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[K.I.L.E.R]

I seem to hate large fortresses and focus on a fortress with less than twenty dwarves, I set this as a hard limit. So far I am easily able to be self sufficient and mine my way out of trouble. This means that my military can only afford to run with a 5 unit garrison at all times. I am 2-3 years in on my game and have not had any conflict besides goblin thieves, which run away the moment they have been spotted.

Has anyone had any long term success on small fortresses with raids and demon wars?

[Thief^]

By default titans only attack at after 80 dwarves. This is a worldgen setting. There are probably similar restrictions on actual goblin attacks.

[Oliolli]

I think the limit for proper goblin attacks is 60 inhabitants.

Not sure how one would do with clowns though

[Befenismor]

Yeah, small fortresses are awesome. Don't have to worry about all the retarded migrants that arrive twice a year in huge numbers.

[Flying Dice]

If you change worldgen settings so you get titans, sieges, etc, at low population.

I tend to dislike the sort of micromanagement overdrive that is necessary to keep a fortress functioning with <5 idlers when the population is in the hundreds. Also, given how long military train times are, I usually end up with 5-10 uberdwarves and a ton of cannonfodder anyway, so it honestly makes more sense to cut out the fat, and just have a few dwarves that are really good at what they do in each role, so the only real problem is the lack of redundancy in case of fatalities.

[Azated]

I used to run with a 20 dwarf limit myself, Until I discovers therapist and decided to make massive armies.

I'm thinking about going to a limit of somewhere around 50 or so, So I can still have a reasonable army without having 100 dwarves assigned to hauling bodies.

[Deon]

If you change worldgen settings so you get titans, sieges, etc, at low population.

I tend to dislike the sort of micromanagement overdrive that is necessary to keep a fortress functioning with <5 idlers when the population is in the hundreds.

I have no problems here.

Make a farming, a crafting, a forging and a military profile and a few nobles, and assign profiles in batches. Voila, the fortress runs by itself!

[Hyndis]

Unless you're using large amounts of trap you're doomed. Goblins will win by attrition.

If you're worried about FPS set the population cap to around 100, but then make a micro-fort. Make it a 2x2 or even a 1x1 fort. Large numbers of dwarves in a small fort means you need to build vertically, but you will have the population to replace inevitable losses.

[IT 000]

I've had no problem with small forts. In fact I've had a lot of fun with forts <20 it's fun since you actually try to prevent children from being kidnapped as they become valuable assets. Of course I modded it so they grew into adults after two years for my sanity's sake. Additionally you know all your dwarves rather then just 'arrowshield' A, B, and C. Goblins pose a slight hazard since you need every hand you can get. But five elite dwarves outfitted in Funstuffium can still win against a siege of goblins every time.

Finally the higher FPS is always a nice plus.

Now though I usually hang around 30, Migrant waves usually go into the 40's anyway, and births bring me up to a mayor after a few years.

[Sutremaine]

Unless you're using large amounts of trap you're doomed. Goblins will win by attrition.

Not necessarily. I was doing fine in a three-year-old fortress using three squads of two (iron equipment, disabled attribute decay). Training is everything. A skilled dwarf can parry, block, or dodge an attack before it even contacts armour, and kill half an ambush squad so quickly that the ones at the back don't even join battle.

Getting agile dwarves into the military is also important. Blenders work best at high speed, after all.

[blizzerd]

i have a 20 dwarf civvy limit in my head, and anything else gets drafted

[zephyr_hound]

I like small forts for the FPS but I always find that I end up needing more manpower. The fort I have right now I wanted to keep it at 80 but now the big sieges have started to hit I literally can't get all the junk melted/dumped between battles, so I had to put it up to 140 just to get enough haulers.

Maybe I should do a Boatmurdered and start pumping magma onto the surface to melt/burn all the crap...

[Hyndis]

Unless you're using large amounts of trap you're doomed. Goblins will win by attrition.

Not necessarily. I was doing fine in a three-year-old fortress using three squads of two (iron equipment, disabled attribute decay). Training is everything. A skilled dwarf can parry, block, or dodge an attack before it even contacts armour, and kill half an ambush squad so quickly that the ones at the back don't even join battle.

Getting agile dwarves into the military is also important. Blenders work best at high speed, after all.

I know, but you're still going to take losses. I have 30 elite dwarves who engage goblin sieges in melee. I lose about 1 dwarf every 4 years or so. Its rare but unlucky hits do happen. It also takes longer than 4 years to get an elite dwarf. With 30 of them this means the remaining 29 elites can cover for the 1 rookie until he gets up to speed.

[Vercingetorix]

I know, but you're still going to take losses. I have 30 elite dwarves who engage goblin sieges in melee. I lose about 1 dwarf every 4 years or so. Its rare but unlucky hits do happen. It also takes longer than 4 years to get an elite dwarf. With 30 of them this means the remaining 29 elites can cover for the 1 rookie until he gets up to speed.

I have a similar situation; however, it does appear that those new recruits train very quickly if put in to a squad with a group of elites; my fort's population is maintained solely by children becoming adults and I've already trained up one of them to expert hammerdwarf/legendary fighter in two years.

[Eggocchio]

War beasts can tip the balance I find. I love small forts.