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Messages - j.brigante

Pages: [1] 2 3
1
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: Ahhhh
« on: January 29, 2007, 10:52:00 pm »
separate levers must be the cause, then... my entrance hall has a setup which goes like this, on a redux version (the actual hall also features an excessively complicated, and mostly useless, set of fortifications):

code:
  
       #~#
       #~#
########~######
#______X~X____#
#_###########_###
#_#.........._..#
#_#.........._..#
#_#.........._..#
#___........._..#
###_........._..#
..._........BBBBB
..._........BBBBB
###_........._..#
#___........._..#
#_#.........._..#
#X#.........._..#
#.#.........._..#
#............_..#
#################


- a permanent, natural channel brings water from the cave river (the "~"s on the top are the permanently filled channel tiles);

- the two floodgates that fork out are activated by separate levers; the one to the right is always open, and fills the channel that passes under a drawbridge (the "B"s), and the one to the left, when activated, fills the "back-moat", trapping everyone inside and filling the channel up to the third floodgate, the one on the lower left corner;

- that third floodgate, when activated, floods the room.

when I activated the entire trap - first floodgate already open, raise the drawbridge, wait for the hostiles to get in, open the second floodgate, trap them inside, open the third and drown the bastards - everything worked. sweet. then I closed the third floodgate, but nothing happened. the room was still flooded. uh-oh. close the second, still nothing. only when I closed ALL the three floodgates everything dried. there you go, partial, controlled (?), if somewhat bonkers, and completely useless, reversible permaflood. all because of separate levers.


2
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: Ahhhh
« on: January 29, 2007, 12:49:00 am »
also, build channels in the outer limits of the area to be flooded, before the doors. channels halt floods, and someone WILL drop a rock that will block a farm zone door sooner or later.

XXXXXXXX.X
X.....XX.X
X.....XX.X
F....._D.X
X.....XX.X
X.....XX.X
XXXXXXXX.X

Xs are the walls. ("doh! floodgate invasion!" duh.)
F is the "destination" floodgate.
the 5x5 room is the area to be flooded.
_ is a channel.
D is a door.
the corridor to the right is the rest of your fortress - the area you don't want flooded. even if the door is left open, the flood will never go beyond the channel.


3
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: Build Order?
« on: January 28, 2007, 09:50:00 pm »
Er, I thought supply/demand rules were already in place? I mean, in my current fortress I have more than 3000 portions of prepared meals, and as a consequence even the masterpiece ones are dirt cheap - the "prices" screen always shows prepared meals at 50% of the base price, but I'd say it looks more like 10% or 5% by now; even the occasional peasant "claims" a three-bar syrup roast. Though, I admit, my peasants are somewhat overpaid.

4
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: Build Order?
« on: January 27, 2007, 09:09:00 am »
Yeah, masons and crafters en masse can clear your main fortress of rocks in a few years, and trained siege operators not only dispose of rocks in an efficient way, they also earn good money doing so.

As for "what next", I find that magma smelters/forges as soon as possible are a good idea - I always put a huge cassiterite/malachite stockpile near the magma river so my metalsmiths can churn out lots of bronze equipment (mostly armor, spears for both the military and the weapon traps, and whatever else the human caravan wants - and crossbow bolts, too, should I want to send the marksdwarves to target practice on the local wildlife).

After having enough bronze bars for all eternity, switch the smelters to steel (for when your armor/weaponsmiths are reasonably trained - and don't forget the hematite/coal/limestone stockpiles!) and silver/gold/platinum for expensive, showy furniture and statues - and coins, should you want to start the economy (if all of your bedrooms are smoothed, 3x3, three-bar-furniture rooms, everyone would be evicted in a season because no-one would be able to pay the rent).

Also very important: clothes. Start making clothes. LOTS of clothes. You'll need looms (which, thankfully, are somewhat automated) and clothesmaker's workshops. Not only it will (hopefully) keep all of your dwarves fully dressed, it'll also create lots of jobs.

