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[Swiftfreddy]

This suggestion is one of the only ones I find hard to make my mind up on 

I would have to say that (I think) Dwarves speciality is Mining therefore they can efficiently excavate a fortress. Certain creatures should be able to dig as they are adapted to do so (claws, tusks, strength etc) but certain enemies shouldn't or should to some extent.
(all is in my opinion) Goblins are generally not that intelligent. They wouldn't be as good at digging as Dwarves so if they did get picks to mine they would do it very slowly and unless they dug in many different places at the same time you would be able to kill them quite quickly.

What I'm saying is that if this was Implemented, then certain Civs should have better digging skills that ultimately Cannot rival the speed of even the most dabbling of mining dwarves. This would be realistic (in my view) and shouldn't jeopardize the security of the fortress as much as it would have but would pose threatening if overlooked or unnoticed.

Ofcourse as I said Creatures should be better diggers because of their adaptations to digging but this would still be balanced as they generally wont have a massive army like other civs ready to siege you.

[(name here)]

Dwarves have an advantage digging, but goblins clearly get the masses of iron, flux, and obsidian the use to build their stuff somewhere, so they must dig to some extent. getting a certin

[Squeegy]

Goblins should bring Goblin Miners with them on sieges to tunnel into your fortress.

[Iden]

Da Vinci had a crude suggestion for detecting tunneling, in the form of dice on a drum which would vibrate based on tremors. Perhaps something more sophisticated like a seismograph or so?

Wouldn't ones own mining operations give screwy results for any type of seismological observation of the nearby areas? Unless of course you entirely stopped your mining operations, which doesn't seem always an effective solution as one would constantly be needing to expand ones own underground fortress.


I almost have this feeling a lot of ppl "tl;dr" my previous post.
Or is it just me?

By all means, Dwarves would be masterful miners. They should, by all means, get an effective bonus for digging in stone over other races.

Realistically though, it had to have happened. If you can't walk in, you'd need to find other ways in. Digging in would eventually be an option. In the Middle Ages, it was certainly something tried, so logically speaking it would happen to the Dwarves too.

You'd just need to find a way to defend against it. In the Middle Ages they built walls and iron gates. Eventually making complex castles and large gatehouses with murderholes and "the works".

What would a dwarf do? IMO, make a debuffing wall, as I had suggested previously.

The entire opposite of a wall, in essence: Dig out a large tunnel around your compound, as if it were some sort of "inverse wall", connecting only to a point in which you desire it to, so that you can deal with anyone trying to dig in. Chances are they'll follow the tunnel and end up getting slaughtered before realizing they need to start digging again.

[Muz]

I'd like it to be like in Dungeon Keeper. The tunnelers will normally be worthless slaves that die as easily as kobold thieves (maybe they should be captured kobold thieves). They'd mostly dig against the walls to find a weak point, but if they couldn't find anything after a while, they'd dig through the wall. That made fortifying walls very important, but not the ultimate solution.

Antmen diggers would also be interesting. I know I'd be quick to wipe out an antmen colony if they were digging through my precious mountain.

[Lightman]

I think digging enemies would be interesting, especially in sieges. Catapults, battering rams, bridges / ladders, etc. will all be very disruptive and destroy parts of your fortress, but it seems to me that most people are keen to have more challenging sieges.

It should make a difference whether or not they are digging through a construction or just a lump of soil/sand/rock. Just like it takes your dwarves much longer to remove a constructed square than to dig, it should slow them down if you've built proper walls. Your dwarves should be able to hear them, too, when they get near a wall and then alert the player.

[Belteshazzar]

Perhaps this will encourage the construction of underground and defenses as well. Those maze levels and random lava and poison pits so common to underground lairs seem a safety concern to us humans but to dwarves they form a web of possible traps (hmmm acid vat thirteen appears to have spontaneously drained, I guess those goblins got an unhealthy surprise) and early alarm systems (I hear echos or horror from The Labyrinth of Sudden Might so I thing we have another gremlin infestation.).

[illiterate]

I know I've chimed in already, but I'll say it again.

