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[snow dwarf]

 I was wondering what's the easiest way of going about constructing a multi level room (think throne room with a high ceiling)? I tried this before but it seemed really complicated and a bit dangerous.

[Telgin]

Complicated is the only way as far as I know.  If you're mining it out you can just be cautious about channeling multiple z-levels, but if it's construction work it'll have to be done like anywhere else with high walls: with scaffolding.

One tip I've read recently but which I haven't tried, is to use bridges for scaffolding instead of manually constructing flooring.  It's faster and less work if you have an architect that isn't very lazy.

Another note, but I'm pretty sure you couldn't designate rooms as being multiple z-levels high in older version.  That might have changed in newer versions though.  If it hasn't, any height to the room will be purely cosmetic and won't count toward its value.

[Damiac]

I'm assuming you're talking about digging out a large multi-level room, rather than building one.

Probably the easiest way would be to channel from the top down, designating 1 layer at a time, but I'm going to go ahead and assume the throne room itself is already dug out at the bottom.

So channeling from the top down (1 layer at a time) is still the way to go for all the layers except the one that's currently your throne room's ceiling. You'll be able to designate the entire area to be channeled at once, since there will be a floor underneath, until you get to the level just above your throne room.  That's the layer that's going to be a pain.  If you mine out the outside tiles, the ceiling will be unsupported and cave in, which would be a bad thing.  And since you can't really influence the order the channel jobs are done in, designating the whole level at once is almost guaranteed to cause a cave in.

What I'd do for that last layer is to build an up stair somewhere around the center of your throne room.  Then dig a down stair in the layer above, which gets your dwarves access to it, and frees the dwarves we probably trapped earlier from channeling out all the layers above it.  Then I'd just designate one row or column at a time, starting at the outside, until I've channeled every tile away from the ceiling. You could even make a macro for it if you're so inclined.  Finally, channel out the down stair, deconstruct the up stair, and your fabulously high ceiling-ed throne room will be complete!

As you can see, this process is easier if you plan it out ahead and just channel down one layer at a time.

If you're building on the other hand, what I typically do is just build up some up/down staircases up to the height I want to go to (Depending on the size, maybe 1 in the center, or 1 in each corner, don't forget the ceiling!).  Then just designate floors and walls to be constructed from those staircases.  If it's a really big room you'll either have to wait for sections to be completed before designating the rest of the room or build more staircase columns to build off of. 

While it's going to be slow going no matter what, this should let you at least designate the entire structure once you've got the staircases up.  When you're done just remove the extra staircases (You'd better have built walls before you do this!)

[Insert_Gnome_Here]

Dig priority is your friend. 
As is a good supply of disposable miners.

[nuget102]

Or you could intentionally do a cave in and then remine the room

[Insert_Gnome_Here]

Just remembered another trick. 
Dig everything you want to hollow out as stairs, then remove them from the top down.

[nuget102]

Just remembered another trick. 
Dig everything you want to hollow out as stairs, then remove them from the top down.

probably the safest.

[snow dwarf]

Now I have a question about multi z level buildings... What do you make the roofs with (floors?) and how do you actually go about constructing a roof on a very tall tower without trapping a dwarf? Do you guys just build a wooden staircase next to the building?

[Pyrite]

You generally make roofs out of either floors or walls, and you generally have to have some kind of 'ladder' (typically an up/down staircase) to get your dwarf down, which you can later deconstruct from the top down piece by piece. Dwarves can also now jump 1-2 Z levels down, usually without injury.

[PatrikLundell]

The last time I made a roof of a tall building I built a stair up to a little "house" with a drawbridge on the roof-to-be. However, since then, I've seen a post suggesting building a ramp tile as one of the wall tiles of the last wall level. That will allow dorfs to access the top of the wall, and thus to build a floor over the interior area. Once done, the ramp is removed and replaced by a floor.

One warning with that approach: It has been claimed that fliers can somehow move diagonally down under the roof if the wall is not floored over. I'm not sure that's correct (so far it hasn't bitten my bum, anyway), and if it was correct, it might have been fixed when the very real issue of swimmers/fliers/climbers entering a (Up/)down staircase with stone/SMR directly below from downward diagonal direction was fixed recently.

[snow dwarf]

The last time I made a roof of a tall building I built a stair up to a little "house" with a drawbridge on the roof-to-be. However, since then, I've seen a post suggesting building a ramp tile as one of the wall tiles of the last wall level. That will allow dorfs to access the top of the wall, and thus to build a floor over the interior area. Once done, the ramp is removed and replaced by a floor.

One warning with that approach: It has been claimed that fliers can somehow move diagonally down under the roof if the wall is not floored over. I'm not sure that's correct (so far it hasn't bitten my bum, anyway), and if it was correct, it might have been fixed when the very real issue of swimmers/fliers/climbers entering a (Up/)down staircase with stone/SMR directly below from downward diagonal direction was fixed recently.

The ramp thing is definitely smart, wouldn't have thought of it. Do you guys ever do any roof design or just flat ones? I remembered I did a sloped roof before.

[PatrikLundell]

Given how DF works and displays things, anything but flat is just a pain, in my view. However, if you get satisfaction out of knowing you've made a nice sloping roof you should go for it.

[Rose]

Sloping roofs look great in Armok Vision though.

[h27kim]

I have this nagging suspicion (not properly scienced, but based on occasional experiences) that multilevel rooms are not very FPS friendly.

[Dunamisdeos]

I mean, I usually build the four walls, make a 1x1 scaffolding up to the top of the walls, then use ramps on top of the wall and concentric squares of walls going inward. Makes for a roof with a point in the center.

For non-constructed I just tunnel to the center point of whatever I am hollowing out, build stairs up to the top, and channel down, smoothing walls as i go.