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[Dorfimedes]

windmills need their central tile open to the sky. building another windmill on top cancels that, so will make the lower windmill useless, afaik

Will building a windmill next to a windmill make it combine power then?

Nope, I tried that back in 40d. This is the problem with windmill farms, they take up a lot of space and the further away you get from the central windmill, the more axles you need to connect it to the central gear assembly, which results in diminishing returns and an eventual net loss of power once it gets large enough. For a map that only gives 20 in wind power, the windmills on the edge of a 6x6 windmill farm would only give one power each. But there's twenty of them any way, so they give enough power for two screw pumps. This only works for waterwheels since they're compact, generate more power and can link up by being adjacent to each other.

For windmills it's best if they're not centralized like that. Windmills really shine when you build them directly above machines that don't need a lot of power, like millstones or single pumps.

e: The manhattan distance for the windmills that aren't in a direct horizontal or vertical line from the central windmill is actually greater, so only four windmills would be usable that far from it, resulting in an extremely underwhelming net gain of 4 power. Also, there isn't really a single central windmill since the diameter is an even number of discrete units, but I'm just nitpicking my own examples at this point.

[vertinox]

Hrm... So powering a pump stack may require more than one water wheel then? If there are more than 10 pump stacks?

[Dorfimedes]

Hrm... So powering a pump stack may require more than one water wheel then? If there are more than 10 pump stacks?

Nonono, I'm talking about windmills. They're kinda inefficient. Water wheels are completely awesome.

In other news, I've done some testing and it looks like only the central tile of a windmill causes the terrain underneath it to be marked as "indoors." If you staggered them correctly you might be able to settle on a pseudo-pyramid design which would be denser and thus more efficient. If a building destroyer took out the central axle the whole thing would hilariously pancake, crushing anything underneath it in a large area, however.

[Abysium]

This is the problem with windmill farms, they take up a lot of space and the further away you get from the central windmill, the more axles you need to connect it to the central gear assembly, which results in diminishing returns and an eventual net loss of power once it gets large enough.

your saying the net loss is higher with a higher number of windmills, but that doesnt really make mathsense

if you got a line of mills {on x axis}, one next to the other, conected on their z-1 like this
G--G--G--G--G

each windmills gain beyond the first is deduced by the value of --G (7) so you still get a minimum 13 gain of each next mill (more with some maps)
now you can still make more {on y axis} with the same --G conection, still only costing 7 per next mill

considering the initial power cost of the drivetrain needed to make a windfarm highup, it only gets more efficent by having more windmills, not less efficient

windmills do take up a lot of space and wood, but are easy to make, and fairly failsafe
space can be saved if you build em high up, wood cant be saved, but theres usually enough wood anyway


anyways tastes differ, some prefer wind, some prefer water, some do both
its the beauty of choice and there is no 'one' correct solution




also, as allready stated, windmills are best when mounted directly ontop of a single pump (or a dual pump mister - but thats somthing i need to post in its own topic)