Let them DIG!  Let our fortresses be breached!  If you want to build mega-forts with perfect symmetry, then embark somewhere without digging enemies (put them under "other features" or some such), or put a global "enemies_dig" in the raws somewhere. 

Adamantine, obsidian, bauxite constructed walls should rarely fall. 

Now, one thing I would be concerned about is the capacity of the bad guys to completely undermine a fortress.  It would be a truly terrible thing to have your entire fortress drop 10 z levels into a pit constructed by a goblin legendary Miner. 

Doesn't even need to be a gobbo..  Hostile races have snatched dwarves in their armies all the time, right? 

Good reason to dig "tickler" shafts deep into the ground, complete with sentry beasts or traps. 

[Silverionmox]

Let them DIG!  Let our fortresses be breached!  If you want to build mega-forts with perfect symmetry, then embark somewhere without digging enemies (put them under "other features" or some such), or put a global "enemies_dig" in the raws somewhere. 

Adamantine, obsidian, bauxite constructed walls should rarely fall. 

Now, one thing I would be concerned about is the capacity of the bad guys to completely undermine a fortress.  It would be a truly terrible thing to have your entire fortress drop 10 z levels into a pit constructed by a goblin legendary Miner. 

Doesn't even need to be a gobbo..  Hostile races have snatched dwarves in their armies all the time, right? 

Good reason to dig "tickler" shafts deep into the ground, complete with sentry beasts or traps. 

I don't give a kitten biscuit for symmetry. Why not give them nuclear weapons, just to make sieges more difficult? I'm not against digging enemies per se, but to give every kobold and his grandma digging because sieges need to be more difficult is lazy. At least think of something typically goblin, like massive numbers: instead of raiding parties, sieges means a legion of goblins. Or let them bring diseases into the fort: dwarves working in goblin blood have a chance of getting infected (random wound to random body parts). Or let them take a lone dwarf hostage, and force him to reveal the location of all the traps.

If the most common menace breaches your fortress habitually, it defeats the purpose of having a fortress in the first place. Goblins normally aren't expected to have legendary miners. What would the difference with dwarves be otherwise?

Goblins capturing dwarves to dig sounds good, but is the dwarves' digging ability and craftsmanship inborn or taught?

[Tormy]

Let them DIG!  Let our fortresses be breached!  If you want to build mega-forts with perfect symmetry, then embark somewhere without digging enemies (put them under "other features" or some such), or put a global "enemies_dig" in the raws somewhere. 

Adamantine, obsidian, bauxite constructed walls should rarely fall. 

Now, one thing I would be concerned about is the capacity of the bad guys to completely undermine a fortress.  It would be a truly terrible thing to have your entire fortress drop 10 z levels into a pit constructed by a goblin legendary Miner. 

Doesn't even need to be a gobbo..  Hostile races have snatched dwarves in their armies all the time, right? 

Good reason to dig "tickler" shafts deep into the ground, complete with sentry beasts or traps. 

I don't give a kitten biscuit for symmetry. Why not give them nuclear weapons, just to make sieges more difficult? I'm not against digging enemies per se, but to give every kobold and his grandma digging because sieges need to be more difficult is lazy.

You are overreacting this situation. Just think a bit. Only "intelligent" creatures are forming civilizations. Thus, I don't really understand your problem. Intelligent creatures shouldn't be able to dig a tunnel? This isn't rocket science you know. No one would like to see as the various creatures are digging tunnels all over the map. "Special" units should have this ability. Just think about a troll for example. That is a special unit for the goblins. It is their building destroyer. Now what if the goblins will have a new unit, what will be able to dig tunnels?
This would be quite realistic and FUN in the same time...but of course we should be able to turn this on/off in the RAWs, so everyone will be happy.

[Duke 2.0]

 With an on/off function, this could create some interesting dynamics.

 Capture a bunch of goblin diggers, a bunch of antmen, situate them in a dirt-filled 'arena' surrounded by undigable walls, and you have a grand fight when digging is turned back on.

 Hmmm... Or dooming your fortress with a ton of sealed enemies placed at regular intervals. That would make a grand succession game.

[Iden]

Just because digging, and more sophisticated sieges should be enabled, it shouldn't mean that it should happen every bloody time. It would get old, plain-out boring, and just plain annoying.

