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[Particleman]

So I have all the dwarves I really want (~50ish, more and I start running out of things for them to do,) and I recently got a wave of about 20 migrants, so I decided to come up with a way to make them kill themselves, automatically. And after some experimentation I came up with this.



Restrict all the dwarves you want to keep from using the lever and hook up the pressure plate to the drawbridge. Then, just queue up a single pull of the bait lever, and watch them march to thier deaths, one at a time. The size of the bridge allows for some variance due to the fact that dwarves walk at different speeds.

Let's watch.

A useless freeloader dwarf approaches...



Stepping on the pressure plate causes the bridge to rise. Since the door to the northwest is locked, this is the only way to reach the lever.



Run, Obok! You can make it!



Er... maybe not.



The biggest downside is that once all the dwarves you've assigned to that lever have been smashed, the lever reverts to being usable by anyone, so you have to keep count of how many are left and make sure you cancel the pull order once the last one is gone, or else you could wind up smashing your legendary planters or something.

And I know this is hardly the first automatic dwarf killer, but it's the first one I designed and built myself.

[UberNube]

A simple solution to the reversion problem is to assign one extra dwarf to the lever, but lock him in his room. Once you get a "cancels pull lever: couldn't find path" message, it's done.

[Warlord255]

I'd love to see this reversed to make an automatic dwarf-flinger. Removing the pressure plate element would probably do the trick.

[qwert]

Why not put a burrow on the lever, and then assign migrants to the burrow? Should be more manageable than restricting all of the dwarves you want alive.

[ItchyBeard]

The biggest downside is that once all the dwarves you've assigned to that lever have been smashed, the lever reverts to being usable by anyone, so you have to keep count of how many are left and make sure you cancel the pull order once the last one is gone, or else you could wind up smashing your legendary planters or something.

And I know this is hardly the first automatic dwarf killer, but it's the first one I designed and built myself.

Are you using 0.31? If you are, you could make these changes to make it properly automatic (your current solution isn't really automatic):

• Assign a nice large burrow for all the dwarves you want to keep (cover your entire fortress and any areas you want to dig in). Don't put your trap in the burrow obviously.
• Assign all dwarves you like to that burrow.
• Remove the lever you're using currently.
• Assign a meeting room where the lever was. You'll probably want one on the other side of the pressure plate too.

Migrants will path between the meeting rooms, triggering the machine. I like to imagine a sign just outside labelled "Paste Factory".

The dwarves you want to keep will ignore the dummy meeting rooms because they're outside of the 'safe' burrow.

Pros:

• New migrants will automatically head for the 'Paste Factory'.
• You don't have to designate anything for new migrants.
• Cats don't respect burrows.

Cons:

• Animals in general don't respect burrows (you can mitigate this problem with a pet proof door).

I usually use a really simple shallow pit design which uses a small meeting room with a retracting bridge over a shallow pit. A pressure plate triggers the bridge which drops migrants and unwanted animals into the pit where they can either be left alone, or further 'processed'. A locked door at the bottom of the pit can be used to release dwarves/animals which get unintentionally stuck. I've found it's hard to unsmash someone, hence using the shallow pit to safely review whoever is about to get destroyed (so poor Mr. Output Liason doesn't get turned into Red Paste #9).

[zwei]

um ... just draft them to military?

[ItchyBeard]

um ... just draft them to military?

I believe the goal is automating reduction of headcount - i.e. making it easier. When you have waves of 20 dwarves showing up which you don't want, drafting them would be a time consuming process. There are numerous legitimate reasons for wanting to reduce headcount too (fps is the big one).

Anyway, congratulations on your solution Particleman - it's always good to see stories of people doing clever things. For your next project... automated elf cleaner for the trade depot (bonus points for using magma).

[Particleman]

um ... just draft them to military?

Like I said, I run out of things for them to do if I have much more than fifty. I mean hell, I'm at sixty right now and I'm having trouble finding stuff to keep them all occupied. I'd smash a few but I'm going to need them pretty soon when I start on my first real big project (I want to finish up stuff like furnishing all the bedrooms and such before I get on that. Also got another project that I'm halfway through and kinda stalled because I'm having trouble with the logistics of it all.)