I think a winch/lift system would be a cool addition to DF. Here are some thoughts.
A dumbwaiter is basically a small elevator used to transport goods over floors.
Let's say you put down a series of "movable floor panels" in your fort. These would basically be floor panels that aren't actually attached to the floor, and allow other stuff to be put on top. In coding this feature, this would probably just internally mark those tiles as "detatched/movable". The game may also want to have a "make room" type function activated from a panel tile to define a connected area of these tiles. I'll refer to this room as the 'lift' below.
On top of the panels we might designate a stockpile, for instance.
Now, channel out some Z-levels above the panels. At the top, build a "winch" and connect to power. Then, connect the winch to the lift in the shaft below (requiring a segment of chain for each tile of distance to be traversed).
At the top and bottom of the shaft, build a lever in the adjoining hallway and link the levers to the winch.
Finally, the lift would have an action available to "Pull lever when full", which when selected would let you link the lift to a lever(s). Whenever 100% of the tiles of the lift have something on them (item, creature, whatever), a dwarf job would be created to make a dwarf come and pull the connected lever. Another job will not be created until at least one of the lift tiles is cleared.
So of course when the lever is pulled the lift travels up or down the shaft -- towards or away from the winch in alternation. Functionally, this effectively removes the lift tiles from a given Z-level and puts them on the next Z-level repeatedly.
Similarly, this setup could be used to make carts that could be pulled across a single Z-level.
So some ideas on what you could do with such a setup:
- Transport large quantities of materials over distances without requiring dwarves to do all the carrying. For example, have 3 stockpiles - one at the bottom of a lift shaft, one at the top, and one on the lift. Set the lift stockpile to take from the bottom stockpile, and the top stockpile to take from the lift stockpile. Could be useful for removing excavated rock more efficiently. Mine cars would be easy to simulate.
- Create a crushing trap that pulls some wall pieces across the map (built on lift tiles) using the winch (could be horizontal or vertical crushing effect).
- Set up a stone processing station (stockpiles, workshops, etc.) on top of a lift. As your exploratory mining mission proceeds down Z-levels, lower the lift to reduce time dwarves spend traveling.
- Nasty defensive complexes of ballistas and fortified marksdwarves that could be raised out of the ground or sky as needed to assault the enemy hordes. A defensive lift one Z-level above the surface could provide a means to attack without the enemy being able to reach your soldiers (they might target the winch or chain)
- Designate an entire section of a fort to be lifted into the sky by a sufficiently powered winch, out of reach of baffled goblin invaders. Or seal the entrance to your fort by lowering a lift on top of it.
- A lift that helps automate the process of sacrificing large numbers of captured creatures into the volcano.
- As an alternative to screwpumps.
Lots of possibilities here.
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Topic: Winches, dumbwaiters, carts (Read 1838 times)