And some optional stuff, should you want to maximize your food output/food producion control: build kitchens and farmer's workshops, and plant some sweet pods. Dwarves won't eat sweet pods, nor the unprepared syrup you make from the sweet pods at the farmer's workshop; but you can turn all the syrup into prepared meals, which give happiness boosts and can come in up to 80-sized stacks (sometimes even more) should it be made mostly of barrels of syrup - and that means your food stockpiles won't need to be huge even after you've produced obscene amounts of food. Place a prepared meals stockpile in the middle of your dining hall, and don't forget to assign a few dedicated food haulers, or else the food will rot before leaving the kitchen - but that's rare. Another good thing with syrup is that, although it is processed into barrels, you have a greater control than with plants being put in barrels - with syrup, barrels are constantly being filled AND emptied, so most of the free barrels will be used for booze instead of plants/seeds/whatever else they always try to put into barrels. And anytime you run out of barrels, just suspend syrup-making for a moment and the kitchens will free up some of the syrup-filled ones, which the stills will promptly claim. Of course, you WILL need more (many more) barrels eventually, but your stills will never grind to a prolonged halt.


5
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Fey immigrant
« on: January 22, 2007, 12:30:00 pm »
First spring wave, an arriving craftsdwarf enters a fey mood before setting foot into the fortress and makes himself a felsite trumpet... instant legendary stone crafter, but I wonder, should a dwarf enter a strange mood THAT quickly? Was he so amazed at the sight of the entrance door? There was an insane amount of movement on the outside, since I was scrambling to get the road done before summer while fending off some elephants a bit to the north, maybe that triggered something? No fancy decorations on the trumpet to tell.

6
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: Food hauling crisis unavoidable?
« on: January 28, 2007, 01:17:00 pm »
Yeah, stockpiles right near the farms made it a non-issue... except for meat bought from the caravans, which always rots. But everything else was just bad design from my part, now things have been going so well that I have food stockpiles enough to feed 150+ dwarves for years, and a bunch of experienced growers (including one legendary) who produce more food than I'll ever need. Four growers working on six 5x5 farm plots, I believe, and it has been much more than enough. (and with House Ber pushing farming wages up - specially when nearing spring - they're millionaires, without ever doing anything else but planting and harvesting).

7
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Re: Food hauling crisis unavoidable?
« on: January 22, 2007, 12:22:00 pm »
I just found out that the best solution is to have the farms and the kitchen/stockpiles all next to each other, and not obscenely far from the trade depot if one wants to buy mountains of food.

another discovery is that a no-plump-helmets policy helps, too: no more stupid dwarves scrambling for seeds all over the fortress. sticking to booze and syrup keeps food from being mismanaged, and "forces" everyone to go for the prepared meals - happiness-boosting, high-quality meals, no less. at least until the economy starts, when I'll assing a novice cook to cheap biscuit production.


8
DF Dwarf Mode Discussion / Food hauling crisis unavoidable?
« on: January 21, 2007, 07:56:00 pm »
I had this extremely well-planned fortress going on - defensive structures before the river, some temporary quarters before the chasm, and almost everything else between the chasm and the magma river. Workshops near the dining hall which had direct access to my kitchens/stills/food stockpiles (and with a big booze/prepared food stockpile in the middle of the tables), and quarters all around. At least one dedicated, experienced brewer and cook working full-time (not even "health care" and "cleaning" turned on) while novices took care of the other kitchens and stills, and food haulers kept things from becoming cluttered. But alas, this fortress, like the one before, was to face starvation problems, and this time it wasn't my fault.

It seems to me that the first problem was that, having placed my farms near the river, everyone would drop the harvested plants in the middle of the hall when hauling everything to the big food stockpile in the heart of the fortress, because they ALWAYS decided midway that they should do something else. An entire crop withered this way. I could (and can, and will) build new farms after the chasm in my next fortress, but still, how annoying - and it won't solve the greatest food-related problem with post-chasm fortresses, which is that buying food becomes useless - apparently all that meat bought at premium price from the human caravan will always rot, unless one transforms the entire main hall of the fortress in a series of food stockpiles with the "take from" option, hopefully, making the haulers bring it all the way to the kitchen. Now, that wouldn't be a problem if the human caravan brought food in barrels - I really wouldn't like to lose 100+ pieces of meat this way again.

