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[GoblinCookie]

Wild beasts share no such sentiments.

True, but wild beasts are not as dangerous as armed people.  If you can see the beasts then you can simply avoid them and call upon the military to deal with them, while the beasts themselves are too stupid to tell an armed person is more of a threat than an unarmed person.  If an ambushing wild beast attacks you, then you will likely be dead before you can bring the weapon you are carrying to bear. 

My point is that professional troops and the fortress guard physically cannot be everywhere. The issue is that the soldiers unless they happen to be nearby, will always be unable to respond to something attacking someone in a timely manner - the civilian's option is to either fight or flee, and in many cases, particularly with cavern creatures, they simply can't outrun them. Better to have a knife or second-hand sword or axe than your bare hands when faced with a horde of crundles or a reacher out for your blood.

Plus, well, sometimes you simply can't make more proper soldiers without potentially crippling your operations, as you might find yourself short on haulers or builders at the wrong time - for example if you call up the militia when caravan season comes, all those part timers aren't able to help haul trade goods up because you need them on the walls, or you might not have enough harvesters when a harvest comes in, which could cripple your booze supply.

What are you on about with the solders?  Soldiers do all the work that regular dwarves do, unless you choose to activate them, which you can do instantly at any time.

In this case it's not a delusional belief that a vampire might come after you after four people are found drained of blood, or that you could be attacked by an undead wolf while you're gathering plants. This isn't our world where you could argue such a thing (because even as a gun owner, I think it's entirely reasonable to have that debate and try to find the middle ground,) this is a game setting where half of all living things and most undead seem to actively want to murder your people if they happen to be in their general vicinity, with or without provocation, and dwarves or whatever you happen to be playing simply can't flee from all of them (or put themselves in danger of worse injury/equal chances of dying if they try to climb to safety,) and many will outright refuse to flee and try to fight them barehanded.

Our midgets have far worse to potentially deal with than some braindead burglar or a mugger on the streets, and DF players being who they are, that means they are all but guarnteed to need to defend themselves without the benefit of the militia at some point (Hell, I had my fisherdwarves all decide to attack a horde of zombie dark gnomes and that shit left one of them hospitalized and the rest with varying degrees of moderate to severe brusing in a fort I'm play at present. If they'd had knives or fishing spears, none of them would have likely been seriously hurt.)

Most of the things you are describing derive from the undeveloped nature of the AI, the civilians should run away from zombie dark gnomes not trying to fight them.  Essentially civilian armament is already in for humans in adventure mode (I modded it so it applied to everyone), but it is needed because the AI is too flawed to allow sites to rationally respond to an invading creature or rogue adventurer.  In fortress mode however there is the player, so the need for this feature is much reduced. 

If your shit is their goal, then you are mostly likely going to be killed for it. Goblins and virtually any other invader likewise have no reason to ignore any of your dwarves or livestock, and won't. They'll kill soldiers, animals, and civilians alike with absolutely zero fucks given beyond forcing you to surrender via the succumb to invasion menu option or killing everyone.

You are trying to argue for civilian armament based upon the fact that intelligent invaders presently behave in a manner that is rational when you are dealing with likely armed civilians.  Intelligent invaders should ignore your harmless livestock and ordinary civilians.  The reason why arming civilians realistically (not in present DF) does not make them safer is because it encourages attackers to behave towards them as present DF AI does.

That was literally the point of my statement. If your militia was badly mangled and you haven't had time to train your replacements, fix your gate, and rearm your traps, the civilians gathering round and following the militia commander to help might help as they may add the sheer weight of numbers you need without everyone running around having equipment mismatches trying to gather weapons and armor (as they're bringing their own weapons instead of using the site government's stocks,) but they might also get in the way and make the situation substantially worse for you.

How can they do that if they are already all dead?

Currently organization is irrelevant and likely will be for some time, as we can alter the battlefields around and in our fortresses to make formation fighting impractical at best and impossible at worst barring tunnel fighting where it would come down to who has the better men up front to mulch the other side. In this instance the "organization" would consist of the scratch militia forming up in a meeting place closest to the militia commander or in the nearest barracks and then following the Militia commander like his regular squad already does.

