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Author Topic: Help me build a Minecart-Magma-mist incinerator siege killer - Done !  (Read 3620 times)

hanni79

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Greets fellow forumites,

I normally play without invaders, but right now, the garbage collectors ( read : elves ) are on strike ( read : war ) for more than five successive years ! Outrageous !

The natural answer to this is obviously magma, so this is the plan :
z+1 : Minecart dropper ( minecarts on Floor Hatch )
z : Hall with holes in the floor, where the minecarts are dropped into
z-1 : Magma-basin with rollers to push up the minecarts back up to the droppers.

Questions :
1. Do minecarts dropped on a roller receive propulsion ?
2. Are magma filled steel minecarts heavy enough to produce a proper amount of magma mist ?
3. What amount of z-levels should the drop have ?
4. Is this properly over-complicated to be truly dwarvy ?  :D

Any comments or help on this problem will be wildly appreciated and will lead to bonfires in your honour !

In case anyone wonders : I also plan to make three 50 tile long rows of webbed cagetraps, in case the incinerator has to be closed due to overpopulation, since I now were able to get my GCS breeding program running ^^

Edit 30.05.2016 :
Yay, I managed to build a properly working Magma mist incinerator  :D

Behold :
Z0
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Z1
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Z6
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Z2-5 are the elevators, not shown here. So much overkill ^^ The whole thing needs a total of 2305 Power, 264 Rollers, and lots of axles.

More explanation ftw :

This is Z1, 1. marks where the minecart drops through the floor onto the roller below, which produces magma mist although the magma itself is on Z0. 2. marks the position of the up-ramp on Z0. On the top left of the green X you can see another hole in the floor, this is another roller which is covered in magma like 1. and 2. would be if I hadn't deleted it for display purposes.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

On the next picture you see the rollers covering the tracks. Position 1. is where the minecart is dropped onto, Position 2. is a curve covered by a roller, Position 3. is a ramp up covered by the same roller as Pos. 2.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I guess now everything should be clear :)
« Last Edit: June 10, 2016, 12:00:45 pm by hanni79 »
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Crashmaster

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hanni79

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Re: Help me build a Minecart-Magma-mist incinerator siege killer
« Reply #2 on: May 25, 2016, 07:58:53 pm »

Thanks a lot for that link, but I actually neither completely understand the construction presented there nor yours  :o

Maybe because nearly all of the spoilers are not working for me ...

What I understood from your video, it's a ultra-compact impulse elevator with minecarts sitting on Floor hatches and when those are retracted, they fall into the magma and are then impulse-propelled back up ?

This design is made up of 6 self contained units, each firing a minecart north then south:

     _____
     #   #
     #▲F▲#

So, basically, this is a side view and if I would look on top of this, those would sit stacked East-West ? Where does the magma mist rise through the floor then ?

I guess I will try to do a more conservative approach with a roller-powered spiral, I have around 600 power left from my oversized reactor ^^ That impulse stuff is quite nice, but I somewhat guess this will be fixed sooner or later, so I would like to build something that works without those.
« Last Edit: May 25, 2016, 08:10:14 pm by hanni79 »
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Fleeting Frames

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Re: Help me build a Minecart-Magma-mist incinerator siege killer
« Reply #3 on: May 25, 2016, 07:59:59 pm »

The design you have in OP would usually work on elves clothed in wood (there might be some situations where creatures jumping over the hole collide with minecart, not sure if that would throw off the cart), though using rollers might leave them vulnerable to being shut down by building destroyers (though magma-unsafe BDs might not, given inability to path to them).

...I'm not sure whether mid-air roller would give a cart falling through itself speed - pressure plates don't notice falling carts - but the cart needs to be going not too fast and magma has significant friction anyway, so if you want to use one for acceleration you will probably put it on magma track anyway (careful with the power source).

My experience on water mister minecarts suggests that as long as there is 5/7 liquid in a tile (4/7 doing almost nothing iirc), you will get mist on dropping in from flying in or skipping.

Furthermore, it is possible to have the mist generated with 2 z-levels, as long as the cart was sent flying by hitting a rough patch of floor beforehand.

