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[Mushroo]

True. Some job profile always come back as backbone meatgrinder
military conscripts in league for fun: weaver, spinner, clothier, animal caretaker,
fish dissector, animal dissector... and of course potash maker
(probably the most unused profession in the game, at least in early stages).

Or they end up in the atom-smasher. Sad end for them.

I agree that animal and fish dissectors are fairly useless... I usually make my animal dissectors into hunters (they are already the correct color) and fish dissectors become masons for megaproject-building duties.

However potash makers are incredibly valuable and useful, especially in the early stages of the game if you are trying to get a farming industry going. Doubling your farm's output is nothing to sneeze at! (Especially since big plant stacks don't take up extra space, hauling, or jobs.)

To keep on topic... a potash maker with no military skills is more valuable to your army in a support capacity, making sure the troops have plenty of plump helmets to eat.

[The Wanderer of Planes]

You are right, potash makers are really useful.
Yet, I never used potash makers migrants early in
the game and used them rarely after, considering that
I haven't played in "food" hostile environments much
and have never really had food efficiency problems.

I many biomes, where plants and wildlife are abundant,
the task of potash making is irrelevant ( at least the
way I play the game). This is why I included them in
the useless migrants.

[Sutremaine]

I'm not familiar with Therapist or whatever you were using for that. Is it just a symbol representation of skills or what?

Yes, the more lines there are the more levels there are. There's also a skill key that was cut off to save space and which I should have stuck back on.

The learner in the two-dwarf squad is Professional in Knife Use (lv.9), a Competent Dodger (lv.3), Legendary +5 in Fighting (lv.20), Adequate in Kicking and Striking (lv.2), a Novice Wrestler and Armour User (lv.1), an Adept Shield User (lv.7), and has no Biting skill at all.

[Nan]

Also, do dwarves (who spar together like brothers) level up faster
if they share the same weapon proficiencies or is it only an
aesthetic choice for the player?

If anything, the opposite is true. If they have the same weapon, then whenever one gets ahead of the other, they might stop to do weapon-skill demonstrations, which with low teacher/student skill is hopelessly slow. If they have different weapons, they'll never perform such demonstrations and will just spar non-stop, which will build skill faster. Overall it's probably not going to make a big difference, but if you want to be as effective as possible, go cross-weapons (I favor Axe/Spear, the axeman cuts elves limbs off, and the spearman stabs them in the head once they are passed out).

[MrShovelFace]

Military Planner 101:

1. Migrant Wave Arrives
2. Draft The Entire Migrant Wave
3. Outfit The Entire Migrant Wave In Surplus Armor (the by-products of training a legendary smith)
4. Put The Entire Squad On "Military Cleaning Duty" (AKA carver safari)
5. Give The Survivors Beer And Leave The Badly Injured In A Locked Clinic
6. Put The Survivors On Seasonal Goblin Patrol Outside (to keep them from being sickened by the light)
7. Draft Outstanding Individuals Into Your Candy-Clad Squad

[Jerg]

By far the fastest way to train my melee squads is having them tackle fully armored (de-weaponed) goblins THREE at a time in a locked room with training weapons. The fights last a week or two at a time and give the squads around 1 levelup in weapon skill and half as much in fighting skills.

I have yet to find an effective way to train my marksdwarves though. Having them shoot at fully armored goblins in my arena only lasts a couple of frames, and don't provide them with any good exp at all.

[Beeskee]

I have yet to find an effective way to train my marksdwarves though. Having them shoot at fully armored goblins in my arena only lasts a couple of frames, and don't provide them with any good exp at all.

Set up archery targets, designate them as rooms, and provide wooden bolts to practice with. They'll hit legendary soon enough.

[Mushroo]

Hunting is also a great way to train up marksdwarves, and feeds your fort as a side bonus.

[Ifeno]

I like the school of hard knocks approach.  Lots and lots of dorfs in the military (40-70).  They train by fighting.  The weak will be weeded out and replaced by new migrants.  Eventually you'll have a squad of 20ish quit competent fighters and x amount of useless cannon fodder.  X being determined by how many you put in....

It's a very entertaining and much more epic way to build up defenses.  Have 2 armies charge into battle and both retreating with massive casualties....now THAT's awesome

[Jerg]

I have yet to find an effective way to train my marksdwarves though. Having them shoot at fully armored goblins in my arena only lasts a couple of frames, and don't provide them with any good exp at all.

Set up archery targets, designate them as rooms, and provide wooden bolts to practice with. They'll hit legendary soon enough.

I have around 20 archery ranges (all separate rooms over 5 blocks long), a couple thousand wooden/bone arrows, but usually only 1 archer trains on the targets, and shoots maybe 10 times before giving up.

So far most of the recruits haven't shot more than 5 arrows.

[Beeskee]

That means something is messed up, one way or another. When everything is set right, they'll burn through arrows until they're out. It's tricky to get working even in the latest version, but when it is, you'll know it because they'll practically train nonstop. I have to limit my production of ammo or lock the rooms off to get them to not use it all up.

You may need to do things like unassign the ammo, order it dumped, remove them from the military squad, and re-add them all after unforbidding and reassigning the ammo. The order of that may vary too. I know, it's a pain.