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Enlightened_One

Eastern Canal Rework

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If you mine down to the maximum possible depth, you'll end up with water deep enough for all ships to pass. 

So easiest would be to mine down to maximum depth and things will work out fine that way.

 

Thorin :)

Edited by Thorinoakshield

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I'm hitting the QL66 vein right now. I've got the capacity to take 1,800 ores before my transport is full. I guess that will leave it around the 800-ore mark by the time I'm done.

 

EDIT: I ended up leaving after just 1,050 ores, so there should be about 1,600 left. I renamed the brick accordingly.

Edited by Ajala

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20 below water for the larger ships, but max depth makes it nice and flat :)

Edited by Snowtech

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I think it's best if we allow the larger ships to pass. At the moment only one of the two water routes to the coast allows my corbita through. 

  • Like 1

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Yeah, that sounds great to let all ships through, especially since it's such a central passageway from the SE sea into the middle.  I'm sure I can dig it down to max depth all the way through, since it's one of the shortest canals of them all.  It'll take close to a year real time to complete, but hey, I like it.  And I make some coin from chiseling the rock shards into stones.

 

I worked on that same iron vein, Ajala, and brought it down from 1,600 to about half that a couple of nights ago.  I'll finish it off over the next day or two if someone hasn't beaten me to it.

 

I also straightened-out the diagonal passage leading up to that vein by taking out about 6 or so stone blocks, and also reinforced both walls from the west entrance down to that 66 QL vein.  I'll be updating the map and posting a new thread later this week.

 

Progress!

 

Edited by Enlightened_One

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There's an update on the canal in a new post named "Eastern Canal Rework - Phase 1.2".

 

Edited by Enlightened_One

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There are already seven threads about this canal. It's going to become quickly difficult to follow what's going on.

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Yeah, you're right.  I was thinking that since this project is going to be running for at least a year real time, having just one thread is going to be exceptionally long.

 

But ok. I'll just keep everything in one thread.  Someone else already remarked that too many threads would be confusing.  OK.  We'll go with this one, then.  Give me a sec and I'll post the latest map here.

 

Edited by Enlightened_One

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We also have to bear in mind that we don't want to clutter up the forum, lest we alienate the vast majority of people who don't care about this project because it's hell and gone from their home turf.

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Hey, all.  We're making good progress on the Eastern Canal Rework Project.  We cleared out another iron vein in the west along the diagonal (thanks Ajala for doing the better part of that).  I also cleared away a few stone blocks and managed to reinforce both walls from the western entrance to the next iron vein.  I moved the 2 forges next to that vein, which contains some 7300 or so iron ores.  If anyone wants to have at it, by all means have at it.  But the ore is only QL 20, so it would pretty much be a charity work or community contribution on anyone's part. 

 

 

q1BBO1d.jpg%20%20

 

Because that iron vein is going to take such a long time to mine out, I'm going to focus first on taking out the rock blocks (marked with "X"s) all the way to the eastern entrance, and also reinforce both walls clear through from end to end to prevent further collapses.

 

 

Edited by Enlightened_One

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Hey, all.  I think I might be managing to cut through the western wall and create an entrance after all, thanks to a tip from Zethreal, who suggested I could mine through the reinforced tiles if they were deeded.

 

I planned on establishing a tiny settlement outside the western entrance anyway, so we could have a token by the entrance so that people could sell their ores and stones and such while working on the canal.  So I used my snowball money and planted a token just outside the west entrance, making sure all of the tiles to the entrance were incorporated into it.

 

Well, it worked.  I was able to mine through the reinforcements and take out a couple of stone blocks from the inside of the wall which is to become the west entrance.  Only the last block closest to the existing entrance can't be removed because of a cave-in warning.  And even the last layer of blocks warn me about the risk of dirt coming inside and my being buried alive.

 

So now I'm going to dig the dirt on the outside of that wall to expose the rockface completely.  And then hopefully I'll be able to punch through completely and make an opening in the rock deep enough for ships.  I just need to make myself a dredge because I have dug dirt on the outside down as far as I can with just my shovel, and the rocktile is still not completely exposed.  So I need to remove more dirt at its base, hence the need for a dredge.

 

I'll update when I see if it's successful or not.

 

Edited by Enlightened_One

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Just out of curiousity:

Do you have any altars near the entrance or in the tunnel?

I'm planing to send my Mag-priestess over to help mining out the entrance as well as bringing things to max depth, but she's also able to do some strongwalling.
However, it would be a lot easier when there's a few Mag-altars nearby, so she's able to sac chopped veggies to gain her faith fast.

