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[huhu]

Since floodgates can't be used anymore like in the past, what's the method to controlled flooding in the new version?

Or is there some totally different approach to indoor farming?

[Tormy]

Good question, Ive no idea about this eiter.

[Name Lips]

Water flows like it would and should in a real-world situation. Or a simple imitation thereof. You don't dig channels per se - you just dig tunnels. Floodgates are little more than walls which you can open or close via a lever. If there's water on one side, then when you open it, the water will flow out. Assuming you have a nice farm room completely sealed off from the rest of the fortress, you won't flood any more than it. The problem is, when you pull the lever again and shut off the water... the water you've let in doesn't go away. Why would it? It just sits there. You need an outlet too.

[Virtz]

You can always just flood the room using the "pond" zone assignment (your dwarves will fill it using buckets) and then you may very well build a farm plot there (1/7 water permits it, not sure about more). It's actually easier than previously if you don't insist on using pumps and the like.

[Solara]

If you've got sand or clay or loam you don't have to do anything at all, just toss some plots down and put your farmers to work.

[Tormy]

quote:Originally posted by Solara:
<STRONG>If you've got sand or clay or loam you don't have to do anything at all, just toss some plots down and put your farmers to work.</STRONG>

I dont get it. My fort is now placed on a sand area. I can make farms easily, however is it making any sense that we dont have to irrigate the farms placed on sand??
 :eek:

[mickel]

Presumably they're irrigated enough naturally.

[Fenek]

I simply dig a tunnel under a river, and pop a floodgate and the end. Whenever I need irrigation, I simply pull the lever ;] Easier than in previous version. However, if you don't have any river nearby... Then you have a little problem     I  guess you could dig around in search of a underground one... if they exist now that is.

And on a side note, you can farm even in winter - goodbye starvation!

[ October 30, 2007: Message edited by: Fenek ]

[ October 30, 2007: Message edited by: Fenek ]

[Aquillion]

mickel, don't you need to change your sig now?   :p

[Faces of Mu]

I got a farm room set up with a floodgate inlet and a grate that lets over flow drain to another farm room below. I've learned (at least for the size of my farm) how much water to let in before pulling it so both levels get 1 water everywhere.

What I can't figure out is just how much irrigation the land needs. I think I managed to survive 3 years (dunno how to check that) but I was never sure exactly when my plots needed water. So I started thinking: Do they just need to be irrigated once to get the muddy soil in and then never again??

The other thing I tried was connecting the floodgates to a water pressure (set to 2 exactly) plate. I found that the gates kept opening and closing every time the water on the plate switched between 1 and 2 units of water. This lead to dwarves cancelling the drink water task they were gonna do because the water disappeared (i.e., the floodgate closed. They were gonna go up the floodgate tunnel and take a sip of the river from the bottom!). I can see now that making the plate react only to 1-3 water would have stopped the constant switching, but I was never sure if it was going to simply close the doors and keep them closed after I had initiated a flooding with a lever. I think it just kept toggling them open and closed.

It would be handy to be able to specify whether a unit of pressure activates, deactivates or does nothing, rather than every pressure plate (and lever) doing both actions.

Anywho, so how DO we know when to irrigate?

[nagromo]

quote:Originally posted by Faces of Mu:
<STRONG>...
The other thing I tried was connecting the floodgates to a water pressure (set to 2 exactly) plate. I found that the gates kept opening and closing every time the water on the plate switched between 1 and 2 units of water. This lead to dwarves cancelling the drink water task they were gonna do because the water disappeared (i.e., the floodgate closed. They were gonna go up the floodgate tunnel and take a sip of the river from the bottom!).
...</STRONG>

I put a wall grate (as well as a floodgate) between the river and my water works. That way, no fish get from the river to my cave, and no dwarves try to do anything stupid like that.

[Mylon]

quote:Originally posted by Faces of Mu:
<STRONG>Anywho, so how DO we know when to irrigate?</STRONG>

Dwarves currently track mud very, very easily.  So your muddy plots, if traveled across often, might last indefinitely.

I'm still learning how to play with water.  I only have a brook on my map plus a few lakes.  I drained one by mining out the wall (I'm not sure how to put in a floodgate) and then had to rewall that spot because it was a security breach.  Grates look like fun, as well as the possibility of using pumps to move water around, but I still need to learn how to use floodgates.  Right now I don't have too much motivation to learn how water works since irrigation is not required.

[ October 31, 2007: Message edited by: Mylon ]

[Faces of Mu]

Floodgates are built like doors in empty spaces. I think they act almost exactly the same as doors except they do not and will not open without a lever/pressureplate. So you can place one and dwarves won't go and jam it open with a seed (dunno what happens if something is left in the way, though).

[CharonX]

Personally I'd try something like this:

code:

~~~~~River~~~~~
   +                + Tunnel/Reservoir
   G                # Farm Plots
   X ++ #####       G Grate
   ++++X#####       X Floodgate
     ++ #####

first dig out the Tunnels (except for the last bit to the river), Reservoir and Plots, link the floodgate between Plots and reservoir to a lever, pull said lever to open it (and free any dorf that - yet again - managed to end up at the wrong side of the gate) place the Grate and and 2nd floodgate, link the 2nd floodgate to the level. When one gate is open, the other is closed. Dig the last bit of the tunnel to the river (rescue your dwarf from the floods) If you need to irrigate, pull the lever: the outer gate will open, filling the reservoir (locked tight by the inner gate) pull it once more your reservoir will empty and the closed outer gate will prevent a world-flood.
The Grate is there to secure your irrigation from invasions by killer-carps.

[ October 31, 2007: Message edited by: CharonX ]