40d:Mega construction

There comes a time in every dwarfs life when he says to himself - why not? ("Because it's insane" is not considered an automatic fail condition). Be it magma waterfalls, huge castles, skyscrapers, great cathedrals, inverted pyramids, the Statue of Dwarferty - you can build anything!

Construction Techniques

Building a large number of anything can be a real pain, to speed up the process it is recommended that you create a stockpile filled with only the correct stone/block type either inside or as close to as possible to your construction. This way the material will always be at the top of the list when you're constructing.

The important thing to remember is that all walls, floors and anything built with the b-C keys are LIFO - "Last In, First Out". That means that the very last designation you make will be the very first thing your masons will work on next! Once you master this concept, it can be used to your advantage, but only if you can plan ahead.

It is also important to remember that you cannot build on top of a constructed floor.

Towers

Building a huge tower is a Dwarf Fortress rite of passage. There are many pitfalls to construction though, mainly due to your masons' habit of building walls in their LIFO order, so adding anything puts that before everything you've already done. This step-by-step guide avoids these problems. The diagrams are for a 5x5 tower, but the instructions are adaptable to any size of tower.

Build corners first!

The first rule of building upwards is to build the corners first. This keeps your mason from trapping himself in the corner, or making the corner inaccessible.

Key:

symbol	tile
.	Empty space
+	Floor
O	Constructed wall
X	Up/down stairs

Base

Access to the tower is presumably from below. If not, leave a door so your dwarves can get in and out. Make the staircase in the corner for quickest building. You can build a stone or block stockpile here, for easy access to building materials.

OOOOO
OX++O
O+++O
O+++O
OOOOO

Next level up

+++++
+...+
+...+
+...+
+++++

Staircase

Use up/down stairs for maximum efficiency.

+++++
+X..+
+...+
+...+
+++++

Floor tiles

Cover the empty space with constructed floors. Be careful not to build floors on top of your existing walls, since this keeps you from building walls over them. For a 3x3 tower, you don't need any floors at all.

+++++
+X+++
+++++
+++++
+++++

Corners

Start the corner walls once the first ring of floor tiles are finished. You can start them sooner, but there's a chance the far corner could become inaccessible, which suspends construction.

O+++O
+X+++
+++++
+++++
O+++O

Center Walls

You can start the center walls before the corners are finished, but always leave the walls adjacent to the corners for last.

O+O+O
+X+++
O+++O
+++++
O+O+O

Finish walls

That's all. This level is complete. From here you can go up and repeat the pattern again.

OOOOO
OX++O
O+++O
O+++O
OOOOO

Corners Last?

If you don't mind your tower not being square, you can seal the corners from the inside. This takes up some space inside the tower. The corners have to be built from the inside. Even on ground level, your masons will always end up on the inside.

.OOO.
O+X+O
O+++O
O+++O
.OOO.

.OOO.
OOXOO
O+++O
OO+OO
.OOO.

Scaffolding

Building rows and rows of up/down stairs will allow you to build large walls without having to worry about getting the workers and materials up there.

Be careful when you're dismantling them that each row is removed one at a time, starting from the top!

You may also consider building the scaffolding inside the building you are constructing, ensuring that the entire ground floor wall is constructed. Then you wont create any surprise back doors into your fortress.

Sloped Roofs

Sloped roofs can be created by building a row of walls adjacent to the top of a wall, a row of ramps can then be built directly on top of the wall giving access to the top of the adjacent wall. Now just build a second wall adjacent to this one and repeat.

Viewing

Most mega structures look best when using a 3D tool, there are however some restrictions involved.

3Dwarf

All walls regardless of material will show up the same, the only difference is fortifications which will show up a lighter shade of blue.

All ramps and stairs regardless of materials will show up as wood.

Single ramps will show up as square pyramids but only if there are no adjacent walls that are one z-level higher than them.

A row of single ramps will not join together as a 'toblerone' shape, instead they will show up as a row of square pyramids.

Examples

Cathedral to the Blood God

Hippie Exterminator

You gotta water those trees man, and let the treehuggers that care so much for them take share in this watery gift! Basically, construct a megalong wall all the way around an elf-village, then use flooring to put a lid on the entire village. Hook up some pumps from the local river to fill this box with water. This will kill all of the elves enclosed inside, and your fps in the process. Totally pointless and timeconsuming, thus making it a worthy megaconstruction.

Dwarven Arcology

This is ideal for your patently insane Stupid dwarf trick needs. Essentially it's building your entire fortress above ground in ONE structure. A subterranean level (the basement) on the bottom floor provides plump helmets, pig tails, and so on. On the ground floor, grow above-ground plants and carve fortifications into all the walls. From here, it's all about absolutely huge levels packed with food stores, refuge dumps, wood stockpiles, workshops, archery ranges, and bedrooms. The only subterranean activity permitted is digging, although you may be able to get away with building your depot below ground. This consumes ridiculous amounts of time and stone, placing walls is extremely fiddly, and as soon as goblins control the ground floor your fortress will starve unless you can exterminate them. So, pointless, frustrating, and borderline suicidal...in short, a perfect megaconstruction.