. Even traps releasing dwarves and creatures directly on the enemy would be awesome. With a DF logic computer, I should be able to reset the maze with one input.

Of course there are much less interesting things that can be done such as a level of doors on repeaters which create and erase paths through weapon traps or repeating spikes, or repeating drawbridges opening and closing (smash, smash, smash :-) ), with the exit from this maze of death leading back to the main labyrinth.

4) Magma logic: Possible, in place of water on maps without infinite supplies? I am recycling and storing rain right now on my experimental map, a nice technical challenge on a map with no river. However it has a magma pipe and SoFs, of course. The issue is that any water logic computers or repeaters will eat water 7 at a time, and I'd like to do some magma molding later with it (after I create an infinite wind-less power plant).

5 What questions do you have, and wonderful ideas to contribute?

33
DF Gameplay Questions / Dwarf Blind for no known reason?
« on: November 13, 2009, 09:57:22 pm »
Hi. I have a dwarf who appears to have been struck blind for no reason. At first I thought it was just an effect of sun-sickness which I did not know about, but I can't find anything about that anywhere. For now, I've named him Tiresias and his job description is The Blind Prophet. The only known cause for blindness like that would be wrestling afaik, but he's never participated in any such activity. Could a raccoon have done it? (He doesn't have any kills and they have been around lately. Beside that, I know for a fact about every goblin and kobold encounter, as they all resulted in a dwarf dying or a goblin dying. He has never sparred. He wasn't blinded by wrestling.) Of course the first time he showed up blind I checked his history, but he only had a very old "he was attacked" on there. Could be wildlife, but it's all peaceful so far. Nothing has been smoking afaik either.

The most likely cause for the blindness is simply that I missed an event.

However, Tiresias is always gumming up my fort by falling unconscious. He is Tough, but it seems that his "wound" of severed eyes causes him to constantly pass out. He doesn't have any internal wounds, and of course he can't rest severed eyes. He has no pain.

Is it normal for a severed external part to cause a dwarf to fall unconscious? I hate to do it to him, but Tiresias is currently a useless pain in my *** and I may kill him if this is a bug. I micromanage pretty heavily so that no one stands around with No Job for days at a time, and if I see Idlers never go to 0 for a few minutes I check the list. It annoys me to no end that Tiresias is always making me look at him.

34
General Discussion / Employing Mechanics in DF (mazes, computing, repeaters, etc)
« on: November 13, 2009, 08:31:04 pm »
Alright, I have some questions and I'd like to know where the DF community currently stands on some things.

DF has some nice mechanical capabilities allowing a lot of free reign with setting up technical systems, usually employed in the form of defense systems. So, I have some questions. Some of these are things I am experimenting with right now:

1) Can a waterwheel be arranged to run off an artificial waterfall, resulting in the normal 100 power (which would also allow it to be pumped back to the source, with your power gain growing the more z-levels you drop it through waterfalls without it hitting a reservoir). And/or: will arranging it so that an artificial water supply flows under a waterwheel before dropping again result in power?

2) Has anyone employed logic computers to a purpose in DF? Is it even possible to do so without devices being more fine-tuned (such as Toady allowing us to set the delay on them)?

3) Does anyone have some functioning labyrinths to show off? One method I heard suggested was employing a repeater and/or pressure plates to open and close doors, allowing enemies to walk the maze.
A) I was thinking it could be done so that the exits were stairs leading to other z-levels and freedom, with the dead-ends are constructed by doors/bridges connected to pressure plates blocking an exit. You start with some exits open, and when an enemy enters the dead-end and triggers the plate, the door closes, forcing them to find another path.
B) Another feature I plan to implement is placing some glass walls (windows) in a maze, then placing some creatures hostile to each other (such as a tame dragon when mazing orcs) as a type of trap which will be triggered when an enemy walks in front of a glass wall and hits a pressure switch (causing the dragon to be released, see them through the glass wall, and begin pursing them through the maze).
C Another feature I plan to implement is spike traps and hatches hooked to pressure plates. With the hatches, I am hoping to drop enemies onto a pressure plate in a room below with an exit back to the maze. This will be used as another form of dead end, but if they fail to get to the exit quickly enough the spike traps in the room will go off (having been activated by falling onto the pressure plate). The power of the traps could decrease in a radius from the plate, so that almost getting there results in merely a wound. Other options for the trap room will of course include flooding from reservoirs of specific volume with a recycling drain hooked to a liquid pressure plate.
D Yet another option involves a pressure plate next to a fortification with a creature behind it with no path to the enemy (so it won't attack until the plate is triggered). Once the plate is triggered, the exit  to the pillbox is opened and the creature, now with a path to the enemy, begins making ranged attacks and/or pathing. Before it reaches the exit to its pillbox, another pressure plate closes it. From what I have read, creatures won't attack without a path.