 

I'll check my other chars about the amount of chopped veggies I got, as well as prepping her some food.

When all goes well, I might be around to help coming friday.

 

Thorin :)

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Sounds great, Thorin.  And no, I don't have altars.  I wasn't aware they could be so useful.  I have seen altars lining other canals, though.  So eventually I could see building some.  For now, though, I haven't yet.

 

But if you need to be a citizen of the settlement I set-up at the west entrance, let me know and I can add your alt if you need that.  I can also grant it any required permissions, like terraforming, mining, digging, reinforcing, etc.

 

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Woohoo!  I managed to bust through the wall.  After deeding the tiles (thanks again, Zethreal, for the tip) I mined through the reinforcement on the inside and mined the floor as far as I could go, which is 25 dirts below water.  Then I had to expose the rock on the outside.  So I finally built a dredge (which required some charcoal piles for the steel, hence the delay) and dug the outside of the wall down until the entire tile was rock.  Then I went back inside, mined the tile, and in one action broke through.  The opening is almost completely flat, being 25 dirts below water on the inside 2 corners, and 24 dirts below water on the outside 2 corners... which should be deep enough for all ships.

 

I think I'll just leave the one tile opening for now, because I'm having a hard time with the tile between old mine opening and the new tunnel opening I just made.  So I'll just leave this new opening one tile wide for now, which is the middle tile of the 3-tile canal, so it's well positioned.  Now I'm going to reinforce the walls around the opening to prevent it from caving in again.

 

After that I'm going to remove a few more rock blocks to straighten-out the passage, and reinforce those as well.  After that I'm going to dig one tile down the middle from the west entrance clear through to the east entrance so ships can start using it.

 

Moving right along!

 

Edited by Enlightened_One

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Question:  How high does the ceiling have to be for all ships?  Before I dig out a center line, I want to make sure the ceiling is at the right level, or I won't be able to reach it.  Although, I am going to leave the shoulders of the canal at surface level for now, so we can still reach the center line of ceiling tiles from the sides.

 

At any rate, how high should I go?

 

Edited by Enlightened_One

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As far as I know, the height of the tunnel does not matter in terms of letting ships pass.

 

HOWEVER, in my experience on larger ships you might find your head is inside the ceiling so you won't be able to see where you're going.

 

My recommendation would be to mine the center tile as high as possible before working on lowering the floor.

 

But I've never done this before either so I bow to the opinions of the more experienced players.

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Great, thanks.  Wow.  Head in the ceiling... the Philadelphia Experiment of the middle ages, I guess.  Running through forges is kind of fun, though.

 

OK.  I like the look of a vaulted ceiling, so I'll do one of those.  I noticed at the eastern end of the canal the previous builders already dug out the ceiling pretty high, into a dome or vaulted shape which is nice.  After I"ve done the walls, I will work on the ceiling starting from the eastern end where the vaulted ceiling leaves off and continue it from east to west, so I can keep it all the same level.

 

The only thing about height is that the west entrance I just made is not very high.   I tried mining it higher, but get a warning message saying that the ceiling sounds hollow, and it won't let me mine it any further.  But I can raise the ceiling starting from the next tile over from the entrance.  So anyone on a tall ship will just have to duck going through the entrance.

 

Edited by Enlightened_One

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What Ajaja said about mining the roof first is the way to do it to avoid visually sailing through rock.

 

Quote

As far as I know, the height of the tunnel does not matter in terms of letting ships pass.

 

HOWEVER, in my experience on larger ships you might find your head is inside the ceiling so you won't be able to see where you're going.

 

My recommendation would be to mine the center tile as high as possible before working on lowering the floor.

 

I helped mine out the eastern straight section and I raised the roof there, if I remember right that part was 5 tiles wide to allow a land route next to the canal on the south side although we never widened the diagonal or western parts. Has it all collapsed to three tiles wide ?

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Hi, Explora.  Yup, from the source rock all the way to the west entrance it's all 3 tiles wide.  Some parts were just 2 or even 1 due to cave-ins.  But about 25% of it starting from the west has been straightened-out and reinforced.  I'm going to put up an updated map tonight.

 

As for a land route next to the canal, I think it would be too consuming to expand the canal inside for wagon traffic.  And seeing how it is not close to any large towns, I don't think the canal would see much wagon traffic anyway.  There is already a highway running west from Highland Meadows which almost reaches the coast by Applebrooke.  It would be quicker to complete that highway instead of widening the canal, I think.

