Bay 12 Games Forum

The unusable ramp method works wonders, although frankly the description of them usually is rather hard to follow, so I'm going to attempt to show you how to make them.

Just simply channel a trench using d-h command. Then on the Z level below the trench, simple designate a tunnel next to the trench you just dug.
This will result in a series of ramps that can be accessed from the ground on one side, while being unusable from the other side (the unusable side will be the side with the tunnel underneath it). It's fairly easy to trench out a level or almost level embark site so that only wagons are capable of passing over the trench. For other creatures that walk, they simply can't pass. So you'd need to provide an alternate path for them. Said alternate path can have loads of traps, military and other items to welcome visitors (remember that the caravans not only include wagons, but also include humanoids leading pack animals. Those traders can't pass the unusable ramp trench. So be sure to provide them some means of entry.


   

Just use the workflow command in dfhack.

In a nutshell, the workflow command is told how many of what item you wish to have (low and high limits).
It will then suspend, or unsuspend any jobs that make such items.

So you go to a forge (or multiple forges) and set up one or more repeating jobs for each item within a set of armor. Tell dfhack how many of each item you want, and then totally ignore it since you'll have that many items available once they're produced. And when the dwarves actually wear the new items, dfhack will not consider the worn item to be available so it will make a new replacement for the new dwarf or group of dwarves.

There are some people who use workflow just to manage meals and drinks. I use it for that plus....
1. Armor and weapons.
2. Clothing of all types.
3. Basic building materials such as stone blocks, hatch covers, floodgates, etc.
4. Furniture such as chairs, cabinets, tables, etc.
5. Mechanisms
And so forth and so on....

As long as I don't consume the produced items too fast, I always have a small stock (or not so small in the case of blocks) immediate at hand and shortly after I use those items, I have replacements for the next time I want some.

Find yourself on this chart

Hmm... Looks amazingly similar to the Eve Online learning curve.....

Just use a hatch activated by an any weight non-citizen pressure plate like this

Outside uncontrolled area     ^¢      Inside "safe" area.

Dwarves can walk over that area without slowing down at all. While anything else that's not trap avoid and non-flying will find the hatch to be an impassable barrier. And if a single tile passage is too small, just make several in parallel like this

#######
+++^¢++
   ##++
+++^¢++
   ##++
+++^¢++
   ##++
+++^¢++
#######

The other approaches you mentioned have issues.

Minecarts - You can only get non-military dwarves to ride them. So in order to use, you'll have to have the military inactive. Get them to accept the ride task (a trick in itself to get that to happen with a large enough population to allow them to arrive at nearly the same time), and finally, convert them to active while they're riding towards their destination. Not gonna happen given the way dwarves operate.

Bridge drop - This method actually looks doable. But you already know the issues with that approach. But if you can drop the dwarves from 2 Z levels, you might "soften up" the targets by having two layers of bridges. The lower layer is filled with trash to dump on the invaders and the upper level drops the barracks dwelling dwarves.

Dwarfpedos - Not gonna work as described. An active military dwarf won't accept ANY task. So you can't get 'em to pull the lever to drop the dwarfpedo... But you might be able to get a civilian to pull the lever instead.

dfhack lies about what the dwarf actually has, but it tells the truth as to what the dwarf wants. So use the 't' command to look at the workshop to see what the dwarf actually has and then check against dfhack's list to see what's missing. For instance, I will generally forbid 5 to 10 of each cloth type (cloth, silk, yarn) as a mood reserve stockpile. Can't tell you the number of times that dfhack has claimed that the moody dwarf had a cloth when in reality didn't. So I'll go into the inventory screen and unforbid one of the required clothes.

Dear outpost liasion,

NOOOOOOOOOOOOO DAMMIT MY BARON'S ROOMS AREN'T EVEN UP TO SNUFF YET WHY ARE YOU PROMOTING HIM TO A COUNT ALREADY YOU DICK

Argh,

Overseer of Orbeagles

Dear Outpost Liasion,
Since my baron's quarters and tomb are already upgraded to the standards of a Duke, how about we skip the intermediate steps and simply bypass the count rank?

P.S. Working on royal quarters at the moment. When they're complete, I'll send a gift to the mountain home...

Nope, you can have as many suspended jobs as you want in a workshop and, if there's any un-suspended jobs in that workshop, those jobs will be performed.