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[Artyr]

As I play my Human Fortress a certain pattern starts to emerge. Oh, it's tolerable when building on the ground floor, but once I start to build up things get complicated. This can apply to any sort of multi-level structure above ground, whether human, dwarven, or even goblin.

Whenever I build a building, I inevitably have to add a roof to it in order to add a bed. Then when I want to add a second story it becomes such a pain when I have to delete every single floor space that I want to make into a wall, slowing down building to a crawl as I tell them to remove the specific pieces of flooring, waiting for them to finish, then ordering them to build walls in their place. This can even cause "cave-ins" (or more accurately, structural collapse) or end up trapping my builders while someone else goes to build the thing they need to get out.

I propose that floors can be converted to walls and vice-versa, allowing me to build a complete roof above, then when I want to add a second story simply convert the flooring into walls. It would also be useful for renovating existing structures. This wouldn't work for floors created by building a wall.

Though a more realistic option would be adding a building that acts more like a roof rather than using flooring. Maybe some kind of thatched roofing?

[G-Flex]

Actually, I think floors and walls should be LESS similar.

Why does it take so much stone to make a floor? Ideally, it would be more like roads, taking up one block per N tiles. Of course, this leads to weird rounding errors (such as 11 tiles taking 11 blocks if you build them one at a time, but, say, 4 if you build it all at once), so maybe it's best left for when/if objects get bigger stacks.

[PTTG??]

I agree with both of these suggestions: let's see more sophisticated structures!

[Artyr]

Actually, I think floors and walls should be LESS similar.

Why does it take so much stone to make a floor? Ideally, it would be more like roads, taking up one block per N tiles. Of course, this leads to weird rounding errors (such as 11 tiles taking 11 blocks if you build them one at a time, but, say, 4 if you build it all at once), so maybe it's best left for when/if objects get bigger stacks.

If you don't have conversion then you run into the same problem: once you build that floor you can't build walls on top of it. It's only good for being one big room. Since most bedrooms are going to be only a few tiles big then you only save a few pieces of stone.

[Serg]

Can't you floor in all the spaces not above the walls? That way if you wanted to expand, you delete 1 of the floor tiles to get to the roof, and build new walls, then build a new floor over that?

[Draco18s]

Can't you floor in all the spaces not above the walls? That way if you wanted to expand, you delete 1 of the floor tiles to get to the roof, and build new walls, then build a new floor over that?

....

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sideview:

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Now assume that it looks like that most of the way through and now he wants 4 smaller rooms on the second floor.

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sideview:

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|.......|
The outer two are just wall-tops, but that inside one is over empty space, he has to remove that and replace it for every single one of those which takes two steps: removing the floor and building a wall.  He wants it to take ONE step.

[Artyr]

Can't you floor in all the spaces not above the walls? That way if you wanted to expand, you delete 1 of the floor tiles to get to the roof, and build new walls, then build a new floor over that?

What Draco said. Though you're right, it works if I'm building the second floor exactly like the first. But I don't always want to do that.

It would also be nice if I could engrave constructed walls too. I never got why it's not possible.

[CobaltKobold]

It would also be nice if I could engrave constructed walls too. I never got why it's not possible.

I belie'e the usual rationale is that you wouldn't make art on graph paper, you make it on plain white.

But this is just spec.

[G-Flex]

The thing is that constructed walls aren't necessarily made out of tiny bricks.

The Egyptian pyramids had engravings inside them, and those were made out of blocks, for instance.

Also, I'm sure there's SOME kind of art you can put on smallish bricks as well, so I'd deal with the minor questionability of engraving walls if the tradeoff is, well, being able to do it in the first place.

[TettyNullus]

I do agree that having to strip constructed floors for walls don't makes much sense, I'd rather wall be built ONTOP of the floor that's been built. And that constructions are engravable, since after all there're arts on built things in reality and I don't see anything stopping it other than possible complication of implementation which I wouldn't know.

[G-Flex]

Why would you want to build a wall on top of a floor? Do you ever actually do that in real life?

You don't build some intricate floor and then cover the entire thing with a wall, do you? There's no hardwood flooring in the walls between this room and the next, I know that much. And it certainly shouldn't take up that much material.

[The Doctor]

It's not material.

It's the time it takes, and the over-complicatedness of it all.

[TettyNullus]

Why would you want to build a wall on top of a floor? Do you ever actually do that in real life?

You don't build some intricate floor and then cover the entire thing with a wall, do you? There's no hardwood flooring in the walls between this room and the next, I know that much. And it certainly shouldn't take up that much material.

Well, you need a floor structuring to be able to set up wall structure onto IRL. And I'd rather be able to set up flooring to act as roof, then later build onto it without having to tear... every... little... tiles... for.... walls. And no, I don't do anything fancy, just floor over areas as I builds up to act as roof, then later set up room and go up, up, up. Don't makes much sense to have to -tear- floor down to put -up- walls, since walls can be built off floors. The way Dwaf fortress treats floors and walls currently seem to be to simplify the underlying construction order, though I finds it very uniniutive that I can't quickly just wall up rooms on constructed floor.

[Bryan Derksen]

It seems to me that adding a new storey to an existing building _should_ be a tricky feat of engineering that's fraught with danger. There have been some pretty terrible structural failures in RL where builders figured it'd be profitable to tack a new floor onto an existing building and then it turned out that the building couldn't support it properly - I recall seeing a show about a mall collapse in South Korea that killed about a thousand people that resulted from one such renovation.

When I build structures (and even when I dig caverns) I always make a point of trying to line up as many walls as possible between the levels to provide load-bearing pillars and planes. I missed the 2D version of DF, but I understand there was a feature where anything more than four tiles away from a wall would collapse? Something like that would be awesome in the 3D version. I love digging out multi-level vaulted ceilings for my larger rooms and leaving a forest of pillars to accompany the tower caps in my subterranian timber farms. I can _feel_ the claustrophobic crushing depth of the lower Z levels of my fortress better when all the rooms and corridors down there are cramped and tiny because of the need to provide supporting walls for the levels above them.

[Draco18s]

Why would you want to build a wall on top of a floor? Do you ever actually do that in real life?

Clearly you haven't seen our downstairs bathroom.

It's in fact quite common to build walls in order to divide an existing room into two or more smaller rooms.

Ok, it's a terrible picture but it does show a wall frame built on top of an existing (concrete?) floor.