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[Immortal-D]

Smoothing & Tracks will level the skill equally, so pick a handful of Dwarves (I use 15 in a Fortress of 200) to be your Engravers and dedicate them to the task.  Additionally, you can always start by Engraving non-critical areas like the Refuse Pile and mine shafts.  Heck, I've had a few Fortresses where I dug out several large rooms for the sole purpose of training my Engravers.

[Daris]

Engravings on walls cannot be replaced, but ones on the floor can be erased by building a floor over it and then removing the floor and re-smoothing the tile.  The wiki says this can also be accomplished by carving a track and then smoothing it away, but I never took this route.  If you have enough patience and OCD, you can ensure that a room has 100% masterwork engravings on the floor in this manner.

[Pseudo]

Engravings on walls cannot be replaced, but ones on the floor can be erased by building a floor over it and then removing the floor and re-smoothing the tile.  The wiki says this can also be accomplished by carving a track and then smoothing it away, but I never took this route.  If you have enough patience and OCD, you can ensure that a room has 100% masterwork engravings on the floor in this manner.

Or lava. Everything is better with lava.

(That being said, make sure you don't destroy legendary engravings!)


I really wish you could prioritize labors.

I tend to do one skilled labor for things that require skill and/or has enough of a time difference with skill and is done often enough to make it worth it (mining, smelting, etc), and everyone else is, well, everything else.

(On a related note: does mining skill actually affect anything but speed now?)

In long-running forts I'll eventually switch to two dwarves per, and if I have a dwarf that has trained to legendary on something that doesn't get used often I'll add another skilled labor, but that's the general idea.

What I wish I could do is to have ~everyone be ~one skilled labor + all unskilled labors, but prioritizing their special labor over other things. Unfortunately, I don't know of a way of doing that currently.

[Micro102]

So I've been trying out the whole unskilled laborer profession vs individual skilled dwarves professions and am finding myself enjoying it, however I have come across a problem. Farming.

If I put all my laborers on farming I get a mass rush of "plant seeds" jobs and end up with rapidly growing plant stockpiles and dozens of canceled jobs as all the seeds get picked up. How do you deal with this?

(On a related note: does mining skill actually affect anything but speed now?)

I believe that higher mining skill increases the chance of leaving stone behind. Useful for flux stone.

[Dozebôm Lolumzalìs]

1. You don't need tons of farmers.

2. Mining only affects speed.

[steel jackal]

typically i have a dwarf assigned to do 1 or two things if they are related
like you, my miners do stone detailing

my farmers ONLY have farming (fields) because i want them to be planting those sun berries and rope reeds all the time

i have only 1 dwarf that can brew, always churning out barrels of sunshine
i import other booze from the yearly caravan, since i have over 3000 sunshine the other drinks last the year

my bookkeeper is also my broker, no other jobs but their noble duties

i have 4 carpenters, all of them are legendary due to constantly cranking out barrels year round

my wood cutters have wood burning enabled, except the queen who only has wood cutting and hauling

i have looming and weaving set to one dwarf, he is legendary in both so he cranks out enough clothes to make them faster than they are worn

im considering sending some rope reeds to be made into river spirits

i have 1 metal working dwarf, he (or she, i dont pay attention to anything but professions)  dose everything, armor, weapons, crafts, furniture


i have 120+ dwarves in my fort so i can afford to set them to just 1 labor
i like it better this way too because i know they wont get distracted from doing their job

[Bouchart]

In a mature fort I'll give every dwarf its own singular labor, with a couple of exceptions.  Lye making and potash making always goes on the same dwarf.  Some of the marginal skills like wax working or spinning will get a single hauling labor, usually refuse hauling.  Maybe this isn't the most effective way to go about things but it's nice to sometimes see a legendary wood burner or milker.

There are a few labors I'll give to multiple dwarves, notably mining, engraving, growing, and furnace operating.

[zeves]

after years of playing df one thing you learn is that dwarfs will die so i separate them into groups of important unimportant and army
Builder with carp-mason-arc-mech
Farmer with all important food related skills
Smiths with ussualy only ether armor or weapon enabled and the other metal related skills
doctors with whatever their best skills in healthcare enabled and also they do the soap related things.
and finally the last important being the Lord he tends to do whatever skill is needed but i tend to start him with weapon or armor smithing.

All of the above tend to have hauling labours disabled and other sock collection effects to help their survivability.
all below have hauling enabled

Miners mining and hauling
Crafters have all important crafting enabled stone wood leather cloth
Fishers although somewhat situational as not all places have to much water
REST theese are the meatshields of the dwarf population they have hauling engraving stone smoothing wood burning wood cutting and metal smelting enabled

any other labour not mentioned say gem cutting and what not are enabled on individual dwarfs that arrive with decent amount of skill in that labour already enabled and i generally fit them wherever their good at their jobs. say a dwarf arriving with masonry would go to the builders profession group until theres a decent amount of those around.

notable problem, wood cutting can get delayed somewhat when they focus on smoothing floors.
you also might not get the best quality with this but theres only a few skills that really mather haveing quality of, masonry mechanism smithing being the main thing.
generally this makes 25 30 important dwarfs that are protected and the rest turning into military labour.

[Dunamisdeos]

The only custom profession I use is "Nurse".

This is an unskilled peasant whose sole job is recover and feed/water the wounded or imprisoned. I usually go with two in the fort.

[Skorpion]

Dwarf Therapist is a gift from Armok.

Miner: I'm a traditionalist. One miner per 25 dorfs, and they're an elite force of rock-munchers, kept constantly busy doing something.
Engraver: Stone detailing only. Legendary rooms created by just making large rooms with fancy engravings in.
Smiths/craftsdwarves/mechanics/cooks/brewers: ONLY their specific labour enabled. They're legendary, and they create the good stuff. This is only for skills where quality of production is important.
Farmers: Only farming (fields). My food and booze supply is a major priority.
Hauler: One size fits all. Hauling labours, cleaning, furnace operation, masonry, carpentry, minecart haulage, butchery, food processing labours, and basically anything unskilled. And yes, carpentry and masonry are 'unskilled'. You don't need to be legendary to carve out blocks or construct a wall. And I may need beds RIGHT NOW. If I have any particularly skilled dorfs, then I'll set up some workshops with skill levels set for some fancy stuff to be produced. But, mostly, quantity > quality in most things. Especially haulage, with my attempts to automate it only meaning I do MORE of it. This is what takes up most of the workforce. The vast majority of them, in fact, because my dwarves need to stay busy so they don't get too attached to each other. Idleness breeds tantrum spirals, so I pursue the hoarding of assorted stuff. Mostly stone blocks, food, booze, and metal bars.
Medical staff: Only cleaning and hauling of wounded enabled other than their specialisation. My attempts to automate and streamline hauling tend to cause accidents.