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[Shurikane]

So I'm gonna rebuild my spike strip.  I want a push on the pressure plate to get the spikes to shoot up, and a release to get them back down.  So, here's my plan.  Hopefully I understood the conditions well, which state that all conditions must be met for a trap to be sprung.

1) Build a lever and pull it.
2) Link all the spikes to the lever.
3) Pull the lever.  Spikes retract.
4) Build pressure plates and link them to spikes.
5) Pull the lever.  Condition one met.
6) If an enemy steps on the plate, condition two met, spikes shoot up.

If I want to temporarily disable the spikes, I just pull the level so that condition one is never met.


ALTERNATE METHOD.  I'm not sure this even works...

1) Build spikes in a checkerboard pattern.
2) Build a gear assembly close to a river.
3) Link the assembly to a lever.
4) Link all the spikes to the lever.
5) Build another gear assembly next to the first one.
6) Build a water wheel.
7) Link the wheel to the gear assembly.  This should make it so the spikes continuously shoot up and down.
Pull the lever to disengage the assemblies.  Time it so the spikes are retracted.
9) Build spikes on the remaining free squares of the checkerboard and link them all to the gear assembly.
10) Whenever required, pull the lever to reactivate the checkerboard spike strip and pierce whatever comes through.


Eventually I plan on something that will completely obsolete this: knowing my river is infested with carps, I will create an artificial lake that surrounds the path leading to my fort and line the sides with floodgates all connected to the same lever.  The gates are above water but horizontally linked to the ground.  I will also build one drawbridge over solid ground at each end to block escape when the lever is pulled (and the drawbridges won't be blocked by petty things like forgotten socks.  This will thus trap invaders in the corridor, and I can then wait for the carps to feast upon them.  This takes into assumption that carbs will attack gobbos, of which I am not sure...

[Shurikane]

Bump.

Lots of views but no replies, so I assume no news is good news and that both methods are feasible the way I prepared them?

[MagicJuggler]

The easiest way is to build a 1x1 room with a pressure plate linked to every spike, set to trigger when water goes off, and a lever connected either to a hatch or screw pump (as a means to get water to the system. Me, I use two hatches, one above the other, so that when I pull the switch, only a limited amount of water reaches the pressure plate, allowing it to reset afterwards.

[iluogo]

I have enough experience to say that method 2 definitely WON'T work
I tested it out myself. It just doesn't work like that it only disengages the gear assembly.

method 1 on the other hand I am not sure about. My guess it won't because i believe it doesn't work like that. If you have 2 levers (or pressure plates) connected to something i think it will open if one of the levers is on, but I am not really sure. I think you would need a AND gate for that.

[Deon]

There's no "1" and "2" positions of lever, there're "on" and "off", so you can't pull the lever, attach a thing, then pull again and attach another thing and wait for them to work in the same order as you attached them. They will work simulationesly despite of the order you've set.

I think assigning a pressure plate to a spike without a lever should work. I'll test that.

[Magua]

I believe (but am not 100% sure) that linking multiple triggers to an item just gives it multiple triggers -- it does not mean that all triggers have to fire for the item to go off.

Which means that a creature triggering a pressure plate will always flip the state of what it's linked to, even if that thing is linked to by levers, etc.

But, stupid dwarfiness is a hobby of mine, so: you can get the two triggers required to do something by hooking them both up to gears.  The problem is then making whatever the gears are hooked up to do something.

Perhaps something like this:

Code: [Select]

Overhead view

XX.X
**%X
XX%X
XX^X
XX.X
XXXX

X = wall, . = open space, * = gear, %% = screw pump (pumping south), ^ = pressure plate

Link your lever to one of the gears, and your pressure plates to another.  Both must be engaged for the screw pump to receive power (not shown).  The pressure plate to the south of the pump is set to activate when the water level on it is 2 or more.  When active, the screw pump pumps water from the north to the south, which activates the pressure plate there, which triggers the spikes.  Space is provided for the water to runoff, so that when the water on the plate goes to 1, the spikes retract.

The timing of this may be problematic, and it's untested, but it should work.

[Shurikane]

Mini-quick alternate method I thought up:

1) Make a spike strip and link it to whatever mechanism that continuously fires, thereby making spikes that constantly shoot up and down.
2) North and south of the field are, in order, up ramp, platform, down ramp.
3) Make a retracting drawbridge that links the two platforms together.

When retracted, the only way to pass is through the strip, meaning stupid gobbos will kill themselves on it.

