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[FearfulJesuit]

Well, you know, technically you can create a perpetual cart machine, but only if the rollers are hooked up to a traditional water-wheel perpetual motion machine. Though that is a cop-out, I know.

[Nil Eyeglazed]

on the seperate burrows:
minecarts trigger pressure plates, so one aproaching could trigger a bridge to open, then after passing the bridge trigger it to be raised again.

Yeah, but you don't have to get that fancy.

Consider this situation:

Code: [Select]


 1M
 ##\
 #### 2
 ######

Minecart M can reach dwarf 2, but dwarf 1 can't reach dwarf 2, and dwarf 2 can't reach dwarf 1.  If the fall causes the minecart to spill its load, so much the better-- fewer hauling jobs.  This structure can easily be duplicated in reverse for return trips.

[Psieye]

One can already transport items downhill quickly by just letting them fall down.

Can this be automated?

Yep. Designate a 1-tile zone directly adjacent to a deep vertical shaft, mark the zone as a garbage dump. Dwarves dumping items will throw everything into the shaft, rather than dropping it on the floor tile. Works with cliffs, too. Or really any size pit.

That's not automated - you'd still need to designate mass dumping every now and then, followed by mass reclaim once it's down there. That means regular player input to get it to work. Sure, I use it myself but 'automated' would mean the dwarves can consistently and regularly do it even if the player goes afk for an hour.

[FearfulJesuit]

Hope he implements hay and things tonight. I suspect he'll have to go through the code a lot to change the way feeding points work.

Or not. He seems to have had superhuman coding abilities the last few weeks- perhaps he's found the Ballmer Peak.

[Girlinhat]

Toady's not new to the game.  He knows how to code and at this point I feel like he's coding what he wants to code.  Not "let's crowbar in more donation animals" but rather "fuck yeah minecarts are awesome!"  It's easy to code in something awesome.

[Monk321654]

Remind me again what those were for?
Something along the lines of "You put these redundant Animals in the game, we give you money?"

[Girlinhat]

Pretty much a donation drive where Toady started adding animals that were donated towards.  I'm not sure anyone actually likes it though.

[KodKod]

"You put these redundant Animals in the game, we give you money?"

You forgot "And then force us to have to extensively mod the raws just to have a relatively normal embark filled with relatively normal creatures like deer and wolves, as well as ripping out all of the five metric fucktons of animal people."

Bees are good though.

[Girlinhat]

I went back to my hauling routes and stops, after my early excursion into moving carts. Each stop gets a list of stockpile parameters, and the stops can be linked to stockpiles and given conditions before the vehicle is set to depart. So you could get a dwarf to send the minecart along when it becomes full or when it is at least halfway full after two weeks. I'm still finishing that off, mainly the sending along part. Depending on the track, sometimes a dwarf can just kick the cart, sometimes it'll have to be pushed all the way, and with the powered tracks and carts taking flight and triggers, the choice will probably be left up to the player rather than having the computer trying to decide.

You can have the camera follow a unit or item, either as a one time thing or as one of the function hotkeys you set up for it. It'll keep following it until you enter another mode, recenter to an announcement, manually scroll, etc. If the followed item is held by a container or by a unit, the camera will center on that.

TL;DR - You can tie a cart station to a stockpile and set up the "launch when" conditions, such as "launch the cart when it's full" or "launch it if it's been sitting here for too long".  Depending on the track setup, the dwarf will either send it along, or may have to push it the whole way, this being mainly defined by how the player builds their infrastructure.

You can also set hotkeys to follow specific items or creatures.  Just like DFHack has the "follow" command, vanilla will now let you camera-chase your axelord into battle.

What I take from this:
##U>>>>>
#===#
#===#
##+##

connected to:
########
>>>>>^
########

This is a basic setup for an automated smasher, of sorts.  The red door is linked to the red pressure plate.  When the mayor goblin steps on the plate, then it opens the door.  When the door is open, it triggers the stockpile for "begin filling this cart with lead bars".  The cart is set to "launch when full".  Thus, dwarves will quickly pack the cart with heavy items and launch it, where it careens down some complicate path and hits a goblin upside the head.  The door will then lock again, and the trap gets reset.

Possibly more importantly though: You could set up routes to the trade depot which would deliver finished goods to the depot, and have the condition "if these carts are less than full, send them" so that they will immediately head back to the workshops to be refilled with crafts.  You can very effectively keep your depot with items one tile away and minimal hauling!

[Reudh]

I was pleased to see the sponsor animals. It's good to have animals that aren't in most 'fantasy' games.

[Garath]

I like the snakes and some of the birds, also a few more critters in deserts. However, before this my tropical fort got swamped by 6 different types of gibbons and some other monkeys, now tropical birds are added to the load. The sponges are just plain weird and nearly unkillable and animal people everywhere. I kept some though.

Anyway, back on track. Seems like the stopping places are going to be mini-stockpiles/depots, carts will need dwarf or mechanical power and we have a go on flying minecarts. Minecarts will be pushed instead of being led/pulled like animals and wagons, reducing chances of dwarf/minecart related injuries. While this doesn't answer the question wether there will be such injuries, I can't believe toady would pass the opportunity for that much fun.

[KodKod]

-snip-

Wowzers, this has a hell of a lot of potential. What I'd like to know is if it is possible to have a minecart deliver goods to an area and return without also allowing passage to dwarves.

This of the possibilities that would open up... seperating vampire prisoners whilst managing to keep them clothed, segregating your fortress... No longer must your upper class even LOOK upon their sweatshop-working kin now that they can recieve regular automated food packages to their sealed off sanctuary.

[Girlinhat]

Having minecarts travel to unwalkable areas is extremely possible, even given what we're aware of right now.  Toady has already built his own system that sorts minecarts according to "is full" or "is empty".

Basically, all you need is for the cart to run towards a closed bridge.  But put a plate in the way.  The cart will trip the plate, open the bridge, pass through, and the bridge closes behind them.  Get creative with your logic gates and this becomes incredible.

[tahujdt]

This brings my dream of a Hunger Games fot that much closer. Travel between districts is possible only with official Capitol minecarts.

[KodKod]

Having minecarts travel to unwalkable areas is extremely possible, even given what we're aware of right now. 

Power... overwhelming!