Some basic ideas for construction vehicles have been floating around the back of my mind for a while now:
Backhoe/Loader:
Counts as a level 3 digging implement for construction purposes, assuming mechanics/construction is over some level
Use the front end to dig a 3x1 pit and fill the front end
Use a filled front end to make a 3x1 mound or fill a 3x1 pit (Maybe use to dump rubble on zeds too?)
Back end is similar, but 2x2 most likely (I considered 1x1, but it seems more like 2x2. Will do more research though)
Dozer
Similar, but 5x1 and front end only
Also, crash through buildings relatively damage free
New wheel type: treads?
Extremely rare armored spawn as an easter egg
Road rollers are pretty much already steamrollers, no real need to change a thing there
Dump trucks
Special back end, could be filled with backhoe or loader?
Dump to mound/fill large areas.
Cement mixer
Pave the world!
But really, just pour asphalt to pave areas
Alternatively fill puts with concrete
Why? Hopefully with more work on Z levels, a stable foundation would help.
To be honest, I don’t know too much about construction machinery, so I do plan to do some research, but if anyone is more knowledgeable and wants to chime in, feel free. This is likely going to be a longer term project since it’s going to involve a good deal of coding, and in areas I don’t know as much about now. Still, I think it’ll make for awesome end game content. We’re already able to shape the world quite a bit by making vehicles and buildings, and the ability to modify terrain on a larger scale would add quite a lot. Thoughts?
ability to create new roads is thing what i realy and lack of machinery like this in cataclysm is little wierd
Dozer
Similar, but 5x1 and front end only
Also, crash through buildings relatively damage free
while scrashing into hard things (walls, trees) should take little damage after 6 building should be damaged enought to be yellow
You’re going to need to dig really deep into the vehicle system to implement these, good luck.
A backhoe would at most be making a 1x1 pit with a single “scoop”. It’d be way faster per pit though, so you could make a trench in a tiny fraction of the time it takes to do it by hand.
It’s good to build up your use cases with real vehicles, and you should certainly add some for testing and vehicle variety, but the main thing to focus on is the individual vehicle parts you’ll need to add to implement them. the real fun will come when people put the components on other vehicles.
What you have so far is:
Dozer blade - scoop.
Backhoe
Dozer blade - pusher? (can’t scoop, but even tougher and better at demolition)
Treads - Super high traction, but very slow. (planning on making vehicles have limited traction depending on surface they’re on)
Construction-grade frame (dozer needs to be made of this to handle mounting heavy attachments like dozer blade and backhoe, and to handle having buildings fall on them)
Dumper? (what the hell are these called anyway?) - Needs to accept items or “terrain chunks”?!? from dozer blade or backhoe, and ahve a command to dump it all out the back (or side)
Mixer drum - Load it with a bunch of raw materials for concrete (possibly other materials, like adobe or paper slurry, though neighter of those would be worth a damn in the northeast), then pour for various effects, this one would be pretty complicated because it needs to interact with terrain modification. You might build “forms” on the ground first, then do a pour operation to fill them with concrete. This might work for both floors and walls.
Glad I’ve got your interest Kevin! I’d had a bit of thought on how to do the parts. The scoops seem like the trickiest, as they’d need to be multi tile to really make proper sense, as would the dumper. I suspect doing the dozer right may require some tooling around in the vehicle collisions code (a project unto itself!) but I know that’s something a number of people wanted to get another pass already.
It’ll be a long term project, but hey, got to have something to keep people trying the experimental once .B comes out. 