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[Leonidas]

I've heard that drafting mighty legendary miners is dangerous because they're likely to maim their fellow soldiers while sparring.  Is it any different if you draft them to be wrestlers?

[Freddybear]

I would suggest making them siege operators instead. Their strength and endurance lets them train up to Legendary on catapults much faster. A couple of good-quality catapults with Legendary operators can really dish out the hurt.

[Harald387]

I've had legendary miners kill each other as wrestlers by crushing windpipes, breaking spines, and in one awesome case, ripping off the other guy's head. My advice is to make sure you craft them full suits of plate mail /first/, and whatever you do don't give them obsidian swords to train with.

[Fedor]

quote:Originally posted by Leonidas:
<STRONG>I've heard that drafting mighty legendary miners is dangerous because they're likely to maim their fellow soldiers while sparring.  Is it any different if you draft them to be wrestlers?</STRONG>

Soldiers will not spar when on duty, so drafting pick-wielding miners to fend off a sudden crisis can be very helpful, especially if they have time to get themselves into armor before going into battle.

As for making them soldiers and training them up:  If they are wielding picks, yes, there's a real danger during sparring.  Picks pierce.  Am iron pick with a Legendary miner behind it pieces a lot.

Kitting them out with silver non-piercing weapons or making them wrestlers reduces risk to an acceptable level (as already pointed out, there is always some danger), especially if soldiers have the best armor they can wear without being encumbered:  Leather armor at a minimum, a full set of chain plus a shield if the dwarf can handle it.

quote:Originally posted by Harald387:
<STRONG>I've had legendary miners kill each other as wrestlers by crushing windpipes, breaking spines, and in one awesome case, ripping off the other guy's head. My advice is to make sure you craft them full suits of plate mail /first/, and whatever you do don't give them obsidian swords to train with.</STRONG>

Apart from obsidian short swords, I've not seen this happen in my games, and I've drafted a lot of miners.  I am fairly confident that miners don't do any more damage when wrestling than other dwarves with the same attributes and wrestling skill do.

[ October 09, 2007: Message edited by: Fedor ]

[Lightning4]

I think the problem is that they don't have wrestling skill. I've heard from other discussions that being unskilled makes them more dangerous while sparring. Especially so if they're wielding a masterpiece weapon and have very high strength.

In a way it makes sense. A novice would make a fatal mistake in a sparring session, one that'd probably make his partner part company with their head.

[ October 09, 2007: Message edited by: Lightning4 ]

[Pacho]

Wrestling lets your soldiers glance off or evade the hits with more frequency.  Wrestling is a great defensive skill for your soldier dwarves.

[Funkadelic Jive Turkey]

quote:Originally posted by Lightning4:
<STRONG>I think the problem is that they don't have wrestling skill. I've heard from other discussions that being unskilled makes them more dangerous while sparring. Especially so if they're wielding a masterpiece weapon and have very high strength.

In a way it makes sense. A novice would make a fatal mistake in a sparring session, one that'd probably make his partner part company with their head.

[ October 09, 2007: Message edited by: Lightning4 ]</STRONG>

Yeah, imagine your sparring partner to be on par with a Fallout supermutant and someone gave him a big heavy death-stick and told him to play fight with you...and uh, this guy has never even held such a weapon in his hands before, let alone knows how to use it.

So if he connects and you aren't Terminator tough decked out in the best armor this side o' the demon pits.... ?

[SnowWhite]

But sparring deaths cause such an amusing combination of thoughts!

Mistem is ecstatic.  She had a satisfying sparring session lately.  She suffered the loss of a friend.  She caused the death of a sparring partner lately.  She admired a fine door.

(paraphrasing from memory)

[Lightning4]

There's your problem. They were happily sparring away, then she got distracted by that nice door and accidentally beheaded her sparring partner!

[JT]

I wonder if she used the door to behead her partner.

Anyhoo, you can minimise -- but obviously not prevent outright -- injuries if you at least deck out your sparring partners in leather armour.  It's good to keep a few sets on hand for sparring.  If you're going to be doing any weapons-training, it's best to go for the heaviest armour you can, of course.

[DT]

Shields are powerful tools of defense indeed... It's normally sufficient to give all your military dwarves shields. I've never seen a yellow injury when they have shields. They also have steel battle axes as well!

[jester]

I got a magma flood (and therefor piles of obsidian) and took an proficient stone crafter to my latest fortress.  Even with layered chain and plate I still lose 1-3 military a year if I hand out the dark stone death sticks.
Usually accompanied by the message xxx the macedwarf has suffocated. The sworddwarf sticks em good in the upper body and pierces the upper spine and its all over.
Ive read that miners use their mining skill as their fighting skill when fighting with pick in hand (not unarmed). I do know that miners with any sort of skill can usually take on cave crocidiles, goblins and other medium monsters and come off on top.  Usually killing with a single peirceing strike.
This may also be that when you put a good miner (who is usually strong fast and unarmoured) and put them behind an iron pierceing weapon you will get a dwarf who 1. hits first (usually wins the fight) 2. hits hard, the pick does lots of red wounds and organ damage.

In short if my miners get drafted to spar they go unarmed (disable the mining skill and activate them a while later) take the high quality pointy stuff off any dwarf who gets too good and let them practice their dwarfjitsu and shield skill.  If it comes to war activating your miners and telling them to grab armour and butt heads will give you another few eager bearded killers who are quite capable of holding their own.

[pushy]

quote:Originally posted by jester:
<STRONG>Ive read that miners use their mining skill as their fighting skill when fighting with pick in hand (not unarmed).</STRONG>

Yup. The pick is generally considered to be a "70% spear" due to the amount of similarities it has to the spear but causing 70% of the damage of the spear, but because it using mining skill as opposed to a combat skill like the spear, it makes your skilled miners one hell of a force to be reckoned with, who can effectively be 'training' their combat skill regularly without any risk of wounding other dwarves like with sparring accidents.

[BurnedToast]

steel plate armor (especially masterworked) will stop almost all training injuries. The only injury I've ever had while using it is when I drafted a no-skill no-stat peasant who just arrived into a squad that was otherwise literally full of legendary champions with max stats. He didn't even die, but just got an orange spine wound that didn't heal so he wouldn't spar anymore.

Yes, putting raw recruits in steel plate slows them down. IMO it's worth not losing halfway through the training to injuries though.

Shields, like DT mentioned, are incredibly powerful. I suspect legendary shield use with a masterwork shield is better then masterwork steel plate if you had to choose between the two.