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[Felix the Cat]

In my current fortress, a giant bat decided to go on a rampage through my dining room/meeting hall.

Nobody seemed to care unless they were being actively targeted by the bat. The bat would be hacking away at a cow or a dog, and dwarves and animals would sit there or go about their business normally. The same happened when the bat decided to attack a dwarf. Other dwarves just a couple of squares away didn't seem to notice.

One hauler even walked over the bat while the bat was actively attacking a dwarf...

Even the military didn't seem to care. I immediately put my military on duty and brought them into the dining room... and they just sat there while the bat made dwarf and dog hamburgers. I set their squad setting to "Squad harasses dangerous wild animals"... and they still sat there. I stationed a squad right on top of the now-exhausted giant bat... and they moved up next to it, but still ignored it! The bat attacked one of the two squad members; the combat lasted a while, but the other squad member, despite being 2 tiles away, did nothing.

Then the dwarves threw a party in the carnage while the giant bat decided to wander around in the nobles' quarters. Unfortunately, no nobles were harmed.

(I finally got the bat to target one of my legendary+97891 miners temporarily drafted as heavy militia. Once the dwarf was being targeted he duly attacked the bat, as normal. His squad-mates still stood around and watched the combat from 2-3 tiles away rather than joining in, however...)

[Emeralddragon2]

I was just about to post on the same issue.

About 10 minutes ago I lost all 32 members of my fort to a single giant rat. Apparently about 3 of them, one after another, were going for the same piece of wood as soon as it fell out of the bloodied hands of the previous hauler.

I wanted to murder the dang thing, and so sent 2 wrestlers to finish the thing. (Since all my other dwarves were busy)

BUT instead of working as a team to kill the rat, Cog sat and watched while an unconscious Ikor was gnawed to death, and unlukily Cog was knocked into a chasm.

Now I was pissed, considering how 5 of my dwarves died thanks to a rodent (7 if you included 2 hunters). SO I sent my entire fortress to see what would happen and they all died one by one, then by twos once a giant bat joined in.

So this is kindof a problem.

[Stromko]

Creatures that come with map features (other than HFS) are technically residents, so that might be why nobody is attacking them. Kind of like how a dwarf throwing a tantrum can smack somebody around and doesn't get attacked but is instead punished for assault. It's definitely a bug and an odd one at that.

Btw are you both actually still using 40a? I ported a game from 40a to 40c and had no issues, though a fix hasn't been mentioned in the dev log it is possible that it has been fixed.

I had a few run-ins today with some creatures from a cave pond and my military were definitely being proactive about attacking them.. on the other hand, giant bats and rats are tagged as Natural animals so the game may treat them differently. Some races (elves) are not hostile toward Natural creatures, and said creatures aren't hostile toward elves in return. Perhaps a crossed wire is making your dwarves think they should leave Natural creatures alone, not realizing that said creatures have no qualms about killing dwarves.

I guess the best workaround right now would be to find a dwarf that can kill the creature singlehandedly and post them close to the critter so they finish the job. Try to keep everyone else away.

[Felix the Cat]

The strange thing is, the bat wasn't generating job cancellations for nearby dwarves. All creatures (dwarves and animals), except for the one being attacked at any particular moment, pretended that the bat didn't exist.

It's strange because wandering herds of camels consistently generate job cancellations.

[Draco18s]

It's strange because wandering herds of camels consistently generate job canellations.

Wandering Animals != Residents.

[qtquazar]

I can confirm that this remains a bug as of 40d.

I have a group of bats that has now wiped out 12 dwarves, including a legendary miner (who i tried flipping back and forth from military to see if he would fight back).

It seems like some of my war dogs may have fought back, but they get wiped nonetheless.

My entire military is standing around watching, no matter what settings, leader, anything...

The bats are named, so they are considered resident. Any solution?

[Noble Digger]

I experience a part of the problem the OP mentions: My soldiers often engage in 1v1 combat despite having 3-4 soldiers present. The others, as he said, will stand there at the station point and wait, or continue their patrol route, leaving their pal to fight alone and probably die.

As a general rule, if you encounter a bug in a version older than the currently-released version, it's a good idea to try and figure out if it occurs in the most recent version, as not all fixes make it into the development log. Since 40d is the last build that will work with current saves, could you try updating and reloading that fort from before the carnage to see if anything is different?

I know someone else in the thread has experienced it in 40d (so have I) but I'm curious about your specific issue--it's always migrant creatures such as goats and boars that cause me this problem, and my soldiers eventually win...only to saunter off to bed and die of thirst because there's no water on the map.