There are two major weaknesses with any system of magma mist generation:
First, it sets some things on fire. You'll probably* lose access to burnable things as well running the risk of them running into your fort, making your populace catch fire and Sankis setting fire to booze stockpile.

Second, it is somewhat ineffective on things that do not burn, doing no direct damage to, say,

dragons. Thank you, Max™.

Third, if I were to implement one despite the caveats, I'd probably make use of good mist having considerable plume beyond initial square -  if I don't care about the risk of carts being stolen mid-operation by, say, a master thief demon or some fps loss, perhaps a retracting bridge over downstairs with minecarts skipping on magma right beneath. Or from the sides.

Perhaps slightly safer (for the carts) would be letting it drift in from above through unpathable floor grates or from the sides through fortifications (might be jumpable and certainly dodgable) /deconstruction-toggled raised bridges, though that would necessarily generate less mist.

Even more safer would be using several minecarts to transport magma high above (so a dodger won't dodge through grates) with the original magma either eliminated or picked up by having the minecart go back down, teleport through a wall, pick up magma, then teleport through, thus necessitating that even a magma-immune flying buildingdestroyer master thief, climber and jumper will be juggled through constantly changing target, unable to path to any one cart for long. 

Additional note, here: I notice that waterguns generate a lot of mist per shot. If you had the mist generated by a magmagun, it would be possible to kill almost anything° immune to magma mist anyway, provided they get hit by the ball of magma.

Fourth, there are several threads on similar topic with variety of designs, here's just one:
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=148372.msg6024935#msg6024935

A search for "magma mist" turns up a lot more interesting things than just that, of course. 

* Hm, I wonder if anything happens when you have magma mister and water mister next to each other...Time for SCIENCE!

° I'd guess you'd need at least a hydra made of adamantine with ten times the healing rate to have a chance against high cadence max speed magma minecart cannon. None have been sighted so far, but I imagine you could mod in one.
That impulse stuff is quite nice, but I somewhat guess this will be fixed sooner or later
Could be bit difficult without removing track/ramps from game entirely, given currently all proper ramps are impulse ramps - the simplest way to do it that I can think of is to remove their acceleration and completely change gravity to mostly apply on z-level changes - which would have quite a bit of "time to look beneath your feet before you start to fall" as well as giving minecarts low level antigravity.


EDIT:
...So, uh, it seems magma mist is bit less of a firehazard than I expected:


That cart flying through magma mist is still at subterran temp. Didn't catch fire.

Also, generation is bit different. My usual water skipping system didn't work so had to drop items in.

Still, nothing interesting on having two mists on same square:

No obsidian coatings or anything, albeit water mist wasn't visible when viewed.

(I also learned you can quench magma-dumped meltable ores - but the result will be ultra-light (11 urists instead of 1932) furrowed-looking object that eventually disappears and is unusable for building or smelting. )
« Last Edit: May 25, 2016, 09:32:27 pm by Fleeting Frames »
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hanni79

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Re: Help me build a Minecart-Magma-mist incinerator siege killer
« Reply #4 on: May 26, 2016, 06:27:29 am »

[Snip sweet WoT]
Thanks for all that info !  8)

First, my planned construction is only thought to be used against elves, I don't have goblins as neighbours, anything else should be handled by my extensively danger room trained 4 Squads of each 10 Marksdwarves, Hammerdwarves, Speerdwarves and Axedwarves, half of them Masterwork-Level equipped in steel, the other half in Adamantine.

I guess thieves shouldn't be a problem, since the minecarts would be dropped through a unpassable hole directly into magma onto a magma safe roller + Track, so I would guess they shouldn't have the time to snatch them. Since there are no ramps involved, I don't see any possibility to pass to the machinery, except for flyers, which would need to be magma-proof.
I tried a 5 z-Level drop first, which produces a mist cloud with 5-7 tiles diameter, so it would work well for my purpose, but needs obviously quite some power (which I have plenty) for the magma covered roller
plus the powered elevator.

Some questions regarding your answer :
What's that about a midair roller ? My question is regarding a minecart that is dropped onto tracks with an active roller covering it, is there another possible layout you have in mind ?