Anyway, I got so annoyed that I opened the pits and watched every single stupid dwarf burn. But hey, at least I got to see my top wrestler, not yet elite, strangle a demon to death - and become elite in the process. Alas, he was torn apart seconds later when trying to take on two demons at once.

EDIT: I forgot to add that, after a point, my cook started to hunt for ingredients fortress-wide instead of taking what was right next to him. Maybe because I had a seed stockpile near the farms, and had allowed cooking plump helmet spawns?

[ January 21, 2007: Message edited by: j.brigante ]


9
DF Gameplay Questions / Re: Taking a year long vacation from farming?
« on: February 04, 2007, 02:01:00 am »
you can never have too much food. if there's a thing you need done, it's barrels. I mean, you're going to brew all these plants, aren't ya? not to mention that all these tasks you mentioned can be done in less than a season by two or three dwarves, maybe less. there's no reason to stop farming.

10
DF Gameplay Questions / Re: How many workshops should I plan for?
« on: January 30, 2007, 04:09:00 pm »
quote:
I never have more than 1 jeweller, 1 butcher, 1 tanner, 1 loom, and 1 clothesmaker

oh, c'mon, my 5 looms and 5 clothesmakers are creating lots of jobs (and clothes!)   :eek:

quote:
I hit magma, then I build two smelters and two forges

again, I must have some 6 or 7 smelters and at least 4 forges... good for training smiths without getting in the way of anything; I assign one forge to a potential weaponsmith, one to a potential armorsmith, some smelters to "make bronze bars", and some others to "melt item" on repeat. this way the training smiths can forge an obscene amount of armor and weapons which almost immediately gets melted so some of the metal can be used again, not to mention that it keeps the training forges from becoming obscenely cluttered... at least for a while.


11
DF Gameplay Questions / Booze thieves?
« on: January 29, 2007, 06:22:00 pm »
What is this with dwarves running away from the dining hall with barrels of booze so they can drink somewhere else? And what's even more odd, usually they go to some random noble's office, if not to even more bizarre places. One of them even left the fortress, took the road and was already past the river when he decided to eat something and went back inside. Any thoughts?

12
DF Gameplay Questions / Re: Ahh, what a lovely da-BLEAAARGH
« on: January 29, 2007, 06:16:00 pm »
Yeah, I always lock horses inside horse meat roasts.

Not to mention that horse bones give quite a reasonable number of arrows for your marksdwarves to practice with.


13
DF Gameplay Questions / Ahh, what a lovely da-BLEAAARGH
« on: January 27, 2007, 04:16:00 pm »
The entrance to the fortress is filled with vomit, because almost everyone that is "on break" goes outside all the time despite "being nauseated by the sun", and despite the fact that there's a magnificent statue garden inside. Am I missing something? Are they doing that on purpose so their ale-filled stomachs become empty again so they can drink some more? Is this the result of serving +cat tallow roast+ for dinner?

14
DF Gameplay Questions / Re: The Elite Wheelchair Division
« on: January 27, 2007, 05:22:00 pm »
Ookpik: agreed.

In other news, the latest "high-level wrestler" was suffocated during a sparring session. SUFFOCATED. Next thing, they'll start attaching people to the ceiling and making elite piņatas out of their sparring partners.


15
DF Gameplay Questions / Re: The Elite Wheelchair Division
« on: January 26, 2007, 04:22:00 pm »
OK, so another elite wrestler is victim of a potentially career-ending injury (brain, light gray).

I believe that had I given them axes, I'd have the "Elite Bite-and-munch Squad" by now, since they'd probably find a way to get their limbs chopped off by complete amateurs in no time. Anyway, they'll have a chance to prove themselves when I decide to open the pits - I've seen an almost-elite wrestler bring down a demon the only time I went that far (and wearing only bronze chain armor!), maybe they'll be of some use in the end.


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