I don't think you understand what I mean by organization.  By organization I mean the ability of multiple individuals to act in any kind of organized way, I don't mean formations and military drill.  It is already very much the case that you get a better defense of your fortress if you put all squads close together at where the invaders are coming from rather than if you place your squads at random locations.  The problem with armed civilians is that as individuals they are scattered about the place, which means they cannot 'outgun' a squad of fully armed soldiers but will die pretty much as quickly as they would otherwise. 

If they band together however they will prevail by weight of numbers.  In order to keep them from doing this, the invaders kill everyone, rather than ignoring the civilians and focusing on the forces that can actually put up a decent fight at the moment. 

Are miners and woodcutters worse off if they get attacked by something? No, because they're always armed by virtue of their profession, and these are also often the first dwarves formed up into emergency defense forces in forts low on professional soldiers or in dire straights, because they're able to essentially be told to use their tool class as a weapon and they'll only take a few ticks to "rearm" themselves with their own pick or axe, and if attacked while undrafted, they'll fight back (or attack) perceived threats with the same tools anyway.

And attackers who spot your civvies are going to kill them anyway regardles sof if they try to run or not - they're locals and therefore part of the "defense" and will be put to the sword all the same, unless they manage to get behind a door or gate before a beak dog or bear clamps down on their fingers or something.

As already mentioned, they should be.  The attackers should head straight for the miners and woodcutters (and hunters), ignoring the unarmed civilians who should just make for the exit.  That they don't present do so is because the AI does not have the right scripts to identify what enemies are the most dangerous. 

Every single civ has outliers, just like even the most peaceful 1st world nations need at least a small police force to deal with the odd thief, car accident, or bar fight. For example, it's supposed that if you put a shitball in charge of a militia squad, they'll potentially go bandit if you abandon the fort. And it's not unsual to find dwarves who personally either hold the law in disdain or are neutral to it, rather than having a strong general belief; but most dwarves are simply fairly lawful as a rule.

Additionally, the militia doesn't count as law enforcement. Only the Fortress Guard does, and while under normal operation 10 men is more than enough to handle an occasional bar murder, workplace assault, berserker, or production deadline slip.... Well,  if things get ugly, the sheer number of complaints, murders, witness reports, and assaults very well might overwhelm them because they have to physically chase everyone down individually to lock up or met out punishment, which can further clog up the gears of justice.

It should also be noted at least in the early v40 versions, the Militia would circumvent the justice system entirely if they witnessed serious crimes (murder and assault) while on duty, killing the offending party outright. Had a riot get worse because the Militiadwarves I guess decided the fortress guard hadn't been doing their jobs well enough (which they weren't, to be fair; the Watch Captain wanted to do his solo drills instead of take complaints and witness reports.) So your own fortress guard being lax due to poor choices (or just bad luck,) could also make law enforcement unreliable.

It is 1 law enforcer for every 20 people, since there are 10 of them and the population cap is 200!  All real-world nations manage to function on a far lower ratio of law-enforcers to non-law-enforcers. 

And undead even less so. Plus we don't need as many full-time soldiers if the civilians can kill or scare off minor threats like badgers and the like if they have a sufficiently sharp rock or a club or something. Anything is better than the stupidly brave ones having only their bare hands.

Plus if you have a surplus of resources and are sick of having to keep a close eye on everyone and shuffle the militia around to keep them safe from minor things, then this offers a potential solution besides guard dogs for everyone.

Perhaps we should simply have the civilians run away.  Eventually involving them running away *from* the fortress altogether.  What you are in effect proposing is the use of the scarce resource that is Toady One development time in order to add a mechanic that makes the unrealistic AI stupidity more viable.

If we have a sufficient surplus of resources to arm civilians, then why do we not just make *everyone* a soldier?  Inactive soldiers carry their weapons with them in any case, so if you have the resources you can effectively arm everyone in your fortress anyway.

