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[Hyndis]

No military is good enough to be relied upon as your primary mode of defense.

I beg to differ.

http://mkv25.net/dfma/poi-28999-gatehouse

[Garath]

marksdwarves are one of the most effective units, mostly by causing damage and thus causing an enemy to run away, or try to anyway, without endangering your own team. It's also the easiest for recruits. 10 axe recruits probably won't even damage one goblin in a battle, 10 crossbow recruits will.

The kill rate of any ranged weapon is horrible, since you can't aim shots at the head and such. However, in adventure mode you'll find there are 24 slots for arms and legs, always good to hit, 2 for the body, 1 for the head and a lot for head and other appendages, including teeth. So you have a decent chance to disarm or immobilize, but not to kill

[greycat]

I don't personaly have much use for marksdwarves.
[...]
But they don't seem to be very efficent at actually KILLING things. They sit there wasting bolts on a prone unconcious enemy for days on end.

This is true, and it's also why you don't make your military 100% marksdwarves.  You will want a few melee dwarves to finish off the wounded goblins.

If you're playing the standard game without any mods, then your melee dwarves can use any weapon at all -- it won't matter.  Nothing that you're fighting will ever have any decent armor (except for forgotten beasts, etc.).

However, if you're playing something with mods for tougher opponents, then I've found war hammers are the best choice for a melee squad to deliver the coup de grace to a wounded enemy.  When your marksdwarf shoots someone in the leg, they fall down.  When a melee dwarf attacks an enemy that's lying down, he aims for the head.  If the head is covered with a *steel great helmet*, edged weapons will just bounce off.  Over and over and over, for days.  But a hammer will crunch the skull and kill 'em in one hit.