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[msa]

I recently developed a technique for upgrading the armor worn by my military dwarves. Its nothing brilliant, but I thought I would post it because I had a difficult time finding suggestions that did not require micromanaging (ie. individually forbidding/dumping unwanted armor).

It requires two stockpiles, A and B. A is a normal weapon/armor stockpile. B is a second stockpile with a few requirements: it is behind a door, it is set to take from A, and it is set to only accept inferior armor. During my first phase of upgrades, B is set to any non-steel or non-iron equipment, and for later phases it is set to lower quality levels.

To upgrade your dwarves, you downgrade the armor for a batch of soldiers (to chain, clothes, etc depending on level of paranoia). After a reasonable period of time has passed, your haulers will have moved all of the inferior armor to pile B. At this point, mark the door to B as forbidden, and then reset your soldiers' armor levels to plate. They will not be able to find a path to the inferior armor, and thus will not equip it. Repeat as necessary.

Aside from avoiding *too much* micromanaging, this technique also makes it easy to trade away inferior armor with the next wave of caravans.

[LegacyCWAL]

I do something similar, but with opposite locations for A and B.  I also use an extra room connecting to A so that if I want to keep some of his armor (rather than wholesale replacement), I can lock the soldier in there while the haulers come put it in the stockpile where he'll actually pick it up.

[FlyingScissorKick]

Good idea. I've always used the good ol' dwarfs drop everything and then forbidding. I then get them to pickup plate again so they will grab the good stuff. I usually would melt down the inferior stuff as I don't care much for trading in my current location as it seems to be quite volatile and all caravans get wiped off the map before getting close.

[msa]

The only reason I wasn't satisfied with the methods listed above (although I only tried the later) was that it involved selecting individual dwarves or items. The reason I prefer the method I described is because its very hands off. I have to set up the b stockpile, and then the only thing I have to do to update a group of dwarves is:

1. Unlock a door
2. Change their armor level from the 'm'ilitary screen
3. Lock a door
4. Wait
5. Change their armor level from the 'm'ilitary screen

Too me, this goes a lot faster and requires far less attention than methods where I have to control the locations of individual dwarves, their discarded armor, or specific armor I want them to equip. Also, they can be done in groups--I typically update 4-6 at a time but I could do any number (nice in the late game).

[Tormy]

http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=23784.0

Read the topic what Ive created.