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[Thomas Winwood]

Gentlemen...

I love pyramids.

As such, I have an arcology megaconstruction challenge for you. I call it the Pyramid of Power.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The sides of the bottom four pyramids are 2m+1 tiles long. They are spaced 2n+1 tiles apart, and the sides of the upper pyramid are 2(m+n)+1 tiles long. The total height is 2(m-1)+n Z-units. (The diagram above shows the result for m=4, n=0.)

My challenge to you is to build this as a self-contained fortress to house your dwarves. I suggest that you keep n as small as possible, but m may be as large as your embark permits. You might wish to set n=1 and build a small access tube enabling your dwarves to make their way from the upper pyramid to a series of underground farms.

If you create extra Z-levels by digging downwards, leave ramps on all sides and flood your embark to create an artificial lake. Magma, aside from the possibility of building the pyramid from obsidian, should be used offensively (i.e. a magma cannon from the upper pyramid) or not at all.

Now go forth and build, my friends. I would like to see screenshots of your work, both in progress and completed.

[atomfullerene]

eh, divide each smaller pyramid in the same way the larger is divided, making a serpinski sponge!

[warhammer651]

been getting pretty bored since nothing bad happens to my fortresses. (fraking good management skills)

SIR I ACCEPT YOUR CHALLENGE

[Thomas Winwood]

eh, divide each smaller pyramid in the same way the larger is divided, making a serpinski sponge!

Absolutely! Go as many levels of pyramids deep as your heart desires! (As long as it's still habitable and not just a really fancy garden ornament.)

[slink]

By self-contained, do you mean no trading or migrants?  Or just that everything except the underground farms must be within the pyramids?

[Thomas Winwood]

Good question! I was originally intending for there to be no trading or migrants such that nobody ever came in or out, hence the artificial lake. On thinking about it, though, it's more fun if you allow migrants and trading. If you go with the artificial lake, make the trading post a tiny building on the bank with an underground tunnel going into the fortress, to avoid disturbing the lake's shape. Be ruthless in your population control!

[Blacken]

Pff.

Everyone knows newbs can't triforce.

(This is really really cool though. I think I'm gonna give this one a try in my Orc-mod desert.)

[SenorOcho]

SenorOcho cancels Soap Fortress: Taken by mood.

[Amalgam]

I might just try this myself! I'm already building a green glass (green glass is sooooo cool) tower in a yellow sand desert so this will be right at home. I'll probably make each of the four bottom ones out of gold (it should be on this map somewhere), silver (I've got galena), crystal glass (no shortage of sand) and steel (plenty of flux and iron), and maybe make the top one out of crystal glass. I've got no idea what to put in them but I could probably make tombs... Unfortunately the sum of trees in the area amounts to zip so I have to buy all the wood and charcoal off the caravans, and make coke from the coal veins nearby. I've got water too, 4x5 site. THE TOWER COMES FIRST THOUGH.

[Quietust]

eh, divide each smaller pyramid in the same way the larger is divided, making a serpinski sponge!

And by "serpinski sponge", you mean "Sierpinski Tetrahedron". Which would, of course, be Awesome, but would require lots and lots of Z-levels.

[Doomshifter]

eh, divide each smaller pyramid in the same way the larger is divided, making a serpinski sponge!

And by "serpinski sponge", you mean "Sierpinski Tetrahedron". Which would, of course, be Awesome, but would require lots and lots of Z-levels.

Oh Armok, I just looked at that thing. That is one awesome piece of fractal, and if Atomfullerene can pull it off, I will hail him or her as a legend!

[slink]

Made literally, a Sierpinski Tetrahedron would be very beautiful, but worthless as a dwelling place for Dwarves.    I will attempt to complete the original challenge.  I started on a site with 149 z-levels aboveground, but the only running water was an underground river that had three z-levels of its own before dropping into its pit, and it was hitting my FPS much too hard even with just 7 Dwarves.  I could have trimmed it out but then I would have had only muddy ponds.  I then restarted on a site with many fewer z-levels but with a brook.  I am afraid I will not have enough room to finish the upper pyramid on this site, but at least I can practice the laying out the basic functions while I continue to look for a better site. 

[Amalgam]

Hmm. The optimal way to do a fractal tetrahedron would be to embark on the steepest area that can be found, count the number of levels on the map (excluding the highest), mine out the entire map to the bottom level and make it that high, and that wide. 100 z-levels is probably the highest anyone's going to get, and if the pyramid's going to be equal in all dimensions it won't really require a lot of ground space. The resolution won't be very high even on a ridiculously steep map so there's definitely limitations here. I wouldn't be able to do a full-blown fractal tetrahedron on my map because of the brook, but I'll certainly make something like in the OP.

EDIT: Scratch the z-levels comment, just read slink's post.

[Crowbar]

The picture of the Major was a nice touch.

I don't think I could build something like this, but I'd absolutely love to see the screenshots.

[Thomas Winwood]

Good news, everyone!

I've realised I was being misled by my own isometric diagram with regard to the size of the pyramids! See, I had assumed you couldn't have the slopes of the two pyramids existing on the same tile at ground level, because on my diagram that makes the two pyramids overlap. However, in Dwarf Fortress nothing is stopping you using the same row of upramps at ground level as the sides of two adjacent pyramids. Thus you can have all five pyramids the same size with no gap between them to create a true Sierpinski's tetrahedron!

It also occurred to me that if you use a pyramid with an even number of tiles on a side you can create a pointed top (rather than having one tile of flat surface) by building upramps all the way to the top.