Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[KaguroDraven]

Are there any uses to guard towers besides just asthetics? If so are there any recomendations on how they should be made? On one map I had mostly flat land with 3 seperate small mountains, I turned one into a military area and another into a weapons/armor cache, was it a good idea?

[jei]

Are there any uses to guard towers besides just asthetics? If so are there any recomendations on how they should be made? On one map I had mostly flat land with 3 seperate small mountains, I turned one into a military area and another into a weapons/armor cache, was it a good idea?

I always put dogs into towers and make sure the whole area is well covered near any entrances. They work wonders for spotting snatchers and thieves before anything untowards happens.

[Alastar]

Guard towers work quite well when they are only accessible from the below (i.e. the inside of your fortress) and have fortifications slightly above ground level facing your main entrance. While it's possible to build them with safe connections to the outside, that just invites trouble if you are careless.

[VoidPointer]

Definitely never make them accessible from the outside. Last I checked (.14 or so) caged animals don't seem to spot things, so consider ropes (less efficient) or pitting onto a 1-tile area (highly efficient, helps FPS due to no pathing, but silly). Here's my ideal ground-level guard post config:

(space): Enemies walk here
+: Fortification
g: Green glass window
D: Fifty or so dogs piled on top of one another via pitting from above

Code: [Select]

+++++++++
++     ++
+ +++++ +
+ +ggg+ +
+ +gDg+ +
+ +ggg+ +
+ +++++ +

something like that anyway.

The enemies can't shoot the dogs through the fortifications because of the windows, but the windows allow sighting. Similarly, the windows can't be smashed because there are fortifications in the way. The enemies should basically spend as much time walking through this area as possible to maximize the probability of detection. Consider adding traps with which to stun ambushers (stunned and unconscious enemies are easier to spot IIRC).

[lazylonelion]

aren't thieves and ambushers detected only 1 cell from the dog anymore? Because 1 window and 1 fortification makes it 2 cells between dog and goblin.

[bcd1024]

I personally prefer archer pillboxes. Optimal design involves access only from below, two level tower with roof. Also, must be made from microcline to be aesthetically pleasing. Works even better with 1 tile moat around it to prevent enemy units from approaching the tower. 

Code: [Select]

WWWWW
W...W
W.X.W       z0 (ground)
W...W
WWWWW

FFFFF
F...F
F.X.F       z1 (archer level)
F...F
FFFFF

WWWWW
W...W
W.c.W       z2 (roof)
W...W
WWWWW
[W]all, [F]ortification, [.] floor, [X] up/down stais, [c] hatch cover over down stairs

[varangian]

I use guard towers (I like to think of them as ravelins though they're the wrong shape) to cover the fortress entrances. Accessed by underground tunnels the theory is that while invading forces are battering the doors down to gain entry to the long corridor of traps that are there to welcome them my marksdwarves will pop up behind them and start peppering them with bolts. I've yet to try it with a siege as I'm in a goblin free build at the moment, but with various fearsome beasts it worked in theory as squads deployed there quickly enough  although their presence was unnecessary as the assorted monsters just fell into the first cage trap they reached.

[Duuvian]

Remember that as long as your hallway is three squares wide, a dog tied to a rope built in the middle will be able to smell stealthy things going down the hall, as they can smell two squares distance.

[lazylonelion]

Remember that as long as your hallway is three squares wide, a dog tied to a rope built in the middle will be able to smell stealthy things going down the hall, as they can smell two squares distance.

On the contrary, I've read that dog smells only closest squares, so it's recommended to tie two dogs near the walls.
Was something changed?

[VoidPointer]

aren't thieves and ambushers detected only 1 cell from the dog anymore? Because 1 window and 1 fortification makes it 2 cells between dog and goblin.

This is how it used to be. The addition of the Observer skill (I think) with DF2010 made it work differently. I've seen kobold thieves get detected with this setup with nothing right next to them.

Looks like they ran afoul of...

 

... a dogpile.

Archery towers are also useful, but they serve an entirely separate purpose.

[ioi101]

aren't thieves and ambushers detected only 1 cell from the dog anymore? Because 1 window and 1 fortification makes it 2 cells between dog and goblin.

This is how it used to be. The addition of the Observer skill (I think) with DF2010 made it work differently. I've seen kobold thieves get detected with this setup with nothing right next to them.

Looks like they ran afoul of...

 

... a dogpile.

Archery towers are also useful, but they serve an entirely separate purpose.

From how far away? It's a neat idea but unless you create chokepoints (with creative use of walls/natural geography) wouldn't you need far too many of these things to reliably spot anything?

And uh... I assume the choice of 50 dogs instead of one is for "aesthetic" as opposed to practical purposes .

[VoidPointer]

The number of dogs is for redundancy. One dog has a small chance of detection, fifty have a higher chance (if p(d) is the chance of detection, n dogs have 1-( (1-p(d))^n ) probability to detect. As for reliability, I've had a fairly small (720 degree spiral) track for this detect pretty much anything that comes in.

[Hyndis]

The dogs also do not need to be on the same level. An animal pit works great for this, and can also serve as an arrow magnet. They will expend all of their ammunition firing at dogs, cows, or kittens in the pit, and so by the time they get past the pit they have no ammunition left.

Doing this is very simple. Lets say your entrance corridor is 3 tile wide. Channel out the center tile and remove the ramp at the bottom so its a pit, nothing can escape. Pit/pond all of your animals in there.

The animals will never escape. You don't need to chain them up. They will breed and replace losses. Goblins and other invaders will expend all ammunition passing by the pit, and the pit will also uncloak anything stealthed trying to sneak by.

[Wastedlabor]

Would disabled dwarves work better for spotting?

If there is a way to move them to the guard tower they could be handy. Give them a crossbow, dump ammo, food and booze on their tile and let them sit behind the fortifications.

[Hyndis]

You can assign dwarves to places by using burrows. You can also give them patrol points. For example, at the top of a small square tower make 4 points. One on each corner. Link the points into a patrol route.

Assign a squad to patrol that path, and they will walk around the top of the tower continually. Make sure to store some ammo in the tower so they have plenty of ammo to shoot.

Alternatively, make a burrow for the surface or gatehouse. Banish dwarves you don't like to live on the surface or in the gatehouse. Any invaders will spot them first, and they will be able to alert you to any invaders.