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[Alrenous]

Consensus: bathysphere impossible. Lignite, draining, or magma necessary for underwater biodomes.

So assume you don't want to dig in from underneath...how do you properly submerge the dome afterward? I'm thinking you need two sacrificial dwarves; one to channel out the surface-level walls from above, and another to build a floor over the entryway, to properly seal the dome. (I don't want an unusable hatch permanently stuck in the top of my dome.)

But more than that, I want a dome submerged by two (or more) levels of water, without digging in from underneath. I think this is impossible too.

My only idea is something involving raising bridges, so you can channel out the first layer and then simply flip a switch for the second layer.

...actually I just thought of a way, basically building the dome inland. As a bonus, it allows for having sand inside the dome, so glassworking can continue. Still, is it possible to channel down two (or more) layers next to water?

[denito]

Consensus: bathysphere impossible. Lignite, draining, or magma necessary for underwater biodomes.

So assume you don't want to dig in from underneath...how do you properly submerge the dome afterward? I'm thinking you need two sacrificial dwarves; one to channel out the surface-level walls from above, and another to build a floor over the entryway, to properly seal the dome. (I don't want an unusable hatch permanently stuck in the top of my dome.)

But more than that, I want a dome submerged by two (or more) levels of water, without digging in from underneath. I think this is impossible too.

My only idea is something involving raising bridges, so you can channel out the first layer and then simply flip a switch for the second layer.

...actually I just thought of a way, basically building the dome inland. As a bonus, it allows for having sand inside the dome, so glassworking can continue. Still, is it possible to channel down two (or more) layers next to water?

Well with regards to sand inside the dome, suppose you undermined the center of an island, cave it in to several Z levels below the ocean level, I guess in theory if it was a sand tile on top it would still be a sand tile after the cave in.  (Hmmm...  must test this!)  Then you could end up with something like a giant drinking glass:  the center of the island is dropped but you leave a cylinder of the island intact to keep the water out.  Then you could build your dome inside it, have sand for the floor of the dome, and destroy the cylinder to let the water in.

But, how would you destroy the cylinder walls?  If it were constructions then you'd only need to undermine it but it will be natural walls.

How about this (insanely, dwarvenly contrived idea): 

1.  Embark on a frozen biome, but hopefully the ocean salt water doesn't freeze.
2.  Construct an enormous ring-shaped aqueduct in the sky over the ocean, filled with freshwater from pumps.
3.  Use retracting bridges under the aqueduct to drop rings of water onto the ocean.
4.  Hopefully the rings of freshwater will freeze on their way down, hit the ocean, and settle on the bottom.
5.  Keep doing this until you've stacked enough rings of ice to make a cylinder/tank reaching the surface.
6.  Pump the water out of the middle of the cylinder of ice.
7.  Build the glass dome on the ground inside the ice cylinder.
8.  Dig a magma channel under the ocean floor under the ice cylinder.
9.  Use the heat from the magma to melt the ice at the bottom of the cylinder

After all the ice has melted, you'll be left with the dome at the bottom of the ocean!

(I know there's less complicated ways to do it; I also know this crowd appreciates good overengineering!)

[Viroath]

Sadly, with current Cave In rules, I think a sealed object is impossible to drop without exact and timely modding (Dropping FPS Cap to "Dwarven Syrup Mode", Dropping the Sphere, then right as it lands and before it tries to fall into the floor, save, quit and turn off cave ins.  Load up, save and out, turn them back on.  With any luck, it would have wiped out whatever tag is used for falling objects and your Dwarves are safe.  Alternately, if it's not an instant drop, turn off Cave Ins on descent and have a Dwarven Submarine!).  Anything above either hits the floor or deconstructs on impact.  Maybe this would change if you could carve supports out of natural walls, and still have them counted as natural.

But, there is an alternative!  A Mega Construction alternative!

Build a platform over the water.  Build scaffolding and use a complex series of pumps and -ducts to cast an Obsidian Tower/Box, completely hallow and with walls higher than the water is deep.  No roof either.

When finished, deconstruct the floor that is holding it up. Hallow Tower plummets to the ocean floor, and the top will be above water.  Proceed to mine out the Ocean Floor.

You wouldn't believe the problems that are easily solved with dropping an Obsidian Tower on it!

[ikkonoishi]

Falling is instantaneous for tiles. Items and creatures take time to fall, but tiles will teleport to the lowest possible location.

[mattie2009]

If it worked, you could send a small group of miners in and drop it near the ocean walls.
Instant underwater/underground base.
If a little suicidal unless you're REALLY well prepared.

[fleacircus]

What about this:

Side view:
SLS
SXS
S@S
SSS

S = cast obsidian
@ = brave explorers
X = updown stair
L = lava over floor

The bathysphere drops. There are no walls above the dwarfs, so nothing crushes them. There's lava above them, but it *waving hands vigorously* flash-freezes into a new roof before it falls onto the dorfs.

[Derakon]

You could dig in from underneath and then collapse your access tunnel behind you, if all you care about is a neat result at the end. You could even fill in the shaft to the surface on the shore with obsidian, then have a dwarf stranded on the shore deconstruct everything before committing suicide.

[denito]

What about this:

Side view:
SLS
SXS
S@S
SSS

S = cast obsidian
@ = brave explorers
X = updown stair
L = lava over floor

The bathysphere drops. There are no walls above the dwarfs, so nothing crushes them. There's lava above them, but it *waving hands vigorously* flash-freezes into a new roof before it falls onto the dorfs.

