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[quinquan]

Greetings, I've been playing DF for a few months now and feel up to a challenge, and since my last fort on a tundra biome became very fun shortly after conception (read: forest fire, with all but 1 dwarf trapped outside, then slow and painful tantrum inspired death for the lone survivor). I have decided to try out my minimal skills on a megaproject, namely a popular one, an underwater glass city. however before plunging headfirst into the idea, I want to check whether its possible with my current plan.

1) Firstly build a working base on a map that is mainly ocean, with a bit of coast and a magma tube.

2) Build a giant magma pipe over the ocean, and use it to drop magma/obsidian to form a ring big enough to fit my fortress inside.

3) Hollow out part of the ring and use pumps to pump out the water inside the ring.

4) Build the fortress entirely out of glass in the now empty basin.

5) Dig under the obsidian ring so it's held up purely by one support and then collapse it so the water floods in and submerges my fortress/floods the place killing all my dwarves.

6) Bask in the glory of sheer dwarf power/cry in a corner.

Easy right? Now here's my question, is there a flaw in my plan or will this work, assuming no error on my part? (Even though my only experiences using magma have resulted in lots of fun and I've never had a glass industry or a fortress above about 70 dwarves)

[Jim Groovester]

Concerning megaprojects, the sky's the limit. Literally, since you only have fifteen levels above the ground to work with.

Your megaproject is certainly doable. It'll take a lot of time and planning, naturally, but it should be impressive nonetheless.

You've only posted an outline of what your plan is, so there aren't much errors to talk about. There's certainly plenty of possibility that something could go horribly, horribly wrong while you're in the middle of executing your plan. You'll have to be more detailed if you want people to look for errors in your designs, but experience is always the best teacher with these things.

[quinquan]

Well, I can try to provide more details, but without a map to get started on yet, in a little short in actual plans however I'll provide what I can.

the major point I'm thinking could go wrong is the magma tube/ obsidian dropper thing. If something is conneted to the ground, is there any way will topple over if its way off balance (real world physics wise) eg

    xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
    xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
    xx
    xx
    xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Otherwise my tube over the oceans gonna need a lot of supports.

Also when it comes to dropping the magma in, what needs to be built out of magma safe materials and what doesn't? My magma experiences are somewhatlimited at the moment and I don't want this to collapse because i built with the wrong materials.

[Malicus]

Cave-ins currently only care if something is supported by something else  (and so on) that is connected to the ground.  Support only flows orthogonally (not diagonally) and across z-levels, though.  You could have your whole fortress resting upon a single flimsy support right now, if you wanted.

[Jim Groovester]

the major point I'm thinking could go wrong is the magma tube/ obsidian dropper thing. If something is conneted to the ground, is there any way will topple over if its way off balance (real world physics wise) eg

Real world physics? What the hell are you talking about? This is Dwarf Fortress. I know not of what physics you speak of.

Your magma dropper thing will stay aloft so long as it is connected to the ground in some fashion, either by supports, floor tiles, stairs, and other constructions. For the most part, it's not an issue unless you're specifically trying to get something to collapse.

What you will need to worry about is dropping the magma in the ocean. If you want to create a ring of obsidian that you can later pump out, you'll have to figure out a way to drop a ring of magma all into the ocean at once. Otherwise, if you simply pour the magma, you'll get a large disk of obsidian supported by a narrow shaft. Not what you're looking for, I don't imagine.

As for magma safe materials: bauxite, all kinds of glass, iron, steel, nickel, and nickel silver are all magma safe. If you place buildings made out of they will not be destroyed by the magma.

You should note, however, that if a building like a bauxite door has a mechanism in it that isn't magma safe, it will be destroyed when the magma enters the tile containing the door.

All constructions, like floors and walls, are magma safe regardless of material.

[quinquan]

Thanks for the magma info, when it comes to forming the ring i was thinking of going for an elaborately overomplicated design involving something anlong the lines of this:

                XXXXXXXXXX
                XGGGGGGGGX
XXXXXXXXXXGXXXXXXGX
FFFFFFFFFFLGX       XGX
XXXXXXXXXXGXXXXXXGX
                XGGGGGGGGX
                XXXXXXXXXX
X = Wall
G = Grate of some kind which can be opened via lever (all magma safe to allow repeats)
F = floor
L = Floodgates (magma safe)

Magma flows in from the left, fills the structure (how full does it need to be (1/7? 7/7?)

A lever is pulled and the grates open and drop the magma, rinse and repeat.

[Jim Groovester]

Liquids flow through grates. You'd probably want to use hatches, or retracting bridges for their convenience. Magma safe hatches/bridges and mechanisms.

The amount of magma doesn't matter too much. It will still form obsidian.

[LeoLeonardoIII]

Also to note, when you drop the fortress into the water by pulling the support's lever the fort will basically just collapse into little pieces. It won't float whole to the bottom.

[Quietust]

Also to note, when you drop the fortress into the water by pulling the support's lever the fort will basically just collapse into little pieces. It won't float whole to the bottom.

If you had read his description, you'd know that he wasn't planning on doing that - he was planning on using a cave-in to collapse the obsidian WALLS that were preventing the water from rushing in, and that'll work fine.

The actual process of dropping the outer walls has to be done in a particular way, though - dig out the floors underneath the retaining walls (and make a deep channel underneath them, into which they will fall), then further dig out 1 row of tiles underneath the sea floor so that the retaining walls are only being held up by floor tiles. Then construct a large ring of floors above your retaining walls, held up by a support, such that they are directly above all of the floor tiles holding up the walls. Finally, destroy the support - the ring of floors will crash down to the ocean floor, punch through the floor tiles holding up your obsidian retaining walls, triggering a second cave-in which will drop your retaining walls into the ground and allow the water to rush in.

[blue emu]

You'll have to try and find a sea-bed with no Aquifer level, or the project becomes incredibly complicated.

[Shades]

Liquids flow through grates. You'd probably want to use hatches, or retracting bridges for their convenience. Magma safe hatches/bridges and mechanisms.

I have to agree here, it will be much easier to use hatches instead of grates and link them to a leaver so you open them to drop the magma rather than open your flood gate.

Your current setup will mostly flow out of the first few grates and not cause the effect you want.

With regard to the rest of your plan it's fine, the hardest part will be the cave in, where I'd recommend making a two wide lip around the top of your walls and then channelling out the inner square until you have a floating ring slightly wider than your walls and all the way around, connected only by a single tile. Then you need to mine under you walls, below the ocean floor so dropping that ring will punch through the ocean floor and so remove the ocean side supports that hold your wall up. The inner side supports are of course easy to remove because they'll be dry

[quinquan]

Awesome, I wasn't sure about the grates and hatches, that's going to save a lot of experimenting. When it comes to the ring collapsing, Would something along to following lines would work ( Or am I misunderstanding Quietust's post wrong:

    X
    X
    Xa
OO  SOOO     X = Obsidian Wall
OO  OOOO     O = ocean floor
OO  OOOO     a = floor tiles
OOOOOOO     S = Support linked to lever

EDIT : As for a map, I'm still searching, its proving time consuming

[Shades]

am I misunderstanding Quietust's post wrong:

Yes, you need something like


 XXX
   X
   X
OOOO OOO     X = Obsidian Wall
O    OOO     O = ocean floor
OOO OOOO     
OOO OOOO 
OOOOOOOO     


You remove the red wall and the green wall bashes through the green ocean breaking the last support for the main ring wall