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[1A4blazeit]

I've played a few fortresses, I've had maxed-out populations before, but for this one I'm trying to optimize my labour force.

What's a good percentage of your fortress to dedicate to pure haulers? Within the non-haulers, how many dwarves should be able to do any given labour, and how many labours should each dwarf have?

[Dunamisdeos]

Honestly, any dwarf that does not need to be called up at a moment's notice (broker, medical dwarves) have hauling enabled in my fort.

It's hard to give a specific answer for ultra-specialization without knowing the kind of industries and the size of your fort. Basically, play with it until you are happy with the speed that things get moved from place to place. Have plenty of wheelbarrows, and use minecarts for further efficiency.

[NullForceOmega]

Only my miners and soldiers don't haul.

[Uggh]

I always have two kinds of haulers (using custom professions in DT). "Heavy hauling" includes everything and is given only to dwarves with unimportant jobs. Depending on circumstances, a quarter to  a third of total pop.
"Light hauling" is only for those labours that are not required very often but should be done soon, burial or animal hauling, for example. Next to everybody gets to do this.
Then I might have truly dedicated haulers for things that have to move fast and constantly, e.g. food and refuse. A dedicated hauler has only this one labour activated. In a fort of 100 there are maybe one food and one or two refuse haulers.

[SyrusLD]

In my fortress with 120 adult dwarves (and finally only ~15 children) I noticed that jobs aren't being given at a fast enough rate that everyone is working anyway. While it might have to do with having lots and lots of stuff on the (quantum)stockpiles, it means that I pretty much just have almost everyone be a hauler - the hauling jobs get assigned after the workshop jobs anyway, and even later the "fill minecart" jobs get done. So most of the dwarves will just be sitting around doing nothing before a new wave of (hauling) jobs gets assigned, but this can take a considerable while.

Starting a new fortress I'd always suggest to have important workers (miner, carpenter, mason, broker, manager, etc.) not be haulers. After that I thought about having a dedicated hauling-force, but after running in the above mentioned problem, I just decided to keep only the few important people without hauling enabled and get everyone else to carry stuff. Carrying stone from excavation areas is by far what takes up the most time for haulers, so maybe plan accordingly here.

Minecarts can do a fine job, but for me, they lately became a factor that almost slows things down a bit because while everyone carries things to the stockpiles that fill the minecarts, it takes twice as long before they decide to fill up the minecart itself, mostly only after the stockpile is full and they can't haul stuff there anymore. Then again, they work really nicely for making lots of quantumstockpiles. And I'd guess for bigger fortresses they might also be more helpful - my embark area is only 20z level deep before the magma and I kept the hauling routes as short as possible via design.

[Albedo]

Bottom line, you don't want anyone with an "important" or "urgent" job, or a localized job, to do hauling. Hauling can take a long time, and/or can take them far from where they started, often many times in a row, delaying that key job. No sense for a Legendary Mason to waste time doing a job that any peasant can do.

So, any dwarf with an important "production" job never hauls in my fort. This usually includes my masons, mechanic, and carpenter, at least (who "always" seem to be busy producing one thing or another).  Also any metal smiths (armour/weapon, but also black/crafters) who are currently producing. And miners - they're busy elsewhere, no time to walk back to where hauling happens.

If you have a peasant-type with a key job or job combo, he may be turned off too - my Brewer/Herbalist has only enough time to do one or the other, no time for hauling. My Farmer(s) - depends how many I have; if only 1, then he's full-time, but if I get some high-Grower-level migrants, they might also do Food hauling (only).

Similarly, if it's time to milk/make cheese, or gather cave spider silk and spin it, or cook meals, or make soap (if the hospital is running low), or mill dye clothing, or similar "now is the time" jobs, then those specific peasants get all hauling turned off, and they concentrate on getting their job(s) done NOW, tyvm.

Anyone and everyone else, including any of the above that is NOT time-critical, have most hauling enabled all the time - a few non-critical soap jobs via the Manager will get done when they get done - if it's no rush, it's no problem.

That still works out to be well over 50% - maybe 60-70%?


The only "specialized" haulers I have are for Stone and Animal hauling. For these, I go into DFHack and look at the Attributes of my peasants* - for Animals, I want only higher Agility for speed to go find them asap, and for hauling (often quite heavy) Cages they also need high Strength - or, at least, not "low" in either.  Similarly for stones (that occasionally do not have wheelbarrows) I want high Strength and and again "not low" Agility, as they are often walking loooong distances down z-levels.

(* I give all my "peasants" a nickname, preceded by the lone letter "p", so I can group them alphabetically in DFHack. True no-skill peasants get "p" (possibly w/ some other info), while my Master Threshers get a "P" w/ their skill(s) in their nickname. Works for me, even if same skill often has same "first name". ymmv.)

Almost everyone has Lever Pulling (except Miners), and most peasants have Refuse hauling for QSP duty. No one ever has Wood Hauling (that's QSP only). Burial, Trade Depot and Water Hauling are individually selected only when needed.

I'll also have "assistant" Masons and/or Mechanics, to build bridges and make blocks and load traps, so my main dwarves can concentrate on their workshops.

[Psieye]

With Dwarf Therapist, I designate a custom job profile: Drone. These dwarves have ~30 labours enabled, including all the hauling. All the jobs where skill can be compensated with quantity, the drones do.

Non-drone, non-important jobs have hauling permissions dependent on my needs. It's not hard to toggle the hauling for 30+ dwarves with Therapist.