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[Heavily Armed Effigy]

I'm having a problem with stuck miners, and dwarfs who don't want to go in a certain area. The issue is in my stone stockpiles, which are 3 rectangular stockpiles each on its own z-level below the ground level of my fortress. The 1st stockpile, 1 level below the ground floor, is perfectly accessible to anyone. The 2nd level is also accessible to dwarfs hauling to/from the stockpile, but I had some issues getting my miners out of it after they dug it out. At first they were legitimately stuck, but then I had another dwarf dig a ramp down to them. They still would not come out until I set a digging designation for the level above them, at which point they got out fine. I thought it was no problem, but then I started having even worse problems with the 3rd level down.

There is a ramp down to the 3rd level, which a miner used to get down there and dig. However, he wasn't able to go back up, and is currently starving to death. I also had trouble getting my other miner to help the other one get out, because he wouldn't dig on the 3rd or 2nd level until I "lured" him closer by making him dig on the 1st level. He finally got to the 3rd level, using the ramp that the other miner had used, and he is now stuck. I had another dwarf make stairs down to them, which are accessible but they won't use them. I'm hesitant to send a third dwarf to his potential death to save these guys. Also, I figure it's important to note that dwarfs aren't coming down to the 3rd level to haul out gems/ores.

So, what is the problem here? Is it something I'm doing wrong? It seems like the dwarfs are having a problem with how far away the stockpile is from the rest of the fortress, but it's only 3 z-levels down. I'm pretty new to DF, also, so is there just something I'm totally missing?

[Sphalerite]

Are you sure your ramps and stairs are usable?  It's easy to screw them up without realizing it.

Are you using any burrows?

[Heavily Armed Effigy]

I'm sure they're usable on the 2nd level, because haulers will go there and back, but miners are reluctant to dig there anyway. On the 3rd level, I guess I can't be sure since everyone who's gone there hasn't come back up, but I thought that if a dwarf can go down a ramp, they can go up it too. The stairs I'm pretty sure are usable, because after the 3rd dwarf built them, he stood on the up stair and then went back up to the 2nd level. I'm not sure why he didn't get stuck, too - maybe because he didn't leave the stair tile.

I have one burrow right now but nobody is assigned to it.

[Sphalerite]

I think I'd have to actually see the arrangement of stairs and ramps to know if you've broken them somehow.

[Heavily Armed Effigy]

Ok, here are some screenshots:

1st level (weird ramp situation due to numerous rescue missions)
2nd level (I observed the dwarf in this picture (the one who I sent to save my miners) for a little longer, and he has actually been going up and down the stairs from 2nd level - 3rd level, so I know they work.)
3rd level (2nd miner is standing on top of the ramp in this picture, he hasn't escaped)

The non-miner guy doesn't seem to have a problem going up and down the stairs, but my 2nd miner refuses to go up the stairs and he doesn't seem to be able to get up the ramp. My legendary miner died from thirst while I was watching the other 2 dwarfs' movements. Oh well. I hope I can get through this with my other miner intact.

[FrankMcFuzz]

This happens all the time. More often than not it's an oversight of the player. Dig out a seperate set of stairs and that should fix it right up.

[Heavily Armed Effigy]

I dug out another set of stairs, which caused the miner stuck on level 3 to come up to level 2. However, he went straight back down to 3. Making digging designations on level 2 will make both stuck dwarfs get moving, but otherwise they continue to stand around the same little areas, one on level 2 and one on 3, and don't attempt to go anywhere. I have no idea what could be causing this to happen. I've never had a problem like this in previous forts.

[Lytha]

Yes, none of these ramps in your screenshot are functional.

To be functional, the ramp must be adjacent to a wall. And in the z-level above this wall, the dwarves need to be able to walk around.

Your ramps are adjacent to walls, but the z-level above does not show a walkable perimeter on top of these walls.

What you have there looks like this in a sideview:


__ #
__/#


Instead of this, you need something looking like this in the sideview:


_ ##
#\__

# = wall
\ and / = ramp
_ = walkable area.





Here's an example for a ramp that would work:


z=1

####
#+>#
#+##


z=0

####
##<#
##+#


# = wall
+ = floor
< = upward ramp
> = downward ramp



Another example:

z=1

####
++>#
####


z=0

++++
+#<+
++++



If you are in a real hurry now because your miners are all about to die, just have them dig a bunch of stairs to get out of there; then make some ramp experiments when they're well again until you have the ramp mechanic down.

[Gullydwarf]

Hello,
The above post is of course the reason it does not work for you.
But I've been having trouble with dwarves unable to path back into my fortress for some reason.
I built a (1z high) walled moat with one ramp on the outside and one ramp on the inside. 1 tile retractable bridge over the moat right where the ramps were. Then suddenly I saw a dwarf being hungry and thirsty outside so I told her to go into the burrow I've got covering the whole inside of my fortress, but she just stood there with her hungry baby in her arms.
So I thought it might be that they cannot move onto the one tile bridge but when I set the bridge to be deconstruction, the dwarf doing the deconstruction actually moved up the inside ramp, over the bridge, and started deconstruction..... At the point where the dwarf did this, the lost dwarf suddenly moved towards the fortress, but got stuck on the outside wall of the moat because I had just deconstructed the bridge.. So I built a new 3 tile long bridge which covers also the walls and both dwarves entered the fortress.

Now recently a siege started and I closed my gates, hoping all dwarves were inside but then I saw a dwarf running from the Goblin Crossbowmen towards my closed gates. It was the same dwarf that was stuck on the other side of the moat earlier. I have a river splitting my map and the moat is on the top part and the gates are on the bottom part of the map. So the fat and stupid motherdwarf was now stuck on the other side being thirsty and hungry but didn't feel like going back to the fortress till she got attacked by Goblins and the gates closed. I have some potholes on that side of the map so I assigned her to that burrow as well but she didn't go into the pothole which she passed  by one tile but continued towards the fortress.

So it appears dwarves have trouble keeping to burrow restrictions and some dwarves just randomly get stuck somewhere...

[Lytha]

@Heavily Armored Effigy:



If you dig the neon green squares, these ramps are usable.

I have no suggestion for the connection between level 2 and 3, because I can't quite connect these two images. Perhaps because a dwarf was standing on some of the ramps, as you said. A makeshift fix for these should be possible by digging out a square in level 2; but this could destroy the connection between level 1 and 2... so, be careful.

Hope this helps.



Edit: Oh, I get the connection between 2 & 3 now. Looks fine and functional. At least the ramp does, I am not sure about the stairs, because I don't know graphical tilesets.

[FrankMcFuzz]

Indeed. They need to have solid wall in front of the ramp on the lower level.

Lets use an adventurer as an example. If there was a ramp, but empty space behind it, if you ran towards that ramp, you'd go straight through it. So you need a wall behind it, to be able to press yourself against something solid whilst going up the ramp.