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[jcnorris00]

As far back as 40d I've wanted to train my dwarves in swimming, but the only way I could do it was with a manually operated swimming pool, and it simply took too much time and micromanagement for too little gain.  The wiki has a diagram for an automated swimming trainer, but with the new version, it can seriously injure or even kill your dwarves.

So, for my first real contribution to dwarven science, I present: the dwarven kiddie pool.  My design uses an aquifer, but it should be possible to make it work without one.  At least, I think so.

z+1		z		z-1
#,# #,# #*# ###		#v# #.# #%# #%# #v# ###		#?# #^# #O# ### #?# ###

#	: Wall
#	: Aquifer wall
,	: Floor
*	: Gear assembly, floating
v	: Ramp down
.	: Empty space above the pressure plate
% %	: Screwpump, pumping south
?	: Ramp up
^	: Pressure plate, triggered by citizens
O	: Constructed wall

Access is from the north.  Level z-1 is in the aquifer layer.

1. Starting at level z, just above the aquifer layer.  Dig out the five squares, but only channel out the southern-most square for now.  This is so the water from the pump has somewhere to go.
2. Build the screwpump.
3. Channel out the floor north of the pump, then the floor north of that.
4. Move to level z+1.  Dig out the squares, channeling out the last one so that the gear assembly will be able to power the pump.  You can dig out anything else you need to bring in power, but I simply built a windmill one z-level above.
5. Build the gear assembly.  At this point your pump should be powered.
6. Move to level z-1 and remove the ramp at the pump intake.
7. Build a pressure plate at the pump intake, set to trigger when citizens step on it.  Make sure you set the minimum weight at the lowest setting.  You may get some job cancellations, but you'll get it done eventually.
8. Dig out the square south of the pressure plate you just built.
9. Construct a wall just south of the pressure plate.  Again, you may get job cancellations.
10. Link the pressure plate to the gear assembly.
11. At this point, the pressure plate will signal the gear assembly, cutting power to your pump.  Build a lever, connect it to the gear assembly, then pull the lever to restore power.  You can deconstruct the lever to recover two of your mechanisms.
12. Use d-n to deconstruct the constructed wall.  An idle dwarf will come and step on the pressure plate, cutting power to the pump and flooding the pool.  The dwarf will cancel the job and climb out via the ramp, but not before gaining a bit of swimming skill.  Once he's gone, power will be restored and the pool will drain again, ready for the next lesson.

That's all there is to it.  I left one of these running in a small fort with thirteen dwarves.  After 10 months or so, two were adequate swimmers, eight were novices, one was dabbling, and two still had no skill at all.  There were no injuries or deaths.

There's no reason you couldn't build an entire suite of these.  You should be able to power 10 eight from a single water reactor if you space everything properly.  It'll even train any children, since they take deconstruction jobs.

You will get constant "Urist McDwarf, Swimming Student cancels Remove Construction: Dangerous terrain" spam if you don't figure out how to turn it off in announcements.txt.

I haven't tested this with dwarven mothers.  It might be a good idea to set the pressure plate's minimum weight to be more than a baby but less than a child.

UPDATE: Apparently deconstruction work is cumulative.  I guess this should be surprising, since construction is cumulative.  Anyway, your dwarves will eventually succeed in deconstructing the wall you use as bait.
Another way to get your dwarves into the kiddie pool is a 1x1 meeting zone over the pressure plate.  If you do this, you don't need to mine out the square where the wall would go.  Alternatively, you can replace the wall with a statue, and designate a statue garden that only covers the pressure plate.  Both of these techniques will lure idle dwarves into the kiddie pool, but you could get a large number of dwarves idling around the pool entrance, making friends very very quickly.

[parlor_tricks]

I've been reading this and liked it. Will try it later.


Essentially you are asking to deconstruct a wall. When they reach the wall, A pressure plate gets a pump to flood them.

[They Got Leader]

First: you can probably turn off that announcement under the (o)rders menu ingame.

