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[Atomic Chicken]

Hello Bay12ers! I am back from hiatus and I bring with me a new challenge for the community:
create a combination lock and show us your design!
Such a creation will surely be a worthy contribution to dwarven technology and security; a wondrous machine for protecting socks from undeserving thieves by securing the vault from those without knowledge of the correct combination required to open it.

Requirements:
1.Activating a number of levers/pressure plates (levers are preferred, as pressure plates don't work well in adventure mode if discovered*) in a set sequence causes the vault's door to open.
2.The sequence should feature at least 3 levers/pressure plates, the more the dwarfier.
3.Can be reset after both correct and incorrect attempts at opening. We wouldn't want our vault to remain open forever after withdrawing a single sock, now would we? And we definitely wouldn't want some forgetful dwarf permanently sealing off the vault by inputting an incorrect combination.
4.The use of creature logic gates is discouraged, as these currently do not work in adventurer mode, and so *would be a blow to players who come here seeking combination locks for their adventurer dungeons. (all pets die instantly and all other creatures scatter around randomly upon abandoning the fortress).

Bonus Points:
1.Causes a penalty (such as flooding the room with magma) when levers/pressure plates are activated in incorrect order .
2.Although this is Dwarf Fortress, where it is usually mandatory for projects to be overly-complicated, this certain challenge encourages you to try to keep things simple, as I would like combination locks to be an addition to fortresses and not megaprojects in themselves. Don't worry though, your superdwarfputers will still be accepted if they can get the job done.

Also, here's a tip for those who wish to use combination locks as adventurer challenges:

Since adventurers can look at levers to count the number of mechanisms attached, dummy links should be added to some levers to mislead or equalize.

Once you have designed a working combination lock, post a couple of screenshots/diagrams of it as well as a short description of how it works. A save file containing a prototype of your lock will also be greatly appreciated (but is not necessary).

Good luck! Science is waiting.

Entries:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Water-Based
1.Larix -Revised Version
2.itg
3.evictedSaint

Minecart-Based
1.Larix- continues here
2.Button
3.Ravendarksky:1, 2, 3, 4, 5

[Ilnar3]

Small? Not a chance,
This isn't minecraft!

[wierd]

This isnt that hard to do, but to do it right, and avoid the equivalent of an exploit, you DO need to slow the lever reaction time down.

This is because the levers are booleans, and the result of one lever can toggle the value, but not the state, of another lever. (two levers linked to the same bridge-- Throw one, the lever is down, the bridge is down. Throw the other, the levers are both down, but the bridge is up! this means there are many possible solutions if directly driven!)

This means to ensure parity of the lever's states with the lever's values, you need to have the levers control individual bridges someplace else, and use water pressure plates to actually open the door(s), then use  another plate just passed the entrance door to trigger the drains, and slam the door behind the adventurer.

Alternatives to magma and water, are dropped ceilings, release of deadly monsters, and being buried under XXSOCKSXX.
(all can be included in the same trap!)

[Button]

Challenge accepted.

What should I put behind the combination-locked door, comrades?

[Drazinononda]

Challenge accepted.

What should I put behind the combination-locked door, comrades?

You should place an artifact mug (i.e. the 'holy grail') in keeping with the increasingly Indiana Jones-like theme, what with wrong combinations being potentially fatal and all.

[Bigheaded]

Seeing you can link multiple elements to one lever, a simple idea:



Magma-> Bridge1-> Bridge2->Levers 1,2,3 <-Bridge 3<-Bridge 4 <- Magma

let us suggest correct order is 2,3,1, and that selecting any in the incorrect order will cause death.
Lever 2 causes bridge 2 to change.
Level 3 causes bridge's 1,2,3 to change.
Level 1 causes Bridges 3 + 4 to change.

