Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[HexagonalBolts]

I personally have never been a fan of the standard sitting on top of a wall pinging arrows at goblins, preferring to devise an infinitely more sinister, elaborate and deadly demise to our green skinned friends. What obscure but surprisingly effective defence systems have you found?


My personal favourite involves a long series of bridges which have to be crossed to enter my fortress, with a pressure plate in the middle. If the pressure plate is touched then the invaders fall into a small pit. If some accident has happened (for example, one goblin made the bridge fall down while fifty dwarves were standing on it) the dwarves can fall into this small pit without suffering harm and proceed to maim the gobbo's scrawny ass, and then quickly exit via another exit bridge without it being triggered again. However if the very hordes of hell themselves have been captured in the smaller pit, when they attempt to exit they will fall into some infernal pit of deepness with lava and water on tap, and an assortment of fortifications overlooking their thoroughly disadvantaged position. Muhahah. I'm sure there are some infinitely more intricate defence systems out there, so please describe in full, and pictures will be much appreciated 

[Zarimus]

My current favorite is based on starting in very flat terrain. I scribe a single channel around the periphery of my land area about ten spaces in, with one five space wide entry gap. Then a line from the gap to my central fortress entry is walled in and a road built between, with a nice gap to be filled with weapon traps and chained war dogs and a squad patrol area at the end to mop up anything that makes it through the ginsu welcome mat.

Merchants and migrants have no trouble skirting the outer reaches and making the entryway, while any invaders or other annoyances funnel down the road to the waiting rotating knives. I don't bother with hunters as the animals are keen to waltz right into the slaughterhouse and offer themselves up. As a bonus the hordes of goblins provide the weapons I stock the traps with.

[Ivefan]

A long closed corridor over a magma reserve that i pressurize with pumps when the gobs enter the corridor. the pressurized magma rises one level and then sinks back under the corridor and leaves neatly stacked piles of iron.

[HexagonalBolts]

A long closed corridor over a magma reserve that i pressurize with pumps when the gobs enter the corridor. the pressurized magma rises one level and then sinks back under the corridor and leaves neatly stacked piles of iron.

Does the pump have to be on the top level, or is there a way of making the magma rise with a pump on the lower level?

[Ivefan]

the magma will rise to the level where the pump is.

[Wahad]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Red = magma. Blue = Weapon trap filled with 10 serrated disks. Orange = pressure plate. Brown = floodgate.

All gates except topmost are open. Goblins come in, step on pressure plate 1, rightmost floodgate closes. They go further, step on plate 2, then the floodgates close and the magma-gate opens. Poof. (Draining system not pictured)

For those that do get through, the maze of traps.

[Vattic]

I always thought being able to raise the drawbridge and ignore the outside world was a pretty ridiculous but effective defence system but that's not what your after.

One fortress I ran had it so that goblins besieging my fort passed through my main entrance (evacuated for the siege) once the leading goblin stepped on a pressure plate the front doors close and down the passage ahead of him another door closes trapping them, I could then flood the room with water, magma or both, which was my favourite. Goblin bones encased in obsidian keep my bolt makers and my miners busy.

[edit] forgot to mention my current fort, I can selectively flood sections of the map with magma, so many pumps, pity it takes so long to fill the magmapipe though, limits me using it.

Other favourites I've seen in other peoples forts include the clockwork drowning chamber and the one in my sig.

[zchris13]

Those traps are more than enough, I hope you know.

[Wahad]

Yeah, but I wanted to do something with magma. Less cleaning, and all that.

[Nerserus]

Those traps are more than enough, I hope you know.

I know, i could repel a siege with twelve of them in a 3x3 corridor if i had too.

[Albedo]

A long closed corridor over a magma reserve that i pressurize with pumps when the gobs enter the corridor. the pressurized magma rises one level and then sinks back under the corridor and leaves neatly stacked piles of iron.

That is very elegant.  Points for that.

[Jakkarra]

im working on a system that will sort different creatures,  goblins get horrible mauled by Whip traps, doused in a small amount of magma (not enough to kill, most of the time) and finally drowned, but then, i drain the water and send the zombies a captured earlier in to OmNomNom the gobbos (i do this to elves also, but more pain)

then for the Kobolds i drop them one z-level,into the nice little area i made for them, with walls of the engraved stone, golden/platinum/aluminum furniture and a VERY plentiful supply of meat-based products, bones and assorted Liquor.

at the moment its Dwarf powered, but im hoping to find a way to automate it eventually.

Love, jakkarra

[Duke 2.0]

 Alright, so there is the standard long hallway(Although a bit thicker than the standard trap hall, with this one being around ten tiles wide) with drawbridges at the ends. When gobbos are detected from the detection animals, I manually have a lever pulled in an attempt to trap the entire ambush at once. With them all there, I pull another lever releasing the ceiling above them.

 Sure I need to construct a new one every time I use it, but there is something fulfilling about the dust cloud that results from the dropping.

[Mount]

When pooling liquids go in.. how about a corridr that lashes them with whips, and then dumps prickleberry juice in the open wounds? (and drowns them in citrusy goodnes?)

[Jakkarra]

When pooling liquids go in.. how about a corridr that lashes them with whips, and then dumps prickleberry juice in the open wounds? (and drowns them in citrusy goodnes?)

My god, you are a GENIUS!

i need some way of actually removing their skin first, however....

Love, jakkarra