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[Vargas Gray]

Me and some friends where discussing how odd dwarf fortress handled the natural occurrence of aquifers. Like the fact that aquifers are spawned from water producing stones and that aquifers are limitless. Also that the body of water, if not always, but mostly covers an entire zx-level and not parts of it.

Of course the reason why DF handles aquifers as being spawned from water producing stones might be because it hits an edge, practically an empty void, and would dry out without these stones. So perhaps a temporary solution to a more complex problem to be solved in the future.

So if the truth is that the reason behind why aquifers are limitless is because of this problem of hitting edges, as I see it, then my suggestion would partially crumble.

Anyhow I wish to write it down to share my thoughts on this subject. In nature an aquifer can be everything from small to humongous beyond silliness, like in dwarf fortress one aquifer can cover an entire continent, literally. Sure the game divides all aquifers into regional and secluded aquifers but still in the embarking mode one can follow a line of aquifers from one edge to the other.

In nature aquifers differs both in depth and length and it's about here where's my suggestion will make entrance.

My suggestion wish for aquifers with random depth and length. Aquifers that might cover and might not cover entire embarking zones and, at a larger perspective, an entire continent. Aquifers that might and might not be more then one z-level in depth.   

Aquifers that's not produced from stones but from actually water being collected over time by precipitation; a complex system to program for sure. But still if there would be some reasonable way to simulate the accumulation of water into aquifers that would be just epic.

Perhaps, as it would be easier, one could just deal with the accumulation of water in aquifers only in world gen that randomly produce aquifers across the world accordingly to whatever conditions there is for aquifers. Perhaps like it's done now I guess in some sense.

Game-wise this would add a more unique and, let face it, a more exciting experience when embarking in a region with a aquifer that's random in depth and length. Aquifers can be dealt with in a more realistic manner and can also be predicted how it might behave. Aquifers would also be a resource with a limit, if its without edges that is, that one would need to handle with some thought - at least that's my view on it.

Further one could also use aquifers as a medium for diseases and a home for animals/creatures/whatever-that's-scary-and-shit to further add !FUN! into the game. This is of course another topic that should be handled separately and not here.

As an end I want to write that I do hope that I didn't soil the forum with another useless redundant suggestion because someone might of suggested it before. I did a quick search on the forum but didn't find anything like this suggestion.

Best Regards ~Vargas Gray   

[King Mir]

Aquifers are already tied to biome drainage, as far as I know. It might make sense to have some aquifers come in clusters instead of levels though.

The bigger issue with aquifers is that they create water way too fast, and that piercing them involves unrealistic solutions.

[GreatWyrmGold]

What are some realistic ways to deal with aquifers? Other than avoiding them.

It seems realistic to me to be able to pump out aquifer water and build walls to keep more from coming in.

[King Mir]

The larger issue is the flow rate. If you dig a big hole in the ground bellow the water table, yeah it will fill up with water, but not so much that you'll risk drowning while you're building up the walls.

Likewise absorption of water is totally off. Regular porous material, like soil, should absorb water, but also at a slow rate. So you wouldn't build a reservoir above the water table out of soil or porous rock. Aquifer soil on the other hand should not absorb any water, because it's already saturated. 

[10ebbor10]

Then again, that might make them a bit to easy. Maybe every so often one of the walls will crack, leading to water seeping in?

[Vargas Gray]

What are some realistic ways to deal with aquifers? Other than avoiding them.

It seems realistic to me to be able to pump out aquifer water and build walls to keep more from coming in.

Perhaps the issue isn't what's the most realistic way, as in the nature, to deal with aquifers in the game, aka super realistic mechanics and such. But surely the goals should be to make it desirable and fun overall, an to create aquifers that's more or less sensible in the way that they don't, almost 100% of the times, covers an entire zx-level and is made up of limitless water producing stones.

It's possible to pump out a smaller area in an aquifer but that requires an ridiculous amount of windmills and pumps. Or as most do: drop a gigantic stoneplug down into the aquifer and dig through the rubble.

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That's a nice idea King mir. It would be nice to see materials with different qualities as waterproof materials and the amount and rate of absorption. It would be a new level of planing ahead when one is building reservoirs. 


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Then again, that might make them a bit to easy. Maybe every so often one of the walls will crack, leading to water seeping in?

Aquifers shouldn't be seen as a encounter of some sort that should and will hinder the advances of the player and the fortress to an 100%. It should be seen as a natural occurrence that might be a hinder.

Now, as I see it, aquifers are 100% passive encounters that will effect your fortress always negatively, well perhaps not always but more or less. The aquifer might doom your fortress right from the start because of the lack of materials that can be plunged into it as a plug to be dug through.