I could go on, including having levels which enemies can fall down into, taking them backwards one level from their exit. Also useful are cave-ins and recapture traps to be dropped onto. Even traps releasing dwarves and creatures directly on the enemy would be awesome. With a DF logic computer, I should be able to reset the maze with one input.

Of course there are much less interesting things that can be done such as a level of doors on repeaters which create and erase paths through weapon traps or repeating spikes, or repeating drawbridges opening and closing (smash, smash, smash :-) ), with the exit from this maze of death leading back to the main labyrinth.

4) Magma logic: Possible, in place of water on maps without infinite supplies? I am recycling and storing rain right now on my experimental map, a nice technical challenge on a map with no river. However it has a magma pipe and SoFs, of course. The issue is that any water logic computers or repeaters will eat water 7 at a time, and I'd like to do some magma molding later with it (after I create an infinite wind-less power plant).

5 What questions do you have, and wonderful ideas to contribute?

35
DF Suggestions / Practical realism in a few basic tasks (trees have a size, hauler profession)
« on: October 27, 2009, 06:36:50 pm »
I made a read-through of Toady's planned updates, I was surprised by not seeing anything along these lines there. He has beautiful and ambitious projects on the line, but some basic necessities seem to be missing. Amending a few tasks as follows would balance game economy, make some currently near-useless/pointless jobs valid, and in my opinion GREATLY improve game play. The reading is long because detailed explanations are included, but it's worth it:

1. Coal. As anyone can tell you, it doesn't take a whole tree to make a lump of coal or even enough coal to smelt ore or smith metal. In fact, from what I learned when visiting a blacksmith, 4-5 smiths can use a single tree for fuel for about two weeks.
 A. Tied into this is Toady's current concept of partially using materials. Creating charcoal, aka woodburning, should take a while and produce much larger quantities, perhaps in the form of bags or bins of coal. Working with bituminous coal and lignite should still be difficult and time consuming, though it should produce slightly more copious amounts. This would make woodburner a useful skill, as ineffective woodburners could fail to produce the maximum amount of coal from a log. It would also make coke/coal a truly valid way to run a metal operation.
 B. Also tied into this: differing amounts of coal should be defined for use with in different projects.

Example: Tree of size 7 produces 7 bags of charcoal in a short time when a legendary burner works with it, or 0-3 when an idiot tries it.

2. Tree chopping. Currently, we use one tree for a bed and a tree for a bucket. Besides being obviously absurd, it is wasteful. Also, our dwarves chop trees and haul these size-less logs with extreme rapidity to balance out the one-size-fits-all issue. If trees had a size, which was used to calculate the portion of the tree/trees used in a project and the amount of charcoal produced from them, all of these balancing problems would be fixed (with an extremely minimal amount of programming, since all objects have a size as well). And tree choppers could work at a more "realistic" rate (slowly), thus making a talented woodcutter into a valuable profession.
 A. Tying into this and the coal/charcoal issue is the fact that only hardwoods are practically useful for charcoal production.
 B. And, items could be burned or otherwise recycled based on their size.