So lets test in correct order:
Lever 2 used:
bridge two: allowing magma to cross. None reaches it because it is blocked by raised bridge 1
Lever 3 used:
Bridge one is now allowing magma to cross. Bridge two is now raised and lets magma drop off into the level below. Bridge 3 is letting magma cross, but bridge 4 not raised yet so nothing reaches it
Level 1 used: Bridge 4 now allows magma to cross, Bridge 3 does not.
so would be
Magma,->bridge 1 (magma allowed across), bridge 2 (magma can't pass) lever room Bridge 3 (magma cant pass), bridge 4 (magma allowed across)

Using Lever 1 or 3 first, will allow magma to cross immediately (and preferably lock you into the lever room)
Using level 2 then 1 will let the bridges 3 + 4 cross to reach you still and burn you alive


I may attempt this, but may not, i hope this makes sense in writing, if not i may have to attempt it in game, and allow save access.

Just attempted, ye, i think weird typo'd it, and to say that if 1 lever is pulled attached to a bridge, it goes down, but getting another lever pulled will leave it stayed down, only when all of them are off will it go up again.

[Button]

So I'm still designing and I have a question: do water wheel perpetual motion generators work in adventure mode? If yes, I presume the adventurer needs to kick-start the generator?

[Larix]

How about this (made after mulling about this thread, fiddling with some stuff on my site and just being bored waiting for my miners to finish excavating the 20x21x20 empty area for the cast-obsidian wing):


and opened correctly:


(There's an aquifer below this level, otherwise the lock wouldn't work properly.)

The two levers to the north (olivine and kimberlite) are only accessible through a mechanism-operated hatch cover. The hatch is opened by pulling the bismuth bronze lever, which also switches the gearbox to the west to engaged, turning the pumps on. The door to the vault (stocked with my artefact finished goods by now) is operated by the olivine lever, but the same lever _also_ opens the door in the lever's corridor. The inevitable flooding can be avoided by opening the hatch cover, which is of course also lever-operated, by the cinnabar lever, which once again opens the door leading into its own corridor. The hatch cover in the southern corridor is operated by the kimberlite lever, and it's all that lever actually does.

So the proper order of operation is bismuth bronze - kimberlite - cinnabar - olivine. You can of course switch the cinnabar lever as much as you like as long as the bismuth bronze one is off, but that won't achieve much; when you activate the bismuth bronze one to first open access to the olivine and kimberlite levers, the cinnabar lever _must_ be turned off.

PS: well, of course it can't be properly reset when you mess up the combination; you'd have to stop the pump and punch open a wall to drain the corridors. I guess you _could_ install a water-activated pressure plate or two (possibly single-use) to serve as emergency shutdown - disengage the pumps, open the drainage hatches, and close an extra blast door to shut off the vault, so people don't 'hack' it by deliberately entering the wrong combination.

[UnlawfullyDeranged]

Challenge accepted.

What should I put behind the combination-locked door, comrades?

You should place an artifact mug (i.e. the 'holy grail') in keeping with the increasingly Indiana Jones-like theme, what with wrong combinations being potentially fatal and all.

Or a vampire-blood-infected-well, necromancer slab/book, danger room, and artifact steel and adamantine armor and weapon(s). Basically a one-stop-shop for awesome adventuring. Assuming this is all possible to create in fortress mode and use in adventure mode, of course.

[itg]

I have a design I'll have to wait until tonight to try. I'll do my best to describe it.

There are N levers, and above your head are N-1 vertical shafts of doom, most likely meaning magma, but for clarity's sake, we'll set N=4, so that's 4 levers and 3 shafts. The magma supply to each shaft is cut off by a floodgate for each lever and a raising drawbridge. All lever start in the off position, meaning all floodgates are up and all bridges are down. I'll go shaft by shaft:

Shaft 1:

Lever 1 raises the bridge, cutting off magma. Levers 2-4 are linked to the floodgate. Thus you will release the magma and melt if you pull any lever before lever 1.

Shaft 2:

Lever 2 raises the bridge. Levers 3-4 are linked to the floodgate. You will die if you pull levers 3-4 before lever 2. You may safely pull lever 1, but you are dead if have not already pulled it.

