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[Strangething]

My long-awaited defense guide is finished:

http://www.dwarffortresswiki.net/index.php/Defense_guide

It's the biggest wiki article I've ever done. Four screens tall, and all from scratch. There's a lot that I decided to move to the trap and siege engine pages.

Please let me know if there's anything I missed, or corrections that need to be made.

[Anonemoose]

On fortifications, the higher it is, the higher chance the attacker has of hitting the fortification.

[Yngar the Wise]

Great article.

[BurnedToast]

on traps and master thieves: kobold master thieves (like all kobolds) never trigger traps. Goblin master thieves (like all goblins) always trigger traps.

on sieges: goblins don't always bring beak dogs or trolls, they seem to be quite rare in the 3d version. The article seems to imply they always do.

on enemy archers: charging them with legendary+5 shield users is hardly suicidal, in fact quite the opposite - a single champion can easily butcher a whole squad of bow goblins without taking a hit. Should probably change to charging with low skilled dwarves is suicidal or somesuch.

Flying animals: I've never seen Toady say anywhere that dragons will eventually be made to fly. This part should be removed unless you have a quote, as far as I know non-flying dragons is intended.

megabeasts: a well trained, well equiped squad will steamroll any megabeast. A *single* well trained, well equipped dwarf will dominate them in fact. Should change it to poorly trained squads or something.

Otherwise it looks pretty good.

[Strangething]

on traps and master thieves: kobold master thieves (like all kobolds) never trigger traps. Goblin master thieves (like all goblins) always trigger traps.

I've seen goblin thieves slip past my first line of traps, then get caught by the second line. There's a random factor in trap avoidance. I don't have much experience with kobolds.

Flying animals: I've never seen Toady say anywhere that dragons will eventually be made to fly. This part should be removed unless you have a quote, as far as I know non-flying dragons is intended.

In the dev pages, Toady mentions flying dragons in Core40. The wiki page for dragon says the same.

Perhaps I overstated the threat of archers and megabeasts. I bow to those with more experience.

Thanks for the feedback!

[Zako]

Fantastic! Just what i was looking for and in the right fromat for me too! 

Thanks a lot! And great work!

[TheDeadlyShoe]

Very nice article. The only thing I might mention is that if you desginate an activity zone at your gate, your loose animals will wander around there.  That's an excellent defense against thieves and raccoons and the like while you are still digging in and establishing your fortress basics.  Espeically since you can expand the zone to cover outdoor stockpiles.

(Of course, later on, your children will wander around there too which has obvious downsides. And once you get Ambushes, you can loose a lot of animals this way. )

[Gantolandon]

Always have your soldiers carry food and water. They will each need a waterskin (or flask) and a backpack. This keeps your soldiers from wandering off to eat and drink. For an around the clock guard, have them sleep on the ground while on duty. Hopefully the sounds of combat will wake them up before they get killed.

Does it work? I thought filling waterskins was broken somehow?

[Calenth]

The only thing I'd add is that invaders often have very low morale and will flee once a few of them die to your first line of traps. If you want to kill *all* the invaders, you'll want to experiment with more advanced architectural traps, like drowning rooms or retractable bridges over magma.

[Deathworks]

Hello!

A nice article. Unfortunately, I already have my own defense strategy set, so it does not add much for me, but I am sure it will be useful for others.

From my personal experience the following comments:

Giant eagles are harmless. I had a female giant eagle on a 3d map even fly into my tunnels, have a look around and then leave. Later, she got slaughter by my weapon traps which I placed in the country side as ambush deterrents (actually, I was surprised that the traps affected her, but there was nothing else around ... ).

With merchants again ignoring traps, just as it should be, the trade depot is not much of a security issue. A few rows of traps + a few constructed walls with non-aligned doors and everything is fine. People should not forget that wagons do not need to travel in a single straight line; as long as you have 3x3 tiles along the entire path, you can make their path as twisted as you like, allowing for those walls protecting against archery.

Anyhow, good job on the article. I am wondering whether people would want to flesh it out with screen shot and layout examples...

Deathworks

[Untelligent]

I'd like to make a comment on flying creatures, in that they will ONLY fly over your walls if they have a valid land route to the other side.

However, I think Toady did a few things with pathfinding recently, so it MAY be possible that fliers no longer have this oddity. Not likely, but possible.


Also, in the "death from below" section, you should probably make a note that only flying chasm critters (like Batman) can get out of the chasm in the current version.


Very nice guide, though.


EDIT: Holy carp, I think I just contradicted myself. =D Eh, listen to the guy below me, he seems to know what he's talking about.

[Soadreqm]

I wouldn't call giant eagles harmless. They're not very agressive, and trained military dwarves can take care of them easilly enough, but if a lone herbalist accidentally stumbles upon one, he's dead. And unless you react quickly enough, several of the dwarves come to steal his pants may also be dead.

I think the flying pathfinding oddities only apply to things that are actively trying to get to your fortress, such as dragons. Giant eagles and bats can just randomly fly close, and find a dwarf to maim without having to path past your walls.

[grelphy]

I've always built my trade depots in a sort of airlock. One drawbridge over a ditch (or moat, depending on the circumstances) leads outside; another drawbridge (possibly also over a ditch) leads inside, and only one is ever opened at a time. Ordinarily I leave the outside bridge open so caravans can get inside; once they're in, I seal them from the outside and open the inside gate, trade, and then reverse the bridges so they can get out whenever I decide to get rid of them.

Diagram:

Code: [Select]

..BBB..
__BBB__
##BBB##
.#DDD#.
.#DDD#.
.#DDD#.
.#BBB#.
__BBB__
..BBB..

. = floor
_ = channel
# = wall
B = bridge
D = depot

[Relee]

You mentioned animals and thieves but you should probably have a footnote about raccoons, which are both. I've had raccoons steal giant cave spider silk mittens before.

I didn't know you could capture thieves or military prisoners. My dwarves always eviscerate them even after they've been knocked unconcious. Maybe because I use so many war dogs.

[SocietalEclipse]

Immediately after a siege you can turn off waterskins for each squad long enough for all soldiers to get their fill of bubbly then turn them back on to get rid of the negative thoughts [Can't remember the last time he had a drink.]  Every little bit helps when your soldiers start tantruming every time their precious war dog gets squashed.