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[forfor]

So, I'm on an embark that magically has every military-relevant metal. I found a few small pockets of iron, an endless supply of tetrahedrite, and pure silver for copper/silver weapons. I even found a bit of tin to upgrade my copper to bronze. My question is: what is the best weapon to build an army around? Silver warhammers are generally my goto weapon since I seem to find silver everywhere I go for some reason, but I'm wondering if that's actually the most efficient choice for my primary weapon given the extreme amount of metal diversity on my current fort? (Of course this had to happen on an island so I can't really get much out of it, but at least there are caves to keep my military dwarves from dyeing of boredom)

Since the only threats are cave critters and the occasional cyclops/Ettin (both of which got instapulped by warhammers) this is mostly just for the sake of learning.

[EuchreJack]

Diversity is the spice of life.  Overspecialization means your military will be able to pulverize one type of threat, but be extremely vulnerable to others.

You didn't mention, do you have flux for steel?  Really changes the answer there.  Are you planning to mine for Adamantine?

My rule of thumb is generally 2 of everything, although Swords are the jack-of-all trades, master of none weapon.

...but after your second migrant wave, you'll probably just equip your Master Military Migrants with whatever weapons they specialize in. Oh, island nevermind.  But I may have a trick if you're not getting migrants and there is unclaimed land on the island.... No longer an issue, civilizations can travel to islands for trade and migration, as far as I can tell.  I got at least one of my own civilization's caravans and 2 migrant waves.[edited]

Edged/piercing: Adamantine, Steel, Bronze, Iron, Copper

Now, there have been changes to the blunt damage so that if the material isn't "good enough" it won't penetrate.  Used to be that you'd make them out of the heavy silver, but now you should have a mix of silver for density and steel for higher impact fracture/yields (I have no idea what that means).

Don't worry about your military getting bored, I think friends can still visit in the Caverns.

[Thisfox]

Variety is excellent. I don't do very war-hungry forts, but I try to have a set of spearmen and a set of hammermen. Spears are the killstealers of the game, as various people have pointed out over the years. They are very effective at making living things dead. But if you suddenly get attacked by the undead, then hammers are a much better option. Don't skimp on shields!

[forfor]

No flux unfortunately or I would probably just be spamming swords. I'm not having any problem getting migrants thankfully, and the fort is up to over 100 people with 2 cavern entrances to defend plus the overworld entrance. So far I've only taken 3 casualties to cave critters, one of those being a bad dodge that led to a drowning.

[EuchreJack]

Then I'd probably say Bronze spears and Silver Warhammers.

[Bumber]

Pick axes are like spears, except they don't have a useless blunt attack that your dwarves might try to use.

[dwarfish]

Pick axes are like spears, except they don't have a useless blunt attack that your dwarves might try to use.

this is a piece of misinformation. spears do straight stabbing damage while picks do a sort of tearing damage at an angle. you'll notice picks severing nerves and limbs a lot more often against small humanoids than spears but cause less bleeding against larger beasts. tearing damage is a combination of slashing and stabbing effects and picks use the miner skill

i dont personally use picks outside of the early game though. i love seeing the badass military tiles on my troops and pick users always end up as wrestlers and look unarmed from a tile perspective

Edged/piercing: Adamantine, Steel, Bronze, Iron, Copper

it's a very bad idea to make any adamantine weapons, it will result in a bloodier bath if you ever have a loyalty cascade and the weapon grade is higher than your armor grade


in an undead biome you should have 50% of your military at least with blunt weapons, maces for stronger dwarves and warhammers for weaker ones. you can have as much as 100% blunt users and it works because no armor stops legendary blunt weapon users from causing muscle and spinal tears from the force of their blows

i regret not going 100% on my undead embark, too many reaminated severed limbs, but i guess for larger beasts reanimated limbs are easier to pulp

for weaker dwarves try to give them lighter weapons with smaller penetration area such as short swords or warhammers. they'll still be able to keep the enemy busy when they're fully trained. large contact area and low strength (for example, using a maul on a dwarf with only 1500 maxed out strength) is usually the worst

[Bumber]

Pick axes are like spears, except they don't have a useless blunt attack that your dwarves might try to use.

this is a piece of misinformation. spears do straight stabbing damage while picks do a sort of tearing damage at an angle. you'll notice picks severing nerves and limbs a lot more often against small humanoids than spears but cause less bleeding against larger beasts.

Angles aren't calculated. The numbers put them close to spear and sword stabs:

Code: [Select]

Type Size Attack Attack type Contact Area Penetration Velocity
S.Sword 300 Stab Edge 50 2000 1.0×
Pick 500 Strike Edge 100 4000 2.0×
Spear 400 Stab Edge 20 10000 1.0×
The penetration is a bit lacking compared to spears, but the contact area is similar, with the sword's slash attack having a contact area of 20000, for comparison. (You'll notice in adventure mode that they get stuck in wounds a lot like spears do.) Velocity adds extra force to the blow, resulting in greater damage, which probably causes the extra severing despite the small contact area.

[anewaname]

... maces for stronger dwarves and warhammers for weaker ones. ...
... for weaker dwarves try to give them lighter weapons with smaller penetration area such as short swords or warhammers....

I do this too. I suspect that giving a weaker dwarf a heavy weapon leads to them becoming exhausted sooner.

[dwarfish]

Angles aren't calculated. The numbers put them close to spear and sword stabs:

Code: [Select]

Type Size Attack Attack type Contact Area Penetration Velocity
S.Sword 300 Stab Edge 50 2000 1.0×
Pick 500 Strike Edge 100 4000 2.0×
Spear 400 Stab Edge 20 10000 1.0×
The penetration is a bit lacking compared to spears, but the contact area is similar, with the sword's slash attack having a contact area of 20000, for comparison. (You'll notice in adventure mode that they get stuck in wounds a lot like spears do.) Velocity adds extra force to the blow, resulting in greater damage, which probably causes the extra severing despite the small contact area.

idk all this, im not good at math. i just observed a more noticeable difference from combat logs over long times of playing and it was more of a difference than the numbers would suggest

[EuchreJack]

Edged/piercing: Adamantine, Steel, Bronze, Iron, Copper

it's a very bad idea to make any adamantine weapons, it will result in a bloodier bath if you ever have a loyalty cascade and the weapon grade is higher than your armor grade

Interesting concept, although I might make a handful of forbidden weapons for wandering adventurers.