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[MystRunner]

So I have a fortress going and I was planning on making a wonderful fake entrance. I thought it might be fun to have not one but two unicursal mazes stacked on top of each other. The first and largest maze will be crammed full of various traps. The second maze I was going to pen my trained war animals inside. After that it would lead into a winding corridor lined with carved fortifications for my archers to fire out of. That would then lead the invaders right into the barracks of the fighting force.

The plan is that my archers and fighters shouldn't ever have to fight anyone and by the time they actually fight anyone that invader should be rather damaged. This plan has come about after several fortresses have been attacked and destroyed by gobbo's. I would love to know what others would think of this rather large complicated defense plan and what they might change about it.

The game this fort is in is one where all exotic pets have been modified to get by the dungeon master bug.

[612DwarfAvenue]

Make sure you have some way of blocking off your regular entrance, otherwise they could just use that instead. Use a raised bridge or something.

[Loud Whispers]

The multiple fortifications also work against your own Dorfs. Make that a raised walkway with fortifications, and you've got a deal

[doublestrafe]

The "long winding corridor of traps" was my go-to scheme for a while, but it never worked. This is because goblin hordes would start to come in, a few would get trapped, and then they'd just stop, and sit there for months on end. Eventually I gave up and moved on to other strategies. I'm still not very happy with my front gates at this point.

[Oaktree]

I've not been a fan of the long-maze defense plan.  My first "training fort" eventually had tunnels with windy paths and piles of traps.  I discovered that these tended to actually be dangerous to my mechanics who would go to reset cage traps at the drop of a hat and thus charge into goblin sieges (Note A).  And that using single-width tunnels led to congestion when cleaning up afterwards.  And if I put in short-cut tunnels to aid access I had to make sure the entire tunnel was secure before opening these up - which led to further patrolling, issues with securing exits (Note B), and losses of civilians who would go into tunnels and discover goblin ambush teams the hard way. (Note C). 

You also get the problem with an early trap killing or caging a squad leader, after which the whole group "camps" in the tunnel until they get very bored, you chase them out with your militia, or a dragon appears and flames them for you.

A - Burrow issues here. I've since made each access tunnel their own burrow and can thus keep the civilians out of them during alerts without a great deal of fuss.
B - Doors work, but trolls stop and destroy them, and goblins seize control of them.  I've also used drawbridges with pressure pads - but these kill dwarves now and then.  So now it's drawbridges connected to levers and ditches at the end of access tunnels to act as seals.  Can keep goblins out, and also keep them in.   
C - I tend to put animal watchtowers at tunnel entrances, and also post watch animals partway down the tunnel for early warning.

My current preference is having my trade depot at the intersection of 2-3 tunnels that lead from the fort fairly close to the edges of the embark.  The tunnel exits allow for migrants or trade caravans to get underground as soon as possible and into a "controlled" environment.  Multiple tunnels are used to allow for entrance from different directions, and also for tunnels to be closed for cleaning, maintenance and upgrading, or holding enemies in place.

The tunnels are 3-wide to facilitate traffic and being used for temporary storage (Note D).  Drawbridges are located at either end for sealing, and generally also a third drawbridge seal to force traffic into narrow trap corridors (Note E).  The main corridor is also trapped - cage traps as a last line of defense and some weapon traps towards to outer edge to deter wildlife and kidnappers.  The inner part of the tunnel and the trap corridors are overlooked by fortifications that the marksdwarves can use.  I have also added pit traps and dodge-me magma pit traps to a few of these.  The latter are also useful as temporary dump points for cleaning up if you do not want to save non-iron goblin gear.

D - In wooded regions a lumbering expedition out of a tunnel entrance will initially stockpile cut logs in the tunnel.  Once the civilians are done cutting the outer door is closed and the haulers can safely move the logs to the main stockpiles inside the fortress.

E - These corridors are "grinders" were pathing gets blocked and attackers end up repeatedly running back and forth over a set of weapon traps.  The hatches used in this are protected from trolls by a few sets of lever-operated spear/spike traps.

If the tunnel is long enough 2-3 squads of a goblin siege can be lured into a single tunnel and sealed in.  None of them get out, and the wounded eventually path back in towards the fortress since that is the only way "out" after the outer drawbridge is closed.

[zilpin]

I'm a big fan of a hatch walkway, where hatches are used instead of a drawbridge, above upright spikes.
It takes a long time to link all the hatches to a lever, but it's worth it.

I've never had any building destroyers destroy the hatch they walk on above empty space, though I've heard others complain about the possibility.  Even if they do, they fall in pit.

The nice thing is that hatches always open instantly when the lever is pulled, no matter what is on them.

I also split my embarks into quadrants, using terrain features to prevent movement between them on the outside where possible, and keep independent entrances into the outercourtyard.  Never place traps outside the kill zone, because bad guys tend to stay where the first one falls, demanding you come out.

