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[Omegastick]

My fifth succesful fortress. It's a huge tower, spanning both underground and over ground, made entirely of chalk. third year, first invasion: I lock up the entrance to prevent people from getting into or out of my fortress. I set my archer to patrol the fortifications, check his inventory, two arrows D:. No matter, if all goes to plan I wont need him anyway. I keep waiting, but because my doors are closed the invaders don't come close enough to pepper me them with the bolts I have in the making. Eventually my dwarves start to get thirsty so I move my champion wrestler squad from guarding a dwarf with a fey mood (I couldn't get any of the materials he needed) to the entrance and open the gates. The invaders flood in immediatley, my archer ignores his new ammo and runs to get into close combat with the enemy and my champons are all killed almost instantly. On top of that all my dwarves run to the river to drink and promptly get slaughtered by orcs.

This has happened five times now, how do you guys survive the seiges. I remember once I survived one with a complex maze of traps and archers. But that was destroyed by an enemy that destroys buildings.

[gtmattz]

Why are your dwarves drinking from the river? Do you not have a stockpile of booze?  And champions getting slaughtered???  What do they have for armor?  I have survived sieges with a single squad of 5 champion axedwarves in the past, so I am not sure where you are going wrong. 

First thing you need to do is get them some water inside at the very least.  All you need to make a well is a shaft a few z levels deep, a mechanism, a bucket, a block, a rope/chain and a bucket brigade to fill the bottom with water, then your dwarves have no reason to go out and get slaughtered at the river. 

As for your champions getting slaughtered, do you have them armored properly?  As in layered up (see armor layering on the wiki) so they have the maximum defense?  I usually get my dwarves in armor before I start them sparring so that they are at least semi competent armor users by the time the fighting starts.

Of course all of this becomes 10x harder with the orc mod, but you didn't specify so I am assuming vanilla here.

[darthbob88]

Lots and lots of traps, a single entrance, and a squad of legendary wrestlers in at least chain mail hiding outside the entrance. My main problem with sieges is how long they take; goblins generally seem a trifle wary of marching into my traps and defences. I usually don't even raise the bridge for them, I just let them walk right into my military. That is, of course, the result if I don't shoot them first.

[Kav]

You just summed up my first 3 experiences with orcs. Set crossbow squads to not pursue enemies, that way they will go back for ammo instead of running at them with a death wish.

For now I actually have orcs off. They're just a little bit too hard for me. Goblins are bad enough.

You should do the drawbridge over a ditch connected to a leaver thing. Pull the leaver to close it before they are close enough to get shot at other wise it'll be too late. And find a way to keep the dwarfs well fed and drunk without going outside.

Good luck

[dakenho]

a 10 x 20 farm growing plump helps season a year and 4 farmer dwarfs is more than enough to provide for a full fortress of booze and still have  surplus.  so what are you doing that your dwarfs have to drink from the river?

[Kanddak]

Yeah, I'm going with other posters and betting your dwarves are at a disadvantage in battle because of their sobriety.
You should probably also arm them as soon as they hit legendary wrestling.
I tend to defend my forts by digging deep moats with retracting bridges to drop invaders. I used to build elaborate drowning and magma traps, but it's just not worth the effort when pit drops are so wonderfully effective.

[slink]

To get water easily to your fortress, dig a tunnel underground, in the first layer, from the very edge of the brook or river.  This tunnel should go to a place where you intend to have an enclosed outdoor area.  End the tunnel there with a staircase to the surface.  Next to the staircase channel a hold into the tunnel.  Build a well over the channelled hole.  Now you are ready except for the water.  For safety's sake, you should make a stone grate and install it as a wall grate at the end of the tunnel nearest the river.  Lastly, cut a channel between the river and the tunnel.  Water will flow into the tunnel and your well will be functional soon afterward.  An additional feature could be a floodgate controlled by a lever, to close the connection between the well and the river, but it is not necessary.

Make the well a water source zone, and then set it do the Dwarves ONLY drink from marked zones. 

This is only good for non-freezing biomes, but you did not mention a problem with freezing.

