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[Mimodo]

So far all of my fortresses have been based off of a central staircase design, simple, but unfortunately a bit more difficult to isloate sections of the fortress..

Does anyone have a fortress design that doesn't rely on a central staircase that I could try out and modify to suit me. Something that is still suitable for quick movement of dwarves between locations.... Just wanting to try out something a little different...

Another question while I'm here... Should I start with trying to get through an aquifer, or survive in an evil (resurrecting) biome? I haven't tackled either yet

[wuphonsreach]

One approach is a 2x2 staircase, with a gap, then a 2x11 hallway, another gap, then a 2x2 staircase.  Basically, a very large grid with the staircases evenly spaced.  It's a reasonably flexible design and dwarves are never too far from stairs.

But it's even harder to isolate sections of the fortress then the central staircase is. 

[thiosk]

I was sitting in a talk by a Swedish guy today when he started showing nanowire arrays.



Not these, of course, but similar.  And what popped into my head?

Vertical pillars descending into the blackness of the earth, with dwarves carving out various living and work spaces branching off.  I'm considering having each pillar being pseudo independent using the burrow system, and independently interlockable and sealable to, for instance, prevent critters coming up or down one pillar from accessing the center.  I see the great hall area as a vast cavern between the pillars.

Don't know, thats just what popped into mah head today.

[Fnear]

Nowadays I build a central stair and every 3-6 levels, I have a landing, and build a living space on the right, workshops on the left, spanning several levels, but only connecting to the central stair at the landing.  I set up militia training on the landing, and burrow the workers for that level's shops/living space.  An underclass of dwarves is allowed to haul between levels.

[Mimodo]

Thinking I might try a 5 staircase design... A larger, 'main' staircase in the centre, and 4 smaller ones spread around, one for sleeping areas, one for workshops etc. with the larger one being used to quickly travel between them, and down to the mines

[Oaktree]

I have done a mix of central stair designs and also a few "square" designs that had staircases on the corners and a cross-connecting hallways.  Depending on the organization of your entrance and mining shafts in relation to the square a "corner" can concentrate vertically on a certain industry; e.g. cloth industry sits near where the pastures are situated, forges above the mining shaft entrance etc. and if micro managing the residence section for them is in that same corner as well.  (The residence levels were "windmill" design layouts that each centered on one of the corners as well with offices and noble's quarters around the middle.)

Something with circular/hexagon chambers might meet well with a non-central stair design depending on how the fort situates itself.

[thegoatgod_pan]

Try a sphere. It is a bit difficult to lay out initially, but there were some designs for  making circles floating around the forum, and following off those you can get a general idea of how circles are signified. Staircases can  make a secondary internal circle.

[Flodeklojo]

If you're looking for sphere and circle layouts, check out http://www.plotz.co.uk/plotz.php .
Someone once posted that here and i've been using it ever since.

[Nkosi_SW]

Hatches are your friends.  A long stairway is not much more inherently risky than a long corridor.  It's the lack of barriers and defences along it that creates the problems.

For me, the longer routes and extra pathing from breaking up main transit lanes aren't worth it.  I keep my major defences between the main thoroughfares and any entrances or potential danger.  An intruder should never get to a main thoroughfare unless something has gone seriously wrong.  Then lots of hatches to lock areas down when something inevetiably does go wrong, and if I'm feeling really paranoid, a building-destroyer-proof minimal horizontal diversion in the staircase:

Side view of 8 Z levels
X = Stairs
B = Raising Bridge

     XXX
     XXX
  XXBXXXBXX
  XX     XX
  XXX   XXX
   XXX XXX
    XXXXX
     XXX

[Altaree]

I use a spiral ramp design.  The main work shop/living stack is connected only to one level of the ramp.  So, from top to bottom I have:
- Farm
- Farm storage
- Kitchen, brewery, leather/tan/butcher, farm work shops, querns, cloth industry, animal pens (yup, it is a lot)
- Storage for products of the level above
- Living quarters connected to the main dining hall.  The dining hall has the only connection (over bridges) to the spiral ramp
- more living space.
- furniture, finished goods, gem, wood storage.  hole to stone quantum pit.
- workshops for wood/stone/gems

I like to build this cluster between caves 1 and 2. 
The magma forges are MUCH lower and have the following setup:
- storage for bars, metal products, sand, clay
- magma workshops, living/dining space for the smiths.  This is connected to the spiral ramp with a bridge
- magma pipes supplied by a manual screw pump stacks (doesn't need power because we only use it once)
- ore/flux storage


The biggest problem is that the main living area does not connect to the forges aside from the central ramp.

[itg]

You could build retracting bridges over the staircase at key floors. Hook them all up to the same lever for fortress lockdown.

Whether you go for evil biome or aquifer (or both) depends on what you're looking for. Aquifers provide an engineering challenge with restricted resources (most of the time you won't have access to stone until you pierce the aquifer), but they don't have to be all that dangerous. Evil biomes are more of an oh-my-god-I'm-gonna-die sort of challenge. You need to be good at keeping your dwarves indoors, especially if your site has the kind of evil weather which turns them to husks.

[Ace_Warbringer]

The general layout i use is a small 3x3 room with updown stairs in the corners with doors leading out at the 4 cardnials. these doors can be lever operated or manual. but i also put hatches in as well to prevent vertical move ment and usually some sort of drowning trap to flood the space.