Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[haberdasher]

I really doubt I'm the first person to think of this, so I thought I'd ask here:

has anyone ever set up a fort in which every single able-bodied dwarf is enlisted in the militia? not full-time, obviously, I'm thinking rotating training schedules, on for a month/off for a month, with squads set up in such a way as to never have all of your miners active at the same time, for example.

my current fort is making preparations towards launching a massive steel and armoring industry, and I want to have something to use it for, so I'm just wondering if anyone has ever had any success with this kind of thing. the only danger I foresee is botching the squad and scheduling assignments and suddenly realizing that all my dwarves are about to die of thirst and starvation because all of my farmers and brewers are locked in a danger room for the next month.

it seems like a 200-dwarf army clad entirely in steel equipment would be nigh-unstoppable, though. considering the effectiveness of the danger room, you could just leave your entire population in uniform at all times and never worry about ordering your militia around, which (depending on your playstyle and preferences) would either be extremely entertaining, or mind-numbingly boring.

anyway, thoughts?

[DavesWorld]

I've been thinking that sorta thing in the past few days, since the new military menu (once you claw your way up the learning curve for it) specifically allows for "wear uniform as a civilian".  Haven't tried it yet, but I figure you could easily take the time to squad up every dwarf with whatever uniform you like and just never take them off inactive.  Or, like you said, they train one or two months a year.

Seems like it would have some uses since having armored dwarves would be seriously useful during ambushes and such (especially for woodcutters, hunters, fishers and any other dwarf that regularly heads outside the fort for any reason).

[meto30]

I might be having partial success with this idea. As of right now the seven administrators (mayor, manager, broker, bookkeeper, militia commander, chief medical dwarf, guard captain) and the baron (who was appointed, not sent) are all armed and armored in steel gear (all superb or higher). They are actually my starting seven (other than the guard captain), and after fending off 15+ years worth of enemies they've all reached legendary status in their respective weapons (short swords, spears, and crossbows). They go about their usual tasks while fully equipped; they never take any of their stuff off, even when throwing parties.

However, I am having trouble making my miners behave the same way. For some strange reason I cannot fathom, whenever I designate squares for mining, the miners (despite having the pick equipped as a weapon) run around the armories stripping themselves of all equipment and then pick up another pick before going down the shafts. After the designation is satisfied, they throw away the pick onto the tile they are standing on, run up to the barracks and rearm themselves. Sometimes they ignore this part altogether and simply drop the pick and move around.

On a side note, for causes unknown the pick is listed as foreign in the equipment page. Perhaps this is why the miner squad is not functioning as intended?

I will experiment with other militia settings (especially having the woodcutters designated as axedwarves). I will report back with further findings.

[ungulateman]

That's because picks and axes are civilian tools, and the dwarves won't use them to fight. I suspect that the programming requires tools for some jobs which are also weapons, and they can't be used as weapons when the user is activated.

[elizar]

I've toyed with an idea of a community fort sorta like that, but instead of everyone in the military, it's only the men, the women take care of farming, trading, administrating... aside from the last one, it's more like how the city states might have worked in the old days.

And before you think me misogynist, I'm a woman

[meto30]

That's because picks and axes are civilian tools, and the dwarves won't use them to fight. I suspect that the programming requires tools for some jobs which are also weapons, and they can't be used as weapons when the user is activated.

Ah... so, basically every dwarf other than the miners and woodcutters can be made into fully armed militia?

[synkell]

I think woodcutters can be used... at least when the axe in question is a battle axe?

[Sphalerite]

I did have a small (pop < 20) fort where every dwarf was a member of a military squad and carried either a pick or an axe.  Getting them to use the same weapon for both military and civilian duties (every one was a miner or a woodcutter) was tricky and took some trial and error to figure out.  I tried to get them to also all wear assigned clothes this way, but couldn't figure out how to make that work.

[DarkerDark]

I've done this on one of my big forts, and one thing I've noticed besides the usual miner shenanigans, is that your Dwarves will often ignore burrow restrictions when they're all in the military. I thought that throwing them all in squads and equipping them all with armor would improve their survivability, but in reality, I'm losing more Dwarves because there's always one or two that completely ignore any burrow settings and simply wander off to resume their old jobs.

My catacombs are filled with the tombs of my military-masons. Each of them found still constructing their surface monoliths long after the alarm had been sounded.

"Yes. Those are Goblins roaming the surface, Urist. No, I don't know why you decided to leave the safety of your burrow either."

[LoSboccacc]

I've done this to with a twist:

two steel axe squad of professional

five miners, two woodcutters

some other specialist

every one else as a crossbowman with a constant schedule all the year around: 2 training, 2 defending the internal burrows

the sheer number of bolts shooted at enemy overcome the fact that those are all bone bolts from leather armoured rookie 

but I don't really know how effective truly is because siege are now mostly won by the bronze colossus caged outside and retrapped every time 

[Zaik]

That's because picks and axes are civilian tools, and the dwarves won't use them to fight. I suspect that the programming requires tools for some jobs which are also weapons, and they can't be used as weapons when the user is activated.

Ah... so, basically every dwarf other than the miners and woodcutters can be made into fully armed militia?

due to dwarves being able to equip more than one weapon in one hand, they should have no problem, as long as the miners aren't equipped with picks as weapons and the woodcutters aren't equipped with axes as weapons. That is where the problem is.

[Man of Paper]

Make the whole fortress a danger room for instant success.

[Owlbread]

I've toyed with an idea of a community fort sorta like that, but instead of everyone in the military, it's only the men, the women take care of farming, trading, administrating... aside from the last one, it's more like how the city states might have worked in the old days.

And before you think me misogynist, I'm a woman

I do something similar, except it's only the male, unskilled peasants that I recruit. I haven't gotten very far with this new version, but I'll be picking my commanding officers based on their beards too.

[Lord Aldrich]

The issue with miners / woodcutters is simply an equipment problem. When activated, they drop their current inventory to go pick up their uniform / weapon, which means they drop the pick / axe they were using as a tool. They can still use a pick or axe as a weapon, but you'll need to either undesignate their miner / woodcutter labor before activating them so that they drop their pick / axe (and so can pick it back up when activated), or have a second pick / axe for each one. The whole thing is basically a bug, you can find the details in one of the existing threads on getting the military to work properly.

[mrbobbyg]

Make the whole fortress a danger room for instant success.

I tried something like this, making a danger room in a highly trafficked hallway.

It was...fun...

Hammer Lords do not like it when several of their pets are impaled on spikes.  Tantruming Hammer Lords do a LOT of damage, killing them makes their soulmates in their squad tantrum, etc., etc., etc.,