Print

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

[janglur]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I have two ballistae and an endless arsenal of steel arrows for them.  I have 20 or so war grizzlies.  A military of 54 well trained, all-steel dwarves (some will be upgraded to adamantine as I manage to score it).  I have a 2x10(x10) steel spike pit linked to a lever.  I have three masterpiece steel floodgates blocking each level of defense/offense for slowing them down and, primarily, containing pathogens.  And finally, a dwarf washer at the entrance to the gauntlet to hell.  Think i'm ready for the party?

Stuff about HFS.  You've been warned.  WITH MAGMA!

For the rest of you:

What's the most valuable non-modded non-artifact non-bluestuff CRAFT you've ever made?
I'm trying to build an artifact-killer out of a non-artifact.

[ext0l]

go for it 

My cotton candy battle axe is worth 1.6 mil 

[Girlinhat]

To deconstruct this one bit at a time...

I have two ballistae and an endless arsenal of steel arrows for them.
--You need silver bolts instead.  Projectile damage is based on weight.  Steel is very light, and makes a bad projectile.  That's why bullets are made of lead, because it's cheap and heavy, instead of something light like aluminum, and why depleted uranium is the holy grail of projectile.
--Also, make sure they're good quality.  The quality of the ballista parts used determines the accuracy and rate of fire, the ammo quality determines accuracy, and the dwarf's skill level determines accuracy and rate of fire.  Also be aware that siege operators are civilians, and will run away from a groundhog into a spike pit.  If you have any blind peasants, they won't flee because they can't see.  Otherwise, put them back a bit.  Ballistae have range, very good range, very likely longer range than any tunnel you would normally build.

I have 20 or so war grizzlies.
--I'm ok with this.  A few more wouldn't hurt, to be sure.

A military of 54 well trained, all-steel dwarves (some will be upgraded to adamantine as I manage to score it).
--Hopefully no steel hammer?  Refer to above, when considering kinetic weapons.  The strength of a hammer or mace, is in its striking power.  The more weight it can achieve, the better the strike, much like a wrecking ball.  Steel, being light, is a poor wrecking ball.  Silver, being heavy, is perfect.  Refer to The Beetles' song "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" - That would have been a very heavy, very lethal hammer.  Otherwise, steel for armor and anything bladed.  Also, NEVER EVER FOR NEVER adamantine hammers!  Except for justice use, because blue hammers are less than lethal.

I have a 2x10(x10) steel spike pit linked to a lever.
--1x20(x10) would be preferred.  As it is, you have 10 traps the enemy will hit.  If you stretch it and snake the route, you can make them run over 20 traps instead.  This is clearly twice as deadly.

I have three masterpiece steel floodgates blocking each level of defense/offense for slowing them down and, primarily, containing pathogens.
--Good, except, those masterpieces are someone's lovechild.  When they get smashed by demons, the creator isn't going to be happy.  You may very well have a tantrum spiral from masterpiece destruction, of all things.

And finally, a dwarf washer at the entrance to the gauntlet to hell.
--This is good, but not totally needed.  As I understand it, demons will have syndromes, but not as often as your average FB.  Still, never hurts to be over-prepared!

Think i'm ready for the party?
--Clearly, you are not.  If you were ready, you'd know that you're never ready.  You're simply "less naked".  The simple truth is, you are not ready, you never will be, and you will die.  Now, let's see how well you can screw over hell before you're sent there!

[shmelse]

I have two ballistae and an endless arsenal of steel arrows for them.
--You need silver bolts instead.  Projectile damage is based on weight.  Steel is very light, and makes a bad projectile.  That's why bullets are made of lead, because it's cheap and heavy, instead of something light like aluminum, and why depleted uranium is the holy grail of projectile.

A military of 54 well trained, all-steel dwarves (some will be upgraded to adamantine as I manage to score it).
--Hopefully no steel hammer?  Refer to above, when considering kinetic weapons.  The strength of a hammer or mace, is in its striking power.  The more weight it can achieve, the better the strike, much like a wrecking ball.  Steel, being light, is a poor wrecking ball.  Silver, being heavy, is perfect.  Refer to The Beetles' song "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" - That would have been a very heavy, very lethal hammer.  Otherwise, steel for armor and anything bladed. 

I've seen you represent this on other threads, and I'm wondering where you got the above bolded information. Unless you have some source I'm unaware of, I think you're mistaken. Certainly, steel is less dense than silver, so it's not *as* good. However, steel is hardly light.

You can find the densities of the metals on the wiki. You'll see silver listed at 10.5 g/cm3 and steel listed at 7.8 g/cm3. That means that that steel's about 80% as good as silver, if all we're looking for is density. This is in comparison to aluminum at 2.7 g/cm3 and adamantine at 0.2 g/cm3, which is so low that it makes obviously terrible blunt weapons, hence the joke/complaint about artifact adamantine maces. So steel isn't as good as silver, I agree. But steel is not so much less dense than silver that it shouldn't be used at all for blunt weapons, like aluminum/adamantine.

