Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[GavJ]

it goes into quantum superposition, and the dwarf involved will never get the bad thought.

*they get HALF a bad thought, which rounds down to zero =P

[Innocent Dave]

I have then made a haul route, assigned a minecart and it to take from the stockpile, and dump south.
But, nothing gets moved from the stockpile.

Just to check, because this seems a little oddly worded... you did set the track stop, during construction of it, to dump south, right?

Have a quick look at your routes screen, and if this route has anything other than 0% next to it, the track stop it's on isn't dumping automatically, and will need to be rebuilt.

[Loci]

From science threads in the past, the best method for lowest impact on FPS is atom smashing with a bridge. Which you can also do with minecart quantum stockpiles. But also just regular old refuse zones...

There are no "refuse zones". There are "refuse stockpiles" and "garbage dump zones". Unfortunately, refuse stockpiles cannot share a tile with a bridge. While garbage dump zones can share the tile, they require manually designating items for dumping and interfere with other "garbage dump" quantum stockpiling.

A minecart quantum dump several levels above the atom smasher, though, can be completely automated, and does not interfere with the ability to use garbage dumps to stack rocks, carry items to the depot, etc.

[GavJ]

From science threads in the past, the best method for lowest impact on FPS is atom smashing with a bridge. Which you can also do with minecart quantum stockpiles. But also just regular old refuse zones...

There are no "refuse zones". There are "refuse stockpiles" and "garbage dump zones". Unfortunately, refuse stockpiles cannot share a tile with a bridge. While garbage dump zones can share the tile, they require manually designating items for dumping and interfere with other "garbage dump" quantum stockpiling.

A minecart quantum dump several levels above the atom smasher, though, can be completely automated, and does not interfere with the ability to use garbage dumps to stack rocks, carry items to the depot, etc.

Yes I meant garbage zone.  Yes, you have to manually dump items, but so what? Since almost everything I ever destroy is a subset of something I want to keep some of (like dumping excess clothing from sieges -- don't want to dump all clothing! Just excess), not sure how a minecart dump could be automated. Maybe I'm just confused.

[wierd]

Refuse (Rotting meat/food items, rotting skin, dead bodies, worn out clothes, "other"...) is automatically recognized by the game, and not manually disposed of.

However, I am with you GavJ-- Automatic handling of waste products to refuse stockpiles is hit and miss, and not all items that would be sent to a refuse stockpile SHOULD be sent there automatically, in my estimation, because refuse stockpiles now rot. (Shells, bones, etc.)

Much easier for me to just dump offensive items, then pull the lever. Dwarves seem to respond to dump-order designated items much faster than they do to refuse items anyway.

[GavJ]

Well yeah it works for that stuff. It's just that that stuff is like, 10% of the things I want to atomsmash. Mostly it's goblin socks that I have to manually interact with anyway to unforbid.
(Incidentally, it would be nice to be able to define the inclusion criteria of such special categories, say, in the RAWs or in game, but this isn't the suggestion forum)

[greycat]

From the player's point of view, waste comes in different kinds:

• Waste that the game recognizes as "refuse".  This includes vermin remains, and cartilage from the butcher's shop.  Vermin remains can be stockpiled; I don't know about cartilage (I've always manually dumped it).
  
• Waste that isn't categorized as "refuse" but which can nevertheless be stockpiled.
  
• Waste that cannot be stockpiled.  This includes large clothing; the game cannot be told to separate this waste material from useful material.  Everything in this category must be dealt with by hand, or by some other tricky means.
  

If you can stockpile something, then you can deal with it in all kinds of wonderful ways.  You can set up stockpiles with or without wheelbarrows, depending on the weight of the items.  You can set up automatic minecart dumping from those stockpiles.

If things can't be stockpiled, then dealing with them is a huge pain in the ass.  You have to manually mark each item for dumping, and dumping can never use wheelbarrows or minecarts.  This means not only do you have to spend extra time marking everything and creating/destroying garbage zones, but your dwarves also have to spend weeks dragging heavy things across the ground with their beards.

However, I am with you GavJ-- Automatic handling of waste products to refuse stockpiles is hit and miss, and not all items that would be sent to a refuse stockpile SHOULD be sent there automatically, in my estimation, because refuse stockpiles now rot. (Shells, bones, etc.)

