Bay 12 Games Forum

The Protractor certainly helped me get close to other planets faster, and with luck my first flight to Eve actually succeeded. However, the same lightning hasn't struck twice, and since then I haven't gotten to the planets precisely enough. If the protractor helps you get into the general vicinity of the planet, how do you make the final fine tunings for the rendezvous?

How do you hit the gravity of other planets? I have made a rocket that can easily reach Eves orbit, but even getting the ships orbit close enough to the orbit of the planet seems so difficult that I must be missing something vital. Is there a way to see where the two orbits would be closest to each other? Or how do you hit the planets orbits?

I for one would love a pony mod, even if it was just the modified anatomy. Ponies in LCS would fit perfectly in the sugar apocalypse genre!

My modding experience is limited to reading the source files, so at least I could help with names and locations.

I think multi-tile creatures would have separate parts of their body in each tile. For example, a dragon might have its whole uppoer body in one tile, and lower body with its organs and appendages in another one that follows it like a mule follows a trader. A tall creature would be a stack of upper body on top of lower body. That would be an easy solution for two-tile creatures or giant snakes, but I've come to expect more throughout solutions from Toady.

The narrow entrances stopping large creatures is completely realistic, and turtling underground works only because the fortresses can currently be unrealistically self-sufficient. When we become more dependant of food produced by hill dwarves, we'll have more reason to drive off all kinds of blockades.

The genetics make sense in standard settings, but things like color and markings of technicolor ponies would require a way to override the basic behavior. Things like sunglasses would also be better off completely randomized for each creature that has them.

"If you launch a wooden minecart towards the ocean at a sufficient speed, you can have your entire dwarf sail away in an ark."

That quote inspired me to do some !!SCIENCE!! on what happens when a dwarf leaves your fortress alive. The fortress of Shiphopper was built for a simple purpose: build a cart track on the edge of the map, and launch the dwarves past the border. The site was selected to contain a river and a shore, for two extra types of borders in case more experimentation would be needed.

For testing platform, a 10z ramp was built as close to the map edge as possible.

First test with an empty cart was a disappointment. The cart gains good speed along the track, but stops immediately on the map edge.

Second test with a ramp one tile away from the edge, same result. The fact that the cart appears on the ground immediately points to a ramp construction error.

For the third test, the old ramp was demolished with one acceptable casualty, and a new one built further away to allow a wall piece behind the launch ramp. The acceleration ramp, now 16 z-levels, was enough to launch the minecart against the map edge at 4 z-level height, at which the cart stopped and dropped straight down to the ground.

Fourth test was a manned cart, launched against the map edge. At the impact, the cart fatally crushed its passenger, who flew an additional 1 z-level before losing grasp of his axe and falling down with the cart. In mid air, the dwarf continued to take hits from both the minecart and his own falling axe. When hitting the ground level, he got propelled away by the force of the blow, instantly teleporting two squares west and unexpectedly turning into a a peasant and displaying his color in white. After two more steps he teleported two squares back east, skidding along the ground and slamming into an obstacle. He teleported two squares west again, this time maintaining his description as a woodcutter and coming to rest.

The test was repeated with a peasant, who in the air was shown in bright cyan. In the air, he proceeded to get pummeled by the minecart, and oddly enough, himself. Upon reaching round, he too got pummeled by the cart, yet died without other anomalies.



The fifth test was over before I realized the expedition leader had gotten the cart to the top of the ramp. It was too late to take notes, other than typical bruising and death.

The sixth test was another one with a peasant, this time promoted to bookkeepper to further study the effects of falling on the dwarven profession colors. Upon hitting the border, he produced a spattering of blood while still airborne. Upon landing, he got mangled by the cart three times before coming to rest and dying.

With two dwarves remaining, the seventh test was supposed to be about a cart bumping into a dwarf standing on the tracks. However, during the redesigns of the launch ramp, the second to last dwarf got hit by a falling rail segment and died of suffocation. The last dwarf then went insane, marking the end of Shiphopper in the early summer of 251. Strangely, the legends show the last member of the test team being slain with a copper battle axe. As the message of settlements crumbling ended the game, there was no way to see what exactly happened to him.

edit: forgot the quote

I think the diamond megabeast rule "must still be killable" can be extended here in form of "it must be able to win and survive a battle, even if its against another one of its kind".