The first time the goblins attacked my fort, I thought I was pretty well prepared. I could raise the drawbridge for our main entrance, forcing the goblins to attack through a large gauntlet of traps and siege engines. All of my dwarves were ordered to stay indoors, so as to not interfere with military actions.
Hah!
Dwarves, when ordered to stay inside, are apparently similar to little children: they like to get as close as they can to breaking the rules without actually going outside. So these stupid dwarves are crowding up in the exact worst spot imaginable - right between my military and the goblin invasion force, which is now about to come through the back door.
Fortunately, I someone managed to avoid a complete disaster. There were only 8 friendly casualties or so (minus the entire dwarven caravan which happened to be outside).
When the battle was over, I decided that I really need to revise this plan! I can't have all the civilians getting in the way like that again. So how to keep them from going so close to the back door?
Easy! I'll dig a skylight, so that part of the tunnel leading to the back door is considered "outside", and the civilians won't be allowed to use it! Sure enough, the next time the goblins attacked (with 64 invaders, no less!), my civilians stopped at the skylight, leaving the rest of the tunnel free for military action.
"What the...?!" I saw civilians begin to drop like flies, in a huge pool of blood and guts beneath the skylight.
Crap. Goblins can shoot down through skylights :(
Try constructing a small, outdoor gate area just outside the entrance. That should prevent your dwarves from getting themselves killed.
I keep them inside a glass tower so they're quite safe during invasions.
quote:
Originally posted by The Cube:
<STRONG>If you build a floor over it, it should still count as outside, but I suppose that would be taking advantage of a glitch.</STRONG>
This does indeed work. Note that this also means that there is no way to make outside inside again. As I can tell from my own experience, accidentally created outside-spots in your fortress can be pretty annoying because they constantly generate job cancellations when the outside is forbidden. I had to wall the area off...
Of course, I'm making sure that there's no line of sight from the one side of the bridge to the other, or I fully expect my dwarves to sit there like dopes wondering how to get to the side with the dozen happy-looking humanoids. You know, to help build interracial connections.
quote:
Originally posted by RogerN:
<STRONG>I think I may adopt a new Dwarf Fortress mantra: "No defense plan survives collision with reality."The first time the goblins attacked my fort, I thought I was pretty well prepared. I could raise the drawbridge for our main entrance, forcing the goblins to attack through a large gauntlet of traps and siege engines. All of my dwarves were ordered to stay indoors, so as to not interfere with military actions.
Hah!
Dwarves, when ordered to stay inside, are apparently similar to little children: they like to get as close as they can to breaking the rules without actually going outside. So these stupid dwarves are crowding up in the exact worst spot imaginable - right between my military and the goblin invasion force, which is now about to come through the back door.
Fortunately, I someone managed to avoid a complete disaster. There were only 8 friendly casualties or so (minus the entire dwarven caravan which happened to be outside).
When the battle was over, I decided that I really need to revise this plan! I can't have all the civilians getting in the way like that again. So how to keep them from going so close to the back door?
Easy! I'll dig a skylight, so that part of the tunnel leading to the back door is considered "outside", and the civilians won't be allowed to use it! Sure enough, the next time the goblins attacked (with 64 invaders, no less!), my civilians stopped at the skylight, leaving the rest of the tunnel free for military action.
"What the...?!" I saw civilians begin to drop like flies, in a huge pool of blood and guts beneath the skylight.
Crap. Goblins can shoot down through skylights :(</STRONG>
Time for some shameless bragging on my part then. just recently uploaded my fortress Tradesoared on the map archive, sp you couold check my solution out there. Basicly I have a walled, medieval style courtyard outside the entrence to my fortress. meaning that when I say that all civvies shoudl go inside they leave all fortifications manned by military solely. when they are all inside the courtyard I then pull the lever that drops down the steel grates making impossible for the dwarfes to leaver, and after that I can change the commands so that dwarfes are allowed outside if I need them to haul drinks, food and ammo to the military. Only problem with this approach is that the gobbis stop the invasion the second I pull the lever since their pathfinding causes them to stop in their tracks. a locked door is enough to keep them out and the dwarfes safe. (I also have a bridged moat with spikes in the bottom but that really just for the really big mosnters, and in case all of my 5 adamantine clad champions dies somwhow.
but ayway, outside fortifications works really well. and traps are cheese...