3. Haulers. Yes, someone whose profession is Hauler, utilizing the skill Packing and possibly the attribute Strength. These people would use a cart (special equipment, like an axe for a woodcutter) to haul amounts of material or items around, so we would no longer see a chain of 100 dwarves taking a month to carry in one sock at a time. Ideally the carts would be programmed as mobile mini-stockpiles to which a single bin is assigned until full, or as containers which are filled. The contents or bin would then be reassigned to a static stockpile.
Aside from the technical how-to: a skilled hauler could either transport more goods, collect faster, or haul his cart faster (or all of the above), and carts could have quality ratings to affect travel speed and capacity. Could be made by haulers as traps are made by trappers.
 A. Avoiding problems with the system: Items in carts (or bins on the cart) would be designated "TASK" and not accessible while being used to collect items. When there are no more of that item to collect, be it Finished Goods or bituminous coal or the contents of that latest silver vein, the bin/cart would be designated to a static stockpile. This will prevent dwarves from chasing carts to grab an item, though programming for them to dump items into the cart might be desirable.
 B. Tie-in: vertical elevators, using the existing stair programming to implement: the difference is that these will be temporary stockpiles like the carts, but accessible from all connected elevator construction / z levels. They would require mechanics. The idea is that a cart/bin, something that could not reasonably use stairs, is dumped on an elevator and then is accessible from any z-level that the elevator is connected to. A simple, cheap solution to something that could be handled in many more complicated ways: vertical non-dwarf transportation!
 C. To prevent trouble accessing your items while they are reserved for Task, you could have options for "All Haulers return carts" and "free all cart items".

4. Workshop storage: craftsdwarfs and the like should use a bin (utilizing the current bin programming) in their shop. Thus a craftsdwarf will have a bin assigned to his shop, and bundle as much crap into it as he can fit before it is hauled away. No more insane one-item hauling, and clutter programming could be adjusted to count the Bins as large objects. Haulers could move full bins, or alternately the job could be auto-assigned at the shop so the craftsdwarf would do it himself. (to be turned on/off in options)

Edit:various grammar changes

36
DF Bug Reports / 125x3 squares of water used to Give Water (40d16)
« on: October 25, 2009, 09:41:42 am »
As absurd as it sounds, my dwarfs filled a bucket endlessly from my new 7-deep glacial map water cistern to give water to a poor engraver with a broken lower body. The area I had melted was 125 squares, and in the interest of this guy not dying of dehydration I ordered an iron bucket forged in the magma forge, and a square channeled out above the water to serve as a source until I could divert the water.

After about 10 days in-game time had passed, my bucket was still in the forge, and my engraver had gone from Thirsty to Dehydrated. Annoyed, I added a valid water zone on and around the source and went through the more usual annoyance of every dwarf going to sleep, eat, or on break the moment I removed other labors. Well, eventually my leader got around to it, and used 3 water levels from the 125-square pool before he tried to carry the bucket to the Engraver. I posted about it in our succession game thread, joked, and began digging a well to divert the water and end this glitch.

However, the water never made it to the engraver, and now he's both dehydrated and starving. My carpenter/mechanic is now refilling the bucket and has the cistern down 1s and 2s. I propose that while the bucket was sitting unused in the magma furnace, which is directly above a vent, it became heated and now evaporates all water that comes into contact with it. It is not hot enough to set a dwarf on fire, but hot enough to evaporate endless amounts of water. There is no steam or mist. Besides being absurd, this is also certain death to our engraver and probably the fortress if I don't cheat my way out with a forced abort. I will back up the file and provide it if anyone asks for it.

37
DF Community Games & Stories / Glazeviper, Succession and Community (sponsored)
« on: October 24, 2009, 02:32:37 am »
Welcome to Glazeviper, a cacophany of magma and ice! You can see what the state of the map is from the embark pic:
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Now, who's with me!?
Everyone has a dwarf, appearing in the order you volunteer.  After the first year, a new leader is elected here from the current dwarfs.  I think players should be able to be reincarnated if their character dies, perhaps only from babies :). We'll figure it out.

Players with dwarfs in the fortress will nominate themselves here for the upcoming election, as the turn comes to a close.  If you like the way someone ran the fort, want to give them a chance, like their writing, or just plain want to, you can vote for them.

Since this is a glacier map, it was necessary to start with a solid set of dwarves, and so I'm afraid it would be impossible to give the first 7 whatever professions you want. However, if you want to be one of the first seven here they are:

"The Architect", Leader, Appraiser/Judge of Intent (will be mining) [Architect]
Kogan "Violencetongs" (Barconis), Miner/Weaponsmith
Sarvesh "Rampartrelics" "Sava" (sava2004), Miner/Armorer
Unib "Lastpaddles" "Darish" (Danish), Carpenter/Mechanic
Cilob "Lancedkeeper" "Glarthir", Engraver/Mason/Building Designer (Chicken Launcher)
Eral "Rythmconstruct" "Vicas" (Vicas), Brewer/Grower (will dabble in something for artifacts)
Unib "Strifefulclasps" "Unib" (KenboCalrissian), Cook/Grower (ditto)

Names can be changed, of course. Claim your dwarves now! A waiting list will be updated here when there are more interested players than dwarfs. Let the frostbite begin! Tear the skeletons bone from bone! Build the obsidian tower! Up with the arena! Set the cage traps! Disarm the goblins and fling them in with the denizens of our Terrifying landscape! STRIKE THE EARTH!

