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[Edges]

My latest problem is a lack of trading. Every time merchants show up, there's a siege at its back. Half the merchants can't get to safety in time and are slaughtered. The other half get behind my walls until the battle is over and then promptly depart without ever setting foot in the depot.

I rely on  trading. The only metal I have under foot is gold and I have no fuel. The waves of goblinite aren't cutting it. My legendary axedwarf swings a copper axe! It's been a year since there were trades.

My fortune swells and my military shrinks. Approaching Fun.

Advice?

[rephikul]

Manipulate where they spawn.

[NRDL]

Can you last long enough to outwait them?  If not, well, I don't really see too many other options if you don't actually have good metal for weapons and armor.  Do you have other resources, water, magma, an overabundance of dangerous animals?

Really, ask a person who actually has experience in getting out of this sort of thing.

Off topic: I just never realized how much Goblin sieges work as trade embargoes.  If they can't directly destroy your fort, they cut you off, and just wait for the inevitable doom of your non-self-sufficient fort. 

On topic: are you adverse to cheating by editing the Raws, so that the goblins just go away?   

[Edges]

Can you last long enough to outwait them?  If not, well, I don't really see too many other options if you don't actually have good metal for weapons and armor.  Do you have other resources, water, magma, an overabundance of dangerous animals?

Really, ask a person who actually has experience in getting out of this sort of thing.

Off topic: I just never realized how much Goblin sieges work as trade embargoes.  If they can't directly destroy your fort, they cut you off, and just wait for the inevitable doom of your non-self-sufficient fort. 

On topic: are you adverse to cheating by editing the Raws, so that the goblins just go away?   

Not much in the way of other resources. I've got a waterfall, marble, and gold.

I'd rather abandon than edit out goblins at this point. But thanks for reminding me.

Manipulate where they spawn.

How?

[rephikul]

Traders will spawn where they can get a 3 tiles wide path to your fort. You can press D to see where they can spawn (all the green edge tiles). So you can build a 3 tile wide path to your fort, walled all the way to the edge then make sure it's the only one 3-tile wide path to your fort Like say, build a wall and put doors in other directions. Do note that walls cannot be built on the edge but raising bridges can. There's a slim chance of goblins spawning in it too, but that's what a lot of traps for.

[Stefrist]

You could dig out 'shortcuts' from every direction of the map near the edge and seal those shortcuts off by default.

Keep your base entrance open (would be better to keep it at a distance from the shortcuts).

Not that this will work all the time, but I think invaders will path to your entrance and if traders come along, you can open the shortcuts.
Probably you will have to close your main entrance to make traders path to a shortcut, which will mean the invaders will re-path too.

If you're lucky, the traders will reach a shortcut before any invaders, and youll be able to trade.
I'm trying to do this myself as well with one-dwarf-entry corridors, hoping it will block invaders off, but will allow friendlies. (having a pressure plate / hatch/bridge combination)

[Tirion]

You can loot the stuff of dead traders from the ground. As a matter of fact, you should do so, if you don't do it, kobolds will steal even forbidden wares from outside and send ambush squads against you. And you could just massacre traders who waltz into your fort but refuse to trade, and take their stuff too. Unless of course they are fellow dwarves, you'd better not hurt those.

Also, don't waste your metal and fuel. Keep digging down, you'll find magma, then you'll only need (char)coal to turn melted down iron items into good steel. Also, if you have sand, you can just spam the map with weapon traps with 10 serrated green glass disks in each. Goblin parts everywhere

[Triaxx2]

Since sieges only come on the surface, you can build a path to a 3-wide path to a cavern that has map edge access to get Caravans to come there. Just wall and roof in the path and they'll go there. At least it should work like that.

[Sphalerite]

Caravans will never enter the map through the caverns.  They may leave the map through the caverns, but they will only enter on the surface.  And sometimes they'll only enter on one side of the map, if the civilization sending the caravan only has access to one side of the map.

It's a bit of an exploit, but I routinely build a 3 tile wide walled path from the trade depot to the map edge, and then seal off the last 5 tiles where you can't build walls with raising bridges, so nothing can get into that path from the rest of the surface.  Caravans will only appear in that path.  Diplomats and Liaisons will still appear randomly on any surface edge tile, so I need to have an alternate way into the fortress set up for them.

[zwei]

It would be interesting to have different kind of siege - "blockade" - once we get to sending armies offsite.

It would not pose immediate danger to your local site (maybe a bit of increase in ambush parties/thieves), but it would prevent caravans and diplomats from reaching you. You would have to get rid of it by sending your military away to deal with it.

[Triaxx2]

Are you sure? I've seen advice for hostile places say that underground depot access is vital so the caravans can arrive and leave safely.

[Sphalerite]

Are you sure? I've seen advice for hostile places say that underground depot access is vital so the caravans can arrive and leave safely.

Quite certain.  Caravans will only arrive on edge tiles which the civilization which is sending the caravan can reach.  At the moment no civilizations are considered to have travel access to the caverns (even though the dwarves really should) so caravans can only enter the map on the surface (and sometimes, only the surface on one side of the map).  Caravans will leave by any edge tile, including underground edge tiles, but they'll only arrive on the surface.

[Garath]

you can stock up on weapon traps and marksdwarfs. copper bolts can do enough pain to chase a squad off. Bone bolts can at that. Spiked copper balls are, while not as good as silver, rether effective in breaking and chipping arms and legs. Let the gobs in squad by squad and either eliminate or chase them away This should land you some goblinite to melt down and then use in your own fort

[Triaxx2]

Ah. I see. Well, you could have a short path then a ramp down.

[Edges]

You can loot the stuff of dead traders from the ground. As a matter of fact, you should do so, if you don't do it, kobolds will steal even forbidden wares from outside and send ambush squads against you. And you could just massacre traders who waltz into your fort but refuse to trade, and take their stuff too. Unless of course they are fellow dwarves, you'd better not hurt those.

Yes, I discovered this. It's a consolation prize. Instead of getting just what I want from the caravan, I get random stuff for free.

It's a bit of an exploit, but I routinely build a 3 tile wide walled path from the trade depot to the map edge, and then seal off the last 5 tiles where you can't build walls with raising bridges, so nothing can get into that path from the rest of the surface.  Caravans will only appear in that path.  Diplomats and Liaisons will still appear randomly on any surface edge tile, so I need to have an alternate way into the fortress set up for them.

I did this on rephikul's suggestion. But it didn't quite work. One trader spawned in the 3 tile zone. The others spawned way outside of it forcing me to drop the bridges, set an alert, and post squads in hopes, once again, that the traders could get in before getting run down. It does make the fort easier to defend though. So I'm grateful.

rephikul's other suggestion, checking the D key, gave unexpected results. The wiki says D is currently inaccurate and misleading but regardless, I just get a green blob island around the depot in a sea of red. "No access", it says. Incidentally, the green blob does have a 3-tile wide arm that extends a short distance from the depot. But these 3 green tiles are in the middle of a 5-tile open path.

Thoughts?

...This should land you some goblinite to melt down and then use in your own fort

I have no fuel for this "melt" that you speak of.