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[xcorps]

Good biome, volcano, river, heavily forested

The river is on the north side of the map about 4 tiles from the top. The volcano is on the southeast corner with cliffs running east west on the southern third of the map. I'm trying to find a good Depot placement that will give the wagons access. I tried putting it the center of the and walling it in with a bridge over the river and foot access covered by a trap field. Problem is that by the time I get the bridge open, the wagons are gone. If I leave the bridge down,  I'm exposed to ambushes. I cleared all the trees to the north of the river and east to the edge of the map, but the wagons never came. I'm good with the traders only, but I'd like to trade mechanisms and trap components for steel since I haven't found any flux or iron on this embark. I can only get a couple of bars without wagons.
Military is not an option. I'm defending by access control, screw this military system.

Any thoughts on depot placement for controlled access for wagons?
Now is the time to plan it, since I flooded the last attempt during a cistern fill.

Thanks!

[Cobbler89]

You could, rather than relying on the bridge alone to be up to stop invaders, make a certain amount of the path to your depot on your side of the bridge be walled on either side and instead use a raising bridge at its end that blocks the walled path to keep out invaders when raised but allows passage when lowered.

Be careful about traps and wagon access; I believe wagons consider trapped tiles to be blocked, just like boulders and such.

[Urist McRas]

Use unusable ramps to make wagon-only pathway.

[xcorps]

Use unusable ramps to make wagon-only pathway.

I don't understand this.


 Cobbler, you are correct about traps blocking access.


My issue, though, is the forest. There is no wagon access to the fort entrance because of trees. I was under the impression that if you had wagon sized access to any edge of the map, all caravan wagons would use that path, but that's not my result in the former fortress.

[vanatteveldt]

Use unusable ramps to make wagon-only pathway.

I don't understand this.

Apparently, there is a bug/exploit such that wagons can always use ramps to change elevation, even if they're unusable. I guess that the pathing for wagons is custom because of their size, and Toady forgot to check for the usability of ramps. IIRC, you can connect like this: (side-view)

Code: [Select]

    ____
___/\

Since there is no wall behind the ramp, normal creatures can't path through, but wagons can.

My issue, though, is the forest. There is no wagon access to the fort entrance because of trees. I was under the impression that if you had wagon sized access to any edge of the map, all caravan wagons would use that path, but that's not my result in the former fortress.

When there is a river, the wagons always come from the same side of the river.

In a forest, you can clear a path and then build a paved road to the edge of the map to ensure that trees don't grow over it.

[xcorps]

I should have mentioned it's a river with a source,  so you can walk around it.

I think I'll try a center placement again with retractable over dry moats and a trap section for invaders.

Will making treeless paths to the edges of if they show up they show up.

[WhimsyWink]

I like having the material on heavily forested embarks but it is a pain to keep the paths cleared of trees.  More & more I like the above ground depot with walls.  And call me delusional but I had wagons roll right over above ground traps.

[GhostDwemer]

I use two cheesy exploits for depots. First, I dig a tunnel from the depot almost to the edge of the map, and channel down to the tunnel. I then build raising bridges around the tunnel, to the edge of the map, connect, and raise them. Then I dig out the walls behind the ramps. Finally, I make a u-bend bypass that can be sealed with a hatch, for non wagon merchants to use. Now, only things that spawn on the three edge tiles can use that entrance, and only wagons can use it until I unlock the hatch.

[jcochran]

The unusable ramp method works wonders, although frankly the description of them usually is rather hard to follow, so I'm going to attempt to show you how to make them.

Just simply channel a trench using d-h command. Then on the Z level below the trench, simple designate a tunnel next to the trench you just dug.
This will result in a series of ramps that can be accessed from the ground on one side, while being unusable from the other side (the unusable side will be the side with the tunnel underneath it). It's fairly easy to trench out a level or almost level embark site so that only wagons are capable of passing over the trench. For other creatures that walk, they simply can't pass. So you'd need to provide an alternate path for them. Said alternate path can have loads of traps, military and other items to welcome visitors (remember that the caravans not only include wagons, but also include humanoids leading pack animals. Those traders can't pass the unusable ramp trench. So be sure to provide them some means of entry.


   

[Getix Kain]

Be careful about traps and wagon access; I believe wagons consider trapped tiles to be blocked, just like boulders and such.

I had the same problem in one of my (now) lost fortress.
Trap tile -> Impassable for traders.

[Ivan Issaccs]

Traps do indeed block wagons in the current version.
For me I set a short and very obvious route via the front to set up traps, invaders always use it as the shortest path.
Then for wagons I have a line of walls circling the fort entrance with no traps that the wagons can path through, as its so much longer invaders never bother with it.