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[Shazbot]

Working with mechanisms and levers, I started wondering why pipe sections aren't moving flows across my fortress in about the same way that levers link distant objects.

Take a pipe section and a building material of your choice, then build a floor pipe (like a floor), wall pipe (n/s/e/w) or ceiling pipe ('hangs' from the ceiling). Build another pipe at your destination, then link the two using pipe sections. Pipe sections will be required for every three or five tiles of separation between end points. Once linked, water flows into and out of the pipe structures, depending on the structure's orientation, as if those tiles were adjacent.

For example, a 7/7 tile of water on top of a floor pipe inside checks to flow down into the pipe, obeying pressure rules, to see if it can flow east out of an east wall pipe. If it can, it appears in the tile east of the wall pipe. Once the two have normalized, 4/7 and 3/7 water flows back and forth, normalizing the level. If one pipe entry is higher than the other, water flows down using the normal logic.

A pipe can also be linked to a screw pump to pour water directly into your destination.

The FPS savings for waterworks, water-hauling jobs and pump stacks could be phenomenal.

As an aside, the same distance-for-linkage logic could require levers and their linked mechanism to require chains/ropes.

[Alfrodo]

I like this.  It'd make waterworking much easier, especially upward.

Also, I guess you could combine this with a screw pump to bring water upward...

Although, I do like the idea of a visible flowing system of pipes, so if toady wouldn't want to go the gamey route,  he could use bunch of pipes going from place to place, but still having the water traverse near instantly to lower all the FPS murder.

Also, I'd like to see the water traverse through the pipes if they're made of green glass, should he take route B)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

inb4 mario superproject

[NW_Kohaku]

On the contrary, I expect quantum mechanisms to be eliminated later on for being too abusive of game mechanics.  The only real reason they work now is that they've been grandfathered in from a more game-y period of time, and because the lack of sub-tile constructions that would make having some sort of rope or chain hanging along the side of the wall that can be tugged to cause something further down the line isn't really feasible yet.

Instead, again, I'd suspect the real solution to this is a reworking of the concept of flows to avoid relying upon brute-force mechanics, and work upon bodies, rather than tiles.

[Alfrodo]

On the contrary, I expect quantum mechanisms to be eliminated later on for being too abusive of game mechanics.  The only real reason they work now is that they've been grandfathered in from a more game-y period of time, and because the lack of sub-tile constructions that would make having some sort of rope or chain hanging along the side of the wall that can be tugged to cause something further down the line isn't really feasible yet.

That's why I suggested the visible pipes.  I'm not sure if visible pipes would solve the FPS problems... though.

[BoredVirulence]

I wouldn't mind having pipes behave realistically, while reducing the calculations. Like an optimization. Instead of water actually flowing through a pipe, make it behave like a queue, where for each tile in length it has an extra space in the queue. That would keep the propagation delay of moving liquids without actually moving them. Homogenize the temperature calculations to the whole of the pipe section based on something such as the average of the temperature of the liquids inside the pipe.

Its an optimization, but it should maintain the same gameplay properties, but it eliminates some of the calculations.

[NW_Kohaku]

Well, we should have pipes, no question about it, and I would like to see them as part of an irrigation system.  Pipes which have holes in them to drip-water tiles would let water be doled out in controlled fashion, rather than full 1/7ths, the way that thread in hospitals doesn't have to use a whole thread unit.  That is, pipes are for smaller volumes of water than a full flooded tile. 

I'm just saying it's not a replacement for working on optimizing fluids, so that players can actually enjoy ocean embarks. 

[Shazbot]

Could move 1/7 of water every twenty ticks or something slow like that. I'd still prefer the pipes abstracted "into the walls" to reduce how cluttered the fort is. Big canals and reservoirs will still be needed for moving large volumes of water quickly, so you might feed a flooding trap's cistern with a pipe but then actually drain it through a floodgate.

Speaking of floodgates, I can already think of numerous dwarfy-looking valve arrangements using floodgates.

[King Mir]

I suspect the biggest trouble with plumbing is getting it to link up and in generated forts.

