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[slothen]

professional military all the way.

If you need more haulers, set the weaker squads inactive a bit i guess.  Or I'll enroll my civillians in a 10-man marksdwarf squad.  Once they get their equipment, I just leave them inactive and they do their work, use station orders as needed.

[acmuseum]

Warning: This is my first post...  so it's probably longer than it needs to be.

I prefer to automate my defenses as much as possible, but in the interest of !!FUN!! I've got a pretty good working system for my militia.  I have 1 square wide battlements that overlook my entryway.  Heavy troops below in the entry way, light troops up top providing cover fire.

6 Heavy combat squads (10 troops)
All metal armor
wooden shields
melee weapon of choice (make sure you have decent weapons)

6 Light combat squads (10 troops)
Metal helm
Leather armor (I'm considering a transition to metal)
wooden shield
crossbow
axes (read somewhere in a forum post that axes have a higher AI priority for melee than blunt)

1 medic squad (up to 10)
<Never schedule but assign barracks near hospital>
Metal helm
Leather armor
2x wooden shield

Non-military
woodworkers
miners
Everybody else is assigned to a light combat type squad.  They may not be in a training rotation, but at least they have a crossbow and shield if something makes it past the outer defenses and it cuts down on clothing requirements.

Wear armor when off duty.
Replace armor as soon as I have sufficient quantity that they aren't naked.

All squads are put into a 3 month training/patrol rotation.  The 6 unit schedules overlap by 1 month and I have 1 barracks with an attached danger room with specific burrow.  If you don't want to use danger rooms it will take longer for them to get skills.

Rotation:
Station on danger room burrow (6) (or another training order, your choice)
train (4)
train (4)
off
off
...

I throw a couple kittens or poults into the danger room from time to time just to make sure the recruits get a bit more hardened.  Or maybe my pet airlock could be better...

[Porpoisepower]

I'm actively avoiding a standing army. 

I know this will be suck.

I

[Melting Sky]

I wish you luck. As somebody else brought up, I think the one consolation you might want to make is to keep your key dwarfs out of the training rotation or its going to drive you nuts during the couple of months each year when you can't make masterwork armor, weapons etc. I would personally keep all the irreplaceables in a squad together and avoid using that squad as anything but a last defense.

[BoredVirulence]

If you're avoiding having a standard army at all, I'd make 70% of them crossbow dwarves. Even recruits are deadly dangerous in numbers and less prone to horrible death. The remaining 30% should be a variety of melee weapons. Axes and hammers are great, but nothing kills dragons quite like a spear.

I also vote to keep key dwarves out of rotation. Or better yet, in a self contained sub-fortress where supplies can be dropped in and out, as well as equipped with a mini-farm and supplies. Because whats better than having a fortress capable of surviving total annihilation? One where the smiths that created your masterwork armor survive to supply the next wave of cannon fodder.

[Urist McShire]

I've realized recently, after installing the Fortress Defence mod and embarking in a Joyous Wilds location (damn Giant Kea), that when your fortress is on the smaller side (<100 dwarves by how I feel), that a militia system or a very small number of standing dwarves is likely your best move, particularly marksdwarves paired with war animals, since generally most of those dwarves are running around the fortress moving things around. Once you get over a hundred dwarves or you're several years in and children are starting to grow into recruits (I mean peasants *shifty eyes*), then a standing army truly becomes viable.

[Tenderroast]

idea. Every Dwarf in the fortress, conscripted. Set all squads to 2 or 3 dorfs training at a time per squad. The rest of the squad should be free to perform civilian duties, and they will take turns on who is sparing.

[Porpoisepower]

idea. Every Dwarf in the fortress, conscripted. Set all squads to 2 or 3 dorfs training at a time per squad. The rest of the squad should be free to perform civilian duties, and they will take turns on who is sparing.

That's pretty much what I'm doing.... I need to make a few more squads.  I've determined to make this fortress, more of a city with each dwarf having a bedroom, and personnel work area.

Now I just need to find that flux...

[Panando]

I find that crossbow militias with minimal skill usually end up running into battle and beating enemies with their crossbows, instead of shooting them.

The reason this happens is very simple. Squads by default are assigned 250 bolts. Dwarves try to fill their quiver with 25 bolts. So a squad of 10, 10 x 25 = 250 bolts. Right? Right? No of course not.

What happens is Urist goes and grabs 20 bone bolts, then he still don't got 25 bolts. So he grabs a stack of 25 copper bolts. Now he has 45 bolts and he's a happy little beardling. Urist #2 has 25 bolts, and he fires 10 of them, then grabs another 25. So he has 40 bolts. And so on it goes. By the time you get to dwarf #7, because the previous 6 dwarves all took way more than 25 bolts, the allocation of 250 bolts has run out. So Beardlings 7 through 10 charge into battle and bash enemies with their crossbows.
Solution? In the military screen, increase the ammunition allocation to 400 bolts, or if you want to be really safe, 500 bolts. Now, as long as you have produced enough bolts (and that's up to 20 wood/metal stacks per squad, you want to really spam the things), the marksdwarves will all have a quiver full of bolts and will basically never charge into combat.