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[Xheia]

I'm having trouble getting my military to do what I want when a siege comes. The kill and station orders give me trouble, and the way the dwarves select a target is somewhat troublesome.
In theory:
I don't want a single dwarf trying to attack a whole goblin squad by themselves, as they inevitably get killed.
I would also want  to get my archers to soften up specific squads.
What happens (at least in my last siege): (This may be too rambling)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I try to station my melee dwarves in a gathering area, away from the fighting but still above ground.
Some dwarves see the goblins, and charge off individually.
I give a kill order to all the melee soldiers, but they still milled at their station - I had to give another move order to where the goblins are, and at that point, the couple of charging dwarves are already dead.
Even when the dwarves charge at once, some of them are faster, and are therefore targeted by multiple goblins.

My marksdwarves almost never target where I want them to. Often, they step outside, and fire at whatever's closest - which isn't necessarily important to me. Especially elite marksdwarves - I station them somewhat close to the goblin squad they're supposed to attack, ask them to kill the squad, and they shoot across the map to another squad. It's also difficult to get them to target at one specific person (such as the squad leader).

I guess I want advice and info.
For advice, what specific steps do you do when there is a siege? Do you only use kill orders, for example, or only station?
Do dwarves always target the closest enemy? Do they need to be in sight? How big is their range, or field of vision, or whatever? Do dwarves ever change targets, or do they keep on attacking until someone dies?
For orders - when I set a move order, the dwarves often still have "Go to combat practice" or whatever as their job. Is this normal? When I give one move order after another, I think dwarves still go to the first station first, and then the second one. What is the deal with "No reachable enemies?" Do dwarves react slowly to kill/station orders, and why?

Edit: I'm using the .07 version.

[Maxmurder]

Darves are pretty dense when it comes to combat stratagy (ie. dodging off cliffs, taking on a gobbo bowman squad alone). My stratagy for sieges is to let the gobbos come to me. Station your dwarves in a indoor battle room. Make sure your dwarves dont see the gobbos until they are inside the killing room, otherwise they will blindly charge in. Filter the gobbos thru some traps before they get into the killing room.
For marksdwarves, set up a patrol along your walls (with fortifications of course) that is only acessable from inside your fort. Have at least two or three constantly patroling when things are peaceful. When a siege comes and dosnt have any master bowgobs set thier patrol orders to reqire the whole squad that way they will all move to defend your walls. Stationing marksdarves isnt the best idea because once they run out of ammo they will suicide charge. Having them patrol instead lets them reload once they are out of ammo.

[Loud Whispers]

Dwarves don't always target the same enemy. It always depends really, you can never count on a Dwarf to target one target and one alone. Then again, the Dwarf might just do that, they're chaotic creatures.

Also if you ever want to engage the goblins, station your Dwarves next to the goblins. This'll ensure that the Dwarves all rally to the same place as each other, and automatically engage the goblins usually in the best manner possible. Usually with an axe. Kill orders tend to be rather finicky.

[DTF]

Build a twisty path so your melees will only ever see the few gobs that just came around a corner.
Thats the easiest way to control dwarves mid-battle: breaking line of sight to the enemy.

[Werdna]

Highly recommend using the "come to me" style.  Use bridges to seal off your fortress from invasion until you are ready, and use several with spacing, to create zones that allow you to 'trap' a siege within your walls.

Typical siege for me is:
1.  A vile force of darkness!
2.  civilians ordered to burrow, military to stations; close the bridges and seal the fort if we need time
3.  Open the bridges once military is ready and civilians are out of the way
4.  Seal the farthest bridge as the siege moves past it (with good timing, you can even split a large siege into two!)*
5.  Wait for siege to enter the kill rooms.  My forts make them run by a gauntlet room of marksdwarves perched above them, before they turn a corner into the melee dwarves' room.
6.  Open bridge to let in remainder, if they haven't left already, and repeat
7.  Profit!

* three major benefits of sealing a siege in - it prevents your melee from chasing stuff back out, where more siegers and possibly ambushers await; your little ax murderers get maximum experience from killing every last goblin; and the resulting goblinite is now inside your walls for easy and safe collection.

[Panando]

Managing military dwarves is comparable to herding cats. Actually that's a bad simile. It's more like herding a bunch of bloodthirsty like psychopaths who will try to murder the first thing they see (or if armed with a crossbow, might shoot at it).

My favoured strategy is this:

When a siege is announced I civilian alert to get everyone inside. I station all my squads to activate them. I place the marksdwarves in front, and the melee dwarves behind them. The siegers will charge up to the marksdwarves, who will rain bolts down on them. The trick here, is that a struck enemy will usually stop, the still-healthy enemies will overtake the wounded enemies, and the marksdwarves in the back will start shooting at the still healthy enemies, if you have enoguh "depth" of marksdwarves you can easily create a field of crippled enemies this way. Ence either the enemy stop trying to advance because they're all crippled, or get close to the marksdwarves, the melee dwarves charge forward (or are ordered to move out), and clean up.

One strategy worth using is the "Dwarvern Landmine". Have a hatch, and your melee squad stationed a couple of z-levels below. have the marksdwarves stationed on top of the hatch. The enemies will charge forward and get shot to pieces, once they get close, station the melee dwarves on the surface, they will erupt from the hatch and slaughter everything (to maximize gibs, use axedwarves).

This approach of letting the enemy charge, then engage them when they are close, works a lot better than letting the melee dwarves rush out immediately.

I almost exclusively use open-field engagements. Sometimes I station the marksdwarves on a tower or a de-ramped hill - or even a de-ramped hole in the ground - so that they can fire a lot more bolts before the enemy attackers can engage them. But really it's a lot more sporting to fight on the open ground and it gives everyone a nice day out.

[Werdna]

One strategy worth using is the "Dwarvern Landmine". Have a hatch, and your melee squad stationed a couple of z-levels below. have the marksdwarves stationed on top of the hatch. The enemies will charge forward and get shot to pieces, once they get close, station the melee dwarves on the surface, they will erupt from the hatch and slaughter everything (to maximize gibs, use axedwarves).

This strat is also good in a pinch vs enemy archer squads, and Elite Archers.  A good trick is to give the enemy archers some sort of distant target(s) to focus their fire on first, before springing your melee into their midst.