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[Mr. Accident]

He cripples two, and kills a final one by biting him. In the mouth. From behind.

Am I to understand that this dwarf effectively bit off a goblin's head? 

(Except for the mouth, apparently?)

[Golcondio]

I can't stress the importance of covering ALL body areas: while breastplates will effectively protect the torso, a well-aimed sword slash (even with a silver sword) will chop off an arm like nothing... As my legendary axedwarf, wearing an artifact adamantine breastplate, learned to his expense considering he still fights with both shield and axe, I didn't retire him: he's LESS vulnerable now that he's got less body parts to chop off!

[DarthCloakedDwarf]

Well, I'm officially impressed. My military (one squad, ten dwarfs) got annihilated by three goblins. One of the goblins was a bowman.

Now I'm curious.  Ten dwarves in steel armor should take a while to fall to three goblins using iron, even if they're not dishing out any damage themselves.  What were your militia skill levels like?  Did they take any shots to unprotected areas, or were the goblin weapons getting through their armor?  Did your militia manage to engage as a unit, or did they get cut down piecemeal? 

(And yeah, I had Fun the first time a goblin ambush got through my militia and into one of my early fortresses - walls were painted with dwarven blood.  But every fortress since then has slaughtered the goblins pretty easily, using well-trained militia in metal armor.  Which is why I'm curious what happened to you)

My dwarves approached the goblins in a group, most of them broke off the attack as soon as they saw a goblin shooting arrows at them. The ones that didn't were almost immediately incapacitated by the goblin spearmen. It took a while for these dwarves to die, but I consider a squad eliminated when it stops fighting, not when they all bleed to death.

My dwarves were dabbling warriors, as I made sure not to let them train (or they would have killed each other long before the arrival of the goblins).

My dwarves were assigned to wear full steel armor, steel shields, and weapons. The goblins horribly slaughtered all of them.

In this version full of equipping bugs, the logical next question is: were they actually wearing them?

Indeed.  Fully steel-clad dwarves are *almost* immune to being instakilled by goblin weapons, big severs, brain-crushes etc won't happen.  You can still get some nasty bruises or even broken smaller bones, but try it out in the arena - bronze/iron weapons vs full steel plate + mail shirt (upper arms, people!) = very, very, very long combat.

The dwarves were wearing the armor, or at least had them in their inventory.

Goblins are the same as they always were, grasshopper. It is YOU who has changed...

Specifically your military, who are now totally shit without awesome weapons/armour. Keep that in mind.

Well, yeah. In 40d, I used arrow towers to kill all goblins. Now, we don't get to use crossbows for shooting things anymore, which makes me sad. Ranged combat always was one of my favorite things.

[Laughing Man]

Well, I'm officially impressed. My military (one squad, ten dwarfs) got annihilated by three goblins. One of the goblins was a bowman.

Now I'm curious.  Ten dwarves in steel armor should take a while to fall to three goblins using iron, even if they're not dishing out any damage themselves.  What were your militia skill levels like?  Did they take any shots to unprotected areas, or were the goblin weapons getting through their armor?  Did your militia manage to engage as a unit, or did they get cut down piecemeal? 

(And yeah, I had Fun the first time a goblin ambush got through my militia and into one of my early fortresses - walls were painted with dwarven blood.  But every fortress since then has slaughtered the goblins pretty easily, using well-trained militia in metal armor.  Which is why I'm curious what happened to you)

My dwarves approached the goblins in a group, most of them broke off the attack as soon as they saw a goblin shooting arrows at them. The ones that didn't were almost immediately incapacitated by the goblin spearmen. It took a while for these dwarves to die, but I consider a squad eliminated when it stops fighting, not when they all bleed to death.

My dwarves were dabbling warriors, as I made sure not to let them train (or they would have killed each other long before the arrival of the goblins).

That's probably your problem.  Go ahead and let them train, as they don't seem to actually spar these days, preferring individual combat drills.  While less dramatic, it does prevent you from accidentally decapitating anyone while they idly work their way to legendary.

[Psieye]

Sparring is now only done under strict supervision of a teacher (who need not be the squad leader) when he feels the soldiers are skilled enough not to kill each other. That's the theory at least, but currently the military bug means they will hang in limbo long before this if you set their alert level to active/train. Best to leave them at the Inactive alert level and those who aren't slackers will do some self-training.

[DarthCloakedDwarf]

Sparring is now only done under strict supervision of a teacher (who need not be the squad leader) when he feels the soldiers are skilled enough not to kill each other. That's the theory at least, but currently the military bug means they will hang in limbo long before this if you set their alert level to active/train. Best to leave them at the Inactive alert level and those who aren't slackers will do some self-training.

So it's like martial arts; they only spar with the instructor supervising, otherwise they just do their forms?

[Morrigi]

Yep.

