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[davidc]

I made it into the second cavern layer and defended it with a squad of iron armored hammerdwarves while I built a little tower in the cavern. I have about 37 population, 3000 food and drink, and I haven't run into any megabeasts yet. I think I'm about 4 years in and I haven't experienced goblin attacks yet.

I have a feeling that goblin archers and and maybe even their soldiers will give me a hard time. I don't really have any surface fortifications except for a drawbridge and I don't have a monitoring system (pets) installed yet.

I'm curious what might be a good activity next. I kind of want a squad of axedwarves, and I kind of want to go to the third layer (fire and such). Is there any special prep that I undertake before going to the third cavern layer?

I'm not very good with the mechanics yet, I don't know scheduling etc.  Fire seems like the scariest mechanic in the game in terms of damage. I've fought a dragon and both won and lost to one I believe.

[Astrid]

Explore it by dumping.........unwanted.... citizens into it and look waht happens.

[PatrikLundell]

Personally I consider a good defense to be essential, and I don't really start getting a militia until I reach a pop of 30, growing slowly until I get a full squad at 60. Of course, I use an insane number of cage traps. Most cages are in airlocks (two raising drawbridges in the ends of a tunnel), including into each cavern.
Other more blood thirsty individuals rely on militia (I wouldn't be surprised if there was some fungal induced berserker rage involved as well).

Getting a magma driven production is also a priority for me.

Unless you've changed the setup parameters goblin sieges won't happen until your population has reached 80, and the same goes for titans/megabeasts. FBs do not seem to have any threshold, however, so I'd say they're slightly late. When it comes to mega beasts, I've encountered a paltry total of 2 in over a RL year: they just don't seem to be good at surviving at my pocket maps.

Fire is indeed very scary. Dorfs have very little self preservation near to it, and then they run around like living torches setting fire to things and other dorfs. Very messy...

[Daris]

There seems to be a short delay (a few months to a year) after you discover a cavern before FBs come to visit you from it.  Use this time wisely to prepare for them.  For most FBs, your hammerdwarves will work fine, but a FB with deadly dust, or even deadly blood or noxious secretions, can be very dangerous to kill in melee.  There is no difficulty curve for FBs - the very first one you get could be made of copper and wield deadly dust.

[Deboche]

Don't worry too much about goblins. They usually aren't too well trained or have good equipment. Especially the first couple of sieges.

Go right ahead to the third cavern. When you find one, I suggest sealing it immediatelly and building a raising drawbridge to make sure you can close it off if you need to. Do this for all caverns. If a Forgotten Beast shows up, this will probably save your fortress.

After you reach magma, start fully arming and armoring your military.

[davidc]

After you reach magma, start fully arming and armoring your military.

This just basically saves coal for steel, right?

Is iron going to be good enough for your military or do you need steel?

[Deboche]

Iron will keep them safe from most things. It's mostly the bites and punches to the skull that are really frustrating. Yeah, magma saves coal for steel, allows you to smelt all ores and melt all goblinite.

Ideally, you'll want fully steel armored militias and all weapons made of steel except for mace and hammer, which should be silver. But you can get by just fine with iron.

Also, I hear the material for shields is not so important.

[Daris]

I think shield material matters when dwarves use their shields to bash, and it doesn't when they use their shields to block.  Looking at my combat logs has convinced me that bashing happens frequently, so I give my melee dwarves steel shields.