[Bumber]

Wild beasts share no such sentiments.

True, but wild beasts are not as dangerous as armed people.  If you can see the beasts then you can simply avoid them and call upon the military to deal with them, while the beasts themselves are too stupid to tell an armed person is more of a threat than an unarmed person.  If an ambushing wild beast attacks you, then you will likely be dead before you can bring the weapon you are carrying to bear.

This simply isn't the case. First of all, DF has reasonably intelligent beasts, such as troglodytes. Furthermore, it's if you see the beasts and they don't see you where you can't escape.

Secondly, even in real life, you can very likely react in time to survive an ambush. It's a bit difficult for most quadrupeds to deliver quick kills to bipeds. If the reason for attack is territorial, you'll generally hear a growl first, buying you a few seconds. Even if you die in the fight, being able to at least wound the beast acts as a deterrent to protect others.

[GoblinCookie]

Secondly, even in real life, you can very likely react in time to survive an ambush. It's a bit difficult for most quadrupeds to deliver quick kills to bipeds. If the reason for attack is territorial, you'll generally hear a growl first, buying you a few seconds. Even if you die in the fight, being able to at least wound the beast acts as a deterrent to protect others.

A lot of beasts back off if injured even slightly, for instance by being punched.  The question is whether the confidence caused by being armed is actually more dangerous than the benefit of being potentially to injure the creature and get it to back off.  If I am armed and armored in an environment full of dangerous beasts, the beasts are not bright enough to understand that I am less favorable as a food source because I am armed but I pay less attention because I feel safer. 

In any case the beasts question does not really apply to carrying weapons within the fortress. 

[SixOfSpades]

We're paying a bit too much attention to "Should civilians carry weapons" and not enough to "Are civilians already carrying weapons". As LMeire said, it's quite fair to assume that every (non-baby) dwarf is wearing a small knife, for eating, minor crafting, and general utilitarian purposes . . . and dwarves whose jobs are not confined to a workshop (and maybe even some that are) would likely be  toting at least a couple of their tools along, like a Mason building a wall & bringing a wooden mallet to help knock the blocks into proper alignment. Just as we must assume that wild birds must be laying eggs somewhere, because nothing beyond dwarf-made Nest Boxes has been implemented yet, we should probably take it for granted that dwarves like carrying useful articles on their persons, even if Pockets and Tool Belts do not yet exist.

Also: More improvised weapons. Grabbing a simple rock off the floor can be easy enough, but even if you're in a "cleaner" fortress you can always pick up a chair and swing it. (Picking up a chair made of stone might not be realistic, but dwarves have no problems carrying them from place to place.) Take off your cloak, wrap it around your forearm, & use it as a shield. Break a stone mug (assuming it's a style of mug with a full handle) and you've got yourself a knuckleduster with a jagged business end. Musical instruments, depending on their shape & composition, might make decent weapons, at least once. I feel a bit embarrassed, noting that all of these can be found in a tavern, like I'm encouraging lethal bar fights.

Lastly, if your dwarves know that kobolds can sneak in, that flyers can get over the walls, that a vampire might strike at any time, that cavern nasties might climb in through the wells, etc., then they should want to carry weapons, or at least improvised weapons, at all times. They should take pride in being able to defend their hall, their workshop, their bedroom if they have to. A dwarf not permitted to carry a weaponlike object should feel almost naked--it should, indeed, be a penalty for minor crimes.

[Bumber]

In any case the beasts question does not really apply to carrying weapons within the fortress.

The issue comes up when outdoor hauling, farming (especially once it gets rebalanced), fishing, etc.

[Splint]

Lastly, if your dwarves know that kobolds can sneak in, that flyers can get over the walls, that a vampire might strike at any time, that cavern nasties might climb in through the wells, etc., then they should want to carry weapons, or at least improvised weapons, at all times. They should take pride in being able to defend their hall, their workshop, their bedroom if they have to. A dwarf not permitted to carry a weaponlike object should feel almost naked--it should, indeed, be a penalty for minor crimes.

