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[Shadowfury333]

I've been considering the possibility of making a Dwarven Drop Trooper squad in fortress mode, which would involve tunnels throughout the sky of the map with periodic retractable bridges. The Dwarves station on the bridge, a lever is pulled, then they drop into the fray to bypass ranged units.

I went to arena mode to test out the fundamental problem, i.e. Dwarves dying/injuring on impact from high falls, and I found something interesting: Slade is the most protective armour for this.

Now this may seem obvious, but think about it, Slade is super heavy. In theory a Dwarf should be crushed just wearing it, let alone dropping in it. However, when clad in Slade armour, the Dwarves took the least injuries. I tested from the top Z-Level over the initial floor (next to the magma pool, water pool, and river), and most of the Dwarves would live with only one broken/mangled part, and often would not be stunned.

For reference. Unarmored Dwarves will die on impact, or occasionally a tough one will live to bleed out from a shattered body. Testing with normal armour improves survivability, but they would still often be stunned/unconscious on impact, with a couple yellows and reds. Adamantine didn't seem to help much more than other armour, though it reduced the number of reds slightly and I believe stopped unconsciousness, but stunning still occurred, and Slade I've described.

The point is, weight doesn't seem to have an effect on the ability for armour to protect against falling. Also, the amount of armour pieces corresponded inversely with the number of injuries, once again, weight doesn't change anything. However, I'm not sure if my Drop Trooper idea is feasible, simply because stunning means death in the fray, and my Dwarves may still get stunned on arrival.

[Kadzar]

Distract enemies by dropping ring of kittens around your troops.

[PopeRichardCorey]

At least in 40d, creatures landing on other creatures took no damage.  So the solution is a pillow of kittens being dropped, followed by your soldiers.

Though kittens might lead to a tantrum spiral when they shatter on impact or get killed by the siegers; try a less useful damning creature.  Maybe mules.

[Eric Blank]

The pope has the right idea, but I think the best idea is to drop water on the enemy to push them around/disrupt them in other ways before dropping both animals or troops.

[lucusLoC]

isn't falling instantaneous? therefore weight would have no affect, only the protective abilities of the armor?

[ThtblovesDF]

So we do it like this?


/ D
__________________________
NiceBurningHotMagmaofDoom
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AngryDwarfswithAxesandBeards
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CuteadorableKittensandMules
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WaterWaterWaterWaterWater
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Maybe a timed action with the above array... have a trigger down under the whole thing that starts a water slide that triggers (in quick succesion);

-Water drop on enemy
-Cute Kitten and mule drop ontop of confused enemy
-Dwarfs to land on kitten pillow
~Intermission while angry dwarfs and wet kittens claw, bite and chop the enemy apart.
-Magma ontop of it all to "clean up" all the tiny remaining

... god I wanan see a veteran dwarf of that combat style... "Not like the sound of a kitten under your high boots when you swing your axe down on a wet goblin head..."

[Foxbyte]

isn't falling instantaneous? therefore weight would have no affect, only the protective abilities of the armor?

Only cave-ins are instantaneous. Anything else falling falls at the same speed. 150z levels is about 30 seconds of freefall.

[riznar]

isn't falling instantaneous? therefore weight would have no affect, only the protective abilities of the armor?

Weight wouldn't affect falling speed anyway, only air resistance would.

[Sphalerite]

In 40d, and I assume in DF2010 as well, all creatures and objects fall at a fixed speed of 1 Z-level per 6 ticks.  Mass does not affect falling speed, and air resistance doesn't seem to be modeled at all.

[Shadowfury333]

Weight would have an effect on the impact, as it would have more momentum on impact than the dwarf inside.

[Max White]

Well in real life, yes. HOWEVER, in dwarf physics things fall at a rate of u (Standing for Urist, the speed of a falling dwarf). The strange thing is that things fall at a rate of u regardless of your frame of reference...