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Author Topic: question about pressure plates  (Read 587 times)

noob

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question about pressure plates
« on: February 16, 2011, 12:19:05 am »

inb4check the wiki. that confused me even more.



okay so i have this set up to defend against sieges.
Code: [Select]
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXEEXDX
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEPAAAAAAAAAAAASX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXEEXDX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXEEXRX
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXEEXXX
X=wall
E=empty space
D=door
S=upright spike
R=weapon rack
P=pressure plate
A=bridge

the bridge folds up into a wall for my danger room. when the gobbos step on the pressure plate they get atom smashed releasing my 1 dwarf army to kill the rest of them in the bottle neck. the only problem is that i need the pressure plate to be reusable. when the goblins step off of the pressure plate the bridge would return to its wall state killing the dwarf.

how do i make the reusable plate not deactivate when the goblin walks off of it?
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Girlinhat

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Re: question about pressure plates
« Reply #1 on: February 16, 2011, 12:39:11 am »

That, is the essence of complex mechanics.  You can easily build a pressure plate, but building it to do something complex is another issue entirely!  You'll need some form of fluid, not necessarily a lot of it, set up for something like...
Code: [Select]
WWWWW
~FPFW
WWWWW
~=Water source
W=Wall
F=Floodgate

The outside gate, adjacent to the water, should be linked up to your desired mechanism, in this case the pressure plate in your hallway.  The plate in the diagram should be set to activate when water is on it, and THIS mechanism should be linked to your bridge.  What this means is that when someone steps on the plate in the hall, it'll open the floodgate, letting water pour in to wash over the plate.  When the creature steps off the plate, the gate will close, but there should be 1/7 water or more on the plate already, to keep it active and keep the bridge down.

Then, when you want to turn off the bridge, you activate the back floodgate (the one away from the water source) and either let it drain out into an open area so the water evaporates, or link to a lever on /R so that the water gets repeatedly atom-smashed.

This has the small chance that a creature won't step on it long enough, and you'll get 1/7 water on the trigger plate, which would evaporate and cause the bridge to retract prematurely.  You can solve this by making it vertical, so that water falls down to 7/7 very quickly, although it's a very slightly more complex setup.

noob

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Re: question about pressure plates
« Reply #2 on: February 16, 2011, 12:55:10 am »

i think i get it. thanks
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Girlinhat

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Re: question about pressure plates
« Reply #3 on: February 16, 2011, 12:57:18 am »

Animal powered mechanisms are also possible, but less reliable.