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[Vicid]

Has anyone built a fort with the ability to quarantine rooms with the flip of a switch?  Do you have any ideas about this type of DF technology?  I was looking at that modular fort thread and I began to imagine a system to lock down each one of the modules. 

The function of such a fort design would be to halt disease, out of control invaders, clowns, tantruming dwarfs, water and/or magma from spreading throughout a fort.  I'm just not sure about he execution.


I'm thinking each room should be assessable through a doorway (double doors, some floor space and then another set of double doors leading to the next room.)

On that empty floor magma/water can be pumped and form an unbreakable obsidian wall.  The quarantined room can then be safely monitored,filled with magma and/or be cast in obsidian.

I also think this means each room should have a hatch leading to emergency supplies of booze/food and a pick.  (This will be locked once the supplies are in place and unlocked by the player when necessary... or maybe even linked to open by the same lever that quarantines the room)

Of course each Z level of habitable fort would be surrounded by Z levels above and below for plumbing/emergency storage

Sealing off Z levels seems a bit more difficult... perhaps the same system will work if applied to magma safe hatches (you can build those on up-down stairwells you know)

Hmmmm yes that's all I can think of.  Someone aught to really think about building a massive fort filled with the results of !!Science!!

[Girlinhat]

Well, the sealing is easy enough, you can lock doors and/or floodgates with a lever throw.  Doors are instant but need a nearby wall, while floodgates take 100 tick delay, and can be lined up without nearby walls, for wider areas.  Pressure plates directly beside the doorways can be triggered at 2/7 water/magma, causing them to close as soon as fluids get out of hand (and much faster than a lever-dependent system), and doors can be made to close when a creature steps on them, keeping invaders out as well.

As for obsidian casting, this is also possible but more challenging.  To really achieve it, you'll need at least 2 layers between each level, one for magma and one for water.  On the quarantine section, it would have a few hatches along the floor, and hatches along the entire ceiling.  Upon triggering, then the hatch should open and magma floods in from below via intense pressure (those auto-sealing doors should keep any extra flow in check).  Some well-placed pumps should allow you to pressurize specifically.  Then, after a few ticks, long enough to flood the room with magma, the ceiling hatches should open and drop water down, casting obsidian.  For this reason, it's important that the magma pressure be specific, so that the magma doesn't flow up and cast the ceiling.  The water should fall, not the magma rising.  The water doesn't need to be under pressure, but it likely will be anyway, it won't really matter.

On another note, if you're trying to isolate a specific dwarf, either to contain a syndrome or to keep the dwarf away from a syndrome, having a manager-order lever will get him into a room quickly.  I've also been testing a design for extremely rough closing doors, which involves using several layers above the door for design, but will allow you to drop a natural block wall to seal a doorway tight.