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[vassock]

I have a goblin invasion and they seem to have figured out that trying to cross the nice, long, wide drawbridge results in the drawbridge retracting and dropping them several feet onto a trapped floor death trap with no way out. So they are just standing next to the tower with the doorway to the stairs that lead to the bridge even when the path is clear with no conventional weapon traps in the way. How do I attack them without using a military?

[PatrikLundell]

I don't think enemy campers are the result of any thought. Rather, I think the stand where their leader fell.
Camping invaders are a major annoyance, and my main method of dealing with them is to try to figure out where they'll camp and have a retracting drawbridge drop them into traps.
In my case I have a lot of cage traps, and the campers tend to stand just beyond the furthermost cages in the entrance tunnel, so I have an area with cage traps beneath that which I drop the campers in (and a drawbridge to close the entrance tunnel, so any campers there will get atom smashed or thrown away).

When you're already in the situation, you're basically stuffed. Campers will just stand around until they get bored and leave (if you're lucky it will be the end of the season, but if you're unlucky they'll be there for a year).
If the enemy doesn't have missile troops you might use civilian bait, i.e. get some civilian to take up a job on the other side of the bridge, start to move over it, and then flee when they see the enemy. If you're lucky the enemy will see the bait and try to catch it, and you can then try to time the bridge opening to not sacrifice the bait. There is a significant risk you'll be unlucky and the civilian will see the enemy, but the enemy won't budge.
If you've got sufficient space (more than 10 tiles, I think, to be out of sight), you can set up a ballista at your side of the bridge (a fortification in front of it, preferably several tiles, is good) and then hurl ballista arrows at the enemy. You can use a catapult if you're short of wood, since stone shouldn't be an issue.
Note that siege operator is a civilian job, so the operator will flee when the enemy comes into view, hence the distance. You also want to protect the operator from enemy missiles, which is what the fortification is for.

Edit:
Another approach (need not be exclusive) in case you're if for a one year siege and the campers are in open air, is to build a 12 or so tile high staircase out of sight of the invaders (or the builders will get spooked), then build a floor out to above the enemy. Out there you can either dump rocks on top of them by setting up a dumping zone (stuff dumped at tiles along an edge will fall off the edge), or build a retracting drawbridge on top of which you place mine carts (lead is a good choice) filled with pointy stuff to create dwarven cluster bombs activated when the bridge is retracted. Note that I haven't actually tested that dropped mine carts will spread their contents, though (I know mine carts will spread their contents if they run into a wall at a sufficiently high speed, but that's a horizontal movement. Mine carts dropped down a 100 level chute will retain their contents when the fall came from a track ending at the chute [and the speed wasn't too high]).

[Uggh]

To add to the previous proposal, you could simply cave in the floor above the siege.

You might also consider equipping some crossbows and e.g. carve fortifications to attack the siege from a distance; if they don't have archers in the siege.

You could also create another enclosed space behind the drawbridge, put traps and an animal or dwarve as bait therein (or a door if dealing with building destroyers) and open the bridge.

It depends very much on your entrance layout. If the effort is too high and you do not depend on the surface or caravans for survival, waiting might still be the best option.

[Niddhoger]

In general, it helps to have layered defenses.  Have a quick and easy access tunnel to the center of your fort for your dorfs (and traders) to use.  Then have a long winding death-entrance for your less civilized guests.  When said miscreants arrive, close off the main entrance to your fort, force your new friends into the other gauntlet.  If its large enough, most of the siege force can be within it before triggering your traps (bridge-drops, drowning chambers, repeating spike corridors, etc.  I often end them with a room full of drunken axelords to pick off stragglers.  I often include ballista batteries as well (ballista have a range of nearly 200 tiles).  As has been said, if a leader is killed (or cage-trapped), his squad mates will just stand there stupified. 

