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23a:Cave river
The cave river is the first major landmark you will find as you tunnel into the mountain. It can be found by digging east of your entrance, usually one to three screens away. It is between 5 and 8 spaces wide, and twists and turns between roughly 48 spaces from the cliff face to about 103 spaces from the cliff face. It is surrounded by Template:L 1-2 squares deep on both banks. "Offshoots" of the river will contain either waterfalls or small chasms. These offshoots will stay inside the range of the river, that is, offshoots would appear on the left side only when the river bends far to the right.
It may flood your fortress when you first discover it, sometimes drowning your miner or other dwarves unlucky enough to be in the flood's path. This risk can be reduced by building a door in the shaft behind your miner as he/she approaches the river. Higher Template:L skill also reduces the chance of a flood.
The underground river is an easy source of mud for farming. It will seasonally flood the ten squares nearest to it on both banks. These flooded squares will become mud once the waters recede. Any squares reached by the initial flood will become muddy as well, and can also be used for farming until the mud dries in winter.
River monsters
The cave river is a source of numerous threats, particularly lizardman invasions, and precautions must be taken to ensure that they do not put your fortress in danger. Directly interacting with the river (drinking, fishing, etc.) will trigger subsequent attacks from its denizens. This can be prevented by supplying your dwarves with enough Template:L. Aquatic attackers can also emerge from Template:Ls placed before the river, if you have built any. (Wells elsewhere will spawn Template:L creatures.)
River monsters include:
Waterfalls and sinks
Occasionally the river may join with water pouring in from a waterfall. Waterfalls appear at the top of offshoots that flow downstream (i.e. offshoots that point north). The center of the waterfall produces a "fine mist," which causes a happy Template:L for each dwarf that comes into contact with it.
When the river splits, one branch will create an offshoot that ends in a sink. Sinks have the same appearance as a waterfall, but they produce no mist and are surrounded by a few chasm tiles. A dwarf that is swept into a sink drowns immediately and produces the message "... has fallen into a deep chasm."
Floods
The rising waters of the river each season can be dangerous to your dwarves and fortress, but this can be mitigated by careful planning:
- Build several bridges downstream from each other, so that dwarves swept away by the flood waters can pull themselves out.
- Carve out along the banks of your river. This not only gives you farmable mud and places where tower-cap mushrooms can grow, it also allows sideways flowing water to push dwarves onto solid land.
- Avoid building upstream from a sink. Dwarves swept into a sink or the chasm around it will be instantly killed.
- Doors close to the river banks should be kept tightly closed (not pet-passable) if there is a danger of flood waters reaching a stockpile. This can be set initially or done right after the flood warning appears (and then reversed once the flood has passed).
- You can use floods to dispose of unwanted refuse, as an alternative to Template:L it. Create stockpiles for any items you want disposed of just above any diagonal section of the river. The natural floods will push the refuse into the river, just as if you chasmed it, but without angering any monsters. To keep floods from coating your bridge(s) with refuse, be sure to place the stockpiles downstream from them.