Just because goblins can use crossbows to shoot some of your best dwarves dead from far away doesn't mean that all goblins shoot crossbows.

Sieges should include an array of randomly chosen siege-tactics (on most occasions) if and only if: there is no other way to get into a fort. Digging, siege ladders, rams, siege engines, boats, building bridges; all of these should be viable options when there is no way into a fort. They'd simply try to find other ways in.

(What were these tactics originally developed for? Just that: Getting into a fort/castle/etc. that you had no other viable way of getting into. And that's just how such things should be implemented.)

[Silverionmox]

You are overreacting this situation. Just think a bit. Only "intelligent" creatures are forming civilizations. Thus, I don't really understand your problem. Intelligent creatures shouldn't be able to dig a tunnel? This isn't rocket science you know. No one would like to see as the various creatures are digging tunnels all over the map. "Special" units should have this ability. Just think about a troll for example. That is a special unit for the goblins. It is their building destroyer. Now what if the goblins will have a new unit, what will be able to dig tunnels?
This would be quite realistic and FUN in the same time...but of course we should be able to turn this on/off in the RAWs, so everyone will be happy.

Digging tunnels like dwarves is rocket science, as far as the typical goblin is concerned. Like I said, there needs to be differentiation between the races, why else bother putting them in? Surely they'll let dwarven prisoners dig a tunnel on occasion, no problem. But random goblin penetration at every angle, through granite and gneiss alike, is silly. The sensible thing is trying to breach a hole in a place where they know the rock is relatively thin, i.e. near the entrance.. which is typically well-defended, so you need trebuchets and catapults for that.
It really should depend on the digging capability of the siegers: they're not going to dig ten tunnels of hundred squares through granite for the chance that they might hit a corridor is their mining isn't on par with dwarves. And it shouldn't, because of racial differentiation. Of course, if rival dwarves put their mind to a siege..

[Rawl]

Okay I think it's been stated in this thread earlier. For Sieges (larger ones) in which the attackers have tried to breach walls and such

they would try to tunnel in. This doesn't meen 8 zlevels down or try for "from the bottom up". So they would try to do just enough to

get under Outer walls or under the river. Allow them to catch the idea of damp stone=bad, warm stone=death. Logically you would want

to get as close as possible and dig as little as possible trying to break in. Plus like Goblin Trolls, have them bring 5 diggers (note NOT

miners as that would imply greater skill) for a 50+ size siege. This would give reason once better squad control is adapted and possible if

the player could set ambushers of their own (dwarves that lay in wait hidden while waiting for enemies to pass by and let then let the

axe fall). Also equipment should be taken into account. Steel items seem to be used only by dwarves so they could with them dig

through any stone (adamantite would take MORE time then others but is possible) and an Adamantine pick would slice through the earth

like a knife through butter. So you could line your rooms with variant materials to slow or downright stop digging. When a digger runs

into a wall what does he do? Send the Trolls/battering rams/Trents in to tear them down. And Kobolds? well lets say one makes it deep

into your fort and learns of where the Treasury is and makes it out ALIVE well using the stolen goodies= how bad Kobolds get let's say

they steal a LOT and know where this room is they try to dig there. Once Hidden doors and secret passages are used they make thier

own... Right to your treasury of adamantite spittoons. Of course if they don't have Steel pickaxes that would limit how deep they could

go, but if they have successfully procured some you might get an open season! Plus once Siegers have already started using a tunnel

they try to add to that one until it becomes completely useless (you use a flood trap on it once they know not to use it ever again. Plus

they might want to protect these tunnels so for smarter races like Humans they might set up their OWN traps to make you think twice

about following them down their tunnels giving your engineers a new task: disable traps. Same goes for the enemy (smarter races at

least) for them being able to dismantle your traps. Siegers using Mantlets and such might be an interesting add to. Think you can abuse

Crossbow users to your hearts content? how about a small protective wall coming down the field/hall that is defending a small group of

enemies until they can solve the dwarven crossbow problems.... OH THE POSSIBILITIES!!!!   

[eerr]

no spaces between lines= not fully readable

sorry man