I was running around earlier with a dorf using a steel crossbow in her right hand and a steel spear in her left hand.
Stick bolts into stuff to get it to come play, if it falls over before it reaches you that is fine too. When it is close enough and you are 1 on 1 try to jab the spear into their neck or head, if they don't die and it ends up stuck you can beat on them with the crossbow or do a multi-option to smack them with the crossbow+move around them to dislodge the spear. If there are multiple enemies and you can hit two of them, assuming you did get hammer skill up high enough you can do damn well braining stuff with the crossbow and spearing necks/skulls with the spear.
Really though I was trying to get some usable corpses to reanimate so I tried out crossbow+shield, if something is close enough I clamp the neck with my right upper arm, bash anything nearby with the crossbow if needed, block with the shield, and shoot anything out of reach as I strangle the first poor bastard I got a hold of.
It worked great, too great, because I ended up with a rather unwieldy horde of undead goblins who wouldn't leave the one I was choking along long enough to finish them off.
You can also make use of stealth and go up and bash stuff in the guts to make it fall over then unload bolts into it while periodically working it over about the face and ass with the crossbow.