This is on orc mod, but the orcs didn't survive somehow. Go figure.

Waiting list:
1. Lafiel

38
DF Community Games & Stories / Armok save the Queen! (Succession game, League-sponsored)
« on: October 17, 2009, 07:14:46 am »
Alllright then. It's time for our first game. Sorry about being so inactive lately, but honestly when it comes down to priorities classes and personal relationships trump internet. Hopefully this weekend will make up for my shortcomings in the forum and my responsibilities in our new multiplayer league.

So, what do you want? A nice Bloodline game for our founders, and maybe a couple of side-games of rotating succession to keep us busy while we wait for our turn in the main event?

Well, if someone would tell me how to find the seed in a map file, I have a gorgeous site for a game. Obsidian is the main stone, magma pipe of course, average wildlife, underground river, flux, sand, rock crystal (I've played on it once), 4x3, yellow diamonds, rubies, bauxite, etc. Had a lot of fun there on my nearly first game when 49 humans showed up to siege my 47 peaceful dwarves.

Survival will probably run a round two soon, with a more scary map. It was fun to race for killing HFS, best economy, and all that, but cruddy that we didn't have any undead to dismember (or vice versa!)

While our main game runs we can have a couple of private games too; a few players from Survival have caught my eye as great teammates if they'll have me. If anyone needs help setting up an extra game then let me know. I don't want to volunteer anyone without asking, but several other people are more knowledgeable than me and may be more helpful with questions.

List of Players
1. Architect? (me)
2. Linthar
3. Lafiel
4. Dante'
5. Sava2004
6. Rogabeetah
7. Camkitsune
8. Chicken Launcher
9. Tack
10. TauQuebb

39
DF Community Games & Stories / New Survival Contest (drawing to a close)
« on: October 07, 2009, 07:21:53 am »
*Edit: the page with all the information you need and the Leaderboard is here: http://www.dwarffortresswiki.net/index.php/Bloodline:SL_Survival_Challenge#Current_Rules.
This is a Succession League game; members will rate other members on their performance, and in this game awards will be given out democratically.*

Looking for players to start individually in an evil, savage tiny area and compare forts after 5 years. Good old fashioned stuff. If you die too quickly, Oops.

No maximum # of players. Will give out seed etc when we are ready to start.

Awards for:
Sheer Style
Smiter: Evil population control (bonus if you somehow manage to attract and kill a mega in this time period, bonus for style such as outdoor flooding traps, balista chutes, etc)
"Noble Aspirations": Have the largest and best-satisfied nobility, with style!
MegaConstruction
Merchantilism: Most Wealth
Popularity: Population count minus dead
North Korea: self-destruct switch, taking out the enemies with you!
Military: pretty self-explanatory. Kill, up close and personal! traps are for cowards!
Defender of the Peace: Don't allow merchants to die (will be damn near impossible, i know) or provoke war with human/elven civs
Ronald McDonald: Food/farming
Woody Allen: Wood-related production (with an unsafe surface? good luck!)

Oh, and your fortress has to SURVIVE to win awards. If you're sitting on 17 insane elves and a wealth of 3mil at the end, I doubt anyone's going to consider you a winner.

40
DF Community Games & Stories / Dwarf Fortress Succession Game "League"
« on: October 07, 2009, 06:55:22 am »
Hi, I am The Architect.

Cheesy, i know, but I was thinking literally when i chose my nickname for this forum. A great Architect, planner and executor of projects extraordinaire. At least, so one can believe of oneself until seeing some of the fortresses (other) people have created.

Enough with the introduction. I would like to organize a contact group for Dwarf Fortress succession games. If anything of the kind already exists, please post any information you have to direct me toward it. I am willing to organize games and keep a pool of interested players on hand for any number of games and leaders. Designing your own fortress is fun and all, but having absolute control makes things a little dull to my mind. I would prefer to interact with other people and build on each other person's ideas.

