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[Kelner]

I've been wondering how to equip my militia so it attains higher survival rate. I have access to virtually unlimited amount of steel (magma smelters running, lots of coke bars in stock and chalk is the primary sedimentary stone) so I can put as much armour on my dwarves as I want. The question is how much is most efficient. I've done some basic arena testing and for no Armour user skill adding just one additional steel mail shirt was putting fighters at disadvantage. At Proficient there was some advantage. Most of my military dwarves have this skill at higher level. So how much armour should the put on?

Also, does any additional clothing make a difference. If yes, is leather better than cloth?

I will be grateful for any advice. I'm thinking about converting my whole fort into walking tanks and then taking Hell head on so any info on making my dwarves more deadly and resilient is useful.

[Hyndis]

My standard uniform is as follows:

1 weapon (depending on squad type)
1 steel shield
1 steel helmet
1 steel breastplate
2 steel chainmail hauberk (chainmail shirt modded with UBSTEP:MAX and LBSTEP:MAX so its functionally a robe that doesn't decay from wear)
1 pair of gauntlets
1 pair of greaves
1 pair of high boots

[Kelner]

I'm using the same set myself (sans one mail shirt) but I'm wondering how to improve it.

Also, as adamantine is available in very limited supply, how do I best use it? Make a set of armour out of it for my best dwarf, give everybody adamantine helmets or forge adamantine weapons?

[Blucher]

I'm using the same set myself (sans one mail shirt) but I'm wondering how to improve it.

Also, as adamantine is available in very limited supply, how do I best use it? Make a set of armour out of it for my best dwarf, give everybody adamantine helmets or forge adamantine weapons?

IMO, weapons.  I'd rather have 10 badass weapons than 1 awesome suit of armor.  (Unless you are planning on visiting with an adventurer later, something I always think I might do one day but never get around to.)

[DrKillPatient]

The shield's material actually doesn't make a difference when it comes to blocking, however, it matters in shield bashes. You may be better off with copper shields, as they're the densest that you can normally get.
EDIT: Lighter shields do mean that your non-legendary-amor-user dwarves will move a bit faster. I'm not sure how much that matters.

As for adamantine, I'd first get a legendary weaponsmith, then try to get as many masterwork adamantine edged weapons as necessary. Steel armor should protect your dwarves quite well from everything but bolts/arrows, but adamantine doesn't tend to help with those either. Adamantine edged weapons, however, cut through virtually all types of armor with incredible ease. I've seen a masterwork battleaxe bisect megabeasts on several occasions.

[Hyndis]

The highest priority piece of armor is of course a helmet. Wounds to the rest of the body are generally survivable if you can protect against one of your dwarves being brained by a stray arrow.

Make helmets out of the highest quality and best materials you can get your hands on.

[WealthyRadish]

You may also want to train a new weapon/armorsmith from scratch who happens to like adamantine, as then they'll produce many more masterworks at legendary 5+. Or you could just melt battleaxes, as they seem to give 120% yield... kind of exploitish though.

Definitely make weapons before armor. If you do have enough for armor, I'd make adamantine helms, if nothing else. The head is usually the most vulnerable part of a dorf. After that, some mail shirts, as they have good coverage, then greaves, then breastplates, then gauntlets, then boots.

[xpi0t0s]

I've been using this recipe from the wiki.  It seems to work fairly well; one legendary armour user/speardwarf stood up to the circus and lasted quite a long time.........:

Key: S=steel, L=leather, C=cloth.  "L6 x hood" means "6 leather hoods".

Per dwarf:

Head (H:Helm)
S2 x caps
S1 x helm
L6 x hood

Upper Body (A:Armor)
S1 x breastplate
S3 x mail shirts
L6 x cloaks

Lower Body (no foreign items) (L:Legs)
L2 x trousers
S1 x greaves

Hands (G:Gloves)
S1 x pairs of gauntlets
L1 x pairs of mittens

Feet (no foreign items) (B:Boots)
C1 x pair of socks
S1 x pair of high boots

[xpi0t0s]

Plus a shield and weapon of course.  This worked for a while, then for some reason I never understood they suddenly decided to wear two socks on one foot, couldn't get a boot on and went into battle with only one high boot.  Removing the socks from the recipe solved that.  Ref: http://dwarffortresswiki.org/index.php/Armor

[Kelner]

I guess I'll forge some adamantine weapons, then use leftovers for helmets. Axes are no brainers, but should I make adamantine spears and swords? The steel ones see to pierce stuff pretty well on their own.