Can Thieves snatch a minecart from midair ? Considering jumpers, how likely is it that anything passes over a hole in the floor while a minecart is dropping into it ?

Considering burning invaders, I planned on building a corridor around 80 tiles long, so I can let them path quite a bit into it and then closing off the entrance point to my fortress before setting them on fire, so I guess that shouldn't pose too much of a threat.

I would have liked to put up some pics, but sadly the game crashed when I tried to perfect my design, I will possibly do that later -.-

My intended design now is :
z0: Minecart initially pushed onto a Floor hatch
z-1 to z-3 : drop shaft
z-4: hallway for the invaders with holes in the floor to drop the minecarts through
z-5 : Magma filled basin with a roller facing orthogonally to the invaders path (so, sideways), leading to a powered minecart elevator not reachable by the invaders ( excluding creatures willing to path into magma ), with enough power so the minecart stops on the initial Floor hatch again.

Initial testing showed that this should work at least okay, with some tweaking to the design it might become 100% reliable.
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Fleeting Frames

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Re: Help me build a Minecart-Magma-mist incinerator siege killer
« Reply #5 on: May 26, 2016, 10:47:32 am »

The roller thing is just addressing potential odd untested ideas. I can think of very few designs at all where it would actually matter.

I'd expect a thief who locks onto cart to start following it around. If they're fast/slow enough, they could happen onto it as it is falling, even. Now, while I'm not sure about mid-air snatching, thieves can snatch food from the dwarves as they're eating it, so I wouldn't completely discount the possibility of some unknown shaft of enlightenment style bug giving a thief stats ludicrous enough to be faster than the minecart.

Of course, discovering such is a reward on it's own.

Jumpers tend to jump when there isn't a faster path to destination, or perhaps normally walkable path (and they're motivated). Happens often enough for dog kebab in danger rooms, but having the hole not be the in the most optimal flight path to destination would help, as well as having the hole be 1 longer in travel direction so if they displace the cart it is likely to still fall in.

The odds are something like #number of jump-capable enemies pathing through#*#odds of better path not being found#*#odds cart is currently in the path#*#1 tile length#/(#time the cart spends on the same z-level#*#speed of jump-capable enemies pathing through#).....i.e. very likely very low, I'd expect few % at most.

Though it would go up when you put several minecarts into same track to boost cadence and plume radius. Though of course, a longer drop shaft massively shortens the time minecart is on the same z-level.

As far as cadence/fall depth goes goes, a 6x2 mist skipper generates overall more mist than max speed one running through 50 impulse ramps, but the latter has the mist plume be a bit larger and reach farther. If you put two 6x2s close to each other, they'd have greater coverage in a corridor though.

Also, I'm not sure elves themselves will jump - I've noticed jumping a lot with scared animals, but dwarves so far have preferred to tarzan across trees rather than jump 1-wide gaps.

About burning invaders: fun thing is that siege will be routed when enough death occurs, not when they're on fire, meaning that delaying the onset of death such as here will help you nab more elves, thus giving you greater access to the metal they bri-

"But elves don't bring any metal."

uh, greater access to the bones of exotic animals they siege with? Well, there's some benefit.

As for my possible layouts...I detailed a bit earlier, but they very likely wouldn't use rollers and would probably use impulse ramps, or perhaps toggled bridges to fling items in/out of magma (using minecarts, the flung-out cart can roll back into the hole on it's own).

That said, I'm not too fond of the idea of destroying their clothing given them sharing size with dwarves or not capturing extremely difficult to breed animals hostile to civs, nor entrances that are danger-free for some enemies. I expect that will at least partly change once clothing all my citizens seems low-effort low-cost task - I am kinda new to playing DF, still, having done so for about 2 months I think.

