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[vassock]

I want to make a "kill" corridor using spike traps. What are some good ideas? I assume a good idea is to use an airlock with the upright spikes inside of it. Then I just close the drawbridges and wait until the goblins are dead. Any other ideas?

What about the mechanism to activate it? Can I like one lever to 20 upright spike traps? Is there a better way to automate it, such as with water?

[Insert_Gnome_Here]

setting Pull Lever on repeat causes a full cycle every 100 ticks, iirc.

[gestahl]

http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=114695.0

You ccan do it with water if you want and already have power.  Two head-over-tail pumps, pp at lower input that toggles gears poweing each pump, is hooked to spikes, and is hooked to hatch cover on upper output. Initial condition is upper pump powered, lower one off.

That being said I'd rather use cage traps. Yes they are too powerful, but how else am I to collect test subjects?

[omega_dwarf]

setting Pull Lever on repeat causes a full cycle every 100 ticks, iirc.

Works. Idk about specifics of rate, but works to stab things a lot.

As far as entering...I'd actually do something like this:

Code: [Select]

       
ppbbbb__
WW    WW
W      W
(...as deep a hole as you care for...)
W      W
W^^^^^^W
WWWWWWWW


Where W is wall/natural ground, _ is floor, b is retracting bridge tile, p is pressure plate, and ^ is upright spikes. You should make the bridge and pit longer than I drew them.

Invaders come from left. The first in the group trips both pressure plates. One is non-resetting (requires manual reset) and starts the spikes repeating via some minecart or liquid-based repeater. The second auto-resets, and retracts the bridge after a delay. Trapped and ded with one bridge and no manual input.

In case there are any tough blighters that survive the spikes indefinitely because of armor or dodging skill or whatever, the design of the hole is important to keep them from climbing out. Deeper is better (also more likely to knock out or outright kill the invaders); you must smooth the walls that form the side of the pit (no dirt layer traps for you!); and the overhanging lip around the pit's edge is important.

I would also recommend fortifications at the end of the hall for crossbowdwarves, and a way to prevent any who get through that trap from getting into your fort without meeting significant resistance. In the case that the leader of the squad is caught and killed before some members of his squad, the rest of his squad may camp in the area of the pressure plates, potentially holding the bridge open for their squadmates to escape. Those two measures should remedy that.

Trap also has two weaknesses: trapavoiders and fliers. Potentially building destroyers as well. But it works well for general-purpose enemies, and the trapavoiders can be killed still with manual lever action if you time it right. (You should always have backup control levers.)

[PatrikLundell]

I normally use impulse ramp driven mine cart repeaters to drive my menacing spike trap arrays. You can dual control the repeater so that it's started both by a pressure plate and a lever, but I think the pressure plate will just generate a single cycle unless activated repeatedly with sufficient down time in between (you can make single trigger activation with additional effort). I ignore the pressure plate and just close the drawbridges. Thereafter it's just a matter of waiting (unless it's an FB made out of some material too tough for the spikes).
However, I use cage traps for normal invaders (less mess, fewer bolting merchants, and shorter hauling distances) and save the spikes for FBs.

Lever repeat works worse after the jobs rewrite since the dorf now walks away after one pull, thinks about what to do, and then only possibly returns to pull the lever again, rather than keep pulling until tired/hungry.... It's still frequently the case that the next pull comes too fast to trigger the spikes again, though, but the frequency is erratic.

[omega_dwarf]

What if you set the job to high priority and locked them in the lever room?

And also, thralls. You want to use spikes to get rid of thralls.

[PatrikLundell]

I don't think you've got any other priority control over levers than "do now!" which is stress inducing. Locking them in will get them to go back to pulling the lever, however. I'd still use mine carts repeaters, though, especially given than my levers are in my control rooms (one for each cavern/surface/magma sea).
Cages work very well against undead, though.

[celem]

I use something like:

Code: [Select]

OUTSIDE
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^x
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxO^^x
                 O^^x
                 O^^x
    xxxxxxxxxxxxxO^^x
    O ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^x
OOOOO OxxxxxxxxxOOOOO

FORTRESS
O is a wall
x is a raising bridge
^ is a spike

The bridge-walls are raised initially, creating the corridor for the enemies to walk down.  When everything is dead though you usually want to clean-up, and sending a mass of haulers down a 1-tile death corridor takes forever since they spend the majority of their time lying down to get out of each other's way.  So the bridges are all linked to 1-lever, which i pull before switching off my civ burrow, each bridge folds down away from the spikes it is adjacent to and allows you direct access to almost every tile.

Its only failed me once, when dragonfire obliterated the bridges (which are vulnerable when raised regardless of what they are made of)

[Atarlost]

I find wagons path over spikes so make it at least 3 wide and before your depot.  I prefer powered minecart repeaters with multiple power belts and possibly low friction track stops since those allow you to tune the speed after construction if using DFhack so you don't have to get the timing right the first time.  A floodgate after one or more of the rollers linked to the same lever as the power gear controls it.  You can link everything to one pressure plate or have them activate in aesthetically pleasing patterns with multiple plates. 

[PatrikLundell]

I use a serpentine trade depot path with cage trap rows, but that wouldn't exclude the usage of spike arrays in between (I use retracting drawbridges into a cage trap field instead).

[Atarlost]

I use a serpentine trade depot path with cage trap rows, but that wouldn't exclude the usage of spike arrays in between (I use retracting drawbridges into a cage trap field instead).

Large enough monsters won't let bridges retract.  Nothing resists the spike. 

Besides, who ever heard of something menacing with cages?

[PatrikLundell]

Large enough monsters won't stop to camp just before the first trap row, so I don't have to use the retracting bridges against them...and I've had a number of FBs who've resisted my green glass menacing spikes (since I embark in metal free areas, I can't afford to use precious goblinite for spikes, although I tend to produce final stage candy ones for extra tough mimes). Resistant FBs are eliminated using cave-ins. Since my spike arrays are placed in airlocks, I can at least contain the FB to allow me to engineer a cave-in at my own pace.

If you were subjected to the things creatures caught in cages are, you might find them mighty menacing (silk farm target is a favorite usage)!