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[Oaktree]

Is there a natural penalty or additional difficulty in having a miner dig a channel on the surface?

I seem to not have much trouble with stairs and such, but once I try to dig a channel or ramp on grass or brush the miners seem to take a very long time to complete a channel - when they eventually complete one at all.

Given that I'm trying to connect a tunnel for caravan use it needs to be a ramp instead of just a few stairs.

[Oaktree]

I think I figured out the issue. 

It hinges on burrow definitions!  (Maybe someone can confirm that it behaves oddly this way.)

The channels I want dug to make the ditch are right on the edge of a burrow definition.  If the dwarf works on it from *within* the defined burrow area the task is done as normal.  If the dwarf attempts to work on it from outside the defined burrow area he pounds away at it without making any progress.

I had some miners working without any progress - and then I expanded the burrow in that area one space to include where they were standing.  They finished the channels rapidly and moved on.

[Starver]

That burrow definition thing doesn't sound right to me.  I frequently set a line of channelling designations and a burrow over them and only them, to enforce some defensive ditch digging or a particular part of whatever current Grand Scheme project I might be undertaking.  With multiple dwarfs assigned to the burrow, there is a bit of to-and-fro as they're sometimes channelling from the next to-be-channelled tile on and another wants to get in there, but some tiles get flashy after being claimed by a dwarf currently a long way off, end up isolated (channels either side are now dug) before the dwarf gets there, but he or she happily digs through that with no noticeable delay, while standing to one side or another where they can actually stand.

Albeit that this is with miners who are all legendary, so maybe you're right and it is significant with raw recruits to the mining team for whom "50% longer" is an age, rather than a blink of an eye...

[Oaktree]

I only have seven miners.  Two are level 3, two are level 8, and the rest are legendary.  It did not matter who was digging.  And once I shifted the burrow definition one square left to include the square they were standing on they dug it right out.

I was also seeing the same behavior with woodcutters cutting down trees.  Chopping for a month until they got thirsty and left.  I shifted the burrow border to be just to the left of the tree as well and it came right down.

[Starver]

I only have seven miners.  Two are level 3, two are level 8, and the rest are legendary.  It did not matter who was digging.  And once I shifted the burrow definition one square left to include the square they were standing on they dug it right out.

I was also seeing the same behavior with woodcutters cutting down trees.  Chopping for a month until they got thirsty and left.  I shifted the burrow border to be just to the left of the tree as well and it came right down.

I usually start with two miners, and by year 1055 (i.e. five years into my forts) I tend to accumulate a couple more from immigrants with decent enough mining skills that I can't afford not to draft into the team.  The current fort I can easily check is on Summer 1055 and I have three Legendary+5 (=20) miners active, one Great (=10) Miner who spends part of his time in an 'irregular' military unit (had the auxiliary military skills for it, and you never know when a pick-axe and other arbitrary fighting skills might come in useful to assist with the regular military units) and six dabbling (=0) miners who've never been let near a pick and probably never will be.

So, I just set up a bit of an experiment.  With a "tempMoreDitches" burrow (one I had already set up to get some surface defensive features channelled out over pre-existing dug-out underground drifts, so as not to leave ramp-access) and the Great miner currently tackling a north-south row of ditches I changed the burrow designation so that instead of being only over the to-be-channelled tiles: one third of them had the burrow designated also to the western-access tile (from which the Great Miner was already cutting my ditches); another third of them had the burrow also designated over the eastern-access tile; the remaining third stay as they originally were.  This was alternating between the three, rather than runs of one type, then the other, then the other...

Not only does the miner not have any noticeable difference in speed as it progresses downwards (if I had done ten of each at a time, maybe I could see a subtle timing difference), he doesn't chop and change to dig from the RHS of the to-be-channelled tile, but sticks to the LHS of all of them, regardless of whether the burrow covers that.


But it might be different if I'm not channelling into a void.  I don't have anywhere suitable for that test, though, in this fort, so I'll have to come back to this (or start up a new world/prepare to save-scum this one to undo my vandalism), so I'll put that forward only as a theory, for now.  Right now, I've got some human traders to foist my useless crafts upon trade with.

[Gyvon]

Given that I'm trying to connect a tunnel for caravan use it needs to be a ramp instead of just a few stairs.

Uh, no, it doesn't need to be a ramp.  Caravans will use stairs.

It's WAGONS that need a ramp, and wagons have never worked in DF2010