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[zarmazarma]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

As you can see in the above picture I've got a fairly simple defense going, but it's very effective. There's a small wall blocking all entrance but the front. The very front is guarded by floodgates, with a pressure plate connecting to them behind. The pressure plate will activate if a size 5+ creature steps on it, closing the floodgates from behind and forcing them to walk towards the bridge (which I will have closed. At this point I could simply let them starve, crush them, or collect them in the cages as pets. If I'm not quick enough, it's a large invasion force, or a creature that just utterly bypasses all of those completely, they head towards my next chamber. This area has flood gates (in blue) on both ends. They are all linked to a lever, and a pressure plate in the hall. They are kept open at all times, but, if a force enters and survives long enough to get to the pressure plate (although I've seen that most are anhiliated by cross bow dwarves at the opposite end of the hall firing on them as they are crushed by rocks), the flood gates will close. Everything from a seige of goblins to a dragon should be destroyed in this cave. I believe that if anything actually got past the stone fall traps, I would just let them rot in there, digging out a secondary entrance while they rot.

What's your defense? (Pictures would be nice, lifevis, 3dwarf, mayday, normal, whatever.)

[Im_Sparks]

Sorry I'm not fortress' line of defense.

Also, I hate traps that are used in excess so much. I think it's a sign of great weakness to rely on machines to fight the battles of manly dwarves. I use hammerdwarves/speardwarves backed up by marksdwarves. The ensuing bleeding and flying is amazing.

[Pleeb]

Pressure plates rigged up to drawbridges that fling things in the direction of spike pits. There's a door into the pits. Keeps the haulers busy after an invasion.

[zarmazarma]

I like yours pleeb. Sounds interesting, I was wondering what happened when you raise a draw bridge when people are on it... As for sparks, sorry for assuming your name, I've fixed it.

As for your opinion on traps, I find that pretty unpractical. Hell, if I'm gonna have a fortress, I'll go ahead and make it impenetrable :p. 

[Zironic]

It looks solid, except for you using windows vista.

[zarmazarma]

It looks solid, except for you using windows vista.

It's never failed me yet.

[Muz]

I actually try to play without a powerful line of defense. The game is a bit too easy (and less 'fun') with them. I actually prefer making my fortresses outside the mountain, with houses and tenements and windows and all. Defenses include pits, channels, walls and emergency hiding places

[FluffyToast J]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Good old fashioned curtain wall + 50 bazillion steel bolts/second. Marksdwarves stand on the gatehouse to the left, fire on the enemy as they come in, then they move to the other side and keep on firing. Sometimes I'll have a bunch of swordsdwarves stationed at the gatehouse on the right in case the orcs get through, but usually they have a severe case of *Steel Bolt* embedded in right eye.

[Shiv]

Mine's much like Manifold's except I try to use as few walls as possible.  Walling yourself in is just too easy and severely kills any challenge.

Instead, I always try to build my fort in an easily defensible position, usually a niche in the land so that the mouth of the fortress acts as a funnel.  I then hollow out the sides of the tunnel a bit, collapse the roof, and this gives me a nice rectangular area to play with.  At this point I put hallways down the sides of this rectangle then replace the earthern walls with fortifications so that my marks dwarves can shoot at anything that goes in that area.  I can also raise a drawbridge over a channel if I'm really weak on melee dwarves at that moment but then I'm just shooting fish in a barrel.  I like to throw the AI a bone.

[Areyar]

You should dig out those ramps at the entrance Zarzamzaramza, enemies can bypass your cagetraps and be unfairly killed by the gazillion stonetraps in the main corridor.

I prefer to use as few traps as possible at a few chokepoints. just enough to prevent an ambush showing up in my meetinghall before there is a millitary to be spared for gatekeeping.
train a few melee dwarves and post them at the gate.
build them nice fortifications/train my millitary crossbow dwarves.
safe as heck. (famous last words from sheriff Urist Bomrek)

Only then there is time to create a monstrous masterplan of doom involving water, magma and captured hostiles.

[Protactinium]

It looks solid, except for you using windows vista.

It's never failed me yet.

Once Windows 7 comes out, watch your processing speed shoot up and realize how much RAM Vista had been sucking up that entire time.

[Lamp]

Generally I like to have a 20 x 50 row of spike traps, each with 2 - 3 spikes connected to a lever, hasn't failed me yet.

If I want to overkill I'll make a 20 x 50 pit fall trap with bridges over it and the spikes at the bottom, connected to a lever. Maybe in a layer of magma.

[nil]

My last personal fortress had a pretty elaborate defense.  Enemies went up a large ramp to enter a larger dome near the top.  They then go down a long spiral road to dome floor, where both easy access to the rest of the fortress and a trade depot can be found.

If necessary, I can send a wall of water down the ramp, but it is otherwise undefended.  The road down, however, has three different ways to kill enemies.  The primary method is through the fortifications on each level of the road down; enemies will turn the corner directly into the line of fire, then be forced to advance towards the fortifications.  Before they can reach them, though, they will be at the downramp for the next level.  Second, that wall of water can also be directed inward; this is more to prevent escape and make the loot accessible, but if I keep it on it can kill (I also have a whole squad of legendary swimmers that can use it to great advantage).  Finally, once enemies have gone deep into the fortress I can release my melee forces at the top of the interior road via a drawbridge (the drop will only stun them, it's not far enough to cause injury).  They will then, immediately and on their own, start fighting their way down, killing everything in their path.  Usually some squad members miss the drop, so they go up the road from the other way to rejoin their squad leaders--and anything in between them is trapped on all sides.  Finally, if all else fails the bridges on the road down are all connected to a lever.  I've never used this to kill enemies, though, only to drop the loot down to the dome floor where it can be more easily and safely collected.

This map uses the CivForge mod so there's about 8 sieging enemies.  I've only built three traps, and only once did one catch an invader.  I've accidentally drowned a couple on the ramp, too; otherwise they've all been killed in combat.  Just checked the units list; not counting thieves or merchant guards there are 115 pages of enemy dead.

[Duke 2.0]

 I remember one succession game where the only defenses was a chained animal to detect ambushes and two ten tile drawbridges over a 15 z-level pit. No pressure plates, this sucker had to be tripped manually. There were even bedrooms looking over the deathpit.

 That is my fortress defense preference.

[Skorpion]

Curtain wall with a drawbridge in it, over a pit. This is guarded by the military.

Dwarven airlock system, with a set of doors enclosing a small area. Also, the trade depot has a drawbridge to seal it, ostensibly for killing the merchants.

Dogs to detect ambushers scattered around, and the main dog cage hooked to a lever for archer decoys.