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[kontako]

Hey a moment ago 2 blind cave ogres walked into my cave. I sent some of my Marks-dwarfs to deal with them at long range so they wont get hurt. For some reason they took incredibly long to get prepaid. When they finally walked down into the caves I noticed they were not firing any bolts, that's because they didn't even pick any up! even after how long they took to get prepared. next they just dropped their crossbows on the ground and charged at the cave ogres and began to wrestle them with their teeth?!

the cave ogres killed them quickly because they didn't even bring any Armour!
What the hell is going on!!!!!

[hiroshi42]

Dearth of data denies diagnosis.

Do you have: 
Bolts
Quivers
Armor
Armor assigned to marksdwarves
are all these things accesable to the drunken draftees

The marksdwarves should have at least used the crossbows as clubs, but if they have hunting, mining, or woodcutting available that can and will interfere with their uniforms, in some cases to the point of them running naked screaming into battle or your dining hall. Or possibly both if you are having a bad day

[kontako]

yep
yep
yep
nope, although they should automatically pick up any laying around right?
yep

That's the strange part! They just dropped them and began to wrestle, is there a way to set it to 'ranged combat only'?
Also they had their job listed as "No accessible opponent" or something like that, I don't know what it means by that, they were standing right next to the ogre.

[thegoatgod_pan]

Did you give a kill order? Those seem to override normal combat behavior and make dwarves go melee berserker. Move orders are your friend with marksdwarves

[kontako]

Yeah, I gave them a kill order. I didn't know there was such thing as a move order? 

[Argonnek]

Open the (s)quad orders screen, choose (a) squad, and then hit the (m)ove button and select a destination with the cursor using (enter).

[kontako]

Thanks.

This may be a little off topic, but: Currently I'm trying to keep all my dwarfs inside my fortress while leaving a small passage full of traps. Is there any way I can set a "No matter what, no one may enter this passageway" tag to this area? my dwarfs are constantly waltzing outside picking up random junk, even though I've set a restricted traffic tag to the hallway.

Any way of doing this without having to constantly activate or update the area of a burrow would be extremely helpful! 

[Deus Asmoth]

The only way I've found is locking them inside the dining room. Even forbidding everything outside hasn't been enough to prevent the lemming rush in my experience.

[GiglameshDespair]

ssign your civvies to a burrow. You miliary will be in their barracks training. You can seal off the outside with doors that remain locked, as well, or using raised bridges. Bridges are ideal because they cannot be destroyed once raised.

[Berossus]

Do your marksdwarves have ANY experience in archery?
Ive noticed that dwarves tend to use their best weapon available, so if they are lvl 0 archers but lvl 1 wrestlers, they might go to wrestle the ogres.

[RickiusMaximus]

In the military menu did you specify what ammo the dwarfs are allowed to use? This is separate from the equip screen...

If you have one set of bolts set as training and one set as combat then the dwarfs may already have their quivers full of training bolts and not be able to fit the combat bolts in.

Try selecting only one type of bolts at a time and set them for training and combat and see if they shoot those.


Also make sure you leave a good bit of time between making equipment changes and station dwarfs

[Loud Whispers]

Yeah I was about to ask if you assigned them any ammo.

[Anathema]

Also as a general failsafe, never send military dwarves directly into contact. First tell them to 'move' somewhere nearby but not close enough to trigger combat - preferably with a locked door or raised drawbridge between them and the enemy. Wait for them to assemble, double check that they have all the proper equipment. Don't unlock the door/lower the bridge and order them at the enemy until most of your squad is present and equipped.

[Findulidas]

Dwarves are dumb and the military system, especially ammo, orders and armor/weapons, is currently not really working as it should. So much micromanaging has to be done it order for it to work like it should. My forts always rely on a loooong corridor of traps before the military is allowed to touch the invaders, that way I dont have to work as much when goblin christmas arrives. Its to bad the first two traps you can make stonefall and cagetrap, are either crap or far too good.

Cage traps opness is also attributed to a bug with no current good fix. The only cages animals can nibble themselves out of are artifact cages and not normal ones.

[Seraphim342]

Do your marksdwarves have ANY experience in archery?
Ive noticed that dwarves tend to use their best weapon available, so if they are lvl 0 archers but lvl 1 wrestlers, they might go to wrestle the ogres.

This might be the problem even if they *do* have marksmanship skills, but no arrows.  Afaik the crossbow melee attack still uses the Hammerdwarf skill, not Marksdwarf.