 

But yeah, that's a good idea to make sure the ceiling is done nicely before digging the floor.  Once I finish the walls, it shouldn't take me long to finish the centerline of the ceiling from east to west to keep it all at the same level.  Then I'll dig out a centerline in the floor for ships.

 

I'll have a new map up tonight.

 

Edited by Enlightened_One

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I'm en route to hit the 20QL vein tonight. The iron will be good for grinding out ribbons for support beams.

 

I'll take as much as I can fit in my boat or until I get bored, whichever is sooner, and rename the brick with whatever I calculate remains.

 

EDIT: I removed 1200 ores. So there's probably 6100 left. 

Edited by Ajala

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Sounds good, Ajala.  Yeah, we're gonna need a whole lot of support beams.  The entire canal is around 275 tiles long.  Multiply that by 2 and we get 550 support beams needed just for the 2 side walls.  And with 3 lines of ceiling tiles, that'll add another 825 beams for a total of 1,375 support beams.  I've made 50 so far (yeah, I know, just a drop in the bucket), and I put them up starting from the west, walls only for now.

 

Clearing out those 2 iron veins in the west would be great so I can remove the stone blocks right behind them.  The program won't let me remove them because they are hollow on the exposed back side, and the program thinks it's an adjacent mine shaft.  I'll put up a map shortly.

 

Edited by Enlightened_One

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Hey, all.  We're making some headway.  Thanks, Ajala, for working on those iron veins.  Allows me to take out those rock blocks.  Here's how it looks:

 

wJcZTMR.jpg

 

The western entrance is open, just one tile (4th black square).  It won't let me break the tile between the new entrance (4th black square) and the previous mine entrance (3rd black square) because they are diagonal to each other, and the program gives a message that it cannot connect two openings on a diagonal.  But that's ok, because all we really need is 1 tile anyway.  This one (4th black square) is 24 dirts deep (25 on the inside corners), so it's deep enough for all ships.  I still have a little path blocking sea access at the moment so I can drive my cart over to get inside.  But it will be removed eventually.  I'm not going to dig the floor until last, so the west entrance will remain as it is for now.  And the entrance has been reinforced to prevent collapse.

 

All the stone blocks along the walls that needed to be removed have been removed all the way down to the underground lighthouse (the blue square) which houses a source crystal.

 

The only blocks we need to remove now are:

 

2 iron veins in the west and the stone blocks right behind them

3 iron veins immediately near the source crystal (blue square)

2 stone blocks further east of the source crystal

and 1 more iron vein just before reaching the eastern entrance.

 

Not bad, eh?

 

Once I remove the last 2 stone blocks in the east, I will focus on the ceiling, continuing from where the previous builders left off a little west of the source crystal (blue square) and working my way west, in order to keep it the same level.  Once the ceiling is done, I will cut a groove down the centerline down to max depth (25 dirts), and the canal will then be open to all!  Woohoo!

 

After that it will be the final touch-ups, like reinforcing (wow, what a big job that will be; some almost 1,400 of them), and making sure the floor looks good too.  Speaking of the floor, if we leave the edges near the walls at sea level, it would allow for pedestrian foot traffic, though not for carts.  I don't think anyone would use it for carts anyway, but having a place for people to run on foot would be nice.  And the slope will be just 25 down on the edges, so they should be able to run along without slipping into the water.  The floor would look like a wide "U", or something like this... "\__/".  So only the center tile of the 3-tile wide floor would be at max depth on both sides, while the border tiles would slope up to the walls at sea level to allow for foot traffic.

 

I also redrew the canal on the Xanadu map to better represent where it actually is, more accurately than the first one I made.

 

6ujMVKV.jpg

Edited by Enlightened_One

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Why not move the entrance a bit more up north to get a nice 3-tile wide entrance; using the 2nd (from the south) entrance as bottom tile? That way you got the wide entrance and looking at the map it might be possible. Although there's always the possibility it needs some outside surface mining first, I admit that.

 

The most southern entrance could be collapsed after that, removing the "ugly" view it would cause in the end.

Also, I'm not sure if you're considering to add a path for carts next to the canal; but if you do, keep in mind that you need to keep one tile between the water and the path, because of the future slope. Meaning, if you want a 3 tile wide shipping canal, tile #4 becomes sloped and tile #5 (and 6?) will become the cart path.

 

Thorin :)

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I've made a crate of ribbons. I'll dump that, and a crate of logs, at the western deed, assuming I have unloading permissions.

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