Thank you so god damn much, you perfectly condensed my argument.

I'm also still of the opinion in regards to vampires, with such a thing ever implemented, Vampires would need a stealth roll when they go to feed, and a failure causes the dwarf to wake up and attack the vampire - potentially killing them, or driving them away and fleeing to the nearest Fortress Guardsman. Or potentially getting killed by the vampire in an open fight. Of course, then they might turn hostile and try to flee in such an instance...

[SixOfSpades]

Thank you so god damn much, you perfectly condensed my argument.

I'm just here to help. 

[GoblinCookie]

]The issue comes up when outdoor hauling, farming (especially once it gets rebalanced), fishing, etc.

I would see the issue is more about civilians travelling between sites or sites and off-site structures.  At the moment being ambushed by wild animals when travelling is not a thing, but perhaps it should be.

On site, we can just have squads automated in peacetime (not under siege) so that they attack wild animals that get too close to our dwarves.  With luck predatory creatures would simply flee if they see a sufficient bulk of dwarf against them, but that is a more general problem with predators in general.

Thank you so god damn much, you perfectly condensed my argument.

I'm also still of the opinion in regards to vampires, with such a thing ever implemented, Vampires would need a stealth roll when they go to feed, and a failure causes the dwarf to wake up and attack the vampire - potentially killing them, or driving them away and fleeing to the nearest Fortress Guardsman. Or potentially getting killed by the vampire in an open fight. Of course, then they might turn hostile and try to flee in such an instance...

If we arm our civilian dwarves, does not mean that the vampires are also armed?  The vampires however are expecting a fight so they would kit themselves out in full soldier gear, so a few civilians with knives would not be a problem for them.

[Bumber]

On site, we can just have squads automated in peacetime (not under siege) so that they attack wild animals that get too close to our dwarves.  With luck predatory creatures would simply flee if they see a sufficient bulk of dwarf against them, but that is a more general problem with predators in general.

The issue is manpower. Managing to patrol the surface and caverns (scales with embark area), omniscient god-vision removed (planned), having enough reserve forces to relieve them for training and rest, and still having enough dwarves left for food production (rebalance planned) or the necessary surplus value. And then your civilians decide to take a drink in carp-infested waters.

[Cathar]

Lastly, if your dwarves know that kobolds can sneak in, that flyers can get over the walls, that a vampire might strike at any time, that cavern nasties might climb in through the wells, etc., then they should want to carry weapons, or at least improvised weapons, at all times. They should take pride in being able to defend their hall, their workshop, their bedroom if they have to. A dwarf not permitted to carry a weaponlike object should feel almost naked--it should, indeed, be a penalty for minor crimes.

Thank you so god damn much, you perfectly condensed my argument.

I'm also still of the opinion in regards to vampires, with such a thing ever implemented, Vampires would need a stealth roll when they go to feed, and a failure causes the dwarf to wake up and attack the vampire - potentially killing them, or driving them away and fleeing to the nearest Fortress Guardsman. Or potentially getting killed by the vampire in an open fight. Of course, then they might turn hostile and try to flee in such an instance...

I'm totally for dwarfs carrying makeshift weapons they can find (or tools they would use as weapons - a blacksmith hammer, a bone carving knife, farmer's pitchfork etc), because not only it makes sense for them in a self defense perspective, but this is also their tools of trade.

That said, I'm 100% completely and unapologetically opposed to any vampire nerf. No dwarf should be immune or have a chance of fighting back against a vampire attack, even legendary observators master fighters dwarves should be killed as easily as Urist McAveragejoe. The vampires do not fight against dwarves, they fight against the players. They pose a mental challenge to the player, put them into a position of the investigator of a crime.

If a dwarf can just wake up and do as much as defend themselves and generate a combat report, that whole side of the game is gone.

