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Author Topic: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar  (Read 52682 times)

Patroclus

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Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« on: September 24, 2011, 08:49:55 am »

Quote
As the seven dwarves arrived at their allotted settlement site, and everyone started preparing to build the fortress, the expedition leader saw that the miner was doing something rather... odd.

"Likot, what is that in yer beard? It looks like a ☼Marble Drum☼."

"It's my new invention.  I set the drum on the ground, where it picks up tiny vibrations, which I can feel through my beard."

The expedition leader considered this carefully.

"Have you been smoking the rope reed again?"

"Not at all, Mr. Expedition Leader.  By picking up the vibrations, I can tell where structures under the ground are."

"I thought that's what your pick was for."

"This lets me see them before I dig.  Just watch."  The miner crouched down so he could set the drum on the ground, his beard stretched taut, then hollered "Hey Thīkut, do it like I told you!"

Farmer Thīkut looked down, his eyes unfocused as if he was looking at something far off in the distance instead of at his feet, and shouted "BUILD A FARM HERE!"

So I discovered something.  If you designate a large farm plot (b-p, then u and k to make it max size) and then go to a unmined underground level, the entire plot shows up in red, and you get this text message.



BUT, if even one square of the farm plot covers the cavern floor, you get things like this instead:




By panning the farm plot across the level, you can find areas of cavern floor.  And because caverns have lots of ramps, you can actually follow the floor from level to level.  I started a new fortress, and poking around with the farm plot, found that level 115 had the highest floor I could find.  I marked this area where the walls would be so you can see the layout:



I then designated stairs to be dug, to break through the ceiling over this floor, where the cursor is.  After my miner dug to it, sure enough, the cavern was there:



Note that this trick can only reveal floors, so the open spaces were not marked in the before shot. But it did identify all of the pillars in the center of the area (although you can see that one of them is actually a tree).

This trick is quite useful if you missed a cavern level on your dive to the magma sea, and want to find it without doing exploratory tunnels.

EDIT TO ADD:  CaptainArchmage discovered that this trick works with paved roads and zones too.  This makes it possible to see more spaces than farms (which require soil), including the location of certain spoileriffic things.  This also gives this trick a good name -- Road-Dar.
« Last Edit: September 27, 2011, 08:55:45 am by Patroclus »
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NRDL

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #1 on: September 24, 2011, 08:56:53 am »

You managed to turn farming into radar.  Bravo. 
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FrisianDude

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #2 on: September 24, 2011, 09:00:51 am »

Kinda cool. :D
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ThatAussieGuy

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #3 on: September 24, 2011, 09:03:43 am »

It isn't dwarven till magma's involved and it's used to kill something.  That said, it is pretty cool.  Just tried it myself

NRDL

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #4 on: September 24, 2011, 09:04:51 am »

Yes, but with radar, you know where to focus your underground invasion efforts.  And you can have more precise magma funneling. 
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varnish

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #5 on: September 24, 2011, 09:06:02 am »

Well, if the first post is correct, you can use it find magma a bit more efficiently, thus saving you time and effort in using it to kill things. Either way, very neat.
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Oliolli

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #6 on: September 24, 2011, 09:07:26 am »

It isn't dwarven till magma's involved and it's used to kill something.

Soon, someone will tell the managed to fill a cavern with magma without ever actually seeing it using this.
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FrisianDude

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #7 on: September 24, 2011, 09:15:32 am »

It isn't dwarven till magma's involved and it's used to kill something.
Kiss off, there's more to Dwarf-dom then magma. Steel, serrated disks, idiots locking themselves behind walls or dying in a heroic attempt of retrieving a sock, beards, booze, bastards, tantrums, insanity, nerve-rot, heartache (due to bolts) etc. Magma is but a tiny part of the total.
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gomwon

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #8 on: September 24, 2011, 09:41:44 am »

It isn't dwarven till magma's involved and it's used to kill something.
Kiss off, there's more to Dwarf-dom then magma. Steel, serrated disks, idiots locking themselves behind walls or dying in a heroic attempt of retrieving a sock, beards, booze, bastards, tantrums, insanity, nerve-rot, heartache (due to bolts) etc. Magma is but a tiny part of the total.

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gomwon

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #9 on: September 24, 2011, 10:01:09 am »

Cant you just have fun, instead of wrecking others? Its just a thing we have here, and we do not really care what is built in whatever way.
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Melissia

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #10 on: September 24, 2011, 10:28:56 am »

And now I think I realize where the heck that third cavern is.  I apparently went straight down past it, missing it entirely.
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ThatAussieGuy

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #11 on: September 24, 2011, 10:46:44 am »

It isn't dwarven till magma's involved and it's used to kill something.

Soon, someone will tell the managed to fill a cavern with magma without ever actually seeing it using this.

I did that once.  Sealed off the outer map entrances with walls on all sides with teams of masons and filled the whole thing to the brim with magma.  THAT taught those crundles and Blind Caver Ogres who's land it was.

darkrider2

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #12 on: September 24, 2011, 11:07:34 am »

Um, when you see things underground or underwater, its called sonar. (/nitpick)

also as cool as this is, it should probably be listed under bugs.
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ThatAussieGuy

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #13 on: September 24, 2011, 11:20:59 am »

Sonar is a different technology. It uses Sound to see, not Radio waves. (cant remember the full acronym right now, dagnabbit)

It's used underwater because radio waves are dissipated within large volumes of water.

NRDL

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Re: Dwarven Ground Penetrating Radar
« Reply #14 on: September 24, 2011, 11:22:01 am »

This doesn't use sound or radio waves, it somehow uses agricultural vision to see underground. 
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