Crashmaster

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Re: Help me build a Minecart-Magma-mist incinerator siege killer
« Reply #6 on: May 26, 2016, 11:08:57 am »

Yep, you got mine right. Didn't notice the broken images. The other side-view one, if your side-view is east-west they go on the sides of a north-south passage. The passage floor is at the middle of the side-view with magma pools at it's sides. The mist-generator's ceiling is at the passage's ceiling height. The mist billows out the sides of the generator.

hanni79

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Re: Help me build a Minecart-Magma-mist incinerator siege killer
« Reply #7 on: May 30, 2016, 06:06:46 am »

Yay, I managed to build a properly working Magma mist incinerator  :D

Behold :
Z0
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Z1
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Z6
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Z2-5 are the elevators, not shown here. So much overkill ^^ The whole thing needs a total of 2305 Power, 264 Rollers, and lots of axles.
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Fleeting Frames

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Impressive and pretty. Even knowing it is impractical, I want to suggest putting mid-air hanging statues of dwarves or burning elves over every hole.

I assume to turn it off you simply pull a lever attached to a gear assembly?

hanni79

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Haha, thanks a lot ^^

One Lever controls the hatches over the drop holes (not seen here, obviously), another one the Power to the rollers. Should have used just one.
What do you exactly mean with mid-air hanging statues ?
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Moridin920

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Re: Help me build a Minecart-Magma-mist incinerator siege killer
« Reply #11 on: May 31, 2016, 08:44:36 pm »

Yay, I managed to build a properly working Magma mist incinerator  :D

Behold :
Z0
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Z1
Spoiler (click to show/hide)
Z6
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Z2-5 are the elevators, not shown here. So much overkill ^^ The whole thing needs a total of 2305 Power, 264 Rollers, and lots of axles.

This is awesome. I'm going to copy it on a smaller scale if you don't mind :) I've been using a logic gate to have a room seal, flood with magma, then drain and unseal again (draw bridges) but there's always 1/7 magma left somewhere or something and it isn't quite as good as I'd like.

Yours seems very much superior! Not sure if you want to use this as it is technically a glitch but using impulse ramps would cut a lot of power (most of it comes from raising the carts 6-7 levels I'm assuming).

Just to clarify that I'm looking at it right: a minecart sits on a hatch which when triggered opens and allows the cart to fall into magma pools below which causes mist right? And the mist comes out of fortifications? I'm not seeing how the mist gets to the hallway through the wall.

The question I guess is how much damage does that mist really do but given that my dwarves seem to have no problem burning themselves to death tossing some trash into magma from 1 Z above it's gotta at least do some harm.
« Last Edit: May 31, 2016, 08:55:55 pm by Moridin920 »
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Re: Help me build a Minecart-Magma-mist incinerator siege killer - Done !
« Reply #12 on: June 02, 2016, 10:38:53 am »

While fortifications could work perhaps, in the above images hannz drops them straight on the sides of the road - you just can't see the holes because mist is covering it up, but they're where the brightest spot are on z1, with pattern matching (I love being human) the end of roads on z6 and z1.

hanni79

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Re: Help me build a Minecart-Magma-mist incinerator siege killer - Done !
« Reply #13 on: June 09, 2016, 05:42:12 pm »

Indeed, I just drop them through floor hatches(Z6). On the floor where you can see the Magma mist (Z1), there are simply holes in the floor, where they drop further into the magma(Z0). Impulse ramps is obviously the way to go, but I just had fun to build this ridiculously overpowered (not necessarily function-wise :D ) contraption.
I will upload a picture of Z0 without magma and Z1 without mist so it becomes more clear what I did there, as it is necessary to cover the edges of the tracks on Z0 with rollers as well, otherwise the rollers are NOT sufficient to get the minecarts around the corner with 7/7 magma.
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hanni79

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Re: Help me build a Minecart-Magma-mist incinerator siege killer - Done !
« Reply #14 on: June 10, 2016, 11:59:26 am »

Okay, here we go :

This is Z1, 1. marks where the minecart drops through the floor onto the roller below, which produces magma mist although the magma itself is on Z0. 2. marks the position of the up-ramp on Z0. On the top left of the green X you can see another hole in the floor, this is another roller which is covered in magma like 1. and 2. would be if I hadn't deleted it for display purposes.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

On the next picture you see the rollers covering the tracks. Position 1. is where the minecart is dropped onto, Position 2. is a curve covered by a roller, Position 3. is a ramp up covered by the same roller as Pos. 2.
Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I guess now everything should be clear :)
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