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[Thanshin]

There are unthinkable mosters above the safety of the fortress. Your main, and only, entrance is covered in all kinds of traps, moats and magma. Now, you want to encircle a large portion of the surface with a moat&wall.

What's the best method to build it without a single dwarf ever needing to go out and without giving the many surface beasts any chance of entering?

Extra points if the method also stops flying creatures from entering the fort.

My first instinct is to make a bigger circle, ramp up towards the center, build the walls, dig on the ramps, fill the old ramp space with water and get inside the walls by stair, but it doesn't seem very optimal and it allows dwarf killing by outsiders with ranged weapons.

[Martin]

There are unthinkable mosters above the safety of the fortress. Your main, and only, entrance is covered in all kinds of traps, moats and magma. Now, you want to encircle a large portion of the surface with a moat&wall.

What's the best method to build it without a single dwarf ever needing to go out and without giving the many surface beasts any chance of entering?

Extra points if the method also stops flying creatures from entering the fort.

My first instinct is to make a bigger circle, ramp up towards the center, build the walls, dig on the ramps, fill the old ramp space with water and get inside the walls by stair, but it doesn't seem very optimal and it allows dwarf killing by outsiders with ranged weapons.

I don't think there's any way to keep dwarves out of harm's way. When faced with similar circumstances I would expand outward using an airlock approach. Train up an assload of legendary marksdwarves and a handful of melee ones, move them forward to create a safe sphere of control, build a safe wall (with roof and enclosed tower w/fortifications) out out to the center of that sphere and repeat.

[Sphalerite]

Dig or build stairs on the level just under the surface.  This will let you then dig a channel on the surface from beneath.  Enemies on the surface can still shoot at dwarves digging the channel, but they won't be able to get into the channel and the rest of your fortress.

You can use this method to dig a channel around a large area.  Once that area is semi-safe (no creatures able to path into it) you can then have dwarves venture onto the surface to build walls.  Enemies can still shoot over the channel, so for sufficient safety your curtain wall has to be inset some distance back from the channel.

[Thanshin]

Dig or build stairs on the level just under the surface.  This will let you then dig a channel on the surface from beneath.

You mean you can build a stairs up without a stairs down and then channel from the lower level?! That's a most useful knowledge that I somehow missed on the wiki.

You can use this method to dig a channel around a large area.  Once that area is semi-safe (no creatures able to path into it) you can then have dwarves venture onto the surface to build walls.  Enemies can still shoot over the channel, so for sufficient safety your curtain wall has to be inset some distance back from the channel.

Indeed. A concentric circle wall, far from the underbuilt moat would work.

Thanks.

[Reese]

after wracking by brain for the length of time it took me to read the thread, I think you could make a moat around your fort without a single dwarf having to set foot on the ground outside by digging a tunnel under the surface where you want your moat to be, then build floors one z level above the surface above where you want your moat to be, and collapse that floor.  the collapsing floor will cave in the ground above the tunnel you dug, creating a moat

you can dig out tunnels on as many Z-levels as you want your moat to be deep, and the collapse will take out all the floors... it may also collapse any tunnels you have that extend out under the moat, though, so be careful!