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[cephalo]

Getting military dwarves to do what you want is way too unreliable. I would like to defend my fort without traps, but I don't have enough play time to risk that when there's such a large chance that none of my troops will show up at the gates. If everyone shows up the goblins have no chance, but the goblins do have the advantage of not having to eat, drink and sleep, which means they are always fighting together as a cohesive group, while dwarves are always fighting at half strength or worse.

Changing the heirarchy mid-battle to pry troops away from sleeping commanders is too much busy work, and often the new commander will prove just as incapable as the last.

A couple things can be done about this problem.

Provide a squad order for troops to go to their station no matter what the state of exhaustion, thirst, hunger etc. I rather have them starve at their posts then let ten other dwarves get slaughtered while the ones charged with protecting them are on lunch break.

There should also be an option for an automated rotation system so that there is an adjustable minimum number of troops at a station and adjustable patrol time. When one guys shift is up, he waits for his replacement who knows that it is time to take over. Everyone else is off duty, sparring, whatever. The more troops you have rotated out, the more practice they can put in. Whether the patrol time is too long or too often can be left up to the player to manage.

[Granite26]

How about we see how the currently in progress at this very moment changes to the way armies work affects this, and then come back to it?

[cephalo]

I just wanted to state my desire for a 'set and forget' type thing, rather than a 'omg that squad has been on patrol for three years and is about to revolt' type thing.

[Pilsu]

Well, they should abandon their posts when they start starving but hunger should be ignored when on alert, yeah

[Neonivek]

Remember topic creator these are Dwarves, not slaves... (Besides Starving Dwarves arn't all that great)

Id like it however so that you would be able to get at least 50% of your army to go to their posts in an emergency... a number I admit, often can be unrealistic depending on how you design your fortress. However I don't think the solution is to attach mind control helmets to your dwarves.

in addition Topic creator...

A problem here is also you don't seem to be aware of how the game is played... Your goal is to give your dwarves as much time as they need as well as to weaken the enemies' numbers before they arrive. If you don't use traps then that is the weakness you chose to impair yourself with. If you don't fortify and make outerwalls then you should expect to be caught off guard.

You not doing so is not the game's fault but rather your denial of a part of the game.

[Draco18s]

A problem here is also you don't seem to be aware of how the game is played... Your goal is to give your dwarves as much time as they need as well as to weaken the enemies' numbers before they arrive. If you don't use traps then that is the weakness you chose to impair yourself with. If you don't fortify and make outerwalls then you should expect to be caught off guard.

I have one trap that kills upwards of 3/4 of a siege before I even need to take notice.  Said 1 trap can kill, in theory, 53 goblins at the same time assuming none are laying down.

Tends to get triggered about 3 times a siege, killing any who were left paralyzed.

This isn't broken, then?  I don't even NEED a god damn military.  And that is the problem, if you have traps you don't need a military, but if you don't have traps you need traps.

[Neonivek]

However... he is suggesting something to fix a problem... which is caused... by ANOTHER problem.

Which in truth... turns the suggestion into a complaint

[Electronic Phantom]

Eh?

I do suppose there's a little complaining going on in there, but he's got a point: the military is too unreliable at this stage of the game.

But, ceph, neonivek also has a point.  You should be designing your fortresses to counteract the weaknesses inherent in a half-wit (an insult to all half-wits, I assure you), slacker, inefficient military.  If you're depending on them... expect heavy casualties.

I have been taking a page out of Drac's book (only his book because he was the first to mention it on this thread) and liberally littering my entrances with cage and weapon traps.  If all else fails use a bridge.  As of this point, bridges are indestructable... at least... I hope they are.

So.  When in doubt, seal your fortress against ground enemies with a bridge... or just use about six hundred weapon traps all in a single file line.

-(e)EP

[Draco18s]

or just use about six hundred weapon traps all in a single file line.

I used 53 tiles (not a line) of upright spikes all connected to one pressure plate.  Oh, 3 steel or 4 iron spikes to a tile.

[supremeMang]

the military need to fill their waterskins with booze...theyre pretty pointless items without this.

[Overdose]

the military need to fill their waterskins with booze...theyre pretty pointless items without this.

and some food in the backpacks as well, to eat while in the field

[cephalo]

Remember topic creator these are Dwarves, not slaves... (Besides Starving Dwarves arn't all that great)

If nobody defends the fort, they will be slaves soon enough. Military defense is an urgent matter. Any sentient being understands that getting a few extra z's loses it's value when it's going to be your last breath if you don't get moving.

Id like it however so that you would be able to get at least 50% of your army to go to their posts in an emergency... a number I admit, often can be unrealistic depending on how you design your fortress. However I don't think the solution is to attach mind control helmets to your dwarves.

Mind control? How about a goblin mace into your brain. Oh wait, that's just brain control. Still, if that's not a motivating force, nothing is.

in addition Topic creator...

A problem here is also you don't seem to be aware of how the game is played... Your goal is to give your dwarves as much time as they need as well as to weaken the enemies' numbers before they arrive. If you don't use traps then that is the weakness you chose to impair yourself with. If you don't fortify and make outerwalls then you should expect to be caught off guard.

