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[HungryHobo]

out of interest how effective are spear traps(with metal spears) against the deamons? and how fast do they break down doors? my plan for dealing with them when I finally find a pit has always been a long hallway like this
###############
DSDSDSDSDSDSDSD
###############
D=door
s=Spear trap

where I lock all the doors and have all the spear traps linked with masterwork mechanisms to a single lever.
Do the spears have to be magma proof? are the demons immune to them?

How about traping demons in stone?
plan B has always been a long corridor flooded with magma and one level above that a long corridor flooded with water and floored with hatches all linked to 1 lever. flood the demon pits with magma, let the deamons swarm into the magma tunnel, when they're close to breaking through the last door pull the lever and freze them all in stone.
the beauty is that if any of them go after the hatches above their head then the moment they break through that deamon gets encased in stone as water floods down on top of him.

[Danaru]

IIRC demons ignore traps

[AlmostEverywhere]

I think that by "spear traps", he didn't mean actualy traps but rather upright spears connected to levers, which would then be set to repeat pull as the demons came through.

If that's the case, they'd certainly take damage, although since I don't think they have internal organs (at least not the spirits of fire), it would probably take a lot of poking to bring them down.

[Thasero]

Demons avoid *regular* traps, i.e. ones that trigger when a critter walks over them.  However, spike/spear traps can and will harm demons if you catch them while they're on the tiles.  The spikes/spears should be fire proof if you're dealing with !!HFS!!.  !!HFS!! is hot enough to burn up mechanisms, so the traps will break eventually no matter what, but this ensures you don't claim total victory over the Pits and then burn the fortress to the ground anyway because a dwarf decided to carry a stack of !!spears!! back to your stockpiles.

The doors, of course, will get ripped up no matter what kind of HFS you're talking about, but they will serve to slow down the monsters, giving you both warning and time to send someone to pull the trap lever.

Spears are great for arming the traps - if you're training up a weaponsmith, you can just have him make spears all the time and put the low-quality ones in the traps.  If you're short on metal but have magma and sand, green glass is a good source of cheap, fire-proof trap components.  If you put 10 components in a trap, it doesn't matter if they're made of steel or glass or wadded tissue paper, whatever stands there is going to die.

Water + magma is also a good way to annihilate demons, but remember that you might get steam instead of obsidian if you don't drop enough water.  You'll want to make sure there's several full squares of water held above the magma trap for each single square of magma.  I'm not sure if !!HFS!! radiates enough heat vertically that it would be able to vaporize the water through the floor hatches above, but it's possible.  Remember that !!HFS!! flies, and if the magma trap fails to encase them in obsidian, they can fly right up the water channel, vaporizing all the water along the way, and snack on !!dwarf chunks!! at the other end unless you're careful.

So be careful.  No pressure!  =)

[Andir]

Why is !!everyone!! typing with !!exclamation!! marks?

[Kidiri]

quote:Originally posted by Andir:
<STRONG>Why is !!everyone!! typing with !!exclamation!! marks?</STRONG>

Because !!we're on fire!!. Also, I thought out a plan to deal with HFS, more specifically, Spirits of Fire.

Dig out very long on-tile wide corridor to lead your demons in. When you've done that, flood the last part of it and dig out one tile all the way down to the second last tile of the reservoir. Channel out the topmost floor and refloor it. Then channel out the reservoir so it would cave in, where it not for the ice. destroy whatever's holding the SoF back and watch them get squished by the cave-in when they reach the only frozen tile and subsequently melt it.

Maybe it will take a couple of years before everything's in place, but it should work. Note that I have never tried this, since I have never encountered HFS. The fun part of this trap is that it uses the demon's main strength against it.

[Captain Xenon]

a good plan does not assume resources that are uncommon. what about those of us with no magma (except past the demons), no ice, and a wave of frogs before we get the fireballs?

i like the spears thing. instead of a lever... you could set up a water-operated pressure plate. if done right, when the gate opens the spears go crazy. it would be horribly complex to set up, yet awesome. sort of a complex water clock of doom.

[HungryHobo]

How hot do the fire deamons burn?
Would bauxite mechanisms survive their touch?
I know wood spears burn but do metal and glass ones melt like the mechanisms?
And yes I always load my spear traps with 10 spears. gives my glassmakers something to train on.

[HungryHobo]

also do deamons flood out of the pits forever or do you get like 10 or so and then never any more?

[Surma]

quote:Originally posted by HungryHobo:
<STRONG>How hot do the fire deamons burn?
Would bauxite mechanisms survive their touch?
I know wood spears burn but do metal and glass ones melt like the mechanisms?
And yes I always load my spear traps with 10 spears. gives my glassmakers something to train on.</STRONG>

Spirits of Fire seem to be blazing at 25000, which is more than twice as hot as magma.

Somehow I doubt anything will survive them.

Demons and Spirits of Fire can breathe fire at your dwarves.
All Demons are immune to fire.

[IronValley]

Mine out the HFS around the dangerous are, equip an elite squad of sword/axe/mace/hammer champions with HFS armor, and ONLY HFS armor, no socks or other flammable materials.

Set up a system to let the unwanted visitors out in bacthes (channels & drawbridges, then pray that your champions are legendary enough.

[Kidiri]

quote:Originally posted by Captain Xenon:
<STRONG>a good plan does not assume resources that are uncommon. what about those of us with no magma (except past the demons), no ice, and a wave of frogs before we get the fireballs? </STRONG>

The lack of ice could be the only problem. Because if the frogs come out, they won't be able to get past the ice wall. Perhaps you could have some replaceable peasant or noble act as bait to lure them out of their pits. Once a SoF enters the chamber and gets near the frozen tile, it's bye-bye demons.

Or, if you can't spare your dwarves, build a stairwell upwards and once the demons are in place, complete construct the floor that tops it all off. This works best if the stairwell goes all the way up to the floor level from the lowest z-level and is placed directly next to the frozen tile. The main problem with this is that in order to do this, you'll need some fast dwarves.

quote:Originally posted by IronValley:
<STRONG>channels & drawbridges</STRONG>

Demons fly and are able to destroy bridges, I believe. Even raised ones. So the atom-smasher won't work any more with demons.

[ May 20, 2008: Message edited by: Kidiri ]

[Surma]

All demons have the [BUILDINGDESTROYER:2] token (flag, tag, what?) Here's what the wiki has to say about that,  

quote:When the value is 2 the creature will actively seek out your constructions and destroy them. Megabeasts rely on this token for their pathing when attacking your fort.

so yeh.. no bridges will survive them. I wonder if they destroy constructed walls too.

[corc]

quote:Originally posted by HungryHobo:
<STRONG>also do deamons flood out of the pits forever or do you get like 10 or so and then never any more?</STRONG>

I've wondered the same thing,  the one time I bothered to break a pit I got a huge single demon of some kind that took ~100 military dwarves to kill, then shortly after I got swarmed by frogs who seeked out my nobles who didn't help with the first demon.

since then, I figured it was more trouble than it was worth.

[Greiger]

You might be able to replace that unmined ice tile with a wooden support.  Anything thats not a spirit of fire would be able to pass without trouble but spirits of fire should burn it when they pass, bringing down the house.

And actually it looks like the spirit of fire is the only demon truly immune to magma.  Sure many have fireimmune but they don't have the necessary temperature tolerances to go along with it.  Even the goblin's demon leader should burn to death in a magma pool.