BTW: I do like the idea of walls being able to crumble/crack and let water forth into your fort or into whatever open area there's behind the wall. It would make digging a lot more !FUN! The problem might how to implement it as a mechanic that doesn't ruin your game because of flooding occurring too often and too random.

Perhaps the carrying capacity of any given wall might be decided by the digger, too random perhaps, and the type of material he/she digs through, not so random. But this is another topic.

[GreatWyrmGold]

What are some realistic ways to deal with aquifers? Other than avoiding them.

It seems realistic to me to be able to pump out aquifer water and build walls to keep more from coming in.

Perhaps the issue isn't what's the most realistic way, as in the nature, to deal with aquifers in the game, aka super realistic mechanics and such. But surely the goals should be to make it desirable and fun overall, an to create aquifers that's more or less sensible in the way that they don't, almost 100% of the times, covers an entire zx-level and is made up of limitless water producing stones.

It's possible to pump out a smaller area in an aquifer but that requires an ridiculous amount of windmills and pumps. Or as most do: drop a gigantic stoneplug down into the aquifer and dig through the rubble.

I've pierced an aquifer with four dwarves operating four pumps. No windmills needed. Also, DF strives for realism in every way it can.

That's a nice idea King mir. It would be nice to see materials with different qualities as waterproof materials and the amount and rate of absorption. It would be a new level of planing ahead when one is building reservoirs.

I'd rather wait for leaky walls until walls can be damaged in other ways.

Then again, that might make them a bit to easy. Maybe every so often one of the walls will crack, leading to water seeping in?

Aquifers shouldn't be seen as a encounter of some sort that should and will hinder the advances of the player and the fortress to an 100%. It should be seen as a natural occurrence that might be a hinder.
Now, as I see it, aquifers are 100% passive encounters that will effect your fortress always negatively, well perhaps not always but more or less. The aquifer might doom your fortress right from the start because of the lack of materials that can be plunged into it as a plug to be dug through.
BTW: I do like the idea of walls being able to crumble/crack and let water forth into your fort or into whatever open area there's behind the wall. It would make digging a lot more !FUN! The problem might how to implement it as a mechanic that doesn't ruin your game because of flooding occurring too often and too random.

Look above for my first part.
Also, why shouldn't aquifers be a challenge? DF is a game where everything is a danger, if you don't know what you're doing. It's not like breeching the aquifer wrong wil cause it to start shooting water up to flood your fortress!
I do agree that eventual but inevitable breakage of walls would ruin the fun in aquifers.

[Vargas Gray]

Of course DF should be about challenges but it also should strive for realism. Aquifers as they're now ain't realistic. Aquifers should be absolutely more random then they are now. And at a later stage of development aquifers could be used as waterways for subterranean creatures and whatnot to further add to the challenge of aquifers. 

Thank Armok that aquifers isn't pressurised. Well it's true that you don't see your fortress drown the moment you breach into an aquifer but I don't see why challenge and randomized aquifers don't mix? If one really wish to see a more active challenge in aquifers one should wish for creatures within the body of water itself, wouldn't we now? Or why not ask for pressurised water within some aquifers that will shoot up when breached?

To experience one type, or was it two(?), of aquifer all over again isn't fun, neither realistic. To experience the same procedure when going through a aquifer all over again isn't that particularly fun in the long run. And what's the fault in being able to dig around a aquifer because it's randomized both in depth and length?

   

[10ebbor10]

Of course DF should be about challenges but it also should strive for realism. Aquifer as they're now ain't realistic. Aquifers should be absolutely more random then they are now. And at a later stage of development aquifers could be used as waterways for subterranean creatures and whatnot to further add to the challenge of aquifers. 

Thank Armok that aquifers isn't pressurised. Well it's true that you don't see your fortress drown the moment you breach into an aquifer but I don't see why challenge and randomized aquifers don't mix? If one really wish to see a more active challenge in aquifers one should wish for creatures within the body of water itself, wouldn't we now? Or why not ask for pressurised water within some aquifers that will shoot up when breached?

To experience one type, or was it two(?), of aquifer all over again isn't fun, neither realistic. To experience the same procedure when going through a aquifer all over again isn't that particularly fun in the long run. And what's the fault in being able to dig around a aquifer because it's randomized both in depth and length?

Aquifers ain't underwater lakes(though those do and should exist, considering Df's setting). They are just a whole lot of wet dirt/stone. They can be pressurized, because of the weight of the stone on top. Critters living in them is impossible, unless they are microbes or can ooze through the rock.

I agree that aquifer digging could be better. Mostly this should be done by limiting the flow and amount of water, making them more like water reservoirs, which they in fact are. This would give them a minor positive effect.