Second: I like this idea a lot. I will have to look into using it as well, thank you for the contribution! Increasing skills of all kinds help dwarves in the military. You should do a study of the long term affects of legendary swimming. What attribute does it increase?

[jcnorris00]

Essentially you are asking to deconstruct a wall. When they reach the wall, A pressure plate gets a pump to flood them.

The pressure plate causes a pump to cease draining the room they're in.  It floods naturally.

First: you can probably turn off that announcement under the (o)rders menu ingame.

Second: I like this idea a lot. I will have to look into using it as well, thank you for the contribution! Increasing skills of all kinds help dwarves in the military. You should do a study of the long term affects of legendary swimming. What attribute does it increase?

You're right, that makes things a lot better.  Thanks!

Training swimming is supposed to increase agility, something that pump operating (a common military training tool) doesn't.

[They Got Leader]

First: you can probably turn off that announcement under the (o)rders menu ingame.

Second: I like this idea a lot. I will have to look into using it as well, thank you for the contribution! Increasing skills of all kinds help dwarves in the military. You should do a study of the long term affects of legendary swimming. What attribute does it increase?

You're right, that makes things a lot better.  Thanks!

Training swimming is supposed to increase agility, something that pump operating (a common military training tool) doesn't.

You're welcome.

And very nice. That should help military trainers. Need agile dwarves? Use this! Is it only available on aquifer maps, though?

[daveralph1234]

First: you can probably turn off that announcement under the (o)rders menu ingame.

Second: I like this idea a lot. I will have to look into using it as well, thank you for the contribution! Increasing skills of all kinds help dwarves in the military. You should do a study of the long term affects of legendary swimming. What attribute does it increase?

You're right, that makes things a lot better.  Thanks!

Training swimming is supposed to increase agility, something that pump operating (a common military training tool) doesn't.

You're welcome.

And very nice. That should help military trainers. Need agile dwarves? Use this! Is it only available on aquifer maps, though?

I think any water source would work if you just pump it in constantly to the pressure plate tile and have some system for draining from the south (original design relies on aquifers absorbing water), but it would use up water very rapidly (single 7-deep water tile every tick). Maybe some sot of recycling system is possible with the drain?

And agility is extremely important for not just military but literally everything. Agility is one of the base modifiers in how long it takes a dwarf to perform any activity, from making crafts to hauling/moving speed to combat finesse.

[jcnorris00]

The pump is on the level above the swimming pool.  It draws the water out of the pool faster than the aquifer can refill it, so a dwarf can reach the wall to deconstruct it (the water is forced back into the aquifer, though).  I did try making the pool three tiles long instead of two, but that didn't work.  The water level stayed around 3 to 4, and the dwarves avoided it.

I think maybe you could mine out a large chamber, coming down from above via the ramp, with the pool situated in the middle.  Don't dig out the walls to the north, east, or west, but smooth and carve fortifications instead.  Then construct the bait wall, pressure plate, and pump, link the plate to a gear as above.  The water from the pump should fall back into the chamber.   Then flood the entire chamber and see if it works.  The minimum size of the chamber is left as an exercise for the reader, but it would need to extend far enough south so that the pump's output falls into it. There would also need to be at least two squares at the pump's level to hold water, since it has to draw out two squares worth of water to make the wall accessible.  I think it's possible, but science has to be done to determine minimum acceptable dimensions.  Aquifers definitely make it easier.

[taptap]

This is lovely - like it would actually work without hurting your dwarves. Sadly my latest embark, announced as aquifer didn't feature one. So - can one adapt this to an aquifer free setup and how?

As the injuries come always from dwarves taken by the water flow and as a result hitting walls or skidding or so in my limited experience simply pumping water on the tile where your dwarf stands might not work perfectly. Anyone tried this? Flooding the tile through floodgrate from below? (With some trigger or just periodically every two days or so?)

[Tirion]

So, how does it work with babies carried by their mothers?