When extended, the way is safe as the drawbridge passes over the spike strip.

[Magua]

Spikes can't be autofired without involving liquid continually setting off/resetting a pressure plate (or putting in on a heavy traffic path your dwarves use).

That is, there's no "automatic repeatedly fire" machine.

[Strangething]

That is, there's no "automatic repeatedly fire" machine.

This should be on a suggestion list, if it isn't already. Some device that toggles on and off as long as it's given a source of power.

Mmm, windmill powered death machine.

[ungood]

How about a goblin/kobold powered alternator?  Say a corridor that has two ways out, blocked by doors.  A pressure plate by the north door opens the south door (and is linked to one set of spikes), while a pressure plate by the south door opens the north door.  Drop a goblin in and as he tries to get out of the corridor (to kill your dwarves), he ends up running back and forth, toggling your spikes.

Code: [Select]

Alternator.  X = wall, - = Door, N = plate tied to north door, S = plate tied to south door.
X-X
XSX
XNX
X-X


Code: [Select]

Spike room.
N = spikes tied to the N trigger above.
S = spikes tied to S trigger.
T = a pressure plate designed to release a cage holding a goblin above the alternator.
XXX.XXX
XNSNSNX
XSNSNSX
XNSNSNX
XSNSNSX
XNSNSNX
XXXTXXX


[Shurikane]

By the way, is there a set method I haven't heard about about defaulting spikes to retracted, rather than extended, when installed?

[forsaken1111]

If you have a few slaves you hate, couldn't you give them rooms near the switch and no jobs enabled, then set the lever linked to the spikes to be repeatedly pulled?

[Shurikane]

Perhaps, though I'm not too fond of "sacrifying" a dwarf for the sole purpose of defense.  I already have a corridor of drawbridges, and the initial intent of the spikes was to hurt the gobbos just a little so that the river would be red everytime I dropped an enemy into it.

Although, considering the amount of work needed to redo the strip to my liking, I think I'll simply scrap the project altogether, stick to my few guard animals and use my freed resources to finish the fortress design I had been working on.  I'll be hollowing out pretty much the entire underground, so this alone will need some serious work and a lot of design planning to be done right.

[Hague]

Or you know... You could just use regular weapon traps with crappy wooden elf weapons or bow traps with arrows.

[Shurikane]

This is what I ultimately came up with:



The fort is in brown, surrounded by a moat, and accessible by a corridor of death of drawbridges.  The map is bisected by a river.

The spike strips are in red arrows, north and south of the map.  Linking east and west are retracting bridges (in white) and each spike strip has a drawbridge at each end, which raise away from the strip and reveal a channel underneath to disallow passage.  Furthermore, the spike strip is surrounded east and west by a wall (in brown), under which is more channeling, in case someone attempts to destroy it.  In short, the spike strips are set on small islands.  Further channels along the west end of the map force traffic towards the strips.  Finally, an animal (in yellow) is chained to each end of the spike strip and on the east side of the linker bridges.

If invaders come by, the animals will detect them before getting killed.  Once the invasion wanders onto the strip, I raise the drawbridges and trap them on the mini-island.  Since the invaders will meddle there for a while, they'll most likely set off the traps again and again.  Once everyone's dead or all the traps have been jammed, I either send the military in or I let the survivors be on their way and then finish 'em off at the main corridor leading to the fort.

Eventually, I'd like to set up a bend in the road leading to the fort.  After walling and channeling around the road to prevent traffic from going astray, I place a ballista at the bend, facing yonder, and have a bit of fun firing into packs of invaders.  The ballistas would both be set on mini-islands of their own, converted into booths, and accessible from within the fortress but not without, thus almost completely protecting the operator.


Note to self: next fort will be dedicated to gobbo sacrifices.  Make a tower that reaches all the way to the uppermost Z-level and almost all the way down into the underground - a hole will be channeled for this purpose.  The lower part of the tower is funnel-shaped using ramps, and ends in one single grate, through which blood of the fallen will pass and drip into a closed-circuit artificial river at the very bottom of the fort.  A few reservoirs will clean the funnel on occasion to help spread the blood.  Goal: start with a full and clear body of water, and completely turn it red by capturing goblins and kobolds alive, stripping them of weapons and armor, and releasing them on a retracting drawbridge at the top of the tower.  Furthermore: power a few pumps and create artificial fountains and waterfalls of blood.  Bonus: after a few sacrifices, record the history of the genocide by engraving the walls of the tower.  Good stuff to read while you're falling down.