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[Crashmaster]

After 62 years the Severe Tools have completed "The Black Cauldron." It occupies the top of the obsidian cap cast over the volcano, The Furnace of Robustness, that houses the Magma Hammer that protects Stormrack.

It is a featureless column 43 Urists in diameter and 44 z-levels tall. The bottom 3 z-levels that house the Magma Hammer are of cast obsidian. The Black Cauldron itself is a full 41 (nearly) identical z-levels of unsupported obsidian floodgate rings:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Overseer is acting up for me, won't show floors or walls right. This shot is of partial completion from back when it just didn't show floodgates:

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Even without floor or wall tiles being rendered properly the 41x41 Urist column of free-standing magma on command still gets the idea across:

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Lava wave-front propagation at half-height, 4x3 embark:

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Stonesense series:

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Might be en elf siege soon. I have their princess' corpse.

[Sus]

That's just...
Wow. 

[Trif]

Simple, but effective!

[Sus]

And now for some ‼XXGoblin macemenXX‼...

[Loud Whispers]

How is that refilled?

[expwnent]

Is the whole thing made out of floodgates? How long did it take you to build it in real time?

[GreatWyrmGold]

Simple, but effective!

How is that simple?

[Trif]

Simple, but effective!

How is that simple?

Dwarven trap design doesn't become much simpler than storing huge amounts of lava on top of your fortress and unleashing it all at once. Realizing this trap can still be a huge effort.

Maybe I should just point to this

Spoiler: beautiful picture (click to show/hide)

Simple, but effective!

[Mageziya]

You have made Armok proud.

[Kofthefens]

Well done.

How is that refilled?

I was wondering that too.

[Crashmaster]

It consists of 6888 unsupported obsidian floodgates, linked with some 14112 obsidian mechanisms. The lowest floodgate ring can be controlled seperately from the rest of the tower if desired.

The 50600 cubic Urists of magma is pumped to the top of the tower by three wall-less pump stacks visible inside the ring. They are supplied by three reservoirs filled from the volcano as well as a mamga supply booster pumping from an old project on the floor of the magma sea.

I started the fort in June last year:
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=87053.0
But only got to building the Black Cauldron in January of this year. Total time is hard to guess, the project has been abandoned several times to play adventure mode and new versions, there have been numerous [Dwarf Fortress.exe has stopped working...] crashes, There is a section of the fort I just learned not to loo(k) at due to the crashes, as I preferred to use magma to clean instead of dfhack.

Map for curiosity's sake:
http://mkv25.net/dfma/map-11352-stormrack

It's effectiveness is lessened by the slow speed of un-pumped magma movement, but there is no place on the surface to hide.

Magma Area Denial System update:

The Black Caldron's main weakness - escapability, will potentially be addressed by the addition of project H.A.L.O.
It's construction might make reaching the century-mark unavoidable.

[Crashmaster]

So anyways, more floodgates;

The fort is now in it's 90th year. Project H.A.L.O., or; Heat And Lava Obstacle, is finally complete after much tortuous work.
It is a hollow 3 z-level ring of even more unsupported obsidian floodgates about 88 urists in diameter built around the top three levels of the Black Cauldron's floodgate tower.
Sieges arrives on the uniform, featureless, smoothed obsidian plain. Several others held for months sealed in the fortress' various trap entrances are released.
The main H.A.L.O. lever is pulled.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

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The fill bridge is activated.

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The H.A.L.O. ring and fill bridge upper and lower floors are both exactly the same.

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All magma pumps on, filling begins.

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The magma rushes around the ring both ways filling it quite fast.

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The magma in the fill bridge is removed by extra floodgates built specifically for that purpose.

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Ready to go. (4X3 embark)

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Bombs away!

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Impact area. Some are fleeing, some are attacking.

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The Black Cauldron is released.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Once again the surface is secure.

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Their deaths added to the total of 39000 non-dwarven deaths racked up at Stormrack by the eve of it's centennial. 5400 of which have been killed by a single dwarf.
This fort's been with me so long I need to wrap up all it's tales with a 100-years closing chapter.

The main flaw of the H.A.L.O. is the unreasonably long time it takes magma to free-fall any distance at all. At 40 z-levels it takes a looong time to get to the ground making targeted drops improbable.

[Di]

I like how surface has changed after the completion of this project.

[Matoro]

The surface has turned from green forest into... well, Mordor.

Truly impressive. How is your FPS?

[Fenrisson]

So anyways, more floodgates;

The fort is now in it's 90th year. Project H.A.L.O., or; Heat And Lava Obstacle, is finally complete after much tortuous work.
It is a hollow 3 z-level ring of even more unsupported obsidian floodgates about 88 urists in diameter built around the top three levels of the Black Cauldron's floodgate tower.
Sieges arrives on the uniform, featureless, smoothed obsidian plain. Several others held for months sealed in the fortress' various trap entrances are released.
The main H.A.L.O. lever is pulled.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The fill bridge is activated.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The H.A.L.O. ring and fill bridge upper and lower floors are both exactly the same.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

All magma pumps on, filling begins.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The magma rushes around the ring both ways filling it quite fast.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The magma in the fill bridge is removed by extra floodgates built specifically for that purpose.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Ready to go. (4X3 embark)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Bombs away!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Impact area. Some are fleeing, some are attacking.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The Black Cauldron is released.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Once again the surface is secure.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Their deaths added to the total of 39000 non-dwarven deaths racked up at Stormrack by the eve of it's centennial. 5400 of which have been killed by a single dwarf.
This fort's been with me so long I need to wrap up all it's tales with a 100-years closing chapter.

The main flaw of the H.A.L.O. is the unreasonably long time it takes magma to free-fall any distance at all. At 40 z-levels it takes a looong time to get to the ground making targeted drops improbable.

What kind of tileset is this?

The units look a lot like Battle for Westnoth!