You not doing so is not the game's fault but rather your denial of a part of the game.

That's not very dwarfy.... I know how to kill off a whole siege with a couple of weapon traps, but where's the fun in that? I just want my dwarves to understand that defending the fort is the only thing that matters when the enemies are at the gates. My fort is in no danger, I have a few traps at the entrance that take care of everything, but that's not nearly as fun a dwarves doing their duty. Fortifications are for looks only when there's one dwarf showing up to man the ramparts. Sometimes they all show up and the traps don't come into play, and that's fun.

Another thing that adds insult to injury, is that my dwarves would have the gall to get angry about long patrol duty, when we both know they can abandon their posts any ol' time. They leave it to me to tell them when to take a break, but not when to show up! I would like to be able to count on x amount of troops at a station. If it takes 3 times as many dwarves in the squad, fine, just handle it yourselves. I don't want to have to constantly remember whos on duty and whos not, there's too much other work to do planning out the fortress. I'll give you 20 dwarves(or whatever), nearby food and beds, and you guys make sure you have 6 or 7 at the gate at all times. If the goblins come in great numbers, everybody just stop what your doing and go to your station. The sooner you kill the gobs, the sooner you can go back to bed.

[Hyndis]

I agree that military dwarves should be a bit more punctual, since being in the military is a duty, not a simple job. Wandering off for a break or naptime in the middle of a siege is going AWOL, and going AWOL during a battle is delt with quite harshly.

A possibly easy way to do this could be that during sieges, all military dwarves ignore their basic needs unless they're about to die of hunger or thirst. But just having the munchies or wanting naptime because you yawned? Not a value excuse!

By linking this to siege mode, the military would automatically head to their stations without the player needing to micromanage, and by having it so they will still take care of basic needs but only if the situation is dire, dwarves don't be killing themselves for no good reason during a prolonged siege.

One other thing I'd like to see would be better squads. Right now if the squad leader wanders off for naptime, he'll drag along his 20 subordinates to bed with him. 

...which is probably why female military dwarves are so dang fertile... 

If the leader dwarf has to leave his station for some reason, a second in command should automatically take over and anchor the squad. And so on and so forth down the chain of command. Alternatively, remove the link between subordinate dwarves and the leader, instead having a "phantom dwarf" be the leader. Really just a marker. It'd function like a regular military dwarf squad leader, except it cannot be harmed, cannot attack, doesn't eat, sleep, or drink and is only spawned or despawned when the squad is assigned to a particular location. Basically just something to keep the squad in place.

[Neonivek]

If nobody defends the fort, they will be slaves soon enough. Military defense is an urgent matter. Any sentient being understands that getting a few extra z's loses it's value when it's going to be your last breath if you don't get moving

A Human Army moves on its Stomach... a Dwarven Army thinks on it as well.

Plus this is a siege... those lost Z's can cost you the fortress.

Unless they have breached the walls, no one calls on their whole military.

Relating to sieges once they are seiges... Your job is to use 1/2 - 1/3 of your force to drive back the enemy army while using walls and traps to keep them at bay.

Though on that subject... Starving Dehydrated dwarves who are tired... are dead without a question unless they are Marksmen (because Crossbows work via magic)

Even when there is a siege or an ambush... a "Last Ditch Defense" where Dwarves ignore all their needs... Truely should be Last Ditch and not "I want my whole army NOW!!!" or "I Rely entirely on my army so I should get my whole army". It should also be noticable of the concequences of doing such as it should play on the mindset of the Dwarves.

So as long as this "Ignore everything Last Ditch Effort" doesn't become stupidly superfluous and can backfire if used without care (Note this includes something more then a simple bad memory). Ill be happy! Heck three of these should be enough to make your Dwarves run away.

Of course... One thing I always liked about someone's suggestion about Squires is that they would go out and feed squads. Which is BADLY needed when Dwarves have to travel huge distances to their food.

[Veroule]

The first thing to truly realize here is that this applies to every dwarf.  Dwarves get a happy thought about doing work and therefore should want to do it.  When they get hungry or thirsty in the middle of a job they should try to finish the job (this is already used for sleep in that they doi not wake up for thirst).  All dwarves need to delay eating and drinking some in an attempt to finish thier current work in progress.  I would consider hauling an item to the workshop to be worked at as immediately stoppable, but being in a workshop should attempt to delay eating, drinking, and sleeping.

Next sleeping dwarves need to actually wake up early.  Instead of just having the thought, "slept uneasily due to noise recently"; they should be awakened by that and start doing stuff.  They would just sleepy again sooner.

In military terms being on duty means you remain at your post until relieved.  The squad order need to include an absolute number for the dwarves that should be present.  This should apply to station and patrol orders.  The whole squad system to be seperated from the leader level so that it can pass order to each dwarf.  Once both the military changes are in place, and the general change in dwarven behavior is made, then military dwarves should be much more consistent in being on duty.

Let's worry about the on duty, off duty rotation later.