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Author Topic: Moving sand.  (Read 793 times)

Magua

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Moving sand.
« on: October 14, 2009, 11:48:39 pm »

I have a river.  I have magma.  I have a tower of ice.  I have yellow sand on the map. 

I do *not* have an underground river or pool, so no tower caps shall be growing on muddied squares.

Is there a way that I can get some sand tiles into my tower of ice? 

I *think* it should be possible to mix water and magma inside the tower, mine the obsidian, construct some walls, and then deconstruct them, but I figured I'd ask before I spent the next two days doing that.
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Also, you can manufacture vomit at a smelter.  Subsequently removing the smelter spews vomit over a surprising area.

trav

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Re: Moving sand.
« Reply #1 on: October 15, 2009, 12:07:02 am »

pretty sure that'll just get you obsidian floors, not sand floors
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Quietust

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Re: Moving sand.
« Reply #2 on: October 15, 2009, 07:59:13 am »

pretty sure that'll just get you obsidian floors, not sand floors

Actually, it's been reported that this actually does produce soil floors, since building and deconstructing a wall on top of an existing floor resets the floor to the default layer material, and for stuff above ground in a non-mountain biome, that's apparently soil. The trouble is that it isn't guaranteed to give you sand - if you do it in a biome whose upper soil layer is silty clay loam, then doing this will just get you more silty clay loam.
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P.S. If you don't get this note, let me know and I'll write you another.
It's amazing how dwarves can make a stack of bones completely waterproof and magmaproof.
It's amazing how they can make an entire floodgate out of the bones of 2 cats.

andrea

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Re: Moving sand.
« Reply #3 on: October 15, 2009, 08:25:25 am »

so, if on a freezing biome, i use buckets to drop water on a tile ( which will create an ice floor, already tested), then build a constructed wall on it, the deconstruct, i get a soil floor? interesting, if i ever plan to start making glass in my marble tower.

Quietust

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Re: Moving sand.
« Reply #4 on: October 15, 2009, 08:29:34 am »

Actually, natural ice seems to be a special case, so that may not work as expected.
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P.S. If you don't get this note, let me know and I'll write you another.
It's amazing how dwarves can make a stack of bones completely waterproof and magmaproof.
It's amazing how they can make an entire floodgate out of the bones of 2 cats.

orbcontrolled

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Re: Moving sand.
« Reply #5 on: October 15, 2009, 09:12:55 am »

If you're going to use exploits anyway, you can just go all the way and use Dtil or something to arrange tiles however you want.
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Magua

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Re: Moving sand.
« Reply #6 on: October 15, 2009, 09:58:34 am »

Ice floors are a special case; they work as one would expect (removing constructions gives you back an ice floor) -- I tested this first before asking.

(Ice walls in general are funky -- they're real walls that can be smoothed, engraved, etc, but the game still remembers what was in that tile before the ice was formed.  If ice forms over a stairway, and you dig out that tile (or the ice melts), your stairway will still be there.  So the game obviously keeps track of the ice wall different from, say, obsidian walls, which destroy whatever they formed on.)

As to orbcontrolled: Learning experience.
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Also, you can manufacture vomit at a smelter.  Subsequently removing the smelter spews vomit over a surprising area.

Albedo

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Re: Moving sand.
« Reply #7 on: October 15, 2009, 10:08:33 am »

I've currently got a fortress in soil, but with sand lower. Occasionally I can generate sand - but not reliably or usually.  Maybe it's a random thing, influenced by all nearby-ish soil types - dunno.

DF is often more complex and convoluted than it at first appears.

If you're going to use exploits anyway, you can just go all the way and use Dtil or something

For some, there's a diff between an exploit and brute force cheating.
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