I don't know if you are using the orcs that can avoid traps, but this method will work regardless.  Outside the walls of your fort, make a walled enclosure with two openings.  One is to the outside, and one is to your fortress via a walled hallway.  Build a raising drawbridge at each opening, each controlled by a lever.  One level above the enclosure, build a floor overlooking the enclosure, protected by fortifications.  Post your marksdwarves there with their ammo stockpile nearby.  Next time the orcs attack your fortress, leave both bridges down until a group enters the enclosure.  Close the inner opening by raising that drawbridge, then close the outer opening in the same way.  Now the orcs are like fish in a barrel, for your marksdwarves.  Furthermore, your marksdwarves cannot rush into melee because the raised bridge prevents them from doing that.  You don't need moats under the drawbridges for this to work.  The raised bridges act as walls.  If you want to collect the loot before dealing with the next group, just lower the inner bridge and let everyone finish doing their jobs before lowering the outer bridge.

[Safe-Keeper]

No matter what I try, the idiots insist on drinking from the river. Eventually I built a well over the indoor reservoir they refused to drink from, and all of a sudden the pool water was excellent.

I suppose they thought that the bucket they lowered into the water magically cleaned it or whatnot.

[gtmattz]

No matter what I try, the idiots insist on drinking from the river. Eventually I built a well over the indoor reservoir they refused to drink from, and all of a sudden the pool water was excellent.

I suppose they thought that the bucket they lowered into the water magically cleaned it or whatnot.

That still leaves the question... So why no booze?  Are you trying a 'dry' fort or something?

[KenboCalrissian]

I've found that you can train your military in wrestling at the same time as with weapons by assigning some guards as wrestlers.  Generally speaking, military will only train with fighters wielding the same weapons, but I've stumbled upon an exception with guards.  They'll wrestle with anybody, including marksdwarves, forcing their sparring buddy to wrestle even if they're holding a weapon.  This has saved me a ton of headaches in the weapon managing department (and it's much faster), but at the same time it causes my entire military to be considered "Wrestlers" which makes it difficult assigning positions during a siege with 'X.'

[Omegastick]

Ok, I think I see what I did wrong. I don't know why I had no booze, I had way to many plump helmets and my booze maker was set to make booze repeatedly. I didn't have a well because there was nowhere to put it, My fortress is a 15x15 tower and the entance is only 3x3 (it expands upwards). I didn't use a bridge but instead three floodgates thatwere connected to a lever in the entrance, I think that this achieves the same goal but with less space. I didn't know you could tell your troops to not follow enemies (lol, two years playing and I'm still learning the basics). The Orcs are from the Dig Deeper mod, I don't know if they are meant to cause serious fun but they don't seem to unbeatable. My wrestlers were wearing their clothes from when they were clothiers and cheese makers, so that's why they got torn up so fast. I couldn't have really given them weapons though sa there was no wood on the map and although I had the workshops and furnaces ready to be built there were no smiths.

[bluea]

1) While wells do need to be directly over water, they don't have to be exactly one level up. So you don't need to use one of your tiles in the 3x3 entrance area as the well - you can open a hole in the floor somewhere else in the 15x15 main tower. It looks like you've solved this though.

2) This is a guess, but go to the 'stocks' screen, go to 'kitchen', set plump helmets to 'brew'. If you have an order "Don't brew plump helmets" then you can see exactly what you're reporting. So... turn that off.

[Safe-Keeper]

That still leaves the question... So why no booze?

Ran low on barrels. Happens to the best of us.

[petersohn]

2) This is a guess, but go to the 'stocks' screen, go to 'kitchen', set plump helmets to 'brew'. If you have an order "Don't brew plump helmets" then you can see exactly what you're reporting. So... turn that off.

And turn plump helmets to "don't cook" and dwarven wine (and other kinds of booze) to "don't cook".

But yes, barrel shortage can be a problem. I usually embark with more than 100 units of booze, which comes with a lot of barrels, which will never be used up to hold other stuff, except if I produce way too much plump helmets.

[Grendus]

Always set up a well inside the defensive perimeter of your fortress, and always keep a buffer of several dozen barrels to keep the booze flowing. The last thing you want is for your dwarves to get sober enough to realize where they actually are.