Shaft 3:

Lever 3 raises the bridge. Lever 4 is linked to the floodgate. If you pull 4 instead you die, etc, etc.

Lever 4:

Pulling this opens all floodgates, but all bridges will be up if you pulled all the other levers. It also opens the vault and raises a bridge to seal you in while the vault is open.

Reset after a failed attempt would require a master lever somewhere else and a drain in the floor.

This design could easily be modified to kill you only after pulling all levers by adding a second set of floodgates to the shafts controlled only by the final lever. My primary concern is that if an adventurer just pulls all the levers really fast, the system might not release enough magma to kill him reliably.

[fricy]

Seeing you can link multiple elements to one lever, a simple idea:
...
Just attempted, ye, i think weird typo'd it, and to say that if 1 lever is pulled attached to a bridge, it goes down, but getting another lever pulled will leave it stayed down, only when all of them are off will it go up again.

Yeah, bridges/doors/etc don't work like that, they have on ON/OFF state, another ON signal won't switch them back. However you could build something like that with gears, they switch on any signal.

[wierd]

I distinctly remember this from 6 fortresses ago, or so.  It was pre .34 though, so that might explain.

I had a growing chamber for spore trees that I had set up that was fed by a local brook, which spilled into a controlled flooding cistern for said growing room.

It had 2 levers, connected to 6 floodgates.

Lever one was connected to floodgates 1 and 2, which adjoined the brook, something like this:

Code: [Select]

Wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww
Wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww
Wwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww
O=====X=X=============O
|____________________________|
|____________________________|
|____________________________|
|____________________________|   / /
O===XX=========XX=====O
|____________________________|
|____________________________|
|____________________________|
|____________________________|
O=====================O

Lever 2 linked to all 6 gates, due to an administrative lapse of judgement. (Whoops!)

Lever one opens the 2 top gates, as expected.
Cistern fills with water.
Lever one is thrown again. Gates close.
Lever two opens all six gates!
"OMG! WTF!" As water rushes into the growing chamber in too large of a quantity.
Lever one is pulled again. It's toggle state shows it unthrown though!
Top two gates close, bottom 4 are open. Water leaves the cistern.
"Whew! That was close!"
Throw lever 2.
Top two gates open, bottom four close, cistern fills.
"Whaaaat?!"
Throw lever 1 again, top two gates close.
"Ok, what's going on here?"
(Plays with both levers, realizes that lever 2 is linked to all six gates.)
"Ohh! Ooops!"

True story.

I don't know if it works with bridges, but it definatey does (or did) with floodgates.

[Button]

I could have sworn that bridges would switch state on lever toggle, as long as the second lever was pulled after the first switch had completed.

If they actually do stay up until all of their component levers are turned off, then that makes my design much easier. (I set myself the additional challenge that my design has to be extensible to an arbitrary number of levers.)

[itg]

My impression was that pulling a lever sends an on or off signal when you switch it on or off respectively. The bridge then turns on or off regardless of the state of any other linked levers. of course, if the bridge is in the same state as the signal it receives, it does nothing.

Example:

Initially, the bridge is down and both linked levers are off.

Lever 1 is pulled and the bridge raises.
Lever 2 is pulled and nothing happens.
Lever 2 is pulled again and the bridge drops.

[Larix]

Yeah, from what i can say, that's how levers and pressure plates work for everything apart from gear assemblies (those toggle status everytime they receive a signal): a lever or plate doesn't do anything if it isn't pulled or has its load significantly changed - its _position_ doesn't matter for the position of linked machinery. If a lever is pulled or a plate depressed (or if it resets, 100 steps after the engagement condition stopped), it sends a single signal, either 'on' or 'off', and that _signal_ affects linked machinery. And until a new signal is sent (from this or another trigger mechanism), nothing will change.

An open door is not actively 'held open' by a lever (or even a hundred levers) in open position; if it receives a single close signal, no matter from which source, it will close.

It's messier with bridges and other delayed-reaction triggerable buildings, because they appear to simply ignore any new input during the 100 steps between receiving a signal and acting on it.