In order not to make them all positive, they should have a variety of effects:
-Sometimes cracking walls, ruining engravings and letting water seep inside.(Not in the insta-flood way it does now). The water would wet and muddy the stairs, and this and the crack itself would cause bad thoughts. (Best wait with this till we have other ways to damage walls)
-They should undermine your forts stability. A cracked wall with water seeping through shouldn't be a strong as a normal wall. (Wait for realistic physics)

Rivers and other watersources should, depending on the terrain, also cause minor aquifers

[GreatWyrmGold]

I agree; aquifers should be realistic. Limiting flow would help realism. Let's start to think about how people in the real world deal with aquifers, shall we? Then we can decide how aquifers should be changed to allow those changes.

[Carp McDwarfEater]

You all say that aquifers create water too fast, but i disagree. Even if the water just drips from the walls like a leaky faucet, after a few days I could see a pool of water a few feet deep forming. And in Dwarf Fortress, a few days is just a few seconds. The flow rate seems realistic to me.

[King Mir]

You all say that aquifers create water too fast, but i disagree. Even if the water just drips from the walls like a leaky faucet, after a few days I could see a pool of water a few feet deep forming. And in Dwarf Fortress, a few days is just a few seconds. The flow rate seems realistic to me.

That would be ok if in that few days the dwarves could dig out that 3x3 hole and wall it up. Because it isn't hard to dig and wall up faster than water can flow for a small hole. But that's not possible. In dwarf mode, some things have to be at the calendar pace, like farming and trading. Other things need to be at a more daily pace, like eating and moving. Breeching an aquifer involves enough movement to warrant operating at a slower pace.

Also, a few days seems fast to me for a fresh dug hole 3 meters below the water table to fill up all the way. I could be wrong though.

[GreatWyrmGold]

It probably depends on the aquifer. For instance, as someone mentioned, when impermeable rock is on top of an aquifer, it becomes pressurised, so the water would come out faster.

[King Mir]

What are some realistic ways to deal with aquifers? Other than avoiding them.

It seems realistic to me to be able to pump out aquifer water and build walls to keep more from coming in.

Perhaps the issue isn't what's the most realistic way, as in the nature, to deal with aquifers in the game, aka super realistic mechanics and such. But surely the goals should be to make it desirable and fun overall, an to create aquifers that's more or less sensible in the way that they don't, almost 100% of the times, covers an entire zx-level and is made up of limitless water producing stones.

It's possible to pump out a smaller area in an aquifer but that requires an ridiculous amount of windmills and pumps. Or as most do: drop a gigantic stoneplug down into the aquifer and dig through the rubble.

I've pierced an aquifer with four dwarves operating four pumps. No windmills needed. Also, DF strives for realism in every way it can.

Yeah, it shouldn't take that much. One pump per level at best, IMO. And no job cancellation spam because of such a normal task as breeching aquifers.

It might also help to be able to build walls into the soil without digging out that tile, as if you're building supports into the walls of the hole. This would be helpful for when cave-in physics is back in.

Then again, that might make them a bit to easy. Maybe every so often one of the walls will crack, leading to water seeping in?

Aquifers shouldn't be seen as a encounter of some sort that should and will hinder the advances of the player and the fortress to an 100%. It should be seen as a natural occurrence that might be a hinder.
Now, as I see it, aquifers are 100% passive encounters that will effect your fortress always negatively, well perhaps not always but more or less. The aquifer might doom your fortress right from the start because of the lack of materials that can be plunged into it as a plug to be dug through.
BTW: I do like the idea of walls being able to crumble/crack and let water forth into your fort or into whatever open area there's behind the wall. It would make digging a lot more !FUN! The problem might how to implement it as a mechanic that doesn't ruin your game because of flooding occurring too often and too random.

Look above for my first part.
Also, why shouldn't aquifers be a challenge? DF is a game where everything is a danger, if you don't know what you're doing. It's not like breeching the aquifer wrong wil cause it to start shooting water up to flood your fortress!
I do agree that eventual but inevitable breakage of walls would ruin the fun in aquifers.

Aquifers should be as much of a challenge as they are in real life, and no more. Players can and do disagree on how much fun aquifers are; that's not a reason to change them. Their lack of realistic operation is.

[King Mir]

It probably depends on the aquifer. For instance, as someone mentioned, when impermeable rock is on top of an aquifer, it becomes pressurised, so the water would come out faster.

Ok, but when do you find impermeable rock on top of aquifers in DF? Not most of the time. So if all aquifers are made the same, then the water should come out slowly. For the more rare, deeper aquifers like you describe, maybe the 4 pumps would be needed. But in those cases, things are easier, because you have access to the rock on top.