Oh, and most important, never underestimate the value of low quality glass windows.
Place them on the safe side of a pit, and dwarves can see danger coming in, while still being safe from archers.  Prevents civvies from being complete idiots.

[starshard0]

I have a single main entrance to my fortress, but it splits into two paths, one for invaders, and one for everyone else. When something shows up that I want to kill, I order all my civilians inside the fortress. After they're all through (or at least the smart ones are, I lock up the main entrance, forcing invaders to detour through my "hall of death", which is a one tile wide pathway with a 4-z level drop with spikes at the bottom. The path is lined with with weapon traps, which will force anything that isn't trapavoid to dodge off the path if it doesn't outright kill them. I recently installed retracting bridges that cover the sides when the hall isn't in use, to avoid any unfortunate accidents.

There have only been two occasions when an enemy made it through the hall of death and onto the main span. The main span is a three tile wide road with bridges that crosses over a valley and into my main entrance. It is overlooked by a ballista as well as a pillbox for my marksdwarves. Just inside the entrance is the trade depot, and it's usually where I station my melee squads as enemies approach.

The first enemy to cross the main span (avoiding the "hall of death" as well as being missed by my ballista), was a jackal demon which was leading a goblin siege. He was chased around the fortress by my axedwarves, along with some human caravan guards, and was eventually brought down by my militia commander. The second time was just after I had installed the retractable bridges but not yet hooked them up to  a lever, allowing the invaders to bypass the traps and avoid falling into the spike pit. Luckily, my dwarves were well equipped and trained and repelled them with ease.

I'm at work now, but I'll make sure I post some pics later so you can get an idea of what I'm talking about. For the most part nothing get's through the hall of death unless it's trapavoid, and so far I've killed a giantess, a dragon, an ettin, and countless goblins.

[MystRunner]

hummm I'll think on some of these ideas. For a while I was thinking about using doors/drawbridges to try to funnel the gobbos and other problems further into the trap. Basically once most of the enemy is inside I will shut them inside the maze making so that if they want to path to an exit they will have to go through the maze. But I'll think over these different areas.

[thegoatgod_pan]

I had a lot of fun with a maze set-up--but I used ice to seal off hallways (with doors, pressure plates and goblins) and force a new route (which included more ice traps) Dig the maze below surface in a freezing biome, expose to light anywhere you want the freezing to happen.  Dig the ice up to reset.

[IamanElfCollaborator]

I have two entrances: one from the main gate in my fort, and one leading straight into a sealed corridor with marksbolds, ballistas, traps and marksgremlins. Survivors then get mowed down by goblin and kobold knife wielders. If there are still survivors, they get smashed into a thick red mush by highly annoyed plump helmet men wielding hammers.

NOTE: Dfusion.

[Uristocrat]

The "long winding corridor of traps" was my go-to scheme for a while, but it never worked. This is because goblin hordes would start to come in, a few would get trapped, and then they'd just stop, and sit there for months on end. Eventually I gave up and moved on to other strategies. I'm still not very happy with my front gates at this point.

Use a 1z pitfall with a dodge-trap setup.  That won't hurt anybody (don't worry, the lethal part comes afterwards), but it will get them all locked into your real trap, without having to time drawbridges just right or whatever.  They need to have a path to where they want to go (and a live, non-caged leader) or they sit on their rear ends and stay there for months.  But if the only fortress entrance is through the 1z primary trap and the only exit after hitting the 1z trap is to go into whatever horrible thing you've invented for them, that's exactly what they'll do.

I hate having survivors, you see, so I like to bottle all the invaders with that setup so that I can build whatever torment I desire without permitting a single enemy to flee or survive.

[IamanElfCollaborator]

Meh. You could just use the F**k the world approach:
1. Fill a large resevoir with magma.
2. Wait for invaders.
3. Lock down fortress.
4. Unleash magma.
5. F**k the world.
6. Rinse and repeat.

[Broseph Stalin]

I use a long line of cage traps followed by a long line of weapon traps followed by screw pump that floods the whole mess with magma if they break through the first two. Upside is plenty of arena contestants, downside is if I actually do activate the magma pump I lose a bunch of masterwork cages and mechanisms unless I take the time to dispose of all the non magma safe cages and mechanisms.

[Laserhead]

I like to have an underground hallway, a few traps to grab some live archery targets and maim a few survivors, with marksdwarfs in a bunker built into the roof, where they can shoot at the traps. Conventional military behind / underneath that, then the entrance to my fort. Then if I feel like it some ballista behind the entrance. Tends to be pretty deadly, and I prefer not having to path all the invaders seperately.

Although even with a lot of micromanagement the crossbows tend to have trouble getting and using the right ammo.

[MonkeyHead]

I have been relying on ballistae batteries and marksdwarf pillboxes a lot in 31.25, with melee dwarves to kill routing invaders once the ranged weapons have done thier damage. A few weapon traps to cause problems at chokepoints in the killzone of the ranged wepaons also work wonders. Tis rather simple though.