Well in the cave-in test I did, I didn't have lava but I did have a dwarf at the bottom of a column of stairs.  The stairs broke free and fell and smashed the dwarves.  I believe the X stairs would break loose no matter what was above them and leave an empty square where they were and a dead dwarf in a pile of rubble at the bottom.  But I see what you're getting at with the lava - you're thinking the lava might remain liquid during the cave in process, and then flash freeze just after the cave in stops.

It seems 3 things must be true for this to work:
1.  A lava tile must not be capable of breaking things underneath it just by falling.
2.  The water needs to reach the lava tile and freeze it BEFORE it falls in.
3.  BUT the lava needs to only freeze AFTER the cave-in stops.

#1 seems self-evident (falling liquids do not break things like cave-ins do), so the issue is just how long does the lava remain a liquid.  That comes down to #2 and #3 and it's a question of timing/order of operations.  Maybe an experiment could be devised to test that timing question by itself.

The fundamental problem with a bathysphere is that absolutely anything above an open chamber will break loose and kill things - so if liquid magma did work this way, even if fleacircus's exact configuration won't work, maybe there is some other configuration that can.  You don't really need stairs - actually what you want is open space over the dwarf, and as little constructed things as possible between the dwarf and the lava.  The trick is how do you suspend a tile of lava without anything underneath it?

My first thought was even if stairs are deadly, maybe a really tough dwarf could survive getting hit on the head with a constructed floor.  Because I think what would happen is (provided the timing works right) the floor would fall in just before the magma turns to obsidian.

But then I thought, maybe there actually is a way to suspend a lava tile over a hole without anything at all under it.  NFossil's magma dipping corridor post (and the earlier magma mist generator design) made me think of this:  what if I used a pump to suck up the tile of magma just before it falls?  I'm thinking something like this (side view):

Code: [Select]

O  %%MO
O_mOOOO
OO OOOO
OOdOOOO
OOOOOOO

Top view:

Code: [Select]

OOOOOOOO
O__m%%MO
O_OOOOmO
O__M%%mO
OOOOOOOO

O = obsidian, d = dwarf, _ = channel, %% = pump, M = magma on top, m = magma below

To keep the magma from destroying the pumps I would need to keep it in a channel.  In the diagrams there is a channel with a hole in it over the dwarf.  Instead of circulating the magma over the top of the pump, I'd circulate it around the side to be absolutely sure there's nothing over the dwarf except a magma tile.

[Heliman]

The only possible way to get a dwarf to the bottom of the ocean without using bins containing thermonuclear !!liginite!!(causes the ocean to evaporate) or epic amounts of pumps would require actually stunning and capturing a SoF(soul of ohmyfuckinggodfirefireowowowI'mburningahhhh) and chaining it with adamantium chains to the top of the craft, it would accomplisht the same thing as the liginite but you can kill the sof with crossbow bolts, causing the ocean to refill.

Personally, I think the most dwarven way to do this is throw a bewildered legendary mining dwarf with a good swimmer skill into the deepest part of the ocean and have him dig a staircase down, from there he can dig diagonally and the water can't follow him fast enough due to the pressure reset bug.

[Deimos56]

Has anyone tried casting a giant, ocean-deep cup of some sort and dropping that in?

x=obsidian

x     x~~~~~~~
x     x
x     x
x xx x

Admittedly, it probably would only work if you had a mountain or something to extend the maximum number of z-levels into the sky.
But, if it worked, you could build your glass thing in it, right?
Or, if you just want an underwater base, you could probably say screw it to the cup and dump a huge obsidian plug in.
You could extend it by dumping shallower chunks of obsidian down next to it.

...Again, though, this would only work if you could get enough skyward Z-levels by the ocean...

[Alrenous]

Example; six deep ocean with only three sky levels.

Drop a three-high plug and then a three-high cup. It should work fine - doesn't falling natural wall annihilate water that's beneath it?

[goffrie]

It should work fine - doesn't falling natural wall annihilate water that's beneath it?

In my (limited) experience, falling walls displace the water (even upward), splashing around everywhere.

[denito]

Has anyone tried casting a giant, ocean-deep cup of some sort and dropping that in?

x=obsidian

x     x~~~~~~~
x     x
x     x
x xx x

Admittedly, it probably would only work if you had a mountain or something to extend the maximum number of z-levels into the sky.
But, if it worked, you could build your glass thing in it, right?
Or, if you just want an underwater base, you could probably say screw it to the cup and dump a huge obsidian plug in.
You could extend it by dumping shallower chunks of obsidian down next to it.

...Again, though, this would only work if you could get enough skyward Z-levels by the ocean...

Oh yeah I'm pretty sure that would work.  It's only the lid over the top that screws things up.  And getting enough Z-level height isn't too much trouble; heck the map I tried the prototype on has a mountain by the ocean, and drops magma from a dozen Z levels up!  I'm just trying to figure out a way to drop one in with walls that are lower than the water level and somehow seal it.

Or drop one in that is higher than the water level, build inside it, and later get rid of the walls.  That's why one thing I thought of was making the walls out of ice that could be melted later.

[2xMachina]

Why not just build it on the beach, and THEN flood the world with automated pumpstacks?

[Heliman]

Cause then it would be flooded with freshwater not salt.