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[forsaken1111]

Granted at that point, you're tossing 2 dwarves away to do what one industrial machine could do...

This IS dwarf fortress.... the little bearded midgets are expendable.

[Oaktree]

The game pauses when an ambush is spotted.  I think that's all outside chained animals are really good for.

That and kobolds and goblin snatchers.  Might also help detect badgers since you get the "badger is no longer enraged" message once they've finished mangling the posted animal.

[Solon64]

Granted at that point, you're tossing 2 dwarves away to do what one industrial machine could do...

This IS dwarf fortress.... the little bearded midgets are expendable.

Many people don't like needlessly sacrificing bearded midgets if they can avoid it.

That said, we're talking about nobles, so a) its no loss and b) they were going to meet an Unfortunate Accident anyway, but now said Accident is actually accidental and the noble serves a purpose, even if it is only through their death.

We call that a Win-Win where I'm from.

[forsaken1111]

I wonder if there's a way to reliably have an animal trigger a cave-in. You do get notifications for those. A support pillar with an unconnected constructed stone floor on top, for example

[Tacomagic]

Theoretically I suppose you could put a pen directly over a pressure plate.  Once the animal is gone the plate would switch off after the delay period.  Link it to a gear assembly and then put something on top of it.  Soon as the assembly disengages, whatever is up there will drop.

But, if your doing all that, you may as well just use a plate by itself to trigger when liquid hits it.

[forsaken1111]

Isn't part of the fun to overengineer everything?

[Slayerhero90]

Granted at that point, you're tossing 2 dwarves away to do what one industrial machine could do...

This IS dwarf fortress.... the little bearded midgets are expendable.

Many people don't like needlessly sacrificing bearded midgets if they can avoid it.

That said, we're talking about nobles, so a) its no loss and b) they were going to meet an Unfortunate Accident anyway, but now said Accident is actually accidental and the noble serves a purpose, even if it is only through their death.

We call that a Win-Win where I'm from.

You kill off your nobles?
Nobles aesthetically valuable members of the fort. If my fort lacks nobles, it bothers me greatly.

[BastiBasti]

Can't animals detect dead bodies for your fort? If so 2 kittens. But Girlinhat's suggestion sounds the best by far, only problem may be is that getting a mechanic may be risky/difficult for certain situations, two useless dwarfs may be a better option in larger forts. Hell, we can throw in a few wolfs, quantum food stockpile with mist and replace the dwarfs with children and we also have a dwarven daycare center.

[A Random Passerby]

You kill off your nobles?
Nobles aesthetically valuable members of the fort. If my fort lacks nobles, it bothers me greatly.

So you keep nobles around... because they look nice?

[BastiBasti]

Also mayors tend to pick up friends, so losing them can snowball into the eventual breaking down and total death of your fortress, unfortunately.

[kuniqs]

Granted at that point, you're tossing 2 dwarves away to do what one industrial machine could do...

This IS dwarf fortress.... the little bearded midgets are expendable.

Many people don't like needlessly sacrificing bearded midgets if they can avoid it.

That said, we're talking about nobles, so a) its no loss and b) they were going to meet an Unfortunate Accident anyway, but now said Accident is actually accidental and the noble serves a purpose, even if it is only through their death.

We call that a Win-Win where I'm from.

On what kind of plump helmets are you on? Some nobles are harmless or even useful (mandating production of steel bars, forcing idling, welfare-sustained migrants to useful work). Kids, on the other hand, have nothing to do than socialize, getting high skills and probably replacing your 1 good mayor soon after growing up. Considering the recent growing-up bug, they're useless as haulers and soldiers, too. Only thing they're good for is detecting ambushes and being dropped 30 stories tall into crowded areas, preparing your military to gore-filled world outside caves.

[Parsely]

I saw the topic and my brain just went:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[Larix]

Granted at that point, you're tossing 2 dwarves away to do what one industrial machine could do...

This IS dwarf fortress.... the little bearded midgets are expendable.

Many people don't like needlessly sacrificing bearded midgets if they can avoid it.

That said, we're talking about nobles, so a) its no loss and b) they were going to meet an Unfortunate Accident anyway, but now said Accident is actually accidental and the noble serves a purpose, even if it is only through their death.

We call that a Win-Win where I'm from.

On what kind of plump helmets are you on? Some nobles are harmless or even useful (mandating production of steel bars,

They'll never do that. I've never seen a preference for 'metal bars', and in 0.34.11, they cannot mandate materials.

Kids, on the other hand, have nothing to do than socialize, getting high skills and probably replacing your 1 good mayor soon after growing up. Considering the recent growing-up bug, they're useless as haulers and soldiers, too.

No, no and no. You can manually replace your mayors whenever you feel like it, there's no need to endure a voted-in kid with bad preferences. Actual long-sitting mayors can reach masterful to legendary social skills, a freshly-grown kid with 'expert' skills won't beat them in the elections.

Self-grown children fare no worse than imported dwarfs in civilian jobs. And why would you waste them on hauling only? Even if you're strapped for resources, native 'peasants' are easy to turn into useful planters, furnace operators or even clothiers. I haven't payed minute attention, but their hauling performance wasn't notably different from that of immigrated dwarfs, i think it's primarily governed by strength and agility, not body size.

Recent research shows that homegrown microdwarfs are complete rubbish when using blunt weapons. They still appear reasonably useful with edged implements.

But even if you don't care about the happiness of your citizens: children are well-connected - they have families who care for their wellbeing. A warning system which depends on children dying _and_ their deaths being noticed sounds like a great way to trigger a tantrum spiral _whenever something dangerous knocks on the fortress gates_.

[Loctavus]

With regards to the kittens, if you have narrow passages where the kobolds run,  have a pit full of kittens behind a window. Nothing short of a building destroyer will be able to harm them, and they should spot any sneaky types running by. They'll find anything a chained up creature might.

The only shortfalls are the window means the sneaky things will always be at least two squares away, which might detract slightly from detection ability. Thus I wouldn't trust a single pit with one kitten to find everything. Additionally you need sand and a glass industry to make windows. It might be possible to order windows specfically from the traders, but I'm not sure.

On the plus side, there's no need to go about reloading the detector with fresh kittens just because a kobold got lucky and smashing all the windows will potentially keep some megabeast occupied long enough to seal yourself in.