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[SpawnoChaos]

Hello all:

I've done a search on these boards to try and pinpoint this question, however, I have not found a topic that would apply to this particular situation (more specifically, this EXACT situation).

I'm running DF 2010 version 31.12, have around 133 dwarves, and I've finally encountered my first siege. I have a walled fort protecting my entrance that is 2 z-levels high with a walkway around it on the 2nd z level. I have a front gate with 2 towers on either side that are an additional 2 z-levels higher than the walls (4 z-levels from the ground, easily towering over the lower walls). The top layer of the towers have fortifications to allow my dwarves to fire through.

My plan was to use this elevated position to rain fire down on the goblins when they arrived with Marksdwarves.

Well... the siege occurs, I order my squad of 10 dwarves to the towers. They are armed with crossbows, bone bolts, steel armor, etc.

I close the drawbridge to the front gate to deny the goblins access. They stop 10-15 squares away from the front entrance of the fort... I notice that they are only armed with hammers.

Laughing to myself I say, "Heh... foolish greenskins... not bringing anything to shoot me with".

OK BOYS! Let er RIP!

.....

....

boys???

Ok, why aren't they shooting at the goblins? I select them all and select all the goblins with the "kill" command.

Still nothing.

Well, seeing that this wasn't working, I ordered them down to the gate entrance to face them in close combat. I lowered the bridge and they both charged and met each other in the middle.

I then lost every single dwarf I had. I don't even think that I killed a single goblin.

Aside from this strangeness... why didn't my dwarves fire from the rampart like I had planned? What did I do wrong? It's kinda important that I get this worked out since this was the entire point of my defenses on the map. If this doesn't work... well, then I don't really have a backup.

Any advice here would be appreciated.

[Proteus]

Did you assign the bone bolts for use in Combat?

[SpawnoChaos]

Did you assign the bone bolts for use in Combat?

Yes, all the ammo is assigned for training and combat.

[candylord]

because of how Z-levels are calculated, in dwarf fortress, increasing your height would only serve to DECREASE the effective range of your Xbows
since marksdwarves have about 20ish range, maybe that extra height from the 4 storeys was just enough to push them out of range?q

[Proteus]

Another related possibility could be the "blind spot"...
i.e. crossbowmen/archers that are behind fortifications on elevated positions
not being able to fire at enemies that are too close to the castle alls

[brucemo]

Should work, and 10-15 squares should be plenty close enough.  Check the dwarf's inventory and see if it has bolts in its quiver, and a crossbow.

If everything else seems okay, when your gates closed and your guys up on the rampart, try giving the square a "kill" order.  That sometimes makes them start shooting, although I have no idea why that would make any difference.

[SpawnoChaos]

Should work, and 10-15 squares should be plenty close enough.  Check the dwarf's inventory and see if it has bolts in its quiver, and a crossbow.

If everything else seems okay, when your gates closed and your guys up on the rampart, try giving the square a "kill" order.  That sometimes makes them start shooting, although I have no idea why that would make any difference.

I tried the "kill" order and it had no effect.

Also, when I check my "u" screen and see all my dwarves, I get to the soldiers and it says (cannot follow order) for some reason. I have the archery targets up and correctly placed with proper firing orientation along with the "T" for training on them.

In an earlier save they were actually shooting at the targets. They just wander around now. Any help with this as well??

[Corambis]

I've run into a situation where my marksdwarves won't restock their quivers, and will instead be quite content to go about their patrols and so forth with empty quivers, even though I have stockpiles of bolts right in their barracks.  I too have been sieged, and had my dwarves sitting behind my fortifications apparently just staring at the goblins.  I finally went into the Alerts, and made them inactive, gave them some time, and then made them active again.  This seemed to prompt at least some of them to grab some bolts, so I restationed them at the fortifications and the ones with bolts began firing.  I've taken to making my marksdwarves inactive for periods of time in hopes that the change will cause them to restock during their downtime.  I don't know if this is a bug, or if I am just doing something wrong. 

[vassock]

I've run into a situation where my marksdwarves won't restock their quivers, and will instead be quite content to go about their patrols and so forth with empty quivers, even though I have stockpiles of bolts right in their barracks.  I too have been sieged, and had my dwarves sitting behind my fortifications apparently just staring at the goblins.  I finally went into the Alerts, and made them inactive, gave them some time, and then made them active again.  This seemed to prompt at least some of them to grab some bolts, so I restationed them at the fortifications and the ones with bolts began firing.  I've taken to making my marksdwarves inactive for periods of time in hopes that the change will cause them to restock during their downtime.  I don't know if this is a bug, or if I am just doing something wrong.

I've been thinking about this, too. It seems like a real downer since crossbow defenses are practically unavoidable given how useful it is to be able to fire at enemies while they cannot hit you. Is there a fix for this? It's kind of a game breaker if there is no fix.

[Proteus]

In earlier versions of DF 2010 (donīt know till what sub-version-number) there was a certain bug that made marksdwarves not fire.
But it was a bug thast counted as fixed (and I, for my part, never had any problems notn firing at goblins anymore (at least if they donīt forget to fill their quivers before going to their station )

[Luciferret]

Dunno if this helps, but i read from some other topic that you have to put your dwarfs right NEXT to fortifications them to shoot. use burrows(somehow, i really dont know how to use them in combat) or point exact spot for every marksdwarf.

I havent been able to try this myself yet. Last time i tried, dragon flew inside my fortress when i was constructing this and scorched pretty much everything. Until i got it chopped up, 30 dwarfs was lying on the fotress floor... nuthin but tantrum spiral after that. Every legendary dwarfs went berserk and started killing spree of their own. I choosed abandon in the situation

Somehow i get these situations every time i got something critical going on in the fortress. ie. gate not properly working(or not builded at all), doing some massive mining project in the 100+ z-levels and didnt notice the *Huge dragon appears* notice in the tex box or something similiar. Do you others have these things happening to you, or am i the only one?

[Ze Spy]

"Sir , Someone Took all the Ammunition!"

I ain't Saying Anything Else