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[stillrabbit730]

I was reading up on this trap and was wondering how the most effective setup of this trap can be.
what im searching for is a detailed guide of how to setup an effective trap corridor of upright spikes and pressure plates

any information on this would help a lot, thank your for your time

[zazq]

upright spikes have an 'off' position of extended, and have a delay of 40 ticks when triggered, so in theory you'd have a hallway full of spikes with a pressure plate right before it.  the goblin steps on the plate, and 40 ticks later the spear retract.  when the goblin steps off the plate, it waits 100 ticks and then tells the spikes to extend, which they will do 40 ticks after that, so if a goblin is standing on a spike 140 ticks after getting off the pressure plate, it will get stabbed.

you can increase the probability of this happening by just having stupid amounts of spikes.  However, its usually better to just attach them to either a lever, or some automated triggering device (which might include pressure plates) so the spikes go up and down on their own.

[PatrikLundell]

I drive my menacing spike traps with a mine cart repeater (a mine cart runs around a 100 tick track to hit a pressure plate each revolution). The repeater is started/stopped via a lever that opens/closes a hatch the mine cart passes through one each revolution. Thus, I'm using the method suggested by zazq.

[Fleeting Frames]

It can be extremely effective. I recall buttload (like, 40+ tiles 10x of them?) of repeating iron spikes in a tunnel were used to kill most of the clown car in Deathgate.
If you're facing non-flying enemies, using a "dodge'em" trap where they fall down and die/climb back up would be highly effective. Even a flier could dodge through wall and perhaps into magma, or just sealed room with fortifications. Spikes, unlike weapon traps with spears, don't jam and can hit anyone.

Implementation would preferably use the pressure plate to trigger a repeater linked to the spikes rather than direct link of plate to spikes; Here's Larix's for 41-step cycle (the downramps have two opposite facing valid ramps).

The pressure plate doesn't have to be triggered by enemies directly - them killing a dog standing on top of one or walking through/destroying a door that was preventing water to leave pressure plate or minecart from going onto it would also work for catching anything with a body. Look out for children, outpost liasons and visitors. A bait is the classic solution, especially for buildingdestroyers with artifact furniture.

[Bumber]

This is my repeater:

╔═╗
║+↓  Cart sits on north-most roller tile when unpowered (no track stop, just route stop)
║+↓
║+↓  Rollers accelerate south at lowest speed
╚═^

No impulse exploit. 3x5 tiles, not counting power. (You can attach power with a gear assembly in the middle, or a horizontal axle to the side.) Slow-moving cart should be non-lethal.

I don't recall the exact timing, but the spikes were retracting very soon after they extended.

[Fleeting Frames]

You need 4 plates to get optimum 4-step cycle, but spikes retracting very soon after they extended means it is probably something like 160 steps, I guess.

If just working with power, you can do lot more compact, perhaps something like
╔╗
╚╝

Pressure plate | Track Stop
                    |  Roller pushing north

With 2 minecarts, attaching the powertrain and track stop to pressure plate to get it to have 139 (or 141, with build order) steps of delay between times it can move west.

[Bumber]

You need 4 plates to get optimum 4-step cycle, but spikes retracting very soon after they extended means it is probably something like 160 steps, I guess.

158 sounds familiar. 4 plates could mean too many mechanism linking jobs. (My repeater was attached to 30+ spike traps, before the clowns melted most of them.) Does the time it takes for the cart to cross the pressure plate impact efficiency?

If just working with power, you can do lot more compact, perhaps something like...

I'm not sure how you're supposed to get 140 steps out of a 2x2 track. A roller will increase the speed of a minecart up to its specific speed setting. I don't think you can get a consistent timing without resetting to that speed each iteration. At lowest setting, my cart still has enough momentum to go through an additional loop after the power is off.

With 2 minecarts, attaching the powertrain and track stop to pressure plate to get it to have 139 (or 141, with build order) steps of delay between times it can move west.

139 steps is definitely too short. 140 is the absolute minimum. My initial design was:
╔╗
║↓
║↓
║↓
╚^
I don't recall the exact number of steps, but it was really close to 140. It undershot the reset time and only triggered the spikes every other loop, which is much worse than having an insignificant delay after. Maybe if I made the rollers shorter, the timing would've worked out slightly longer without increasing size (due to slowing down earlier.) I think it would be smaller, but 2x2 is probably out of the question.

[Fleeting Frames]

4 plates means that you can get hit by spears about 3,5 times as often, so you can reduce the amount of different spear traps you use (each costing a mechanism and 1-10 spears) by that much for OP's purpose of repeating spikes one travels through, though it is a valid criticism for artifact bait furniture traps.

Good point on delay on pressure plates. with max roller, it'd take 2 steps, not 1 (I'm too used to checkpoint effect.)

In that case, build the track stop and roller after the pressure plate I guess...

Wait, nevermind, it's flawed. Idea was that the track stop delay (40 . ) + roller turn on delay (100 . ) would get ideal for single-plate. However, it's 40 steps for turning on (thus stopping carts till it is turned off 140 steps after cart leaves pressure plate)) too, which is less time than it takes for a cart to cross the cycle. So yeah, good catch.

Would have to make the track larger or maybe link some furniture to stop the minecarts from crossing the plate again in the 100 step span, which would make it less efficient for single-plate setup.