Oh, another note.  Instead of manually opening/closing bridges all the time, you could make 1-tile walkways lined with weapontraps.  When the enemies dodge, they'll wind up falling off the walkway into your pit (preferably staffed by a forgotten beast >D)

[vassock]

I'm finding the best way is to have some long, winding airlock large enough to lure in the entire enemy force and then trapping it. They are less likely to be bugged that way. Once they are all trapped, you can take your time dealing with them.

[Ganb]

Something I like to do is have a constructed cage or two set up around where the enemy will loiter. These are filled with whatever animal (or animal-man) you can get your hands on, tame or not. Just make sure there's a lot of them.

Then you deconstruct it via lever from the safety of your fort, unleashing them on the goblins. Results will vary.

I had 20 ravens packed into a cage once, that was fun. Goblins were directly in their path of escape.

EDIT: This works better inside small tunnels where the animals have to go through the goblins to get out.

[Blue_Dwarf]

Have you tried a set of two bridges like that?

Maybe they will path through the second bridge once the first one breaks the pathing.

[PatrikLundell]

Campers caught within an airlock generally won't move even when the inner drawbridge is lowered (if it was even raised), in my experience.

[Detros]

Just two addings:

• When sending a bait, you can also station some guard dogs nearby to buy the bait more time.
• When you get above them, you can also drop water or magma on them (track stop set to dump out of the scaffolding, sitting on a constructed block in the sky, and minecarts filled with given fluid).

[PatrikLundell]

Magma dumping is probably quite effective, although it has the potential side effect of setting the vegetation on fire as well. It's also likely to destroy those precious loincloths...

If you're using DFHack there is a plugin that lets you change track stop settings dynamically. This means you can then place several mine carts filled with magma or sharp items in the floor built above the invaders, and then dump all their contents at once by changing all the track stop settings from not dumping to dumping while paused, unpause, and enjoy the ensuing chaos.

[angelious]

use magma.

[deathunter]

The easiest (and most boring) way is to wait until they siege ends. Usually my forts are selfsustaining and due to that i often enjoy helpless gobos watching my walls. The bored gobos also take care of any incoming caravans, so you can loot them afterwards. Dont try to protect the merchants inside your fort as they tend to berserk after a time with no proper way out. idk if its fixed by now but in erlier versions a siege could emerge when a caravan is in your fort, so i usually build the trade depot between two drawbridges to let them find their destination beyond my walls, usually a very bloody one...

[vassock]

The most reliable way seems to be a long, winding labyrinth airlock, long enough to trap the entire goblin column. Then fill with magma, flush, evaporate, loot, repeat.

[PatrikLundell]

There won't be much loot left after magma cleansing, since loincloths will be destroyed, and silver/copper/bronze will melt away. However, if you want only iron/steel, and are insentitive enough to let your dorfs walk around with chafing bottoms that's an effective way to get rid of unwanted stuff (I palm it off to caravans), and you don't have any unsightly bodies to deal with.
Using water instead will preserve items, but I think the natural swimmer trait of trolls means they won't drown (And undead don't drown at all).

My experience is that sieges arrive within the first few days of a new season, while the caravans arrive somewhere between the 10:th and the 15:th of the first month of their season, provided no siege is in progress. Caravans can still get attacked by (semi) mega beasts and were beasts though, since those follow a different schedule (or, possibly, schedules). I once (a month ago or so) caught a dragon for the low low price of an elven caravan, for instance (and, as a bonus, the dragon fire destroyed everything except a single clay boulder and two pieces of elf, so I didn't have much cleaning up to do).

[vanatteveldt]

If you want to kill the siege, caving in a constructed floor on top of them is probably easiest. You might have to build 10 levels or so above them to prevent job cancellation by frightened civvies.

If you want to play with them a bit without killing them, you could also try dropping other stuff on them from above, e.g. dumping boulders or captured cave dwellers. You could also see this as a good time to play with siege engines, but I don't think they fire over walls, so you might have to carve out some fortifications as well?