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Difference between revisions of "40d:Ice"
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Ice appears as a light blue stone which can be found by mining through an ice wall. Ice can be used to build [[construction]]s and [[workshops]]. Ice boulders and objects made of ice will melt when exposed to warmer temperatures (such as inside a fortress), giving it rather limited use. Nevertheless, workshops made of ice have a certain novelty to them, and it's even possible to make [[furnace]]s out of ice, as counter-intuitive as that sounds. | Ice appears as a light blue stone which can be found by mining through an ice wall. Ice can be used to build [[construction]]s and [[workshops]]. Ice boulders and objects made of ice will melt when exposed to warmer temperatures (such as inside a fortress), giving it rather limited use. Nevertheless, workshops made of ice have a certain novelty to them, and it's even possible to make [[furnace]]s out of ice, as counter-intuitive as that sounds. | ||
| − | The | + | The game refers to ice boulders as "water." It doesn't appear in any stockpile options or the manager, but it does appear under the "stones" section of the [[Stocks]] menu. |
== Icy constructions == | == Icy constructions == | ||
Revision as of 19:04, 22 March 2009
Ice is water that has been frozen by cold seasons. Any water that is above ground will freeze during the cold time, but it will stay wet if it is on subterranean tiles.
A water tile with 1 depth will freeze to create ice floor. A tile of water deeper than 1 will freeze into an ice wall, creating an ice floor one Z-Axis above it. The ice wall will be the same no matter how deep the water is. As there is no thin ice, the floor can be walked on freely. Ice walls can be mined like any other natural wall. The ice wall will melt into water of depth 7 [1] when warmer temperatures arrive, which can keep ponds full if rain only fills them up to 2/7. An ice floor will also melt, leaving 1 water if it was smoothed or engraved.
Ice can be mined out, creating stones of ice that melt into thin air come spring. This makes winter an ideal time to get rid of any lakes that are in the way.
Entire water supplies can become completely frozen upon winter in colder areas. This can depopulate an entire fortress with rapidity in the first winter if they're unprepared. To counter this, make a cistern inside beforehand or brew enough alcohol.
Ice as a stone
Ice appears as a light blue stone which can be found by mining through an ice wall. Ice can be used to build constructions and workshops. Ice boulders and objects made of ice will melt when exposed to warmer temperatures (such as inside a fortress), giving it rather limited use. Nevertheless, workshops made of ice have a certain novelty to them, and it's even possible to make furnaces out of ice, as counter-intuitive as that sounds.
The game refers to ice boulders as "water." It doesn't appear in any stockpile options or the manager, but it does appear under the "stones" section of the Stocks menu.
Icy constructions
All constructions are entirely indestructible. Entire fortresses can be built of ice in temperate climates equally impervious to catapults, the summer sun, or a thousand tons of boiling lava. If constructions of ice are dismantled during the warm season, they will melt into thin air.
Ice as hazard
Watch out when digging through ice into (subterranean) unfrozen water resorts. The space cleared by the miner will freeze solid again instantly, encasing the advancing miner into a wall of ice. This means not only the loss of a valuable dwarf, but also of his now inaccessible equipment.
Additionally, surface ponds which go through a freeze/thaw cycle (on Temperate and Cold maps) can be hazardous, as your dwarves will treat the ice as a normal surface when moving about. Spring thaws happen suddenly and without warning, and dwarves in the midst of crossing a frozen pond will find themselves suddenly swimming in depth 7 water. You can avoid this by marking restricted traffic zones over ponds in high traffic areas.
Melting outdoor ice
It can be very important to be able to extract water from permanently-frozen ice (for instance on cold northern maps) in order to give water to the wounded. This can be done with magma. Dig out a tunnel one z-level below the ice sheet and fill it with magma. The ice on the above z-level will melt. You can see this happening here: http://mkv25.net/dfma/movie-153-meltingwateronglacier
If you would like to transport magma to heat a frozen brook or other such feature that is very far away from the magma pipe, try to use a magma duct that is nearly as wide as the area you intend to fill. Otherwise, magma will tend to evaporate as it disperses from a narrow duct to a wider area.