Bay 12 Games Forum

Training weapons are still useful. When you begin your fort, it never hurts to have any non miners, woodcutters assigned to squads under the Inactive schedule,(actually the militia) assigned practice weapons. In their free time, they will do individual combat drill. Since it does not matter what value the weapon is, they still gain skills. This is especially nice, when your fort is poor. I like to assign them shields, before weapons. The shield skill is a lifesaver.Putting them on an alert to train, is a waste of time.
 Creating a new alert,sets up a new menu on the military scheduling screen, as well as the squad menu screen, that takes priority over both the Active/inactive schedules. In this case, for emergencies.
 For example, you have a squad of axe dwarves, set to train 2 months, patrol 2 months, off 2 months, repeat same cycle each year. Also, you have a squad of rookie archers, under the Inactive schedule, just goofing off, and practicing when ever. Being a smart manager, you have set up a civilian alert, where they can go cower in terror somewhere safe. But the axedwarves, and trainee archers need to get to work.
 So on the military menu, make a new alert . On the military schedule screen, a new screen will be added, named after that alert. Then give new orders to each squad, what you want them to do,how many to appear, for that alert. Copy and paste that order, for each month of that alert, for the squad. Same for the orders you want the other squad to obey.
 If you go look at the squad menu, you now have the options, besides kill/move/active/inactive, will have the option to put on alert which squads you need. So if you activate the alert, if your axedwarves are patrolling, they will obey the alert orders. Once the emergency is over, use the squad menu, to put them back on the Active schedule,according to the schedule they were on previously. When you alert the archers, they will quit cowering in terror, and go to where they are supposed to be during that alert. Use the squad menu to then place them in inactive status, and if its safe, unalert the civvies.
 Alerts have the nice quality to activate those under the inactive schedule, to disregard burrow restrictions.
 So, in short, use the active/training schedule to assign monthly dutys to your full fledged soldiers. And use the alerts, for emergencys

I encrust furniture with them. Since I build above ground mainly, engraving it out of the question. So to keep the nobles happy, I add gem /bone/studded pieces of furniture to their rooms, to increase value. Plus just place encrusted items in hallways, to give happy thoughts.

Now this does not include the stockpiles of large gems, I put in the Hall of Heros, along with my artifact stockpile

Blu Emu, imagine the goblins approaching your fortress, getting worried about the carbonized bones, of past seigers. Then as they get closer, noticing all the civilians lining its ramparts waving to them. What the gobbos do not realize, they are waiting to claim charcoal, for the annual barbeque.

Thee, I was worried about the ammo glitch, in version .06, when the current military arrived. When I upgraded to .16, the drunks would use ammo in bins.
 If you always want them to carry extra ammo in their quivers, designate the ammo stacks C and T. So after they practice at the archery target, will still restock their quivers. I still think C means reload quivers, not just designated for combat.
 Now when the miasma of deep doodoo arrives(Siege)assign them some metal bolts, with C designation. Dwarven military doctrine dictates they use the best possible equipment. So when metal bolts are allocated, they will run off to swap bolts. Once the emergency is over, undesignate the metal bolts, so they will go back to using the training bolts.the dwarves like shiny bolts, so thats why you prohibit them, in times of peace.
 The main point for archers, is to use them as part of a static defense, not as a offensive force. Thats what  purely melee troops are for

Its time to wall it in!

Somewhere on the wiki was a setup for a GCS silk production plant. It seems it could be adapted to a flamethrower hallway of death. Webbing being a secondary attack, similar to fire breathing

mrbaggins, build at least a 1x3 atom smasher, in  1x4 room, with stairs leading to a room above it. Channel out a hole above the bridge. Connect a lever to the bridge, and pull it. Now designate the hole, 1x2, as a garbage dump. Then place a hatch, over the stairs, to prevent dwarfs from getting squished.     
       ttdtt ttw
       wwufbbbww
       wwwwwwwwwt=tunnel
w=unexcavated  stuff
f=floor
b=bridge
the gap on first line is a hole,lol
d/u is stairway

 Its nice to set it up, near your main entrance. Deactivate your other garbage ares, (usually quantum stockpiles), and your dwarves will have a quicker route to dump worthless enemy in the CDU