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[conein]

So i got the farms running even if we are short on seeds, the militia seem to get bugged only when i try to  kill that giant hamster. I also plan on creating a second squad with moar axedwarves and three archers. 300000 wealth created in the second test, so i guess stuff is going pretty food. Now i only need to learn how the whole...mechanic stuff works. I tried to let the water go in the fortress with a channel, but i totally didnt succeed.

[PatrikLundell]

Seed shortage tends to sort itself out over time, but brewing the produce promptly ensures seeds are freed up for planting.
A mixed squad is not a good idea, generally. Personally I find marksdwarves too bugged, ineffective, and obnoxious to be worth the effort, but others on the forum disagree.

Wealth is basically irrelevant since the economy is broken.

Getting water into the fortress should be done with care, because any hole can be used by nasties to enter. Drawbridges are the standard answer to that, though.

Getting water to flow isn't that hard: Dig a channel or tunnel up to, but not through to the water, ensure you have drawbridges to control the water flow as well as access to the fortress. Make sure you have the water destination figured out (typically a cistern with a depth of at least two tiles). Note that water flows just fine through staircases, so the tunnel you dig can use staircases for vertical flow. When you've set all the infrastructure up, and tested that you actually build raising rather than retracting drawbridges, you channel the last tile to the water from above, and the water will start flowing. Note that a mega channel or basin will have difficulties filling up with water due to evaporation, so avoid a 50 * 50 swimming pool (you can get around the evaporation issue by dividing the pool into sections so you fill one then channel away the wall, fill up the combined one, etc).
You can do some test channeling up on the surface by e.g. first channeling out two tiles one tile away from a body of water, and then channel away the tile separating the areas.

[conein]

The situation was critical, our drinks became 0. Only one thing could save us: A merchant caravan with a shitload of brew-able plants.
And suddently, a caravan has come. It had a shitload of brew-able plants. And also a lot of fungus seeds. Now we have a lot of food, a lot of drinks, a lot of seeds, a lot of skilled axedwarves. TIME TO CONQUER THE WORLD

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Also, i did this stuff. Its autumn now and the water froze, but when summer comes we should have UNLIMITED WATER CONTROL

[PatrikLundell]

Actually, there are two other ways to salvage the situation:
1. Use herbalism to collect overground plants, brew them, and plant their seeds in overground farm plots (some can only be cooked, though, and there are a couple of dye ones). Obviously doesn't work in completely unsuitable biomes such as on top of a glacier.
2.  Find the caverns and use herbalism to harvest underground crops, brew them, and plant their seeds as per normal.

[conein]

Got another problem now: I created a training room for archers with training targets, they are equipped with weapons and quivers and arrows, but they train in "individual combat drill" instead of "archery"

[PatrikLundell]

Marksdwarves do that as well. However, to enable archery targets to actually be used for training, you'll have to assign each and every target to be used to your marksdwarf squad.

[conein]

I did it but they are not doing it.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Also that junk happened

[Shonai_Dweller]

Is your squad set to the active/training alert?
Are they scheduled to train this month (should be default setting for active/training alert).
 - Archers not scheduled to train, sometimes train individually anyhow.
Do they all have crossbows/bolts?
Do you have an archery range (in which each individual target is set as a training 'range' for your squad)?

In which case they should get round to training at some point.

If still confused, try this thread:
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=150494.0

[conein]

Do i. Need stacks of bolts for every single person?

[Shonai_Dweller]

You need quite a lot of bolts, especially if you have hunters digging into the supplies.
Seems like you can set exactly how many each archer takes, but I've never tested it to see if they'll split stacks by themselves. I usually dedicate one workshop to churning out wooden bolts until I've got things sorted enough to have a massive supply of metal bolts.

So long as there's an accessible pile of bolts someplace in the fort they'll go pick some up whenever they run out (oh, do they all have quivers?).

There's seems to be a bug involving bolts in bins (think it's still a bug?) becoming unusable. Dfhack has a hack that works around this.

[conein]

Instructions not clear, dwarf stuck in cage. Gotta find a way to let him out or...sell him.

[PatrikLundell]

I believe just 'q' the cage and remove the cage assignment of the dorf should do it. That's the way you release animals (as well as captive undead, etc). If that doesn't work, the safer way of releasing hostiles should work: 'b'uild-'j'cage somewhere, build a lever, hook the lever to the cage, pull lever. That releases whatever was in the cage and unbuilds the cage (i.e. it becomes a free cage again). Dismantle the lever (you may greet the former captive first, if you like) to recover the two mechanisms built into it.

[conein]

Ehm guys.. i tought retracting bridges stopped the water flow... the fortress is getting flooded D:

[PatrikLundell]

Raising drawbridges raise to block anything moving horizontally (provided there are walls to the side of it. Also a roof above the bridge is required to stop things from getting over the bridge).
Retracting bridges basically disappear when retracted. This means they will block vertical water flow when extended, and let it through when retracted. A retracted drawbridge will let falling objects through, but a cave-in will smash it even if retracted and the falling rock doesn't reach the walls.

There are a number of ways to deal with flooding:
- A screw pump can remove water to allow dorfs to brick up the breach. The job will probably be suspended again and again, but each time a dorf manages to start working on it the wall building will progress a little further. You may want to check the wiki page on the double-slit method for aquifer penetration.
- Digging a tunnel to the edge of the map (underground), then smooth the edge stone tile, and then carve a fortification in it, and finally redirect water to the tunnel will cause the water to flow off the edge.
- Dig down to the caverns and route the water there.
- Brick the accesses to the flooding shaft up to contain the water and dig a new shaft afterwards if needed. This can stabilize the situation to buy you enough time to get a screw pump to plug the water entrance. Thereafter water can be gotten rid of through one of the methods above, through a bucket brigade, or an atom smashing (raising) drawbridge (build the bridge and hook it up either to a lever or a repeater, dig a passage to let the water into the chamber with the bridge, raise/lower the bridge repeatedly to atom smash the water away.
- Use a cave-in to plug the water entrance. This option is probably not available if you've routed a stream or river into the fortress, but if you've got rock above the entrance (or a convenient place further downstream), you can engineer a cave-in to block it.
- If you're flooding from a body with a limited amount of water in it (normally a murky pool), you can get rid of the water by getting it to spread so thin that the depth becomes 1/7. At this point the water will evaporate. Another alternative in this case is of course to lead the water to a new basin deeper than you'd intended.

[conein]

Why arent traps working? I keep getting the message "Live hamster has gnawed his way out of confinement!"