[AceSV]

Well, we should have pipes, no question about it, and I would like to see them as part of an irrigation system.  Pipes which have holes in them to drip-water tiles would let water be doled out in controlled fashion, rather than full 1/7ths, the way that thread in hospitals doesn't have to use a whole thread unit.  That is, pipes are for smaller volumes of water than a full flooded tile. 

I'm just saying it's not a replacement for working on optimizing fluids, so that players can actually enjoy ocean embarks.

Maybe you could build some sort of device that controls the water flow.  Either a permanent device where you decide the water flow before building it (1/7, 2/7, 3/7, etc) or something like a lever where you can manually crank up the flow when you need to. 

[Zarathustra30]

The best funest way to control water flow is through pressure/head. High head => high flow. There would be devices that reduce head (valves), but the only real way to increase it is through a pump stack, unless there is some new technology.

I think this is the way that water currently works, allowing u-bends and such, but I don't think lag is an issue, because the way I hear it, fluid lag comes from constantly recalculating pathing, not anything with 1/7ths moving around. As long as the water is in pipes, paths don't need to be recalculated.

[taptap]

I like this.  It'd make waterworking much easier, especially upward.

Is there any reason to move water upward in game? Isn't your water source usually higher than the fort (surface water or aquifer)? Most of the things wished for in this thread can already be achieved with in game means. You can move small to medium amounts with minecarts, large amounts with pumps, you can build elaborate measuring / regulating devices...

As for realism long pipes used to pump water vertically are way more unrealistic than pump stacks or minecart based systems (water pressure was a major headache in waterworks long after the supposed technological cut-off of DF, well into 18th century), at least I wouldn't want 19th century hydraulic engineering in a game that doesn't dare to include 15th century technology.

[karhell]

I like this.  It'd make waterworking much easier, especially upward.

Is there any reason to move water upward in game? Isn't your water source usually higher than the fort (surface water or aquifer)? Most of the things wished for in this thread can already be achieved with in game means. You can move small to medium amounts with minecarts, large amounts with pumps, you can build elaborate measuring / regulating devices...

A desert embark, taking water from the caves ?
Creating an above-ground waterfall ?
Just satisfying that Dwarven ego, with improbably complex water/magmaworks ?

[taptap]

I like this.  It'd make waterworking much easier, especially upward.

Is there any reason to move water upward in game? Isn't your water source usually higher than the fort (surface water or aquifer)? Most of the things wished for in this thread can already be achieved with in game means. You can move small to medium amounts with minecarts, large amounts with pumps, you can build elaborate measuring / regulating devices...

Just satisfying that Dwarven ego, with improbably complex water/magmaworks ?

Isn't the dwarven ego better served with the more complex setups like minecarts or pumpstacks existing now? 

[AceSV]

I like this.  It'd make waterworking much easier, especially upward.

Is there any reason to move water upward in game? Isn't your water source usually higher than the fort (surface water or aquifer)? Most of the things wished for in this thread can already be achieved with in game means. You can move small to medium amounts with minecarts, large amounts with pumps, you can build elaborate measuring / regulating devices...

As for realism long pipes used to pump water vertically are way more unrealistic than pump stacks or minecart based systems (water pressure was a major headache in waterworks long after the supposed technological cut-off of DF, well into 18th century), at least I wouldn't want 19th century hydraulic engineering in a game that doesn't dare to include 15th century technology.

It can't be that much harder to move water vertically.  The hittites and romans had plumbing, if not modern plumbing, dwarves should be able to come up with something.  Off the top of my head, you should at least be able to use something like a still to move water upward by turning it into steam and letting it condense back to water at a higher point.  Once water is in the water tower, it can be moved around with pressure. 

[taptap]

It can't be that much harder to move water vertically.  The hittites and romans had plumbing, ...

Roman waterworks were built the way they were for a reason - the reason being precisely that lifting water is not easy - and both aqueduct bridges and even inverted siphoning around obstacles (transporting water through u-bends) are within current DF means. Ppl play DF in many different ways, but for the more engineering inclined this proposal reads somewhat like "let us get rid of the silly overcomplicated combat system and go to a simple hitpoint system" might for you. Fluid lifting (though mostly magma) / proper plumbing throughout the fortress is one of the few engineering projects fortresses encounter, don't remove the fun.