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[AncientEnemy]

it'd be nice if objects/fluids actually treated ramps like ramps. Right now it's impossible to make a real funnel or cone, all you can make is a step-pyramid going up or down.

Fluids treat this:

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\     /
 \   /
  \ /
like this:

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_     _
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there's got to be a million and one applications for funnel/cone/slopes in trap design, waterworks, aqueducts, etc.

[Cheeetar]

I'd see that as a lot of work, and don't really see the use of it (apart from perhaps making the flow of fluids be smoother).

[Urist McDetective]

Seriously? Ramps that direct & add speed / pressure to liquid flow would be great for lots of things, as AE said. Giving them an X of six rating (7 being square height) and basing flow rate on the height difference (& direction) between two ramp squares is the first idea that comes to mind.
The applications are only limited by x,y,z & what you can get to flow down it.

[Bricks]

I also don't really see the point.  Unless you want it to move fluids faster, or something, which would just mean making water take MORE of the processor.  Ramps don't have simulated directions, and adding such might be incredibly wasteful (not to mention confusing; we don't have that many ASCII pieces to play with).

[Sowelu]

I don't think moving fluid faster would hurt processing time.  It just means "instead of this fluid sitting here and maybe losing some fluid to an adjacent tile, force it to move some fluid to any adjacent open space".

Direction of ramps is unimportant.  I would be satisfied with "pretend that this tile is four units more full when seeing where water should go", so two ramps next to each other with 1 water would not move between each other, but they would both instantly move their fluid to an open space with 2 fluid in it.  Only exception is that, of course, you can't move fluid back upwards, and you can't overfill a square.  A ramp can still hold all fluid tiles like normal...though I guess it might also work to only let it store up to 3-4, again acting like you have from 4-7 at all times.

I don't think the whole "three bits for 0-7" thing is a problem with that either, because that's just for storage; the operations to calculate stuff operate on a full byte.

[LegoLord]

It would be great if falling objects in general treated ramps like this.  You could make a giant pit capable of literally funneling an entire siege into a 1x1xZ tile of 7/7 magma.

[Drake1500]

Hmmm... I see the use of treating ramps as ramps, and not as flat squares, but still question whether it's worth it or not.

Direction of ramps is unimportant.  I would be satisfied with "pretend that this tile is four units more full when seeing where water should go", so two ramps next to each other with 1 water would not move between each other, but they would both instantly move their fluid to an open space with 2 fluid in it.  Only exception is that, of course, you can't move fluid back upwards, and you can't overfill a square.  A ramp can still hold all fluid tiles like normal...though I guess it might also work to only let it store up to 3-4, again acting like you have from 4-7 at all times.

This would be a good way to get the same effect, without all the work associated with "ramps as true ramps". I'll put my support behind this idea as the interim until Toady has the time to really get down 'n' dirty with the ramps.

[Bricks]

OK, the level-partitioning ramps make more sense.  I guess I feel... hesitantly supportive.  I still don't see how this would make a huge difference in how water actually flows.  Potential issues:

Does a 'full' ramp tile (say, with an empty height of 4) show up as 7 or 3?  Either way, it's kind of confusing.  I guess 3 would make more sense, although it would take some getting used to.  A height of 1 water on a ramp would preferentially flow to a 2/7 tile.

Would stacked ramps act as impassable to water?  It might be better that ramps are solid (can't be stacked) for the sake of sensibility.  I once saw someone take advantage of the current situation by placing siege weapons behind fortifications that were next to ramps that led to a fort's entrance, which was rather... magical.

[Vattic]

I agree, with magma being a somewhat limited resource for me, as I use my magma flooding trap, having the ability to open the bridges, drop the magma onto the ramps and get the magma back without loosing loads on my ramps as 1 pools would be nice.

It would with water leave a faint covering of water like after dwarves go through mist perhaps.

[Hungry]

true ramps works by taking liquids from a higher plane to a lower plane with less resistance...than falling off a sheer drop, water pathing rules state that liquids like water or lava should prefer a ramp accepting from a higher plane and ramps always dump to lower or even planes prefering lower, this of course is not saying that water wont flow over a flat edge but will flow more efficent over a ramp.

AK Ramp takes from tiles with higher elevation, and dump it to tiles that are even to ramp but prefer to dump to tiles that are lower than ramp, such as another ramp, emulated by having the ramp act like its doing work moving the liquid to lower tiles.

[Draco18s]

Ramps don't have simulated directions

Yes they do.

[Nesoo]

Ahh, Draco18s beat me to it. Yes, ramps have directions; just try to use one in adventure mode.

I think that what ramps should do is give more weight to the "downhill" side(s) of the tile when water is pathing through it.

For an example, consider this:

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█████
,.▲`.
.'..`

Any water entering that ramp tile, from any direction, should be most likely to exit the tile by heading S, SE, or SW (since those are the directions from which you'd have to enter the tile to use it), though going E or W wouldn't be impossible; just much less likely.

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███,.
.`▲.`
.,'.'

This should mostly send water SE and S.

Going with the OP's example:

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███████
▲▲▲▲▲▲▲
.'`..,
▲▲▲▲▲▲▲
███████

Water coming in from either the top wall or bottom wall would (more or less) be funneled towards the center lane.

Add in the idea that ramps are "filled" 4/7 and water will (mostly) naturally head down the lane instead of spreading around on the ramps (for the most part). Alternately, channel out the center lane for roughly the same effect.

[zchris13]

But the problem is losing fluids that are sitting on the ramp.  This doesn't solve that.

[Drake1500]

Au contrair... but it would. You see, the ramps would lose their water to squares beside them, and thus, you would be losing the fluids on the ground. You're not losing it on the ramp, it's on the flat ground. 

But seriously, you can use the ramps to "funnel" the water so that the tiles have at least 2 water in them. Thus, preventing lost water.

[AncientEnemy]

Glad to see there's at least some support. I thought the uses would be immediately obvious, but here's a few I'd like to be able to do:

1. as others have said, have magma/waterworks with less loss. right now if you want to move water around using slopes, you end up with lots of evaporation. That isn't to say there aren't workarounds, but workarounds aught not be the mainstay method forever. Also, liquids have no preference to actually move down a slope. If I have a long slope running down the side of a mountain, water dropped at the top isn't going to travel down to the bottom, unless the slope is turned into a canal and one were to simply dump so much water that it was forced to 'fall' off the sides until it got to the bottom.

2. moving stuff around. who wouldn't want to build an awesome log flume to get lumber from the wooded hills down to your sandy plain. Or for that matter, build a dwarven waterslide. I know mine carts and other forms of material & dwarf transit are very desired features, and this would be just another (and IMO even more dwarvish) way of doing it.

3. deathtraps! like an earlier poster said, pulling back that bridge would be that much more satisfying if you could have the gobs/items fall down a funnel o' doom.

Ramps -do- already take into account direction, and there are a number of different ways this could be implemented.

And even if it does prove to be 'more trouble than it's worth' (a call I think only toady can really make, since we don't know the specifics of how the system handles these things, just generalities), the game has always leaned to the 'as realistic as possible while still fun' side. And I think the myriad possibilities having real slopes would open up would be worth a shot