***If this is too much of a readthrough for you then just post your thoughts on an organized "League" below, and having said this I expect no comments objecting to those who have not read the long list of ideas. However, if you have a new idea (beyond "yes", "no", "lovely", "i hate it") to submit please read all the posts.***

 To my thinking, the perfect succession game has a minimum of 3 and maximum of 4 players. Some will disagree, and please post your own opinions. My reasoning is that two people can't mix it up enough, however creative they are, and end up getting things back too soon, allowing them to control the direction of the fort easily (exactly NOT the point of a DF succession game). Sure, it can be a hell of a lot of fun to share it with one friend, but honestly the human interaction there is very simple: either you directly cooperate or each person does his own thing. Boring? Indeed! However, with more than 4, a player's decisions begin to have less and less consequence for their own future turns, and the natural result is something along the line of Boatmurdered: absolute and glorious mayhem! Otherwise known as losing or "Fun". While Boatmurdered is tons of fun reading-wise and the reporting was really well done, it was painful to see players who couldn't construct a locked door to block smoke, or organize archers and/or towers to control elephant population, etc, alternating with players who just wanted to use their year to make a mark on "BM", frustrating the efforts of others who tried to keep it afloat. However, if debacles are your thing they'll be welcome too.

Anyway, with 3-4 players you have a huge stake in what's happening, as you yearn for your next chance to kick some more ass and show off your abilities, improving on what your friends have done and generally one-upping each other. I would love to have Boatmurdered's world generation info for such a game, if it would work with the current version :) **Magma, underground river, flux, cliff, river, medium trees, and elephants on one map!**

~~~~~~~~~
Alright, well there's a lovely forum here and players can post reports wherever they like. Hopefully our group could find a nice place to have a home forum tab, somewhere like the Wiki (or maybe Toady will give us one here).

If you wish to join the "League" then please post a reply saying so and include any ideas you have; they will be warmly received. Here is what I have thought of while typing this:

Newsletter type updates by request and/or subscription, or a page, with players' stats listed as follows:

Name     ~Activity ~League Experience ~Ability Rating ~Personality Rating  ~Availability ~Notes
Example1 Active    5 Games                 4+                 4                          Available   known for RP
Example2 Inactive  1 Games                 1                   N/A                      Feb 2010    inventive
Example3 Active    6 Games                 4                   8                          Available   witty

This is simply information to help others pick from players they don't know. Each player would rate the others at the time of the fortress' demise or the agreed end of the game, and send a rating for:

recommend: -1, 0, +1 (did they maul your fort beyond recognition with incompetence, contribute little, or excel?)
Personality: 1-10 (how well did you like this player, apart from playing skill?)
Notes: (brief description of notable characteristics)

This survey info then would be used to calculate the attributes show in the table. Notice Ex1 has only played 4 games and received overall positive ratings in all of them, but his personality rating is low. Perhaps the players he was with didn't appreciate his Role Playing? Ex2 played one game long enough to show some skill but dropped out, and his teammates didn't feel they could rate his personality, but they left him a nice note. Ex3 has not made skill 5 in 6 games, showing perhaps a rough start, but his teammates really enjoyed his company. With a dedicated page perhaps players could leave "reviews". Whether you would care to read them or care who joins your game is your business. But if you want a rookie game, you could find rookies, if you want a "pro" game, you could have it.

Included in the Newsletter or page would be
"Example1 is looking for players for an open-ended one-year per ruler succession game, non looping"
"Example 2 is looking for 3 players for looping one-year succession game, 12 years"
etc

Current Games
 Endfall
  Kook, Nacker, Architect, Murder101 (full)
   yr5 as of 09/22/09 (open ended)
   *link to update page*
 Hailnation
  Goober, LosingIsFun, Kevlar, EndtimeProfessor, ... (one-year non-looping)
   yr1 as of 10/01/09
   *link to update page*
   *apply*
 Glazespray
  OtherPlayer, Offal (1 needed)
   has not begun
   *no log available*
   *apply*


etc.
Applicants would leave a note and/or contact info from the link for the game leader and/or participants via PM or email and (most likely) be accepted. We're all very accepting people.

I think with an organized system like this, playing DF succession any way you want would be a breeze! With a short program to handle mathematics and another to format output and the page/Newsletter, it would be largely hands-off.

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