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[SilasG]

Hey guys, I've made a small keep atop my central staircase which is two stories tall. I made the walls (after having to fill in holes in the ground) with minimal problems. I made nice wood flooring all on the top with no problems either. The problems started when I wanted to make an up ramp or stairs beside my inside wall so I could position MarksDwarves on the walls to shoot trespassers. It looks like it will let me but when I try to place it it just doesn't work.

Can one only make an up ramp or stairs where there is already a dirt wall or stone wall? If so this presents a pretty big problem since the only wall is the one I made. I was planning on making it a double wall so there was more room for the dwarves to maneuver but thought I would test the ramp/stairs first. Help?

[Immortal-D]

Constructed Stairs are free-standing, the only requirement being you that you don't have an existing construction (floor) on that tile.  Ramps do require support walls on the sides of the top / frontal direction of the ramp.  If this is no more than an archery tower, you are better off using stairs.

(W)all (S)tair (F)loor

This works:

S
S
W

This does not:

S
F
W

[SilasG]

Hmm. Ok, this looks like its going to be a problem then. See this keep is sitting on a hill. The first level is inside the hill, is mined out with the central staircase in the middle and a drawbridge on one outside wall (this is ground level outside). The top level has a wall all the wall around and has flooring so dwarves can actually walk on that level. If I'm understanding you correctly then its impossible to make stairs on this level since it all has flooring. If I remove the flooring then it just becomes a 2 story drop to the first level of the keep. Wait ...hmm. What if I removed one flooring piece and placed a support pillar below that empty spot on the first level? Could I then make a stairway on top of that pillar on the 2nd level that will go to the top of my wall?

[Pirate Santa]

Dwarves can stand on a staircase and build the staircase above/below them, simply remove one square of the constructed floor on each level and build a bunch of updown stairs in its place.

[SilasG]

The floor of the first floor is soil. The floor of the second level is wood flooring. I can't make a stair no matter what I try to do. I suppose I could make a stair going down from my first floor through the soil but I want to go up. I tried removing one wood floor tile on the 2nd level but can't make a stair on it. I tried making a pillar below that open square on the first floor and then making either a stair or up ramp - nope. I'm not sure what to try now. I find it ludicrous that I can't make this, its crazy haha. I really need a step by step or something. Apparently other people are able to do this and I can't figure it out. I'm not even sure how to make a continuous stair going up or down multiple z-levels in one go. I do one, go down a level and make another stair, go down another level and make another stair.

[Skuggen]

You can't have two constructions (constructed stairs and floors) on the same tile. Remove the floor tile and you can build a staircase in its place.

[TheKaspa]

The floor of the first floor is soil. The floor of the second level is wood flooring. I can't make a stair no matter what I try to do. I suppose I could make a stair going down from my first floor through the soil but I want to go up. I tried removing one wood floor tile on the 2nd level but can't make a stair on it. I tried making a pillar below that open square on the first floor and then making either a stair or up ramp - nope. I'm not sure what to try now. I find it ludicrous that I can't make this, its crazy haha. I really need a step by step or something. Apparently other people are able to do this and I can't figure it out. I'm not even sure how to make a continuous stair going up or down multiple z-levels in one go. I do one, go down a level and make another stair, go down another level and make another stair.

On level 0 (soil floor), just build an up/down stair.
After your idiotsdwarves have built the stair, remove the wooden floor on the first floor and build in the same spot an up/down stair. The dwarves will build the stair from the lower level.
Keep building stairs this way

http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2014:Stairs

[SilasG]

Ok, I figured out where I was going wrong. You can't just build a stair like you normally do, i.e.- designations. You have to use Build menu C to make a stair if the space has no walls anymore and it'll use 1 block or stone per stair. People were like just do this and I'd do that and it wouldn't work haha. Holy crap I wish someone had told me this 2 days ago. I'd still have hair in those bald patches I pulled out.

[Immortal-D]

LOL.  When I wrote 'constructed stairs', I thought that was clear enough a distinction from normal stairs.  If however, you were otherwise unaware of said construction options, I can see how you would have problems.  At least now you have learned a valuable building skill.  This game has so many little details, I still find myself learning something new every other Fortress.

[SilasG]

I had only used b-C to build walls previously. I had noted you could also build stairs and ramps etc from that menu but I had no way of knowing these particular stairs were different than the "designation" stairs. I just luckily was watching DF videos concerning stairs and he just casually mentioned the b-C build stairs option as different and I was like ...damn.

[Skuggen]

Yeah, took me a while before figuring out how constructions work, too

[synyster31]

Same here, took me a while to figure out how to get a ceiling on my archer tower without leaving a hole from a stair/ramp!