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[rodya_mirov]

As a "challenge game" I've decided not to have a military.  Instead I have 50 masons (the other 30 or so dwarves are plenty to keep operations running smoothly) who just build walls, towers, machinations, and hopefully deathtraps.

Anyway as time goes on I get a larger and larger pile of cages full of goblins.  When I try to dump their cages, for some reason, my dwarves like to let the goblins out.  They have no such problem *building* the cages, of course.

In any case, without a military, I'm not really comfortable with setting them loose, and I can't seem to drown them in their cages (not for lack of trying).  Now, I can rig up their cages to be released by a lever, the same lever that floods their area, but that takes forever, and two mechanisms per cage.  Not exactly time-efficient.

Ideas?

[CognitiveDissonance]

Absolutely! A real tall tower with careful application of gravity.
I asked the same thing here:
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=55907.0

[rodya_mirov]

The question is the specific method of uncaging them.  How exactly do I get them from the cage to the sky?

There is a 50z tower waiting

[CognitiveDissonance]

Read the link, lazy

Designate the top as a pond
Pick one goblin at a time to be dumped

Should be all!

[Urist McDepravity]

One day Toady will finally fix the cage drowning bug and it will become truly easy.
http://bay12games.com/dwarves/mantisbt/view.php?id=1599

[rodya_mirov]

I did read the thread (in fact posted this very question in it, at the start, though I was admittedly less clear on my confusion).

The instructions given for disarming don't seem to work (d->b->d doesn't seem to do anything) and I'm a bit nervous about letting them loose, even for 1 step.  Those axes are dangerous.

[culwin]

I think the butcher needs to use goblin meat for animal food and/or bait.

[Urist McDepravity]

The instructions given for disarming don't seem to work (d->b->d doesn't seem to do anything)

Sometimes stuff they wear is forbidden. You can unforbid it via [z]-stocks-weapons or d-b-c

[rodya_mirov]

Well this plan is a failure ...

Constructing cages literally directly next to the Pit, selecting the goblin for dumping ... he escaped and killed two legendary dwarves on his way out.

[Sphalerite]

I think that building the cage, then linking it to a lever, is your only safe bet, provided you want to reuse the cages.  There are several ways to destroy the cages and their contents, if you can accept losing the cages.

[LegoLord]

Normally, dwarves passing by a dwarf that is moving a goblin don't get scared.  But this doesn't work with goblin thieves, for some reason.  So if you mass-designate goblins for pitting, and tell them to include the thieves, the dwarves leading the soldiers will get scared by the thief and cancel the job they're doing.  And it just spirals from there.  So you have to deal with thieves one at a time.

[Arkenstone]

Well this plan is a failure ...

Constructing cages literally directly next to the Pit, selecting the goblin for dumping ... he escaped and killed two legendary dwarves on his way out.

Didn't you disarm him first?  No goblin without a weapon can kill one, let alone two, dwarves without at least sitting on them until they suffocate.
Read the thread on how to disarm them.

[ZeroGravitas]

Well this plan is a failure ...

Constructing cages literally directly next to the Pit, selecting the goblin for dumping ... he escaped and killed two legendary dwarves on his way out.

Try not doing it wrong. Here's how to do it correctly since you seem incapable of reading any of the links or posts that explain how:

0. designate a garbage dump zone
0. designate an animal stockpile
1. put goblin cages in a stockpile
2. d->b->c all the goblin cages
3. d->b->d all the goblin cages
4. k->d each individual goblin cage
5. wait for dwarves to strip all the equipment out
6. do whatever you want with unarmed, unarmored, caged goblins

[Broadsword]

Your CHALLENGE game is to use traps instead of military? I think that's a little backwords.

[Dave Mongoose]

If you don't mind losing the cages, put an animal stockpile in a chamber you can flood with magma.

So long as the cages aren't made of magma safe materials, they will melt and so will the goblins. Wood is the best choice because it will burn and it's an easily renewable resource (glass is also good, if you have sand).

If you don't have magma or want to keep the cages then pitting is the only answer I can think of that's time-efficient... encasing the cages in ice *might* work, if your location is the right climate for winter freezes.