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[burn_heal]

You can disable them.

Ah, thanks. Didn't realize this.

Keep in mind I'm not really complaining about them. I was just wondering what their use was, and the answers that have been given are satisfactory to me.

It does seem however that aquifers weren't really designed to be pierced, based on the difficulty of doing so and the reliance on methods using pumps and cave-ins.

In any case I don't see them as a major issue, especially if you can turn them off.

[Draco18s]

They were added without any (additional) means to deal with them, but the players found ways around that problem, and so, an additional method is probably not needed at this point.

[Damiac]

I think the real life example shows, as well as for playability reasons, that the seepage rate should be far slower.  Real life aquifers are managed easily with sump pumps, well that's how we pierce them in DF, but they fill up ridiculously quickly.

On the other hand, if we slow down the rate at which they put out water, the rate that they suck in water should also decrease, so they can't just be used as an infinite water sink. 

My current fort is on a partial aquifer.  I dug into it while trying to build my well, so it's not 2z deep, and is muddy.  Oh well, not much I can do now.  It's just an additional challenge, as people have said, many just turn it off.  Used properly it can be a handy water source, and sink.

[LordSlowpoke]

I think the real life example shows, as well as for playability reasons, that the seepage rate should be far slower.  Real life aquifers are managed easily with sump pumps, well that's how we pierce them in DF, but they fill up ridiculously quickly.

On the other hand, if we slow down the rate at which they put out water, the rate that they suck in water should also decrease, so they can't just be used as an infinite water sink. 

My current fort is on a partial aquifer.  I dug into it while trying to build my well, so it's not 2z deep, and is muddy.  Oh well, not much I can do now.  It's just an additional challenge, as people have said, many just turn it off.  Used properly it can be a handy water source, and sink.

Our pumps are also ridiculously efficient, so it evens out. Some of my forts employ a rather simple dual waterwheel-12 pumps design to deal with the aquifer, which allows me to flood my primary 3x3 staircase at will. Or the entrance, if I want to claim it to be a defense mechanism. All done with fancy hatches and gear assembles hooked up to levers.

[Scow2]

Aquifers are fun! All the best stuff is hidden under them for you to go grab, and the presence of one, while it makes getting stone difficult until pierced, also provides a low-risk way to build swimming pools, waterfalls, perpetual motion generators, and VERY easy access to clean water... build a well ANYWHERE!

And there's extra Fun if the attempt fails spectacularly!

[GreatWyrmGold]

About aquifer speed: It's pretty decent for the speed the calendar moves at, but not that the dwarves move at.

[Michael]

Or just set the site finder to find aquifers. Then every aquifer tile will have a nice flashing X on it, and you can select a suitable embark rectangle (although make sure that the site info says aquifer, even if it's got flashing tiles)

Wow, I hadn't noticed the site finder was improved.  (Although probably not enough that I'd actually rely on it....)

But it doesn't help with this problem.  It can (very slowly) mark every region tile that contains an aquifer.  But it doesn't mark the embark tiles in the leftmost "local" map.  So it is no help with choosing an embark site with both some aquifer access and also a safe spot to dig.


Also, I had another realization about why Toady put aquifers in.  He wanted the human civilization to be able to sprawl away from the rivers, but then they would need wells.  And wells only work because of aquifers.   (In fortress mode you can make a cistern and then put a "well" on top of it, but I think that stretches the everyday English meaning of the word "well".)

If human cities were revealed in Adventurer mode to have magically working wells that could not be duplicated by a fortress constructed at the same site (the fortress would be built in a separate world with an identical seed but less history), then some Fortress mode players would cry foul.  To forestall that, we have fortress mode aquifers, both the good and the bad features.

[Kazang]

My beef with aquifers is that they are disproportionately annoying to breach in the first place, then are a complete non-issue for the rest of the fort's existence.  And in fact makes everything easier once breached.

For a game this is really backwards and leads to problem a upside down difficultly curve, where the game gets exponentially easier instead of more difficult.


If it were up to me dwarfs would be much better at breaching the aquifers in the first place, by being able to swim and work in semi submerged conditions without drowning or cancelling everything. Floodgates that can be built from above on a submerged tile to block the flow, you know like how we actually deal with blocking water flow in real life.  Throwing stuff in the hole to stop the flow, anything really.  Just make the initial job more simple.
But in contrast aquifers become more problematic later on, they occur at multiple depths at varying thickness, complete with underground lakes and pools, unstable rock formations that have to excavated carefully in order to not cause subsidence or accidental lake breaches, water seepage(not full infinite water flow like full aquifer tiles though) on all levels with semi-porous rock, and through cracks in non-porous layers, that needs to be constantly pumped/mopped(depending on how much seepage there is) out to prevent flooding.  Underground springs as water sources and aquifers that don't "flow" like they do now(as in normal aquifer tiles wouldn't create infinite water constantly and would not be able absorb water at the rate they produce it) so free no infinite power from anywhere, but concentrated on specific tiles that can be exploited as a resource.   

Oh so many things could be done with aquifers, but they remain just a nuisance that are overcome with tedious micromanagement that makes early game a chore but provides stupidly good benefits later on.

[DNK]

The entire game gets easier as time goes on because once you've got your industries up and running, only fun remains (or indefinite expansion).

[Sutremaine]

With either a brook or an aquifer, you can get infinite water whenever you want it.  Otherwise, you are at the mercy of the weather, and need to gather up water in advance of when you need it.

With default worldgen settings, odds are that you'll have sourced water in at least one cavern. Having no sourced water at all is rare (though not impossible).

[Rex_Nex]

Personally, they are annoying to me because I wouldn't embark on a Aquifer zone anyway. Too much of a hassle for almost no return (clean water is oddly not often useful). Plus I have to redesign my fortress to accommodate a zlevel of pure water :C

[Michael]

If it were up to me dwarfs would be much better at breaching the aquifers in the first place, by being able to swim and work in semi submerged conditions without drowning or cancelling everything. Floodgates that can be built from above on a submerged tile to block the flow, you know like how we actually deal with blocking water flow in real life.  Throwing stuff in the hole to stop the flow, anything really.  Just make the initial job more simple.

Such modifications would be also helpful in managing brooks.  However, considering how Toady works, be careful what you wish for.  There are a lot of unrealistic things about DF water that favor the player, and he's apt to "fix" those first.... 

For instance, at present if you do manage to dam a sourced water flow, it stops coming once the water behind the dam is 7/7.  In real life, the level would just keep rising until the water finds a new way through.

With either a brook or an aquifer, you can get infinite water whenever you want it.  Otherwise, you are at the mercy of the weather, and need to gather up water in advance of when you need it.

With default worldgen settings, odds are that you'll have sourced water in at least one cavern. Having no sourced water at all is rare (though not impossible).

But sourced water above your fort (either brook or aquifer) is still more convenient, since you don't need pumps to get it where you want to go. 

[crazybear]

Aquifers are an infinite source of flowing clean water without any chance of nasties appearing in them. Learn the double slit method and you'll never want to embark without an aquifer again.

Can you explain the "Double slit" method?

[krisslanza]

They're annoying to me because there is no simple, easy way to get past them. They all involve either a LOT of pumps (and knowing how to use them) or abusing the dwarven physics of cave-ins or something. There just isn't an easy "dig through it" method - aside from having non-porous materials in the aquifer layer.

[Draco18s]

Aquifers are an infinite source of flowing clean water without any chance of nasties appearing in them. Learn the double slit method and you'll never want to embark without an aquifer again.

Can you explain the "Double slit" method?

http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/DF2012:Double-slit_method