Personally I just leave bones sitting in the butcher's shop (or the bowyer's shop, or wherever they end up) until needed.  But if I wanted to stockpile them, here's what I would do:

• Create a smallish (say, 2x3) stockpile that takes only bones.  Since this is a refuse stockpile, they will rot when placed here, so they cannot be allowed to remain here.
• Two tiles away from this stockpile, dig a channel.  Underneath that is where the bones will land.  Make sure the tile underneath the channel is inside a locked room, so you can restrict access to it, so dwarven babies don't get their skulls smashed in by bones landing on them.
• Between the stockpile and the channel, construct a track stop which dumps in the direction of the hole.
• Build a wooden minecart.
• Create a hauling route that uses the minecart to gather bones from the stockpile.  They will be moved to the stockpile, then from the stockpile to the minecart, which will automatically dump them down the channel into the closet.
• Make sure the stockpile is also in a lockable room, because otherwise you'll have an infinite loop -- dwarves will take the bones from the closet back to the stockpile, from which they will be dumped into the closet again, etc.  Normally you'd fix this by creating a 1x1 stockpile where the bones land, but if you do that, they'll rot (because they are categorized as "refuse"), so you can't do it that way.  What you have to do is selectively unlock access to the stockpile only when the closet is locked, so dwarves can gather bones from the butcher's shop, but not from the closet.
  

[wierd]

Building minecart systems, then configuring them to handle the refuse flow, creating walls and doors to restrict dwarf flow, and all that jazz-- seems unnecessarily expensive management wise, when all I have to do is draw a DUMP designation rectangle over the area I want to have dumped, and then just manage my dump zones, and let haulers just go at it.

Not saying my way is unquestionably better-- but I find it better for me. *shrug

To keep bones and shells from ending up in refuse piles, you have to restrict those things under the pile's properties. It's very easy to mess up somewhere and end up losing bones and shells, and then being screwed when Urist McDumbshit has a mood and needs them.

I like to keep bones and shells outside of thier respective workshops that produce them, because they slow down production lines, since they are clutter. I can quantum dump them 1 tile away from the workshop, then draw unforbid designation over the top, remove dump zone, and call it good. With no refuse piles around, the bones wont go anywhere, and the workshop runs at top speed.

[Loci]

Yes I meant garbage zone.  Yes, you have to manually dump items, but so what? Since almost everything I ever destroy is a subset of something I want to keep some of (like dumping excess clothing from sieges -- don't want to dump all clothing! Just excess), not sure how a minecart dump could be automated. Maybe I'm just confused.

There are different types of refuse. I only have automatic dumping enabled on rotten items, vermin remains, invader corpses and bodyparts, non-wool hair, withered plants and fat globs. None of that stuff has much redeeming value, and not having to constantly remind my dwarves to get rid of it makes me happier.

I take care of most invader trash separately, by atomsmashing it where it lands in my disposal pit. I don't bother with invader clothes at all (my dwarves make their own), and I have more than enough goblinite to last for years. The things I manually save are masterwork bolts, minecarts, and ballista ammo.

But, assuming you wanted to automate invader clothes processing, you could probably set up a take-from-anywhere stockpile and have it give to a storage stockpile and a disposal stockpile. Or set a stockpile to only automatically dispose of leather clothes, for instance.

Building minecart systems, then configuring them to handle the refuse flow, creating walls and doors to restrict dwarf flow, and all that jazz-- seems unnecessarily expensive management wise, when all I have to do is draw a DUMP designation rectangle over the area I want to have dumped, and then just manage my dump zones, and let haulers just go at it.

Not saying my way is unquestionably better-- but I find it better for me. *shrug

That certainly works faster the first time. And you probably remain ahead of the efficiency curve for a few fortress years. But, in terms of management time, automated disposal will eventually win out with long-lived fortresses. (My current fortress is some 70 years old, and I haven't had to mess with my automated disposal system for the majority of that time.)

I personally don't value the "waste disposal engineer" aspects of the game--I think there are much more interesting things to simulate than constantly reminding my dwarves to take out their trash. If you personally enjoy being consulted about the disposition of vermin remains then there is no need to automate the process.

[wierd]

My fortresses tend to die of FPS death after they reach about 20 dwarf years.

This is the result of my building mega-structure fortresses, with 200+ dwarves, with animals, and insane amounts of 'stuff' inside, on fairly large embarks.

By the time the efficiency curve starts to make the bend, my fortresses are usually already at 1fps or so.