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Author Topic: Unreliable drawbridge  (Read 3410 times)

Irenices

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Unreliable drawbridge
« on: April 13, 2012, 05:12:48 pm »

So my fortresses front drawbridge only works like 20% of the time when i pull the lever, iv never had this happen before and have no idea why it wouldn't work like normal, at first i thought the dwarfs just never connected it but as i said it works like 20% of the time when pulled.  Has it been changed so a bridge cant be raised when people are on it or something?
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Telgin

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #1 on: April 13, 2012, 05:17:21 pm »

It should raise or lower if there are dwarves on it.  Do remember that especially large creatures will prevent you from raising it, but the game doesn't sum up the mass of many smaller critters in this way.  1000 dwarves won't hold it down, but a megabeast might.

I'm not sure what the problem could be.  You're not telling the dwarves to pull the lever several times are you?  There is a delay between sending the order and the bridge raising, so if you're telling them to pull it, don't want long enough and tell them to pull the lever again, nothing will happen.
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Irenices

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #2 on: April 13, 2012, 05:26:05 pm »

Nothing very big was ever on it, maybe a ruther once or twice, but most of the time when i told them to pull it nothing/a goblin or two was on it.  I waited a good amount between each lever pulling, i even watched the dwarf come and do it to make sure it wasnt something like the job was being interrupted and the lever not getting pulled.
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Loud Whispers

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #3 on: April 13, 2012, 07:02:20 pm »

Are you sure it's not raising? Sometimes it's hard to tell if a bridge is retracted/raised or not.

vjek

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #4 on: April 13, 2012, 07:10:23 pm »

Goblins, in 34.07, siege while mounted on/with Cave Dragons, by default.

Cave Dragons are above the weight class for bridges, so they will not retract or raise, nor drop with them on them.  They're too darn heavy!

So, it's possible that's what was happening.  Other than that, my bridges have worked exactly as expected in 34.07, including flinging goblins and trolls around and/or atomsmashing them.

Nil Eyeglazed

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #5 on: April 13, 2012, 07:24:03 pm »

Do you only have a single lever connected to the bridge?  No extra levers or pressure plates or any other machinery?  And you're not queuing up multiple pull lever jobs before it has a chance to go off?

If something was too big for the bridge, it'd be deconstructing rather than just failing to toggle, so you'd know if that was the problem.
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Telgin

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #6 on: April 13, 2012, 07:37:20 pm »

I think it only deconstructs if it lowers on top of a beastie that's too big.  Trying to raise it just doesn't do anything.  But yeah, that would be obvious if it happened.

Rutherers are too big to smash / raise, aren't they?  That could explain the problem at least part of the time.
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Irenices

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #7 on: April 13, 2012, 07:47:04 pm »

I defintly had some cave dragons come with the final siege but even when i tried to close it on a ambush with no mounts at all it was being funky, like i said it thought maybe my dwarfs hadn't finished hooking it up until it finaly closed after having to toggled something like 3 times, not in rapid succession.  It was hooked to one lever and nothing else, only bridge in the fortress.
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Sphalerite

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #8 on: April 13, 2012, 09:28:23 pm »

Bridges either work or they don't.  The goblins in that siege were almost certainly on mounts, you just didn't notice them, and those mounts were over the weight limit for the bridge to work.
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Irenices

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #9 on: April 13, 2012, 10:39:13 pm »

Didn't see you behind me, but guess i just didn't notice.
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Talvieno

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #10 on: April 14, 2012, 01:02:28 am »

I had a similar problem once... The bridge raised and lowered as I'd expected it to... and then at some point I tried to raise it and it wouldn't raise. After deconstructing/rebuilding it seemed to work again, and I didn't have any more problems.
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Saiko Kila

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #11 on: April 14, 2012, 02:42:12 am »

In version .31.25 I had moments, when my main (retracting, not draw) bridge wasn't working - if there were multiple trolls and goblins on it, without mounts. A single troll or a pair of goblins weren't a problem, only a multitude of them. Therefore I'm rather convinced that the total mass of occupants count. Unless one of the trolls was exceptionally heavy…
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morderkaine

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #12 on: April 27, 2012, 03:38:13 pm »

Ive had a few similar moments with Drawbridges and floodgates only sometimes triggering.
It seems like giving a level 'Pull Lever' task twice wont make said gate/bridge flip open then closed again really quickly.
I tried it with a flood gate to try and use a controlled flow to fill a well, instead it opened and stayed open, and it took a few tries of assigning a pull lever task till it closed.
Combined weight may do it with bridges - I had the bridge lever on repeat hoping to atom smash/fling the majority of attacking goblines and trolls and have my militia take on the few that got across. The flinging part didn't really seem to work when they swarmed over, it got a few individuals.
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Quietust

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #13 on: April 27, 2012, 03:42:22 pm »

Goblins, in 34.07, siege while mounted on/with Cave Dragons, by default.
No, they do not - your goblins in your world attack your fortress mounted on cave dragons, but other players are likely to see them mounted on totally different animals.
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i2amroy

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Re: Unreliable drawbridge
« Reply #14 on: April 27, 2012, 03:47:58 pm »

Ive had a few similar moments with Drawbridges and floodgates only sometimes triggering.
It seems like giving a level 'Pull Lever' task twice wont make said gate/bridge flip open then closed again really quickly.
I tried it with a flood gate to try and use a controlled flow to fill a well, instead it opened and stayed open, and it took a few tries of assigning a pull lever task till it closed.
Combined weight may do it with bridges - I had the bridge lever on repeat hoping to atom smash/fling the majority of attacking goblines and trolls and have my militia take on the few that got across. The flinging part didn't really seem to work when they swarmed over, it got a few individuals.
It's because both bridges and floodgates have a slight delay on responding to commands. As such if you send a second open/close command immediately after the first then the bridge/floodgate will ignore the second command completely. Also levers don't send "flip" commands (except to gear assemblies), but instead send either an "open" or a "close" command, so if a bridge/floodgate misses a command it will take 2 more lever pulls for it to respond correctly. This will also greatly slow down the number of times that it can trigger while a group of enemies are crossing over it, making it completely possible that you smashed a few and then the rest got across before the delay for triggering ended.
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