40d:Wagon (embark)

Wagons are used by both human and dwarven caravans to transport goods. In Fortress Mode, you start with a single immobile wagon that can be broken down into three tower cap logs.

Accessibility

Human and dwarven caravans come with wagons pulled by animals. To reach your trade depot, the wagon must be able to follow a cleared path three tiles wide. Wagons cannot cross stairs or doors (even if the doors span an area ordinarily wide enough for the wagon to pass). Obstructing boulders must be smoothed ( d - s ), and trees must be cut down ( d - t ). Plants do not obstruct wagons, and neither do ramps, bridges, roads, or natural or constructed floor tiles. Building roads, bridges and floor tiles can help keep paths clear by preventing trees from growing, but caravans may enter the map at a location from which they cannot reach an existing road (even if that road connects to the edge of the map), and if alternate unpaved paths exist, they may take those instead. They will leave without trading if they cannot get to the trade depot in time.

After a trade depot is built, you can use D to check wagon accessibility. Any tile marked in green is accessible to a wagon. Note that a three-tile wide path will only show up as one tile wide in accessibility view, since the tiles next to the walls are not themselves accessible to wagons.

In order to guarantee perfect, permanent wagon accessibility, three tile path must be cleared around the entire perimeter of the map, with at least one joining path from the border to the trade depot. Any parts of this path system which have grass must be paved with floor tiles, bridges, or roads to prevent trees from growing. Ramps must be used to adjust z-level elevation.

Destruction

Wagons are fragile constructions which will collapse if caught in a cave-in, leaving all what it was carrying on the ground as a result. Traders caught in a cave-in will flee as if they were attacked but will leave all the items dropped by the caravan behind. Mules carrying items are affected just like a normal tamed mule and must be killed in the cave-in for it to drop items on the ground. It is however much more likely that the mule(s) will only be stunned or rendered unconscious and flee shortly after recovering from the hit. Wagons can also be destroyed by ocean waves coming up onto the shore if you have settled in the appropriate area, and are destroyed in a similar manner to cave-ins. The only difference between waves and collapsing is that it is more likely the items will be recovered than if they were lost in a cave-in.

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