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[Granite26]

It takes 20 plus stone haulers to keep a single craftdwarf stocked.  Unfortunately, you run out of stone pretty quick that way.

You can always draft your haulers into a national guard, 1 month a year, training squad.  They'll train when bored then.

[Zesty]

I don't manage them. Anything I don't need is a hauler.  When I get bored, I make them all plant-gatherers and harvest the map.

When I get really bored, I attempt a poorly conceived mega-construction.

When I get really really bored, I make catapults and launch them into the ocean (if I happen to be next to an ocean).

[Excedion]

I pause the screen as they all head toward my fort and give them jobs before hand. If they have are high-master cooks or whatever then they do what theyre designed but i usually use them as farmers or masons. The really useless ones get to battle in the arena

[Vercingetorix]

I pause the screen as they all head toward my fort and give them jobs before hand. If they have are high-master cooks or whatever then they do what theyre designed but i usually use them as farmers or masons. The really useless ones get to battle in the arena

Same here, sans the arena.  I never know when I might need to replenish my military.

[Horizonblue]

I take the veiw that, there should always be expansion.  I assign idlers to jobs, then expand jobs if there are still idlers, and repeat until the whole place is mad with workers.
I like the ability to have my industry survive major catastrophes.

[Buttery_Mess]

I've got a population of over two hundred and about twenty idlers, mostly nobles and certain key personnel like doctors, and dedicated cleaners. Most of the are occupied in smelting every chunk of ore in my fort, digging for ore, smoothing or detailing, or engaged in combat training.

[TerryDactyl]

Simple answer is, I don't. I manage huge populations.

My Fortress is predominantly surface-level construction to facilitate farming and fuel harvest. The mines and the quarries will be built into as required, but there has been no such need, aside from the jail and the dungeon (a dumping ground for trapped thieves). I prioritize defense, and as such have only just suffered my first casualties, 5 years in, at 1M fortress value.

Industries are being established as rapidly as it is safe to do so. At present, 1/3 of my fortress are assigned general labour duties which include construction, butchery, tanning, plant processing and other unskilled tasks. Things tend to get done as fast as I get around to designating tasks.

Idlers wax and wane with the tides and the trades. Having yet to complete my castle, invaders tend to disrupt my less-skilled industries, found closer to the frontier gates.

We are running a tetra mine. Our ores are converted to billon at a profit, but as we have yet to attract a metalcrafter of quality, most of our worth is on account of the thriving clothing industry and one very clever jeweller. There have also been dramatic fuel shortages in recent years, though this has not prevented us from using billon as our standard furnishing material.

Ever since the flood, the miners have been sitting on their heels, waiting for the smelters to catch up before commencing a new project incorporating underground farms, sewers, and liquid defenses. We were very lucky that it had occurred in a distant branch of the mines, isolated by ramps.

My only gripe is that with the extra social time, my broker has been replaced as mayor by some upstart with a penchant for nickel silver...

[Sorcerer]

In my Dwarf Therapist i have several different custom jobs, one is Pleb, which have all the menial tasks activated. They are haulers, cleaners, masons and carpenters (but not allowed to work in any workshops ofcourse) Any dwarf NOT a member of this group will have those other skills turned off (the only problem with this is that sometimes a mason will prefer to run off and build a wall somewhere instead of chruning out masterwork obsidian thrones)

Any migrant with skills i don't particularly care for gets assigned this custom labor setting. This has two obvious advantages, firstly, i know that if someone is referred to by their profession, they are of that profession, not just some junk migrant that happens to be a carpenter that think he knows how to make beds. Secondly, i now have a large pool of "expendables" for use in the military.

In a perfect world, my plebs would be split into militia squads and spend a few months every year training in the barracks and the rest hauling and such, so they can give their lives gloriously to the motherland!.. unfortunately, if you give them a place to train they seem to not care about working anymore :/

[Jordan~]

My fortresses usually have about 20-30 non-expendable dwarves. The rest just get put on hauling and building - masonry and all hauling labours enabled. Usually I need them all hauling, anyway - I like having my fortress built out of all the same colour stone, so I tend to dump all the stone in a newly-excavated room and repave it with whatever I'm using for the rest of the fortress - usually something white or grey.

[TerryDactyl]

Hm. I recently gave up on paving obsessively. Does it serve any purpose, or does it simply eliminate excess stone (which I would rather use building a castle on the surface)?

[Buttery_Mess]

Building floors is good for getting rid of stone. Paving is not.

Roads are pretty much useless, it makes much sense to keep the path to your depot clear with weapon traps.

[xordae]

I look at them in Dwarf Therapist, find the jobs with the least dwarves proficient in, and then assign the immigrants with the least number of jobs to that. So that it kinda evens out across the board. I'm not fussed about useless dwarves, you only need two brewers and two cooks to keep a population of 200+ going. They can do whatever until they're needed.

[Crazy Cow]

I would have nothing to do with a hundred dorfs. All my forts have population caps of 55, and that works well for me.

[TerryDactyl]

Building floors is good for getting rid of stone. Paving is not.

Roads are pretty much useless, it makes much sense to keep the path to your depot clear with weapon traps.

No, really. What are floors good for? It makes sense to put all that extra labour onto the construction of a walled city. We can't spare a stone for trade. I consider the mason corps a civilian branch of the military. They don't fight, but they certainly make a valuable contribution to our defense. Why would anyone want to get rid of stone?

[Girlinhat]

I use floors plenty, even underground.  That platinum floor in my dining hall contrasts so beautifully with the recently spilled blood of that one trog who managed to find his way in there .