I lost a few legendary people to vampires, it's very frustrating but it makes for good stories. And when you eventually catch the bastard, then, oh boy then

[Bumber]

That said, I'm 100% completely and unapologetically opposed to any vampire nerf. No dwarf should be immune or have a chance of fighting back against a vampire attack, even legendary observators master fighters dwarves should be killed as easily as Urist McAveragejoe. The vampires do not fight against dwarves, they fight against the players. They pose a mental challenge to the player, put them into a position of the investigator of a crime.

If a dwarf can just wake up and do as much as defend themselves and generate a combat report, that whole side of the game is gone.

I lost a few legendary people to vampires, it's very frustrating but it makes for good stories. And when you eventually catch the bastard, then, oh boy then

That's dumb and gamey. Vampires should just pick their targets more carefully. Besides, don't vampires switch their identities during feeding?

Also, players already house their dwarves in dormitories to thwart vampires.

[Splint]

That said, I'm 100% completely and unapologetically opposed to any vampire nerf. No dwarf should be immune or have a chance of fighting back against a vampire attack, even legendary observators master fighters dwarves should be killed as easily as Urist McAveragejoe. The vampires do not fight against dwarves, they fight against the players. They pose a mental challenge to the player, put them into a position of the investigator of a crime.

If a dwarf can just wake up and do as much as defend themselves and generate a combat report, that whole side of the game is gone.

I lost a few legendary people to vampires, it's very frustrating but it makes for good stories. And when you eventually catch the bastard, then, oh boy then

I actually have some elaboration on that, partially due to players and their efficiency apartments of 1x3 squares. This "nerf" would come with a few things.

1. the vampire fakes being asleep, giving bedroom buffs; however, an observant player may notice he doesn't sleep as long or responds more quickly than he should to things, or doesn't complain about disrupted sleep.
2. The vampire goes out of their way to socialize at a tavern with drinks, keeping them boozed up. If there's a shortage, he's the only one not complaining about thirst or going to the wells. This and 1. serve to mask his presence.
3. Give use to a vampire's often considerable social skills in the event they fail a stealth check. If they fail thier check, they can talk their way out of a fight or a police report revealing them.
4. This gives a reason for why some people are carrying personal weapons - they sleep light or get woken up, and knew they might need them to fight a vampire coming for their jugulars.
5. it adds a "suspicious activity" report that is added quietly if the vampire talks his way out of a fight (or the dwarf is more law abiding or level-headed in general,) but not a police report - you would still have to manually look in the fortress guard's files to find the report.
6. If the vampire does end up having to fight, then he can claim the victim is the vampire, which thanks to 1. and 2. he can plausibly do so as sobriety and lack of sleep won't instantly show him for a fraud with those. If the vampire is killed, the vampire is killed and his identity revealed (as he is found to possess vampire fangs post mortem,) but if he kills his intended victim, then who is going to dispute him? If neither is killed but someone is hurt, then the player has to pass judgement on an assault charge (deciding who you think was the aggressor and dispensing the beating or jail sentence) and make plans to watch the other more closely so you can give him the hammerstrikes he deserves. Maybe.
7. A vampire with good ambusher skill would almost never slip up and wake the target... But they would still gain blood stains on their shirts and any gloves from feeding, especially if they killed the victim by accident. If one is in the habit of inspecting your dorf's stuff, you may figure out who nearly drained Bomrek and left him pale last week  and killed your legendary bone carver the month before without intending to.

The whole idea there is that it gives dwarves a tangible opportunity to defend themselves against a vampire - one of the biggest threats that would warrant someone wanting a weapon on their person - with these private or improvised weapons, irrespective of observer, dodger, etc. It all depends on the vampire being the one to fuck up by failing a stealth check which can represent any number of things - kicked a bed post, sneezed, the victim was a light sleeper, opened the door too forcefully, things like that. A vampire would also avoid people with pet cats or dogs like the plague, as they would bark at them or hiss when he attempts to feed on thier owner.

