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[mike2010]

Hello,

I've been playing pretty consistently for the last two weeks or so. I've figured out most things, but I still can't seem to get my military in a good place. Here's the situation:

I have assigned 10 dwarves to the military. I built them ten armor racks/weapon racks, and placed a weapon/armor/bolt stockpile on the same level. I made -tons- of steel/bronze/iron armor and weaponry, and a few suits of leather armor for any archers. I designated their equipment to individual weapon of choice. Through the "q" menu I created a barracks from the racks for them to train in. I also changed their military orders to "train". So by now, they should get the hint, right?

My dwarves do this "individual training" stuff that seems to do remarkably little for them. I tried setting them up with no weapons, and then training weapons, and still nothing changed. In a past fortress, one of my squads started demonstrations, and that seemed to help my entire group immensely. Why is individual training so weak? How do I get the demonstrations/sparring back? (So I can actually use a doctor dwarf?) How can increase my training rate?

Also, after I sic the dwarves on some target, only then do they turn into axe/mace/sword-dwarves. In all the fortresses I've restarted, only one has actually stayed as "Axedwarf", and showed up as military on my menu. How can I get my entire troup to stay military profession like that too? So in general...how do I build a military? I feel like I've tried everything!

Thanks again, looking forward to reading responses...

Mike

[tj333]

It sounds like your squad is not active. Hit 's', select the squad by its letter and then hit 't' to make them active.

[Dahenk]

Also make sure you've set them to the "Active/Training" in the "alerts" menu in the "military" menu.

I'm also having trouble with the military. Generally i get the feeling they are training very slow no matter how many/few dwarves i have in one squad. Some of them also keep dropping and re-equipping their gear all the time instead of training, even though they are scheduled to train the whole year.

I also realized that each archery target needs its own room designated to it to be used, or my dwarves would just go to the room one at a time and only use one of the targets.

[Sergius]

From what I've seen, demonstrations need the dwarves to be more or less on the same skill level, one that isn't novice or lower. Until then they'll do some drills and stuff. Also, they have to be active and in a squad and stuff. If they're off-duty, they'll just go train individually whenever they're bored, but will not organize anything.

I haven't been able to set them to use training weapons except manually, which is annoying if you get attacked, because as you can guess they aren't very damaging.

However, I haven't ever seen a sparring accident with steel weapons, they seem to train just fine "lightly tapping" each other with it.

[Khift]

Sparring is no longer lethal so training weapons are typically not recommended. They're good for making goblins in the training arena* last longer, though, so they aren't entirely useless. I still would not recommend having dwarves leave them equipped, not just because it is difficult to swap to real weapons on the fly for ambushes/sieges but also because you run the risk of a dwarf getting attached to a training weapon and refusing to put it down.

(*The training arena is simple: use cage traps to capture as many goblins as possible, use 'd'-'b'-'d' and designate the caged goblins for mass dumping, go into the stocks screen and un-dump all of their items except their weapons [leave the armor on so they last longer, also to save labor], un-forbid the weapons, un-dump the cages too, allow your civilians to strip the weapons and carry the cages to a stockpile near a channel, position your military under the channel [with or without training weapons, your choice] and then use 'i' to designate the channel as a pit and under 'P' select goblins to be chucked into the pit. Your civilians will chuck the disarmed [but still armored] goblins into the pit for joint species training operations. It's fairly effective, all things considered, especially if you use training weapons. I also find trolls make decent training fodder; I haven't had one break loose yet. Maybe I'm just lucky.)

[mike2010]

They started doing some real training when I set them to Active/Training mode (I didn't even notice it was there)! I lost my fortress ten minutes ago to a dual Goblin ambush that slayed a passing Human caravan...six of my dwarves were still in the hospital while I tried to figure out how to make thread for them to heal up, so my four dwarves pretty much got owned...and then they invaded..and then...*sniff*

Alright. Next time they'll be training from the start.

[Stargazer]

Don't forget to set the minimum amount of dwarves that train to about half your squad. The default is set so that 10 dwarves are required for a demonstration to start, which means that they just won't do any unless all 10 dwarves are present. Although, I've also been having trouble getting my squads to train on a regular basis. It feels as if having them on -inactive- actually gets them training -more- than the active/training mode does.

Also, when you view a dwarf's inventory screen, will it show if they have a quiver/arrows on them or not?

[martinuzz]

Combat demonstrations will occur, when one of the dwarves in the squad that's training has better skills then other dwarves in his squad.
Demonstrations become more effective, when the demonstrating dwarf improves teaching and leadership skills, and the observing dwarves get better student/concentration/observer(?) skills

I think sparring does not occur until the dwarves have at least some fighting/dodging skills.
Someone gave me the hint to make squads of 3 dwarves (it helps to make have dwarves in a squad use the same weapon), to increase the chance of them sparring. It seems to work.

I got 4 squads of 3 dwarves now. They alternate sparring and demonstrations fine. I assigned each of them a seperate barracks, made of a single weapon rack. The weapon rack only allows training, for the appropriate squad. No individual, or squad storage, or sleeping. (Why would a dwarf ever need to drop his weapon/armor anyways?)

I do *not* build any armor stands in the barracks. I've found that they're bugged, at least in respect to carried food. Dwarves will drop their carried food at the armor stand for some reason, where it rots. Annoying part is, nobody can haul away the rotting food, because it still is owned by the dwarf who put it there. With no armor stands, carrying 3 food works fine (provided they have backpacks).

When setting schedules, notice that you can edit the minimum number of dwarves required. The usefulness still puzzles me though.
I've tried alternating 1 and 3 dwarves minimum each month. Indeed, when a minimum of 1 is set, only 1 dwarf will train (individual combat drill), and the other 2 will return to their civilian jobs. However, all dwarves still get the 'grumbling/angered/depressed/enraged at long patrol duty' thought, even though they alternate between 1 month duty and 1 month freetime.

Same story when, instead of fiddling with the minimum number of dwarves, I tried alternating between 'Train' and 'no orders' commands.
They still get the same unhappy thought.
I have quite a hard time, keeping my military happy, at least until I get legendary brewers/cooks and a mist generator running.
Dwarves who are on 'no orders' revert to civilian status as well. Main difference with specifying a minimum number, would be that dwarves that have 'no orders' will still tend to go to the barracks, for individual combat drills, instead of doing civilan jobs.

EDIT: as for equipment, note that you can layer chain mail with breastplate. Greaves do not go over chain leggings though. Haven't tried leather leggings.

[Elestia]

Tried removing the armor stands, weapon racks. But there are still owned clothes and food littering my barracks. Good thing is some of the meat rotted away into nothingness, bad thing is my military's morale is low by the miasma.

[martinuzz]

The rotting meat already present will stay until it's rotten away. No new food will be dumped though.

As for owned clothes, that's another matter. Only in their free time, and then, only sometimes, will your dwarves store their clothing in their rooms.
They need a(ny) room assigned to them for that though, and preferably a cabinet or two, so they don't litter the floor of their room.

[Elestia]

My barracks is turning into a strip hall D:

[IceShade]

I remember in 40d, Wrestlers had the..interesting.. tendency to rip off clothes of their sparring partner.

For this reason alone I never had anyone wrestle, unless they were both nude (I don't make new clothes, nudist colonies ftw).

I was hoping you could override ownership in 0.31, but that still hasn't been changed.. my biggest complaint about DF. Clothes everywhere. Rotting food everywhere.