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Author Topic: Is there anything that makes handling your military easier?  (Read 730 times)

Itsapaul

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Is there anything that makes handling your military easier?
« on: January 18, 2011, 07:16:46 pm »

So far the game's great on the micromanagement end, but it gets boring when that's all I do because managing a military is beyond complicated.  Are there any tools (probably something in DwarfTherapist I'm missing...) that specifically help out with making/assigning orders and equipment besides the in-game menus?

PS - My most recent problem was my dwarved not training when it looked like I did everything right (and had gotten a squad to train before), but I'm guessing thats because they didn't actually have the short swords in their uniforms yet.  Do you also need all the armor pieces for them to start?
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Shaio

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Re: Is there anything that makes handling your military easier?
« Reply #1 on: January 18, 2011, 08:11:03 pm »

^ They don't need whole uniform, just a barracks/armory that's set for there squad to train in it, and have there schedule set to training.
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martinuzz

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Re: Is there anything that makes handling your military easier?
« Reply #2 on: January 18, 2011, 08:48:08 pm »

This guide might help you with the training issues:
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=75200.0

As for equipment, this magmawiki page holds about all you'll ever want to know about armor:
http://df.magmawiki.com/index.php/Armor

As for your question: to train, dwarves don't need any equipment at all really. Theoretically, they could spar naked. They'd train wrestling, punching, and possibly some kicking and biting then. They just need a barracks and a schedule. Or no barracks, no schedule, but a danger room.
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Brandstone

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Re: Is there anything that makes handling your military easier?
« Reply #3 on: January 18, 2011, 10:21:17 pm »

Dwarves engineering can replace the military, but complicated death traps may not be your style.

shlorf

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Re: Is there anything that makes handling your military easier?
« Reply #4 on: January 18, 2011, 11:32:59 pm »

The only thing i hate about it is looking through 100+ dwarfs for the ones that i looked up via therapist to have some skills or have no useful/needed civilian skills. If that list could just sort the dwarfs by something else than when they arrived...
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Urist Imiknorris

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Re: Is there anything that makes handling your military easier?
« Reply #5 on: January 18, 2011, 11:34:55 pm »

Just give them custom professions before looking for them, like "Soldier" or "Squad 1."
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Caldfir

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Re: Is there anything that makes handling your military easier?
« Reply #6 on: January 19, 2011, 12:41:10 am »

Sadly, with the relative newness and continuing changes/bugfixes of the new military system, it doesn't seem like anyone has had the opportunity to do the necessary hacking/programming to put together a nice UI for it. 

The military MOSTLY works now, but unfortunately it is quite clunky to get set up.  I look forward with great hope and enthusiasm to the day when this is not the case.  Until then, the above-posted guides are a good start to introduce and explain how to get a military working.  Good luck - it isn't easy, but once you get going, there's something satisfying about seeing a dwarf with a 200-name long list of kills. 
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Erkki

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Re: Is there anything that makes handling your military easier?
« Reply #7 on: January 19, 2011, 01:14:27 am »

To me the only things in the military that still bug me are the freaking gauntlets(you have to forge 2 pairs, of the dwarves will wear 2/4 or 3/4...), keeping ranged soldiers supplied with ammo and the fact that the second you assign a univorm with "replace clothes", they will drop their clothes where ever they happen to stand, and there is no way in hell to get rid of them anymore. They dont even rot away.  :-[
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Buttery_Mess

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Re: Is there anything that makes handling your military easier?
« Reply #8 on: January 19, 2011, 04:56:09 am »

Don't bother with training, set up a danger room. It keeps the cat problem down and makes badass dwarves.

I found the military one of the easier parts of the game to understand. I still don't fully understand the production of plant thread. Some of the workshop mechanics are far more arcane than the military. The interface is great, much less clunky than, say, labours. Once you figure it out, it gives you great, fine control over what you want your military to do and it's very quick to implement those changes. By contrast, getting your dwarves to do what you want in the correct order is a nightmare.
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