[Eidako]

On a related tangent: war dogs -- stupidly underpowered. In my current fortress, a goblin thief with a dagger snuck up on one in a narrow corridor and decapitated it with a single blow, walking away unscathed. Then a naked hammer goblin escaped from a cage and I watched as six war dogs spent a week trying to kill it while it was unconscious. In that time I watched its red wounds go to yellow and yellow to brown. The dogs took a beating too.

[Silophant]

That'd be because teeth are currently exactly as hard as skin. Your dogs are gumming the goblins to death.

[Golcondio]

That'd be because teeth are currently exactly as hard as skin. Your dogs are gumming the goblins to death.

Imagine being hickey-ed to death by a pack of 40 war dogs... Sounds like fun!

[Old-one-eye]

That'd be because teeth are currently exactly as hard as skin. Your dogs are gumming the goblins to death.

Imagine being hickey-ed to death by a pack of 40 war dogsfemale vampires... Sounds like fun!

^fixed

[I am Leo]

"Curse them, an ambush"
No worries I think. I allocate a task to pull the lever to raise my drawbridge. Sadly I have a lot of dwarves outside my magma moat, looting the caravan the previous goblin ambush had done away with. The goblins aren't near the bridge, I have time for a daring rescue. I activate the military and it turns out all of them are already outside, looting. It kicks off.
"Curse them, an ambush"
No worries. This time, a mere two squares from my gatehouse, but that thing has five layers of cage and weapon trap.
"Curse them, an ambush"
I worry. The combined might of 15 goblins overwhelms my 20 strong militia in the open. The goblins that swarmed the gatehouse are all dead or caged though.
"Curse them, an ambush"
...ok. The remainder of the horde surges over my traps and loses a lot of their number, but they breach the gap and kill the dwarf running for the drawbridge lever.
"Curse them, an ambush"
STOP IT
"Curse them, an ambush"
I go fetal
"Curse them, an ambush"
37 goblins in total, swarming the fortress. The last 17 of my dwarves withdraw to the crypts, the lowest level of my fortress. Each of those still standing assigned a tomb, I pray that somebody is left to lay them in it. The battle of Claspbronze is met. The last dwarf standing flees to a corner to die bleeding and alone, huddled against his own coffin.
"Curse them, an ambush"
I have had fun.

Next time I have a moat, I'm either going to make it big enough to warrant my dwarves never leaving it and only lower the drawbridge for special occasions, or I'm making a seperate lever house in which there will be a jobless dwarf, walled in with a food supply who will exist only to instantly pull the siege levers.

[Mandaril]

My dwarves were assigned to wear full steel armor, steel shields, and weapons. The goblins horribly slaughtered all of them.

Also, cage traps are, possibly, the stupidest things in DF, and I don't use them on principle. Particularly since they only delay the problem, and I can't harvest the iron afterwards. Furthermore, they do not help against attackers, as they require the enemy to walk over them. You can't send a cage trap to go chase away an enemy.

Really? Goblins are overpowered?

Såkzul Dorenirtir Liruk Aned, "Såzkul Diamonddangled the Violence of Sport" is the militia commander of my fort, "Angelwatch". He is "absolutely inexhaustible, unbelievable strong, extremely agile and quick to heal". He wears a full iron gear and wields an iron shield and an Iron War Hammer. During the 3 years of military service, he has scored 26 kills. 22 of them in a single siege. 8 trolls and rest of kills were goblins. Last autumn the commander went into martial trance and held off single handedly TWO full ambush groups of goblins, some of them had bows, while rest of the military scrambled to help. He only got a couple of scratches.

There is no creature alive who dares to **ck with Diamonddangled the Violence of Sport.

[frightlever]

or I'm making a seperate lever house in which there will be a jobless dwarf, walled in with a food supply who will exist only to instantly pull the siege levers.

I've only been playing seriously about a month, so I hesitate to give any advice, but I put all my important levers in the meeting hall that I've allocated as the burrow for the citizenry to run to when an ambush happens. So first sign of an ambush I put the civilians on alert, they stream to the meeting hall, which is then packed with idlers who are free to pull any lever I need pulled.

Now REMEMBERING what all those levers do required making a schematic...

[Golcondio]

or I'm making a seperate lever house in which there will be a jobless dwarf, walled in with a food supply who will exist only to instantly pull the siege levers.

I've only been playing seriously about a month, so I hesitate to give any advice, but I put all my important levers in the meeting hall that I've allocated as the burrow for the citizenry to run to when an ambush happens. So first sign of an ambush I put the civilians on alert, they stream to the meeting hall, which is then packed with idlers who are free to pull any lever I need pulled.

Now REMEMBERING what all those levers do required making a schematic...

Very good thinking, my man: it's the most reliable way to have those levers pulled real quick!