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[Afghani84]

What factor do you guys prioritize when choosing dwarves for certain jobs? There are a couple of possibilities:

1. The Dwarf Therapist branch version provides a range from 0 to 100 on how well a dwarf fits a certain role in terms of his initial attributes. Even if he is not particularly fit for it to start with, most attributes can be increased through work. But the process is very slow, so this might be a factor to consider.

2. All dwarves come with certain preferences. Giving them a job where they deal with items/animals they like, makes them a) happier and b) more productive. I don't really know how great of an influence this factor is tbh.

3. In terms of military, fitting off-duty jobs should be linked to increase stats important to them even when not officially in training, e.g. fishing or bookkeeping for marksdwarves.

I know that most people just randomly give dwarves the jobs that have to be done and don't worry about it too much. Is the influence of the other points that miniscule or can you actually enhance your dwarves' performance by paying attention to it?   

[Matoro]

During the first two years I use threpaist's roles-thingie. After that, I just give jobs to the useless migrants and I don't care if they are good at them or not.

Since my military is never off-duty, I don't drwaft any important civilian dwarves even if they would have a good military skills.

Micromanaging with roles can be useful, for example, If you're running very small fort. But after it grows into hole of 200 dwarves, it really doesen't matter anymore much.

[Chebinger]

Since I really like low-population forts, what I do is I give each dwarf two jobs; one that deals with what they like/what would give me a kick-ass artifact, and one that I need.

[Afghani84]

During the first two years I use threpaist's roles-thingie. After that, I just give jobs to the useless migrants and I don't care if they are good at them or not.

I used to do the same. But the numbers in DT seem to be highly dependent on experience. I mean, even if your dwarf has initially no talent whatsoever for the job, after he reaches novice status his numbers are up to 80+. That rather suggests to me that the percentages at the start are negligible if they shift that easily.

I would like to think that attributes and preferences in a game like this do indead have an influence on job performance. That would make the game a lot deeper and more challenging as well. But I couldn't find any proof that that is actually the case. Has there been a comment from Toady One or a !!SCIENCE!! experiment on the forums about it at any point?

[Caldfir]

Check out THIS PAGE about personality and THIS ONE about attributes to get the full picture. 

Dwarf personalities are one of those placeholder-things, so they kinda suck and don't matter very much right now.  Whenever a rewrite takes place of that system, expect it to matter quite a bit more than it currently does. 

Generally, it doesn't matter at all what their personalities are, except that training military is much easier to do with dutiful dwarves (this is mainly because the Teacher skill trains very very slowly, so the personality trait starts to matter).  For everything else, the skills very rapidly overtake any importance that personal preferences might have had, so do whatever you like. 

Material and item preferences and creativity can matter in places where it will be somehow difficult to train the desired skill.  For example, if your map has no sand and you're resorting to imports, then it might be worthwhile to seek out a dwarf who likes green glass as your glassmaker, since training the skill is going to be hard. 

[htabdoolb]

I tend to give high agility/strength dwarves the more critical jobs in my fortresses, such as mining, masonry, smithing, and such. Workers with higher agility/strength will manufacture goods more quickly than clumsy dwarves. I also try to match preferences to job roles, as crafts dwarves with preferences that match their jobs tend to produce significantly higher quality items.

Those dwarves with low agility/strength get drafted. My military, especially in the early stages of a fort, tends to have high mortality rates, so I may as well be losing the weak and clumsy rather than the strong and quick. If they survive long enough to gain significant weapon skills, they will have improved their physical attributes enough that the initial deficit doesn't matter much. The practice of drafting slower dwarves also means that my hauling population will get things moved around more rapidly, as only the average or above speed dwarves remain.

I usually don't pay too much attention to personality traits when assigning jobs, but I try to make sure the chief medical dwarf isn't a procrastinator and likes helping others. If there are several candidates for a job with similar material/item preferences, then I'll usually assign the one with higher creativity and artistic appreciation. I'm not sure about the artistic appreciation trait, but I've read that dwarves with a higher creativity attribute have a slightly better chance of making higher quality goods.

Of course, if a migrant has a high enough skill then it may just be more easy and efficient to assign them to a critical job rather than training someone else up from scratch, even if the migrant's preferences don't match the job and they happen to be a lazy, procrastinating s.o.b.

[Thuellai]

During the first two years I use threpaist's roles-thingie. After that, I just give jobs to the useless migrants and I don't care if they are good at them or not.

I used to do the same. But the numbers in DT seem to be highly dependent on experience. I mean, even if your dwarf has initially no talent whatsoever for the job, after he reaches novice status his numbers are up to 80+. That rather suggests to me that the percentages at the start are negligible if they shift that easily.

I would like to think that attributes and preferences in a game like this do indead have an influence on job performance. That would make the game a lot deeper and more challenging as well. But I couldn't find any proof that that is actually the case. Has there been a comment from Toady One or a !!SCIENCE!! experiment on the forums about it at any point?

I don't know about SCIENCE, but if you're willing to accept anecdotal evidence, I assigned a talentless glassmaker in one fort because he liked Green Glass.

By Novice, he was producing lots of Finely Crafted and some Superior green glass objects.

[Klitri]

I just choose what is needed most at the time, even though it's not very good in efficiency..

[KingBacon]

Mass dwarven conscription for all nonessential economic duties. I need masons, bam, everyone in the next migrant wave becomes masons. If I need quality items I restrict access to the workshops, otherwise I just throw warm bodies at the problem (note: does not always solve problems involving deadly dust.)

My starter dwarfs are the only ones I really care about, some initial trainers, a planter, architect and smith.

[weenog]

AFAIK it's traditional to throw dwarfs at the problem until one survives to solve it.  Then, he was the right dwarf for the job.

[PDF urist master]

for most things, i don't want a job well done. just a job done.

the only exception is probably weapons and armor. maybe cooking because that's my major export.