Bay 12 Games Forum

Well the 120 rodent people are starting to go insane due to mainly to boredom but also remembered trauma. I found one of them stumbling around oblivious. What drew my attention was two of them trying to murder each other. So that’s a berserker. And it explains why I found two corpses at the bottom of a 40+ level underground cliff. I am still going to build a weapon-trap-filled corridor to directly clear them out, because they are sending my frame rate into single figures.

That's good to know, because from my experience they can linger for very long time, and new wave can spawn without the previous one dissipating (so there can be hundreds of them simultaneously). I have a bunch, about 60, spawned behind trees in narrow corridors, so they cannot attack me, nor can I easily attack them. I know about them only thanks to DFHack, so they are unrevealed. Maybe revealing them would cause them to start getting insane.

As for finding corpses of rodent men and other animal people, they are attacked by forgotten beasts and other wildlife, that may be other reason for... corpses.

I would suggest hauling enabled only for selected, and select all (or almost all, see below). Once you need something done in bigger quantity, like engraving slabs, disable the hauling for the dwarfs you need for the job. After some time you probably will settle on a particular setting and won't touch it again, or for long time.

Now, I suggest disabling the hauling from the beginning for dwarves who have a particular fondness for items you want for specific purposes, like trade. That is because haulers of items which they have preference for will occasionally "acquire" this item, owning it, and making unavailable for other jobs from now on. I have hauling disabled for coin lovers, for example.

Regarding the priorities, dwarves don't wait for suspended job before doing next one, but the item needed for that job is RESERVED for it, and won't be used for another job, unless this first job is completed or cancelled.

Whether they do something or not is not depended on any order on any list, but on priority and distance. For example dumping close is done much faster, and with high priority, compared to dumping items located far away (which can be selected by job scheduler, not picked up by a dwarf, and dropped, only to be scheduled some time again later).

Also, if you have ghost problems, I would suggest forgetting coffins for now, prioritising engraving and setting slabs. You can create zone over a coffin later, and even if the corpse is a skeleton, it will "claim" the zone and then some dwarf will bury it.

I prepare rows of coffins early in the life of the fortress, with space set for future slabs under each coffin (rooms 10x10, but 50 coffins in each), and enable a 1x1 grave zone on a first coffin in a row. When a need arises I create a second zone, or further ones. Slabs are technically not needed then, but I think them a nice touch (they tell who the deceased was, for my citizens). Other set of rooms is reserved for each historical figure which is not buried (like invaders or my war animals with kills, or forgotten beasts). There I set slabs for them. If I was overwhelmed by deaths, I would create and build slabs first, and then build the coffins in the reserved spaces.

Giant flies are like that too.  I've never checked their size but they're big enough to kick dwarves to death in a single blow, though that's maybe not that unexpected with Dwarf Fortress combat.

They also come in swarms and can fly.  Cut down the trees in untamed wilds at your own risk.

I had encounters with them in v.0.47. They were scary, but they have one weakness - they are very susceptible to anti-aircraft fire (i.e. marksdwarves). Often only one shot is enough to remove their ability to fly, which causes them to plummet to the ground in a spectacular and deadly fashion.

As for size, it seems they are 10x bigger than they should, based on RAWs. For comparison, the big insects or spiders are 10x bigger than the infamous Giant Cave Spider (which has its size explicitly stated, not recalculated based on a smaller animal).

Quote from: Saiko Kila on November 04, 2023, 04:20:09 pm

Quote from: Samten on November 01, 2023, 03:05:52 pm

I’m having a problem designing the minecart repeater for spike traps. Are such repeaters possible in Steam version? (btw, my repeaters for doors work perfectly - 4-tick delay between open and close (good for markdwarf’s training, not so good for FPS). But for some reason I’ve got no luck with spikes).

In my design a minecart enters the “C” pressure plate, starting the 40-tick count towards “retract” condition. About 10 ticks later it leaves the pressure plate, starting the 140-tick count towards “extend” condition. Then, after about 20 ticks, the “extend” signal comes from the “A” pressure plate. The spikes extend without problem. But then, after about 10 ticks, the 40-tick period from pressure plate “C” comes to end… but the spikes do not retract :-(
Could you please advice what am I doing wrong?

I use the same repeater as with pre-Premium versions and it works the same:

The only problem I had was with creating impulse ramps, because I couldn't find explicit "construct track-ramp of given directions" in Premium, and had to use wonky "intelligent" designer. This in turn required making temporary holes on a level above, and designing in specific order (before building track stops) which was not required in older versions.

