Mining would be a pain. If you un-burrowed your miners they would mine in each fort interchangeably, and if you put them in burrows, you would have to update the burrows every time they mined a block.
Although it would indeed be somewhat of a pain mining with burrows, it wouldn't be that much of one. You would not need to update burrows every time they mined a block. when designating burrows, you can designate unexplored space as part of the burrow.
Also, I was thinking of doing a multifort of this sort for some time. Maybe even have four or five forts going, or maybe different levels of fort (the kingdom of luxury, the survivalist nation, the poor starving, and the elite military) all more or less self sufficient in different keeps. may include a small outpost in the circus. And may be less self sufficient, with elaborate airlocks for shuffling food/goods around. might actually be helpful to separate the magma industries like this, so they keep on producing masterwork goods during a spiral (for the lowly dwarves to kill each other with.)
This would be a good thread to talk about the various !!science!! elements of it. especially automated or semi-automated airlocks, and whether each fort should have its own vertical column to grow in, or each take up a different horizontal layer (surface, sedimentary mining, cavern(s), magma).
does anyone have a tried and true goods-shuffling-airlock method? or an idea for fully automating it?
But then miners in each fort would get burrows in the other forts' previously unexplored areas, bringing you back to square one...
Unexplored space can be designated as part of a burrow, if its within the designated rectangle. so previously unexplored space in the other fort wouln't become part of the burrow upon reveal if it hadn't be designated to do so, while previously unexplored space in the fort you designated around would, because it was within the designating rectangle.
Maybe make it so your miners are the only people who can cross between the fortresses. Have like Checkpoint Charlie between the two that the miners have to travel through.
Easier if you aren't doing a lot of digging, true, but miners have an often annoying tenancy to do everything from left to right. so if you have two parallel tunnels being dug left-right, the miners will dig a bit of one, then walk all the way around to dig a bit of the other etc, instead of splitting up and tackling both separately like
sane dwarves elves would. so if you have a fort on the left, and a fort on the right, all the mining in the fort on the left will have to get done before ANY gets done on the right. Similarly, if you have a fort on the top (north) of the map, and a fort on the bottom (south), the dwarves will dig a few squares in one before trecking to the other and digging a few there, meanwhile getting
pincushioned TURNED INTO PICK WIELDING SUPER SOLDIERS by elite goblin bowmen wandering the
surface underworld.
And first person to find a way to mass-produce disloyal dwarves gets candy, and a special visit from bubbles the clown.