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Author Topic: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?  (Read 4329 times)

DarthMetool

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Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« on: October 16, 2012, 04:51:48 pm »

IF I start this, it'll be planned out, planned out on graph paper, and generally take a long time if I don't get any sieges.  The world setting is a pocket island with a 10,000 year history.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

It's going to be a tower.  The Great Tower of Urist.  100 Z-levels tall, made completely out of dolomite aboveground (rough calc of 75000 units needed).  The base of the tower will hold a 7 Z-level high lobby with alternating (and separated) inner magma and waterfalls, along with the trade depot.  There will be statue rows every other Z-level for the first 40 Z-levels.  The outer wall of the tower will be 31 paces wide (trade depot is 3 paces for comparison) at the base for 40 levels, 27 wide for the next 30, and the upper 30 will be 23 wide.

Three secondary towers at 30 z-levels each will be connected and the 10 and 20 level marks, supporting the transport of magma and water into the tower.

There will be an inner partition to match the top of the tower.  This is because I will dig right underneath the tower all the way down to the magma sea.  Should my dwarves find candy, there is a contingency plan that will be in place.  In case of Clowns, the Great Hammer Of Urist will descend.  The Hammer will be placed at the top of the tower, and it will be 21 wide and 10 levels tall.  Rough calculation is that it will take 3940 bars of copper to make.  Once let go, it will crash down through e v e r y floor of the tower to hit bottom and cap off the flow of clowns.  On top of that, the flow of magma and water for the falls in the lobby will come from secondary towers with independent Dwarven Water Reactors, which means that magma and water will flow on top of the fallen Hammer to create an obsidian cap.

If I survive all sieges, if I don't lose all my dwarves to accidents, if my game doesn't crash, if I don't lose interest, I think this might be awesome.

Should I go for it?
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Crashmaster

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #1 on: October 16, 2012, 05:01:24 pm »

the hammer is constructed if it is going to be made from copper and as such it will not survive the collape intact instead seperating into it's constituent bars at the bottom of it's fall.

DarthMetool

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #2 on: October 16, 2012, 05:07:15 pm »

Well, I guess I'll go with extending the pump stacks up that far just to create an obsidian version then.  And smooth it.  Then engrave the whole thing.  Huh.  Carved black obsidian column at the top of a white dolomite tower.  Makes me wonder how that would look...
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itg

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #3 on: October 16, 2012, 08:14:04 pm »

Are you sure you have enough dolomite? It would suck to carve 35,000 blocks only to realize you ran out of stone. It would be safer to go with a renewable resource, like obsidian, green/clear glass, or clay bricks, or maybe a super-common stone like diorite.

Shoruke

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #4 on: October 16, 2012, 08:23:53 pm »

I'm using obsidian for mine...
protip: if you don't need anything from outside (i.e. you have internal water and enough logs), just seal up your fort to win sieges. No sense in slowing down your megaproject with military concerns when "screw you I have a bridge" works just as well.
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Revanchist

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #5 on: October 16, 2012, 08:58:22 pm »

Sounds... Colossal. Let me know how it turns out.

May Armok be with you....
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DarthMetool

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #6 on: October 16, 2012, 09:01:11 pm »

Are you sure you have enough dolomite? It would suck to carve 35,000 blocks only to realize you ran out of stone. It would be safer to go with a renewable resource, like obsidian, green/clear glass, or clay bricks, or maybe a super-common stone like diorite.

Well, I cheated a little using DFhack to reveal the map and used prospect to list resources.  I have over twice the dolomite I need, really.
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AutomataKittay

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #7 on: October 16, 2012, 09:22:48 pm »

Are you sure you have enough dolomite? It would suck to carve 35,000 blocks only to realize you ran out of stone. It would be safer to go with a renewable resource, like obsidian, green/clear glass, or clay bricks, or maybe a super-common stone like diorite.

Well, I cheated a little using DFhack to reveal the map and used prospect to list resources.  I have over twice the dolomite I need, really.

Are you sure? There're 25% chance of stone per tile mined. Might wanna check the civ to see if they can trade you the stuff in the embark screen, just in case! It sounds like multi-year projects so it should be enough, haha.
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Sutremaine

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #8 on: October 16, 2012, 10:10:27 pm »

But four blocks per mined stone. With that number of stones being mined, the amount of dolomite DFHack reports can be taken as the number of blocks you'll get, a little less if some of the dolomite is butted up against cavern water you don't want to drain or if the report includes the edge tiles you can't dig.

Plus, he might already have taken that into account when checking resources.

You won't get much dolomite off the caravan... they'll only bring half a dozen stone and blocks maximum, which will get you one small outhouse a year. Even spending all your embark points on dolomite rocks will get you fewer than a thousand blocks.
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xpi0t0s

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #9 on: October 17, 2012, 05:56:53 am »

But four blocks per mined stone.

Really?  I'm pretty sure I only get one block per mined stone.  Other things benefit from the 4x modifier but I've only ever observed one block/stone (even on the latest version).
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AutomataKittay

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #10 on: October 17, 2012, 06:42:40 am »

But four blocks per mined stone.

Really?  I'm pretty sure I only get one block per mined stone.  Other things benefit from the 4x modifier but I've only ever observed one block/stone (even on the latest version).

Yeah, it's been four blocks per stone ever since the 25% mining drop change, IIRC. I think the coal fix came later and probably metal, but I'm pretty sure the latter's mis-remembering and came with the stone changes.

But four blocks per mined stone. With that number of stones being mined, the amount of dolomite DFHack reports can be taken as the number of blocks you'll get, a little less if some of the dolomite is butted up against cavern water you don't want to drain or if the report includes the edge tiles you can't dig.

Plus, he might already have taken that into account when checking resources.

You won't get much dolomite off the caravan... they'll only bring half a dozen stone and blocks maximum, which will get you one small outhouse a year. Even spending all your embark points on dolomite rocks will get you fewer than a thousand blocks.

I've done some strip mining with odd results, it -should- average out at 25% but I've gotten much higher or lower. I figure it's cluster getting in the way of pseudorandom chance, since I did got more of those. Even small trickle of orders would make up for it, and would be pretty much free if the OP's selling worn clothings as part of clothing the dwarves.

That and I've ended up lazy a few times on some projects, it's at least a way to keep things piling between bouts of planning and working!

I'm still interested in seeing what the OP can make, though :D
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GreatWyrmGold

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #11 on: October 17, 2012, 07:09:49 am »

Should you do it? What a stupid question.
YES.
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ExecratedDwarf

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #12 on: October 17, 2012, 07:50:41 am »

Should you do it? What a stupid question.
YES.

The question itself isn't stupid, it's just simply moot. The fact is that since he posted about it, he MUST do it. Or he risks being forever labeled an elf.
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Shoruke

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #13 on: October 17, 2012, 10:27:15 am »

If you are more interested in completing the thing than you are with doing it fairly, you could do some RAW modding, and make yourself a smelter reaction that duplicates blocks.

Of course you could always make a smelter reactions that just instantly creates 1,000,000 dolomite blocks...
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DarthMetool

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Re: Tower Megaproject. Should I do it?
« Reply #14 on: October 17, 2012, 12:23:50 pm »

I'm going to do it fairly.  No modding.  If !!FUN!! happens and I fail, that's Dwarf Fortress.  It's more important to make the attempt, than to achieve it safely.
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