@ GoblinCookie - The vampire shouldn't be expecting a fight, but that's covered above if one happens - talk their way out, or hope they can either kill them and successfully convince the fortress guard they were in fact being attacked by a vampire or that justice fails a spot check and gets the vic beaten with a club or chained to a wall instead. Vampires would of course have their own reasons for wanting to arm themselves - they can still die from violence, ultimately want to protect others without serving in the military, or be power hungry pricks after all, in addition to using the weapon to fight victims who accidentally wake up when they try to feed. Everyone being armed actually makes them being armed too not unusual, and serves to help hide their presence a bit, because they have weaponizable tools or a personal dagger or axe like anyone else in the fort.

On site, we can just have squads automated in peacetime (not under siege) so that they attack wild animals that get too close to our dwarves.  With luck predatory creatures would simply flee if they see a sufficient bulk of dwarf against them, but that is a more general problem with predators in general.

The issue is manpower. Managing to patrol the surface and caverns (scales with embark area), omniscient god-vision removed (planned), having enough reserve forces to relieve them for training and rest, and still having enough dwarves left for food production (rebalance planned) or the necessary surplus value. And then your civilians decide to take a drink in carp-infested waters.

These are also valid reasons why eventually dwarves may want to have personal protection - they can't spare the time to train in the militia and the militia may not be able to come and save them, but maybe they can kill an attacker, drive away an animal, or slow down an invader while the militia rushes to their position as quick as thier stubby steel-plated legs can haul them. It should be noted even now, some will fight and some will flee, apparently based on personality and number of allies near, so it's not like it'll result in a lemming rush if everyone happen to be complete cowards and scatter at the sight of an armed goblin, even if they have a weapon to defend themselves; it'll be the braver or more dutiful ones who'll try and fight regardless of what you do or say via burrows and such.

[Cathar]

That's dumb and gamey. Vampires should just pick their targets more carefully. Besides, don't vampires switch their identities during feeding?

Also, players already house their dwarves in dormitories to thwart vampires.

>Solving a complex murder problem by giving everyone more dakka is anywhere less dumb or gamey
>Some players breach aquifers so we should remove them

Hard pass

I actually have some elaboration on that, partially due to players and their efficiency apartments of 1x3 squares. This "nerf" would come with a few things.

My point is the victim of a crime should remain the victim of a crime. The victim of a vampire attack should never go down fighting, it makes no sense neither in lore nor in game. In game, vampires are a situation that cannot and should not be solved by sheer violence, but by interrogating, drafting a list of suspects, and ultimately rooting the mole. It should not be solved by the dwarfs automatically.
In lore the vampire is your friend. You cut tree with him, you mine with him. He calls you by your first name and your children like him. Dwarves don't wake up when lemons enter their rooms, why would they wake up when their trusted buddy does? For them, it's normal until it's too late.

Look at it this way, you can have eagle eyes and a AA missile launcher for a handgun, if your wife puts cyanide in your beer you still go down like anyone else.

I'm not opposed to layout to prevent murders. A squad stationned into a dormitory should prevent a vampire attack. A guard bursting in the room during a vampire feedfest should trigger a combat. But the victim itself should remain helpless, that is the whole point of a murder scenario that is a vampire attack.

Frankly if the argument is "if an armed dwarf is woke and around during a vampire attack they should intervene" I may see your point with some caveats (the vampire should not reveal himself in such a situation, but dwarves move so it can happen).

And I say that while totally agreeing that dwarves that expect normal dangerous encounters, like bandits, monsters or wildlife, should carry weapons. Artesans should have their tools of trade, travellers should have daggers and quarterstaves. Vampires are a whole other kind of situation that should not be solved through arming yourself up

[Splint]

That's dumb and gamey. Vampires should just pick their targets more carefully. Besides, don't vampires switch their identities during feeding?

Also, players already house their dwarves in dormitories to thwart vampires.

>Solving a complex murder problem by giving everyone more dakka is anywhere less dumb or gamey
>Some players breach aquifers so we should remove them

Hard pass

He wasn't suggesting removing them, but as it is they are stupidly easy to counter and actively discourage the use of personal rooms.

