Print

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

[Shades]

I was playing on a frozen map when it occured to me that I could actually have running water (due to magma) and pump it into my entrance tunnel where it stayed liquid. (clearly I was low enough down for that). However I'm pretty sure if I open that tunnel to the air it would all freeze.

So here is my defence plan.

First off a line of pressure plates at the entrance which trigger a gear connected to a pump to fill a square of water. This square of water is on other plate and so produces an always on signal once any hostile triggers the entrance no matter that it'll flicker on and off as people travel over it.

This second plate will be connected to another gear/pump system or maybe just a flood gate which will fill a small room, time to allow hostiles to get a fair distance down the hall way. Once that is full a 7/7 plate will open a gate shifting all that water into the hall way.

As the hallway is ramped at both ends it will fill up to 7/7 quickly at which point a plate at just off the far end of the hall, which is covered by a roof, triggers both a delay pump/room combination and the trapdoors/bridge/whatever that covers the hallway. All the water then freezes killing the hostiles.

Once the last delay pump/room is full it triggers magma to fill the a hall below the hallway and a floodgate to drain out the water, finally this magma is allowed to drain as well and the trap is reset.

Does anyone see any major flaws in this, other than the fact I will obviously miss something and end up pumping magma into my living quarters or something.

[Shima]

I thought water only froze if it was listed as an outside tile (Open air or with a floor overhead).

If you can make it work though, awesome.

[Shades]

I thought water only froze if it was listed as an outside tile (Open air or with a floor overhead).

If that is the case I need a way to toggle that status. I'm pretty sure water with a floor overhead doesn't freeze so there must be something I can use to get that effect.

[Scruga]

it does i'm sorry

[Demonic Spoon]

Well, grates make the area under them inside and they can be linked to a pressure plate...

[Shades]

Just realised I can leave it open and pump the magma below back and forth to create the the freeze / thaw system. This has the added bonus of keeping dwarfs out of the trap when stay inside is on.

[Shima]

I supposed you COULD also make a trap wherein you fill the floor above with ice (More or less, an "ice casting" machine of some sort...), and then set it up so that you channel out the edge of that once it's done, with a single support holding it, and a lever hooked to that, allowing you to literally drop a wall of ice on the enemy, crushing them.  Just have to make sure there's no open space under THAT floor...

Not as awesome as freezing them solid, but close.

[pushy]

http://mkv25.net/dfma/movie-231-degrinchinator

'nuff fucking said

[Shades]

Seems someone has already done it oh well back to the drawing board. Although mine didn't need levers

[Duke 2.0]

 The difference, as far as I can see:
 The Drenchanator pumps out water into the air quick enough to fill an outside space before it freezes, thus freezing anything within the space.

 Your idea is to have a frozen pond with two magma cisterns underneath: One directly under the frozen lake the other just next to it. Only one cistern will be filled at a time. If you want water you pump magma underneath the lake. If you want ice you pump the magma out.

 I think the second option would result in a lot more ice and freezing. But can 3/7 water freeze into a solid block of ice?

[Shades]

  But can 3/7 water freeze into a solid block of ice?

A 1/7 water will freeze into a solid block of ice and then thaw into a 7/7 water afterwards.

[Duke 2.0]

 Then one would need to rig a way of draining a perfectly correct amount of water from the pond. Even so, this should be fun.

[Starver]

I considered something similar[1].  But while I was experimenting (on a map with a freeze-thaw cycle and a partial aquifer) I ended up implementing a season-counter[2] instead.  At that time I wasn't able to work out how to create a freeze-thaw cycle (magma not available) outside of the seasonal variation my location naturally had.  (This would also prevent it working all year round, and my original design relied on shallow water turning into engulfing ice. Could have made it full height water for drowning fun in the summer months, of course.)

But I was sure someone had done something like it, and now I know they have.

[1] I've not generally been big on active auto-defences.  Most of the time I have some other fundemental flaws with the make-up of the fortress that doom the population.

[2] The aquifer draining out into the open would create a frozen plug every time the cold months came around, stopping the draining, raising the water level and allowing a 'tick' to be registered (e.g. by a water-pressure plate).  When the warmth comes back, the plug melts, the water drains and a 'tock' could be measured.  With (quite) a bit of mechanical logic, and sticking with BCD logic to save time, I got half way to setting up a series of 21 bridges that would display the year number in something akin to 7-segment display format, more or less.  (Not Y1K compatible[3].  )  Then something happened that terminated that experiment.  Can't remember what, but my forum handle was quite an apt indicator of the nature of my failures, back then.

[3] But then I could have rigged up a carry-flag handler and further bridges while I was waiting for it to get that far, or just a self-destruct sequence to occur on a year of my choosing.  Maybe even a Mayan-style countdown sequence heralding it... Mwahahaha! 

[Shakma]

To avoid having to pump out water, the default state could be a frozen pond with empty cistern below.  Enemies walk across frozen pond and then magma gets pumped to cistern below, melting ice and dropping them in the pond.  Then magma gets pumped or drained back out and they get encased.  If you want any items, just dig ramps down to get items and there should still be plenty of leftover ice to thaw and re-freeze for the next group.  This will probably reduce the number of steps to make the thing work if you want it automated. 

[Lord_Shadow]

A 1/7 water will freeze into a solid block of ice and then thaw into a 7/7 water afterwards.

I must find some way to exploit this fact.