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[Sweedumz]

I'm playing a game with Goblins instead of dwarves and I've encountered a huge problem.

Elves and Humans have attacked and/or beseiged me several times already, and each time, their groups hang back at the edges of the map, doing nothing, and I have to wait a whole season or more for them to seemingly get bored and go away.

Is this a bug or a feature? Sometimes they do attack, but it's usually out of the blue after I've let my guard down. This never, ever happened in my Dwarf games. Is it because I'm playing as goblins? Is it because I tell the goblins to stay indoors?

Any advice. I'm thinking about carpeting the terrain with fortified towers to deter loiterers, but now I have to wait ANOTHER season before doing that.

[Albedo]

First, it's a mod, so anything is possible.   But, we'll assume(?!) that nothing went wrong on that end...

Do you have a path to your dwarves goblins?  If an enemy can't path to you, if you seal all the entrances, then they have no reason to march forward under your walls.

[Quietust]

Hanging out at the map edge is normal siege behavior for humans - they reportedly set up a campfire as well, then wait a while before attacking.

[Untelligent]

Ayup. Humans have the [SIEGER] tag, so unlike goblins, they'll perform actual sieges on you -- they'll hang around outside your fortress for a long time, cutting off your fortress from outside resources and traders.

Of course, it's easy to be self-sufficient without setting foot outside, so it's not all that effective. Annoying, though.

[Sweedumz]

I see.

This is a "mod", but the only change is simply a CIV_CONTROLLABLE tag on the goblins. By the way, this behaviour is not limited to actual Seiges. The Elves and humans do this even during ambushes.

There is certainly a path to the goblins. I even went to the trouble of constructing a long winding underground passage so I could lure them in an drown them in it. After a llloooooongg wait they took the bait, so its not a pathing issue. (Though I screwed up the setup and a few stragglers got in). A word to the wise; it is harder to drown enemies than you might think.

I'm going to try setting up a system of watchtowers, but realistically I don't think it could ever be comprehensive enough to counter this nonsense.

I'll end on an interesting observation. The human troops, on horseback at least, seemed to be afraid of my goblins. If any approached, they would scatter and regroup. Maybe this is normal behavour. I've never fought humans like this before, so I don't know.

[Holy Mittens]

Horses are afraid of sentients, so they run away, even when mounted. It's a weird problem with their AI.

[Nidokoenig]

Earlier today, goblins slaughtered two years' worth of caravans in my near-vanilla dwarf game(just a new plant and reaction, almost definitely wouldn't affect this). The next year they came and sieged and did the waiting game, too, before they finally came in. Goblins just run straight in and get carved up by traps like usual. So it looks like the [SIEGER] tag is what's causing this behaviour.
 Don't know about elves, even with deforesting the entire map I haven't been able to annoy them. Maybe it's because I convert it all into barrels and spiked balls and have next to none in stock most of the time, or perhaps it's because I always send them away with tens of thousands in profit and gifts. Does getting obscene amounts of profit expand caravans?

[XSI]

Firstly, to solve the horses running issue, add [likes fighting] to the horses in the raws, they won't run anymore. (Though running is what makes them troublesome when they are carrying an archer)

Secondly, caravans expand over time, giving them a lot of profit seems to help make the caravan grow.

The sitting around and waiting is almost certainly from the sieger tag, but that's actual sieging, sit around and try to starve the enemy. The fact that this just doesn't work on dwarves is above their thinking processes, they are simply too stupid to know that.

[Nidokoenig]

Secondly, caravans expand over time, giving them a lot of profit seems to help make the caravan grow.

I'll give this one a quick test next time one rolls through. I'll stack 'em up with masterpiece quarry bush leaf roasts, should let me send the elves away with a few dozen thousand in profit. The humans and dwarves will be millionaires. I need to clear some stock and and up my exported wealth, anyway. The dwarves came with five or six wagons last time.

[Jim Groovester]

I'm playing a game with Goblins instead of dwarves....

A man of my own heart! I can't stand these bearded, fat, lazy dwarves, with their addiction to alcohol and marathon drinking sessions. Indeed, I much prefer goblins and their preference for meat and bones and water, which are far simpler to provide. Elf bones, delicious!

Anyways, you didn't mention dwarf siegers. That's because you need to add the [PROGRESS_TRIGGER_?:?] tags to dwarves. Add that, and come autumn, you'll get lots of steel armor to melt. And dwarf skulls to carve into totems to line roads with.

I have a goblin ice fortress in its eleventh year, so I have some experience dealing with them.

[ShadeJS]

Ayup. Humans have the [SIEGER] tag, so unlike goblins, they'll perform actual sieges on you -- they'll hang around outside your fortress for a long time, cutting off your fortress from outside resources and traders.

Of course, it's easy to be self-sufficient without setting foot outside, so it's not all that effective. Annoying, though.

I've been doing a bit of modding and this is the reason... The simple solution is to remove this tag from the entity file.