My point is the victim of a crime should remain the victim of a crime. [etc.]

Look at it this way, you can have eagle eyes and a AA missile launcher for a handgun, if your wife puts cyanide in your beer you still go down like anyone else.

Hence the vampire doing something to mess up on his own is what wakes the intended victim, assuming he didn't time something wrong and the dwarf wakes up while he's in the room but hasn't managed to get on top of/adjacent. It'd be independent of the victim's observer or other combat skills, it's all the vampire making a mistake. And doing so with the wrong dwarf might lead to Urist McSingleAndFriendless reporting the vampire as acting suspiciously (He's not my friend, and not my lover/spouse, why the hell was he in my room?) or UristMcViolent attacking him with a fork because why on earth is this dwarf in his room making noise if he's not trying to hurt him in some manner (CLEARLY HE'S SOME KIND OF NIGHT CREATURE/THEIF TRYIN' TA TAKE MA SHIT!)?

Add in other options and you have other options (suspicious activity reports, a combat log with two suspects, blood on clothes,) besides flipping through profiles for sobriety/lack of sleep, luck while looking at your unit screen, or waiting for the vampire to commit suicide by feeding in the dorm.

I'm not opposed to layout to prevent murders. A squad stationned into a dormitory should prevent a vampire attack. A guard bursting in the room during a vampire feedfest should trigger a combat. But the victim itself should remain helpless, that is the whole point of a murder scenario that is a vampire attack.

We shouldn't need to station a soldier in every sleeping dwarf's bedroom or eschew giving dwarves somewhere to put thier things because vampires are magically 100% successful in feeding if you ever give anyone a personal bedroom, especially if they somehow manage to silently clamber over a cabinet and/or chest to get to the victim with no ambusher skill (this is again based on the tendency of the general player base to use very small bedrooms to compensate for numbers of migrants and it seems from observation, rarely moving them into bigger accommodations, even if only 3x3 or 2x2.)

A light sleeper might wake up the instant someone touches them and struggle or demand to know why that dwarf is in his room, a failed persuasion at minimum leads to that dwarf running to the fortress guard once the vampire leaves his room. If he fails his stealth check: he trips and falls, slams the door by mistake, or hits the bed before he manages to strangle the dwarf unconscious to feed and the intended victim wakes up due to a loud noise.

Of course if there's work going on like lots of engraving one wall over making a bunch of noise, then a stealth check could be ignored, as the vampire uses the work noise to cover his ingress and attack - x number of dwarves within x number of tiles of a sleeping dwarf with no dwarves within view = viable target with virtually no chance of detection barring someone blundering in hauling a rock or something - in which case the hauler may attack him with the rock or with the club he carries for bashing annoying crundles.

Vampires are something I zeroed on because they'd easily be one of the biggest reasons dwarves would want a self-defense weapon, and if vampires remain always successful in their attacks, then it renders them carrying a defense weapon for potentially fending off a vampire pointless. Plus with those sudden duels, maybe add a coroner's screen to the CMD to allow us to examine the body in more detail directly? look for fangs or another dwarf's blood on them from the fight, or traces of someone else's hair or fabric from thier clothes, which would let a player discover the real vampire if they choose to look into it instead of believing the killer's claim out of hand (if Urist McVampire used a club, or used a copper knife, the rough cut damage to the clothes or slivers of wood  in Urist McVictim's beard where he got bashed in the face would give him away.)

A coroner's report would also help determine causes of death from other less evident causes as well. Mangled body found dead? Check the coroner to see what might have caused it; Urist McDead's remains are mangled. it appears to have been done with a blunt weapon. There are mahogany chips on his remains. Suddenly we know we have a murderer in our midst using a mahogany club or other wooden object. Speaking of which, having the occasional psychopathic murderer decide to randomly kill dwarves would be a neat feature and give us something other than vampires sneaking around silently - hopefully on thier part - murdering people. only this one is doing it because they want to, while vampires have to.

