ICE SHEET - build walls using ice

[fatwilf]

the title says it all

except for stone and steel there is nothing to build with in the ice sheet. how about ICE? plenty of that around.

[b0rsuk]

Interesting.
So far biomes only differ in fauna and flora. Both become marginal once you get hydroponics/hothouse running. You are pushed to establish hydroponics/hothouse by events like toxic fallout and manhunter pack.

[AruBun]

Igloos!

[Songleaves]

Perhaps the structure igloo can be made on areas where the terrain is snowy and don't cost any resources to build?

[StorymasterQ]

Well, if you could harvest snow, perhaps the stoneworking table could then pack it into blocks?

[AruBun]

Read some of the wikipedia article on igloos, it's really interesting. There were different sizes used for different purposes, one per family, and perhaps a 'town hall', perhaps a community dining hall, even hallways connecting them. Some of the smaller ones were made as temporary housing, didn't take long to make, and were only used for a few days, less than a week. Some had windows, and I imagine might have had vents for oxygen. Igloo as makeshift short-term shielding from the cold, wind and rain (snow, I mean...), built in less than a day, fits perfectly with the existing campfire as makeshift short-term heat source and means to cook - it fits perfectly with the story of emergency landing on a planet's ice sheet (or more realistically, a planet that's mostly unlivable with some 'ice sheet' areas, therefore an 'ice sheet' planet... if you have a planet like the ones generated by this game, with ice sheet, tundra, boreal forest, tropical rainforest, and desert, and the ship computer manages to pick out a livable planet and make an emergency landing on it, it is *not* going to choose the ice sheet area). And realistically, a small campfire in the open in conditions that cold is going to be hard to start, and won't really keep you warm, just from freezing to death. I think the article mentioned some kind of smoldering heat source used for cooking inside igloos, and combined with body heat and shelter from wind it kept the inside dramatically warmer than the outside. And if anyone didn't know, the entrance from outside dips a little under the surface and then back up through a hole into the igloo floor, like a U-bend or water trap in plumbing, so that the heat is trapped inside, just as how the air is trapped inside a diving bell with no floor... air floats in water, warm air floats in cold air. The same things that made it good for some humans to use igloos here on earth, would also make it perfect for the scenario of being ejected for emergency landing on a water ice sheet, totally unprepared except for dredging up survival information from the libraries in their pods... they'd dig up instructions for making ice bricks of the right sizes out of snow, and laying them into a hyperboloid, so that they can somewhat comfortably survive the night.

[Toggle]

Well, if you could harvest snow, perhaps the stoneworking table could then pack it into blocks?

Yes. And have the walls, if heated enough, deteriorate from the heat. Mine a mountain, get a block of ice that goes to your junkyard, use the stonecutting table to turn it into bricks, make walls.

[StorymasterQ]

Or, try Pykrete. It melts so much slower, although probably not at a higher temperature.

[Toggle]

Or, try Pykrete. It melts so much slower, although probably not at a higher temperature.

That's also a good idea. Having a long discussion in the rimworld slack about this.

[Toggle]

Talked with 100101 and Arubun, this could be the basis for a mod, who knows. Also using StorymasterQ's Pykrete idea. Do with this what you will.

• Items: 'Extract' 'Snow' 'Ice Block' 'Pykrete wall' 'Snow Wall'
• 'Snow' and 'Ice Blocks' cannot be traded to merchants.
• Collect snow from heavy snow cells, which clears the cell of all snow. (None -snowing- Light -snowing- Heavy -extract- None)
• Collect ice blocks from lakes.
• Snow Wall, a wall made out of 5 Snow.
• Pykrete wall, a wall made out of1 wood and 4 ice.
• 'Snow' material looks similar to steel.
• 'Ice Block' item looks similar to just a simple large brick (Subject to change).
• New command under 'Orders' to extract Ice Blocks and Snow from heavy snow cells, named 'Extract' (Subject to change).
• 'Snow' and 'Ice Block' items lose deterioration if not frozen, similar to food.
• Both 'Snow' and 'Ice Block' items go in regular stockpiles.

[killer117]

I was thinking bout this for desert regions too. Having all rocks in desert regions be sandstone, with same pockets of steel. Then hve the stuff be carvable and turned into walls that give higher beauty, like egyption mosiacs. And in ice sheets all rocks are ice, and it detiriorates with heat, and can be set to be repaired constantly. But u can make an ice freezer, and use blocks of ice from traders in othe biomes to have a power free freezer

[Toggle]

-Inhalt-

Region specific material is interesting, but you can't have ALL mountain in that region be one material, as it's just impractical, you won't be able to mine any ore if you mean no ore, and there would just be more materials then sandstone for desert or ice for ice sheets.

[killer117]

1: i clearly stated that ores would be in these mountains. And have u seen ice sheets in real life. Nothing but ice. No mountains. Makes more sense for solid ice mountains in ice sheet. And sandstone mountains are most common in the desert

[AruBun]

In filling the niche of, landing with information but without parkas or building materials, and needing to survive the night, similar niche as camp fire, even something really simple might be adequate. Such as, 'construct igloo sleeping spot'. It takes a few hours, depends on construction skill, can have multiple simultaneous workers, requires no tools to pack snow and stack blocks, can only be built on deep snow, has a flat temperature increase vs. the outside, and has 3 adjacent sleeping spots. Using ice or pykrete walls, built of craftable packed snow or ice blocks, is kind of outside of the exact niche I had in mind. The realism of the igloo means it has to be hyperboloid in order to support a roof with discrete blocks, and the game is rectangular, so using manufactured 'blocks' of ice or packed snow to lay out a wall design is less realistic for the particular niche I had in mind. Even campfires and pykrete require wood (pykrete would probably be strong enough for actual structures, not just igloos, assuming temperature stays below freezing), but igloos don't require you to land with raw wood, and there's no trees to cut down on an ice sheet. (The idea, is to avoid frostbite and 'slept in the cold' when spawning with few resources and no parkas or leather clothing, and unable to construct rooms with campfires or heaters+power source before the first nightfall.)

[AruBun]

(omitted) But u can make an ice freezer, and use blocks of ice from traders in othe biomes to have a power free freezer

That's how freezers/fridges use to work. They used iceboxes, and had an ice block delivery guy, like milk bottle delivery, and you put it in your icebox to preserve food. Delivery person hauled it in with big metal tongs and dropped it where needed.

"Iceboxes date back to the days of ice harvesting, which had hit an industrial high that ran from the mid-19th century to the 1930s, when the refrigerator was introduced into the home. Most municipally consumed ice was harvested in winter from snow-packed areas or frozen lakes, stored in ice houses, and delivered domestically as iceboxes became more common." - Wikipedia "Icebox"