Print

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

[agvkrioni]

It just occurred to me that my starting land is on the side of a mountain (lower mountain so there are trees and grass, etc) with a river running West-to-East across the top most part of the map. My fort is north of the river, about 4-6 z-levels below the river. I could, next winter, dig out the entire top z-level along the North side of the river, so that it literally floods the entire valley below. With the walls around my fort entrance, I'd be absolutely fine, letting me explore the depths below in peace.

Pros/cons?

[Cuanbhais]

Pros - you are cut off from the world forever. Cons, the same.

However, you need to keep in mind that water flows off the edge of the map, so plan accordingly.

[Sphalerite]

The water will flow down the side of the mountain and off the map.  Because it flows off the map edges, it will never equalize to a constant level.  The never-ending amounts of moving water will require a lot of flow calculations, which will cause a never-ending drain on your FPS.  It will take forever for your dwarves to get anything done, as your CPU is busy endlessly calculating the waterfall down the side of the mountain.

[agvkrioni]

I'm going to build walls. A thousand miles of walls.
WE WILL SEE WHO CAN'T DO WHAT.

P.s. Boats?

[Psieye]

Boats don't exist in DF yet. Buoyancy isn't coded in - everything sinks. Bridges are the current solution for travelling over water.

[Patchy]

Done this before. Just got to wall off the edges where you want the water to sit. Also make sure you put a floodgate in to stop the flow after you fill the area you've walled off. Other than that it's really jus a needlessly more complicated method of walling off your fort, and its a bit more difficult to reverse. Then again needlessly complicated is the essence of dwarfing.

[agvkrioni]

Then again needlessly complicated is the essence of dwarfing.

XD This is true.

[astaldaran]

I saw a bloodline DF game where people were trying to build a glass fortress in the sea--they literally pumped the sea out fast enough that they could build...used dozens and dozens of them. I think it is on the map archive somewhere.  It took them years but they got several rooms made--I'm not sure what the end result was the place where I was reading about it stopped after like 8 years so I think maybe they gave up.

It was a beautiful idea though because they won't "cheating" by flooding the map..they were literally trying to build in the ocean.

Anyone else seen this/done this?

[i2amroy]

Yeah I've seen that one. I've done something sort of similar by building into the area underneath the ocean and then opening up the ceilings, but nothing exactly the same.

[MrAnderson]

doing it right now, tapped the ocean and diverted it into an aquifer. 13 fps... got 100 before the break-through

[Tevish Szat]

As others have said, you need to wall off the map to the highest z-level you intend to flood: basically, you'll be creating an artificial lake over the entrance of your fortress.  Otherwise, FPS-death will follow.  Interestingly, this means you COULD set up a topside island.

Pros are, of course, defense: only swimmers will be able to get at your fortress, and chances are whatever is keeping the water out will keep them out too.

Cons?  Yeah, even if you think you're self-sustaining, you never know when you're actually going to need those traders or an infusion of (potentially) skilled, adult dwarves. 
You'll be limited very strictly to what you can get underground, which does NOT include a limitless supply of metal or gems.  Trees and other plant matter are obviously limitless and infinite stone can be had through obsidian-casting  While metal objects are currently bugged so that you can just melt and reforge large furniture (statues, tables, cages) to meet mandates for materials you have at hand, you'll have to watch for nobles who like exotic things, and gem-demanding moods will eventually become ‼Fun‼, costing you one or more dwarves every time they come up.
On the dwarfpower side... Dwarves *are* a renewable resource, but they're one it takes some time to renew, especially when the dwarf in question is skilled.  With a large enough starting population, death by failure to inbreed shouldn't be a problem.  However, if a persistent problem plagues your fort, and your pop starts going down, it will take a LONG time to recover your labor force, much less grow it.

[agvkrioni]

The way I figure it, those same problems listed immediately above this post are inherent to any game. Even if you keep land above you for trees, eventually ore and gems run out if you go on long enough. Not that you'd ever need that much... I've never gone that long really.

[Peewee]

No, the point is in a typical game, you can continue to buy gems and metal, theoretically forever.
If you're completely under water, that means no trade, so FUN is required.

[Agorp Stronden]

I'm going to build walls. A thousand miles of walls.
WE WILL SEE WHO CAN'T DO WHAT.

P.s. Boats?

Or cut a channel in the side of the river immediately over your entrance. Not dwarfy enough?

[SpiralDimentia]

I'm going to build walls. A thousand miles of walls.
WE WILL SEE WHO CAN'T DO WHAT.

P.s. Boats?

I love this post. So much.