And if you have one of each that you discovered... Well. Two carp with one bolt and the problem sorts itself out... One kills the other, hammerer deals with the first.

Another alternate is simply have the duel happen with no combat report, and the vampire quickly leaving upon defeating his intended victim or the vic going to the fortress guard to turn in the Vampire post-mortem (allowing any open murders that might have happened to be closed because the killer died in a fight trying to murder another dwarf.)

I would see the issue is more about civilians travelling between sites or sites and off-site structures.  At the moment being ambushed by wild animals when travelling is not a thing, but perhaps it should be.

I missed this earlier, he meant that certain jobs at the fort like hauling remains to a dump site or fishing, puts the dwarf in inherent danger if it's anywhere outside the fortifications.

Also, in adventure mode we can be attacked by some predators (usually things like lions,) so I imagine the same might happen to others, but in adventure mode at least some people have thier eating utensils to fight with if they have to.

[Cathar]

Hence the vampire doing something to mess up on his own is what wakes the intended victim, assuming he didn't time something wrong and the dwarf wakes up while he's in the room but hasn't managed to get on top of/adjacent. It'd be independent of the victim's observer or other combat skills, it's all the vampire making a mistake.

This counts as an unjustified nerf for vampires. Amusingly, that's how I draft my suspect list. I catch everyone having witnessed the corpse, and I select the ones who shouldn't have been in the room at any time. Now you want to automate the process and I'm repeating myself because my whole point got ignored : please don't. This is hard, this is fun.

On the whole point of communal chambers, I had a vampire that would do that. Everyone is asleep, he's in, kills and he's out. Since everyone wakes up with a corpse we can't draft a small suspect list. Communal rooms should be the go to feeding places for vampires.

Why would the vampire make mistakes? What would it add to anything? You just turn a fearsome predator into a bumbling idiot that stumble its feet on furnitures. Why on earth do that?

And doing so with the wrong dwarf might lead to Urist McSingleAndFriendless reporting the vampire as acting suspiciously (He's not my friend, and not my lover/spouse, why the hell was he in my room?) or UristMcViolent attacking him with a fork because why on earth is this dwarf in his room making noise if he's not trying to hurt him in some manner (CLEARLY HE'S SOME KIND OF NIGHT CREATURE/THEIF TRYIN' TA TAKE MA SHIT!)?

The personality of a dwarf does not matters, he's asleep and defenseless. This is the point and the requirement for an attack.

Add in other options and you have other options (suspicious activity reports, a combat log with two suspects, blood on clothes,) besides flipping through profiles for sobriety/lack of sleep, luck while looking at your unit screen, or waiting for the vampire to commit suicide by feeding in the dorm.

Why not. Seriously buff up the vampires so they retain their dangerousness, and why not. For now, the difficulty level of rooting up a vampire is fine with me - it's hard, it takes work but it's very rewarding. Such things should come with HUGE caveats, read buffs. Vampires are and should remain a danger.

We shouldn't need to station a soldier in every sleeping dwarf's bedroom or eschew giving dwarves somewhere to put thier things because vampires are magically 100% successful in feeding if you ever give anyone a personal bedroom, especially if they somehow manage to silently clamber over a cabinet and/or chest to get to the victim with no ambusher skill (this is again based on the tendency of the general player base to use very small bedrooms to compensate for numbers of migrants and it seems from observation, rarely moving them into bigger accommodations, even if only 3x3 or 2x2.)

I'm just trying to go in your direction, failing apparently. To be perfectly honest with you, I'm of the opinion that nothing, not even guards should prevent a murder. Either you catch the vampire or he takes your pawns one by one.

Vampires are something I zeroed on because they'd easily be one of the biggest reasons dwarves would want a self-defense weapon, and if vampires remain always successful in their attacks, then it renders them carrying a defense weapon for potentially fending off a vampire pointless.

And they are in my opinion the ONE thing that cannot be solved by violence. Seems we will not agree so I rest my case.