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[Bronze Dog]

I'm still a newbie at DF, but I have a few ideas for stuff I'd like to build.

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You're leading your caravan through the desert toward a fortress known as Sandcage the Time-Keeper. Over the horizon, you see a gleaming tower of some sort. As you get closer, you recognize it for what it is: An enormous, clear hourglass. As you ride towards the trade depot, you pass a number of smaller hourglass-shaped towers and see the appraising eyes of elite marksdwarfs, ready to unleash a rain of bolts at the slightest sign of goblin treachery. Passing in winding paths over the tops of these towers is a raised aquifer, freely moving river water through a display of dwarven mastery over the elements, forcing the water into right angle turns.

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Okay, so I felt like getting a little artistic. The "hourglass" shape I'm going for is something along the lines of a pair of pyramids or cones joined at the tips. Since the DF wiki tells me that walls can't be built on top of constructed floors (unless said floors are the result of a wall on the level below), I don't think I can make a hollow pyramid shape, and if I go for a solid pyramid, I still don't think I could build an inverted one on top. Does anyone know a way I could work around this problem?

[Max White]

Why sure you can make it hollow!
You see, in dwarf physics, a wall just needs to be connected to the ground, but does not need a support directly under it, so you can easily build up in a diagonal direction without fear of collapse.

[Flying Carcass]

Walls can't be built on floors on the same z level. Walls can be built over open space if connected to a floor (of any type) on an adjascent tile by the edge.

So if these smilie faces represent two walls on different z levels, and a dash representing open space (facing from the side), you can construct like this:
  -
  -

[Bronze Dog]

Thanks, FC. I had a feeling there may have been some exploit like that I could use.

Just to make sure I'm understanding correctly: I could, say, build a 5x5 hollow square on the ground, and from the top of that, build a 3x3 square. The reverse would also be true, so, if I built stairs up through the center, I could start building outer rings.

I'd probably have to construct temporary floors to get the corners of the walls in, right?

[Max White]

Yes and yes!
May your hour glass dreams come true.

[Bronze Dog]

Yay! Now that I know my dreams are possible, I guess I'd better get back to figuring out the basics.

[DarthCloakedDwarf]

It may help if you turn invaders off in the init file. Actually, scratch that. It will help. A lot.

[Bronze Dog]

Since I got a prompt collection of replies, guess I might as well move onto other aspects of the idea:

What's going to be the "sand" in the big hourglass tower?

Any suggestions on how to pick out a good location? As much as I'd like this to be in an open sandy desert, the lack of wood would probably ruin my chances of making clear glass, along with all the other hassles involved for inexperience players.

[Max White]

well, for your sand, you have a choice of magma or water. Water is safer but magma is cooler.

As for location, any flat forest with sand would be great.

[Bronze Dog]

I thought about having one of the two in the hourglass, but I'd be content with having a static pile of something arranged as if it were in the middle of flowing. Piles of coins, maybe?

I'm also thinking a sandy forest would be appropriate, though on one of my false starts, I managed to get a river running through a desert with a decent chunk of a forest that was somehow adjacent.