Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Girlinhat]

So I had an idea, been bumping around for a while.  Basically, 'what's a good way to build a fort from the ground up without touching a pick?'  You have no stone, but still want a fort.  I've experimented with purely wooden forts, and they're very difficult to pull off.  Trees just don't regrow in time to produce anything significant.

So the thought occurred, to use plants.  I've debated how canvas walls might work out, and I've also wondered about using bone or hide as a material.  I think the conclusion I've come to involves modding in one or two plants.  The first is a wood tuber, or something.  Basically bamboo, it's a long, thin, very tough plant.  The second (debatable) would be a type of cloth, or perhaps a herb that produces an extracted liquid.  Either way, you'd take the tuber plants, cover them in cloth, and then may or may not treat them with extracts for toughness.  This would produce a block that could then be used in construction, or perhaps could produce a door or hatch as well, to keep the theme.

This would be somewhat intensive, taking 5-10 tubers and 2-3 cloth per block, plus whatever extract if that was included, but would have the benefit of industry.  You could dedicate whole fields to this endeavor and produce a lot of material with enough workforce.

I also had the idea that a similar principle could apply to bones or leather.  Leather + tubers is straightforward, but I was also thinking bones taken to a quern to produce bonemeal, then using cement weed to produce bone blocks.  Especially people with modded ethics could make goblin bone walls.

Basically I've been concerned with how to do things without mining at all, or very little, as I'm fond of surface forts.  But vanilla seems to lack legitimate surface options for a challenge like this.

[tahujdt]

I once played an elven fort, and I built a tree fort with cut wood. What was funny was, my elves wouldn't hunt animals, but when an intelligent sasquatch wandered by, they killed and butchered him.

[talysman]

I think it's a shame that bamboo in the game isn't useful for anything except feeding pandas. I'd like to see it as a fast-growing tree, but with an extra life-stage that makes an impassable thicket in a tile that must be cut down, or it blocks pathways. That would make it easier to do an above-ground fort with bamboo blocks.

Cloth blocks (as you describe) are an interesting idea. What about paper "blocks"?

[Mitchewawa]

Or, you know, use clay. Change the raws to make it look less like a pitch grey office space.

[acetech09]

Or, you know, use clay. Change the raws to make it look less like a pitch grey office space.

You still need wood for that, more efficient to just use the wood itself.

[Kilroy the Grand]

So the thought occurred, to use plants.  I've debated how canvas walls might work out, and I've also wondered about using bone or hide as a material.  I think the conclusion I've come to involves modding in one or two plants.  The first is a wood tuber, or something.  Basically bamboo, it's a long, thin, very tough plant.  The second (debatable) would be a type of cloth, or perhaps a herb that produces an extracted liquid.  Either way, you'd take the tuber plants, cover them in cloth, and then may or may not treat them with extracts for toughness.  This would produce a block that could then be used in construction, or perhaps could produce a door or hatch as well, to keep the theme.

I think making them into a solid block wouldn't be realistic, maybe something like a grate or window, something that could be destroyed. You wouldn't be able to build houses, but it could protect your dwarves from most animals.

[DuckBoy2]

Mod soap to not require any tree products.  Modify raws as required to construct a goblin soap fortress.  Elf soap also acceptable. 

Hey, when you melt the fat off of living creatures, does it leave anything you could turn into soap...?

[SharkForce]

Or, you know, use clay. Change the raws to make it look less like a pitch grey office space.

You still need wood for that, more efficient to just use the wood itself.

nope. i mean, you will probably need some *eventually* i guess, since you probably want to make blocks at some point.

but overall, nope. at the very least, not when it comes to fire clay, which i have made dozens of buildings out of. just designate a spot, your dwarves will occasionally go there when the kiln calls for more clay (which naturally you can set on repeat) and make a pile, then leave it in that spot.

i know you can even make walls and floors from it. haven't tested if you can make roads, stairs, etc, mind you, but it will certainly provide for most of the OP's needs.

(naturally, you will first need something to make the kiln from, which means you should probably embark with some stone since it's cheaper than embarking with a pick to get stone. but once you have the kiln, i'm pretty sure i've actually even made kilns from unbaked clay).

of course, it's still a good idea to mine for stone. if nothing else, you'll probably want some mechanisms, and if you like to use falling stone traps, i'm not sure if clay will work (i've watched a dwarf walk right past a clay pile and grab other stones, not sure that really proves anything though).

[ItchyBeard]

Basically I've been concerned with how to do things without mining at all, or very little, as I'm fond of surface forts.  But vanilla seems to lack legitimate surface options for a challenge like this.

I've done 'no digging' or 'renewable digging' surface forts before. It's easiest with a source of magma though.

If you have surface access magma available (e.g. volcano), you can build workshops over it to produce unlimited amounts of glass/clay. If you additionally have a source of water, you can build an obsidian factory (it's still easiest to mine the obsidian and build with it rather than trying to make natural stone walls, but you don't need to disturb the original map - you can do it on the surface). Forts like these tend to get attacked early due to high value (esp. obsidian forts).

Ice is another possibility, though I haven't done this myself - e.g. maps with split biomes (part freezing, part non-freezing) allowing you to take water from the unfrozen part to dump via buckets into the freezing part to form walls (water can freeze in the bucket if too slow though). If you're going to allow 'renewable' mining, you can just make an ice factory and build stuff out of the lumps.

[NonconsensualSurgery]

Ice. I've had this even crazier idea in my head...

Entire fortress. Made out of ice. A massive, inexplicable, icy tower rising out of the middle of a lake in a cold region that refills from a map edge. Constructed walls and buildings never melt. Needs a dragon or fire imps to burn things as they cross the constructed ice walkway.

Seasonal changes will be a bit dangerous though. Fort design must minimize the number of dwarves trying to cross the frozen lake when the temperature changes.

[Blizzlord]

Mod soap to not require any tree products.  Modify raws as required to construct a goblin soap fortress.  Elf soap also acceptable. 

Hey, when you melt the fat off of living creatures, does it leave anything you could turn into soap...?

Fat does not melt of anymore. The creature ignites.

[melomel]

Mod in mud bricks!

Mud, water, sand/straw, longish reaction time to reflect sun-drying... 

[KtosoX]

So, you don't want to dig and you have a lot of slaves migrants...
Great Chinese wall: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rammed_earth

Add a custom reaction to the carpentry workshop that turns logs in to 4-6 frames.
Add a custom workshop that turns a bag of sand/clay and a bucket of water in to a bucket of mud.
I don't know much about modding, can water in a bucket be used in a reaction?

[kaijyuu]

Glass.


Volcano embark with a sand biome.

No modding needed. Just bring along some magma safe stuff to build your glass furnaces.

[Blizzlord]

I don't know much about modding, can water in a bucket be used in a reaction?

Yes.