I'm not sure about your tick counts. This particular repeater does one cycle in about 174 ticks (any above ~150 ticks is good), after hitting the pressure plate, 40 ticks after, the spikes are retracted, stay this way for ~100 ticks (after the minecart leaves the plate, about 6 ticks after hitting it), and then spring back up (potentially hitting targets). Then they wait for the next signal from pressure plate. The minecart moves counter-clockwise here.

I’m sorry, have not noticed your reply on time.

Just to explain my first post, I was trying to make sort of “lightspeed” repeater for spikes. Of course, it is no problem to make a regular repeater for full cycle of spike movement - retract after 40 ticks (starting from the moment the minecart enters the pressure plate) and extend after 140 ticks (starting from the moment the minecart exits the pressure plate).
The point is to shorten some of this time. I do remember somebody on this forum wrote about his repeater, which was calibrated in such way that the spikes showed only for 1 tick and retracted immediately… cannot find this post now. So far I’ve got no luck creating the same concept on Steam version. I can show what I mean in detail with photos in the next post if you want.
Do your repeater solves my problem or it is the basic “full spike cycle” repeater?

So you want to use some eploity super-fast repeaters? It wasn't clear to be honest, I understood you had problems with normal repeaters.

Nah, with only one pressure plate, it triggers as I wrote, standard cycle. However, you can add more plates (I use about ten usually, and up to twenty or so), which shortens the time between retracting (it's still quire irregular, with a pattern repeating after several rounds, and the shortest average time of cycle I got was ~49 ticks). But with this repeater you cannot go for one-tick spikes (which I don't believe is possible, because there seems to be some latency with spikes... unless I mix some signals).

If you could find that quick repeater for spikes I would be interested too, but I don't remember such solutions.

Merchant animals are not setting traps, only wild and hostile animals are, by default. You could check the Others tab (Creatures/Others) and see, if they are Friendly or Merchant, they won't set traps. If they are Hostile or Wild Animal, they will. Now, you say that they were wild animals. Normally animals from killed merchant are not listed as wild, but there may be some bug, and they are listed as such, still counting as merchant. Can't say without a save.

There is also a mechanism of "known traps", not sure if in play there, but hostiles from a civilisation which knows your traps (which were observed by a diplomat) are immune to the known traps. To make a trap unknown it is enough to destroy and rebuild it, even with the same materials and in the same place. Maybe you could try this angle in the future.

I’m having a problem designing the minecart repeater for spike traps. Are such repeaters possible in Steam version? (btw, my repeaters for doors work perfectly - 4-tick delay between open and close (good for markdwarf’s training, not so good for FPS). But for some reason I’ve got no luck with spikes).

In my design a minecart enters the “C” pressure plate, starting the 40-tick count towards “retract” condition. About 10 ticks later it leaves the pressure plate, starting the 140-tick count towards “extend” condition. Then, after about 20 ticks, the “extend” signal comes from the “A” pressure plate. The spikes extend without problem. But then, after about 10 ticks, the 40-tick period from pressure plate “C” comes to end… but the spikes do not retract :-(
Could you please advice what am I doing wrong?

I use the same repeater as with pre-Premium versions and it works the same:


The only problem I had was with creating impulse ramps, because I couldn't find explicit "construct track-ramp of given directions" in Premium, and had to use wonky "intelligent" designer. This in turn required making temporary holes on a level above, and designing in specific order (before building track stops) which was not required in older versions.

I'm not sure about your tick counts. This particular repeater does one cycle in about 174 ticks (any above ~150 ticks is good), after hitting the pressure plate, 40 ticks after, the spikes are retracted, stay this way for ~100 ticks (after the minecart leaves the plate, about 6 ticks after hitting it), and then spring back up (potentially hitting targets). Then they wait for the next signal from pressure plate. The minecart moves counter-clockwise here.

The necros are that way because Mother Nature made them that way

Seriously though, my visiting necros don't behave as such, they don't reanimate a few skeletons I left in the courtyard (for science), even if their towers are warring with me and sending experiments and intelligent undead made by the same necromancers during next siege. They (the necros, not the zombies) just go to the tavern or church and socialise. Like, maybe some necromancers are more polite than others?

Has anyone else found that aquifers seem to be a lot more frequent in Premium DF worlds? Maybe I've just been unlucky, but I feel like I've had a lot more trouble lately finding embark sites that are free of an aquifer.

I haven't found an aquifer in Premium yet (I suppose there is one on a beach embark, but that is expected, I have yet to dig it), so... Maybe your preferred locations just have kind of stone which supports aquifers?