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[noob]

hey couldnt i just drop a cat and have all the dwarfs jump down while the cat is unconscious? (down 10 z levels)

[Girlinhat]

Depends on if the cat dies on impact.  5 is usually fatal, so, probably not 10 levels...

[612DwarfAvenue]

Dwarf Fortress: serious discussions into how to use animals as landing pads for Dwarven ODSTs.

[Horizon9]

Dwarf Fortress: serious discussions into how to use animals as landing pads for Dwarven ODSTs.

Feet first into HFS.

[612DwarfAvenue]

I think i might drop a squad of Dwarves into the HFS. I'll name them Buck, Romeo, Dutch, Mickey, and --, just to keep with the reference .

[Horizon9]

And while you are at it, bring a cat along with them, and name it the Superintendent.

[612DwarfAvenue]

Cat? Heck no, i'll use a Cave Floater. Closer to an Engineer than a cat . I'll also build a seperate pod for everyone... that reminds me, does the distance a construction falls affect how big the cave-in dust area is? E.g. would a 20 z-level drop make a bigger impact than a 10 z-level drop?

[Hurgal]

Cat? Heck no, i'll use a Cave Floater. Closer to an Engineer than a cat . I'll also build a seperate pod for everyone... that reminds me, does the distance a construction falls affect how big the cave-in dust area is? E.g. would a 20 z-level drop make a bigger impact than a 10 z-level drop?

I recall someone did some !!science!! to test exactly this sort of thing, but bugger me if I could find it.

[parlor_tricks]

I seem to be missing something - if you limit a kitten to a 1X1 room wouldn't it work?

One approach which might require horrid amounts of micro management would be having a drop chamber on floor 30, with hatches for a floor, which connect to the entrance via drop tubes.

Sorta like -
Top View of drop room.
xHxHxH|
||||||||||
xHxHxH|
||||||||||
xHxHxH|
||||||||||

Side View of tower
|dxd|
|H|H|
|  |  |
|  |  |
.
30 floors
.
|  |  |
.g  g     <-- gobs at Entrance
|H|H|
|K|K|  <- Landing pad right beneath entrance.

d - odst (odsd?)
| - wall,  __ - floor
H - Hatch
g - Gobs
K - kitten
X - door
So when gobs attack, you station your team above the drop tubes and wait till the targets get into position.
Once they reach, open both sets of hatches. This will cause some gobbos to fall on the kitten cushion chamber where they will kill/replace the cushion. In other cases the normal kitten cushion is present and will absorb your armored soldier falling onto them
Once deployment is complete, you would have killed part of the opposing force, and then your army will come out from some secret tunnel to wreak carnage amongs' the enemy.  the good part is, that if all else fails, your tubes can double as water/magma chutes.

Things that I have not drawn mentioned here - some way for the soldiers to walk out, and some bait animal to keep the goblins busy.

Also you will have to manually station each squad member over the tube and then drop them.

Question - are the resultant kitten body parts usable?

[Girlinhat]

Once again, I repeat, that this may be simplified using the forbidden barracks system.  You set up a barracks like so...

Code: [Select]

WWW
WAW
WDW
WHW
WDW
W W
(W)all, (A)rmor stand, (H)atch, (D)oorThe upper door is set to internal forbidden, the bottom door is normal.  When you create a barracks here, it will result in a 1x1 room that the dwarves can be in, and they'll pack themselves like sardines into this one square, eagerly awaiting/dreading the pull of a lever.  Or, more creatively, the tap of a pressure plate.  If you set their drop zone like so...

Code: [Select]

+++++
+BBB+
+BPB+
+BBB+
+++++
(+)Floor, (B)ridge, (P)latewith the bridges channeled out with no ramps underneath.  This would make a 1x1 floating island of sorts, which should be set to trigger when a goblin steps on it.  Thus, the goblins will walk in and one of them will hit the pressure plate.  Immediately, the bridges will disappear (use retracting, not drawbridges) so that the lone goblin is stuck on that tile, while any neighboring goblins fall below.  Since the pressure plate is ALSO linked to the hatch 30 levels above, it will cause your troops to fall out, landing safely on the goblin, where they proceed to butcher the poor greenback.  Once dead, the pressure plate will deactivate, making the bridges re-appear and allowing your soldiers to rush out and kill the others.

This is, by no small stretch of the imagination, a self-reloading, self-sustaining orbital drop system.  You simply order your solders to train in the barracks, and they group there, being automatically launched when needed.  Because of this, you don't even have to order your soldiers to kill!  Just have them training year-round, and they'll naturally train, slaughter when needed, and walk back up to the drop pod all on their own!

[noob]

isnt there lag time for the bridges?

[parlor_tricks]

What Girlinhat says

[gleryff]

Doesn't the goblin die on the first dwarven impact, meaning that there is only a dwarf in the way of the next dwarven impact? Or are all the falling objects calculated simultaneously?

[Artzbacher]

Since many wounded dwarves will remain unconscious, wouldn't it be possible to build beds for them on level 1, so that the falling militia will land safe and sound on the permanently handicapped? Or would the soldiers splatter on impact?

[Funtimes]

Doesn't the goblin die on the first dwarven impact, meaning that there is only a dwarf in the way of the next dwarven impact? Or are all the falling objects calculated simultaneously?

It seems that the squashed object just falls over, rather than get hurt. It's amazing how tough kittens can be.

But I haven't done any of this since 40d and the wiki article on gravity doesn't give many clues.