All this to say, OP, that your steel hammers/arrows are less than optimal but probably fine. My guess is it's not so much of a difference that it's going to make/break the experience, but you can decide where that line is for you.

Finally, the former science teacher in me feels compelled to point out that we don't refer to less dense objects as "light". There's no difference in how heavy a kilo of lead and a kilo of feathers are, just in how much space they take up. But... yah, I'm sorry for bringing it up, but there it is.

[Girlinhat]

Perhaps steel isn't horrible for blunt weapons, but comparing it to other weapon grade materials, it's the lightest, save adamantine, and expensive to boot.  Even if it's a 20% difference in weight, you're still facing hell itself using one of the worst metals available as ammo.  Depending on stocks though, some players consider silver to be a "waste product" of mining as they go looking for iron ores. so they have a lot of silver bars laying about.  If this is the case, then pumping out some silver bolts is likely worth the effort.

Or do like me and get cheaty, add Platinum as a weapon and armor material

[janglur]

Actually, according to http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=53571.0 steel isn't that bad at all, and it's widely accepted as being better against armor in testing.

But as for the arrows, i'll start churning out some silver.  I guess i'll use these for training.

[shmelse]

Perhaps steel isn't horrible for blunt weapons, but comparing it to other weapon grade materials, it's the lightest, save adamantine, and expensive to boot.  Even if it's a 20% difference in weight, you're still facing hell itself using one of the worst metals available as ammo.  Depending on stocks though, some players consider silver to be a "waste product" of mining as they go looking for iron ores. so they have a lot of silver bars laying about.  If this is the case, then pumping out some silver bolts is likely worth the effort.

Or do like me and get cheaty, add Platinum as a weapon and armor material

I don't disagree with most of what you've said.

• Relative to steel's value, making blunt weapons out of it isn't a great idea.
• Additionally, since silver isn't good for much else, it's reasonable to use it for blunt weapons unless you have some plan to build a giant space ship entire of silver hovering over the landscape and releasing lava "lasers" down at the goblins below (... note to self.)
• As you say, platinum is awesome. I'd guess you could use a strange mood to end up with a platinum mace, if you hadn't reached HFS yet, that would be pretty spectacular.
  

I do have a couple of differences of opinion, namely that since the OP said he's already made this stuff and is getting ready to unleash hell with it, asking him to redo a bunch of crafting because of a slight improvement in density is overestimating the importance. As I said, although it's less dense than the other metals, it's not significantly so much less dense that it should effect performance. It's not, for example, half as dense, or 4 times less dense (like aluminum) or 50 times less dense like candy. The densities are close enough that I don't think you'd usually notice their difference in arena testing (though I may try this out in a couple of weeks when I can play again).

Mostly, I was concerned b/c I believe I've seen you represent that you thought that giving your justice dwarves steel hammers was functionally the equivalent of giving them adamantine ones. That's no where near close to being the case. Steel is a normal, average metal, only slightly less dense than its counterparts, and would give you quite a smash on the noggin. Adamantine, however, is ridiculously light to the point of being a feather touch; that's why 9 out of 10 dwarven criminals prefer being beaten with it. 

[assimilateur]

I have three masterpiece steel floodgates blocking each level of defense/offense for slowing them down and, primarily, containing pathogens.
--Good, except, those masterpieces are someone's lovechild.  When they get smashed by demons, the creator isn't going to be happy.  You may very well have a tantrum spiral from masterpiece destruction, of all things.

Unless those are more or less the only masterpieces his blacksmith made, that's hardly relevant. It used to be, and probably still is, since I haven't seen evidence to the contrary, that art defacement gave a dwarf a negative thought of 1000/n apiece, where n is the total number of masterpieces they've made. Accordingly, losing all or most of a dwarf's masterworks is likely going to drive them insane, whereas anything lower than 25% should be easily compensated by your usual amenities, and anything in between is probably risky.

[Encased in burning magma]

YOU ARE NOT PREPARED

I always wanted to say this

[Flare]

If you're asking this question, you're probably not.

[Mkombat]

Is it possible to "beat" hell? Do you get any rewards from killing demons or anything? Sorry, new guy here.

[Nekudotayim]

Is it possible to "beat" hell? Do you get any rewards from killing demons or anything? Sorry, new guy here.

Yea it seems to be possible. I have been reading about some guy on some wiki talk page building his fortress in hell.

[Encased in burning magma]

Is it possible to "beat" hell? Do you get any rewards from killing demons or anything? Sorry, new guy here.

Use repeating upward spikes.
There is no reward.

[assimilateur]

Is it possible to "beat" hell? Do you get any rewards from killing demons or anything? Sorry, new guy here.

From what I've read, the number of demons is either infinite, or in the millions, making it as good as infinite. Accordingly, exterminating them is either completely impossible or unrealistic. The next best thing, namely sealing hell after first breaching it, is possible.

[Mkombat]

Ah I see. I did read that their numbers are near infinite. That's ridiculous, and cool. So I doubt anyone will ever do it. Either way, that is an awesome challenge. I wish someone would stream themselves breaching hell, I'd enjoy the watch. Maybe someday I'll attempt it, still learning a lot though.