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[Zombie0hour]

Anyone have a basic layout or design for creating a moat? I tried on my mine and failed, flooding my entire fort. I have never really messed around with anything outside of a stone fall trap lol 

[Stargrasper]

Wiki entry for Moat.  The wiki is your friend.

[Skorpion]

I'm currently using a 3-wide channel, set where it doesen't cut into my fort's structure. It's divided into sections by bridges over the brook, which are walled in.
The bridges are necesarry because it's a _magma_ moat. Pumped magma, filled in stages.

[Malicus]

The important thing to pay attention to is that the channels you dig for the moat do NOT cut into your fort.  Bad things (such as flooding) happen if they do.

[Zombie0hour]

The wiki entry really dose not serve any help to its construction..

[durt101]

dude. use a channel (d-h), or ramps (d-r, then d-z to remove them), then connect it to a river and it will fill.

[Stargrasper]

While true, the wiki assumes you know that creating even a diagonal opening between fortress and moat is a bad idea.  Perhaps we ought to edit the wiki for account for that.  In any event, like Malicus said, just don't let the moat come into contact with your fort and you'll be fine.  The Reverse Moat mentioned on the wiki might be in order for you as well.  Don't write off the wiki because it assumes common sense.

Making sure it won't cut into the fortress, channel out the area for your moat as wide as you'd like(Skorpion's advice is perhaps overkill, but would work well), then channel to your local brook/river/ocean/magma pipe/etc.  Keep your drawbridge three wide to allow for caravans.  Beyond that, you shouldn't have too much trouble...some consider arrow towers and moats in tandem to be nigh unstoppable for siegers.  Any other questions?

[bluea]

Some things about moats:

They can take an irritating amount of time to fill. And they can take an irritating amount of time to drain.

For filling: Either multiple pumps shoving the water out into the moat, or an elevated tank you can release into the moat. Neither is crucial, just a bonus for later.

For draining: multiple hatches spaced out on the floor of the moat leading to off-the-edge fortifications works wonders.

A dry moat really does the basic job of a moat pretty well.

[Zombie0hour]

I don't understand how to make it thou. So I just place a bridge and channel water into the bridge and pop it up and there is some water underneath is that all?

[Stargrasper]

Channel out the area you want to use as your moat.  Build a bridge over that space.  Optionally fill with water from a local source(brook/river/etc) or magma from a pipe.

[Zombie0hour]

Ok so channel the space bellow the bridge, and then channel water from a stream into it? Or use pumps and pump it somehow im confused 

[Stargrasper]

You can just channel the water.  People have suggested using pumps for no real reason beyond making filling the pump go faster.  If you have patience, letting it fill naturally will work fine.  You really don't need to learn to use pumps for this job.

[Malicus]

Note that you have to channel the area before building the bridge, because once a bridge is placed, you can't dig through the ground that it is on.  You may want to channel part of your planned moat, build a temporary bridge, channel the rest, build your real bridge, then remove the temporary bridge so your dwarves don't get stuck either inside or outside after digging the channel.  Also, don't channel something that's 3 tiles or more wide all at once, as your dwarves are pretty much guaranteed to get stuck (or cause a cave-in, but if you're not trying to dig your moat through your fort, that shouldn't happen) that way.

That is, where '.' is the ground, 'H' is the channel designation, and "_" has already been channeled...

Code: [Select]

.HHH.
.HHH.
.HHH.
.HHH.
.HHH.This (above) is the bad way to make a moat.

Code: [Select]

...H.   ..H_.   .H__.   .___.
...H.   ..H_.   .H__.   .___.
...H.   ..H_.   .H__.   .___.
...H.   ..H_.   .H__.   .___.
...H.   ..H_.   .H__.   .___.
You could channel as above, reading from left to right.  Alternatively, you could do it this way:

Code: [Select]

..H.. .H_H. .___.
..H.. .H_H. .___.
..H.. .H_H. .___.
..H.. .H_H. .___.
..H.. .H_H. .___.

My point is that dwarves will find ANY excuse to get themselves trapped while doing their jobs, so only allow them to do it in a way where they can't possibly get trapped.

Actually, your moat doesn't need to be that wide, so I'm not really sure why I went on about channeling wider things up there.  It (currently) would be just as effective if it were one tile wide, and you shouldn't have to worry about dwarves getting stuck when making such a moat.  And finally, although it may not look as nice, a dry moat may actually be BETTER, because if it's filled with water, something that can swim can still cross it without any problems.

[Funk]

you can build rised moats

W
WMWR
G G G G G

W=wall
M=moat
G=ground

[Lordinquisitor]

An moat is one of the easiest constructions. As others have said, just don`t cut into your fortress. Now two additional tipps:

1. Don`t fill it with water. Sometimes dwarves (and more important loot!) fall into the moat and recovering them could prove difficult.

2. Consider building an wall behind the moat. Why? Because archers can still fire over it, IIRC.