I'm not sure if it's possible to clone adamantine by melting. Battle axs has MATERIAL_SIZE of 4, according to raws, and DFWiki says it takes MATERIAL_SIZE wafers to smith an object from adamantine (unlike 1 bar for weapons and 1-3 for peace of armour when it comes to normal metals). If that's true, you will lose 2,8 wafers for every adamantine battle axe melted.

Back to the original question: How many mail shirts can a dwarf put on for maximum efficiency. Does extra clothing (hoods, cloaks etc.) increase survivability? If so, is leather better than cloth?

[TerryDactyl]

Test it in the arena. Sometimes, less is more.

It depends on what you're up against.

For instance, it would seem that leather armour is more effective against goblin macemen (typically wearing a helmet and a breastplate, but with soft limbs) for two reasons: blunt damage largely ignores armour, and the extra speed conferred by a lighter loadout can be a significant factor in battle. Therefore, I advise equipping a squad with full leathers plus steel helmets and the best edged weaponry available.

However, if they're coming at you with axes, you're probably better off with full plate.

[Kelner]

I've been using this recipe from the wiki.  It seems to work fairly well; one legendary armour user/speardwarf stood up to the circus and lasted quite a long time.........:
(...)

Head (H:Helm)
S2 x caps
S1 x helm
L6 x hood

I guess that legendary armour users will get all benefits of heavy armour without being slowed down but what about lesser dwarves? Also, is it possible to equip both a helm and caps? Wiki says they both are shaped.

[celem]

I've been using this recipe from the wiki.  It seems to work fairly well; one legendary armour user/speardwarf stood up to the circus and lasted quite a long time.........:

A bunch of the old wiki templates for uniforms wont work with the latest releases.  Caps for one got 'shaped' and dont layer with a helm anymore.

Never underestimate the effects of layering armor.  In practice there is room for many multiple pieces, like 6 hoods or 3 mail shirts.  I generally dont bother with this, feels unrealistic.
A tweaked version of what xpi0t0s posted that works in latest version but doesnt double pieces:

L Hood, Helm
Mail Shirt, Breastplate, L Robe
Gauntlets, L Mittens
L Trousers, Greaves
Socks, High boots
Shield

The 'L' pieces are leather.  Vastly inferior to metal yet less burdening.  Still superior to cloth.
You could actually use my uniform as listed above but have 3x mail shirts and 6x robes and it all still fits, I just dont as it looks unreal.

Every extra item increases survivability, you may see in combat reports that your dwarves get injured through 'leather hood' or whatever but in that case the blow is penetrating both hood and helm, only one gets named in the report.

Always set any 'full' uniform to replace clothing or they will equip a random subset of it

edit: when it comes to training off the armor burdens, I give them the leather parts of the above outfit and the metal helm initially.  Soon as they hit 2-3 ranks in ArmUser the metal goes back on, this feels to me like just long enough that they dont crawl everywhere.  They probably still fight suboptimaly, but that doesnt matter greatly since its balanced by the goblins not being able to wound them even if they do hit.  Their armor user goes up rapidly if you make them fight in the plate, it just doesnt work so well if they actually have 0 skill, hence leathers for a year, but it probably take you a year before you have plate for em anyway

[wuphonsreach]

See also:
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=113502.0

Minimum armor for haulers in my forts is as follows.  But my goal is lightweight, crossbow, militia which will easily fit "over" existing clothing.

- copper/bronze/iron/steel mail leggings
- copper/bronze/iron/steel mail shirt
- copper/bronze/iron/steel gauntlets
- at least (1) leather cloak
- at least (1) leather hood
- leather helm (shaped)
- leather boot (shaped)
- wood/bone/leather buckler
- wood/bone crossbow

[Telgin]

Has anyone done any extensive testing to see how much impact multiple layers of armor has in combat?  I'd be a bit disappointed to discover that two mail shirts didn't help at all, for example.  If I find the time I'm going to try testing this myself at some point.