Editing v0.34:Live training

'''Live training''' is the fine process of how to attack [[creatures]] with [[military]] [[dwarves]] with minimal or inexistent [[injury]] in order to train your military's [[skill]]s, if you consider [[danger room]]s as an exploit, or don't want to randomly lose [[children]] or [[pet]]s, and find sparring and barracks training too slow.

There are many ways how to do this, but the most efficient tend to be:

*complete (train most if not all military skills)
*nonlethal for the dummy creature (so you can reuse it, if you haven't got an infinite source of dummy creatures)
*nonlethal for the dwarf (obviously)


== Killing Wildlife ==

Easy enough, just arm and armor your military and gratuitiously hunt wild [[animals]]. Note that some wild animals are more than capable of killing your dabbling [[soldier]]s, so you may want to scale the creature's threat to your dwarves skill and equipment.

*'''Pros''':
**gets you raw [[meat]], [[bone]], [[skin]], and other body parts for your animal products industry
**gets rid of unwanted animals in the biome
**possibly will get you new, more interesting animals on the map to catch
**very easy to set up, no special infrastructure needed
**slaughtering wildlife is fun
**trains all skills
**very easy to set up with [[marksdwarf|marksdwarves]]: just make your dwarves [[hunter]]s
*'''Cons''':
**not the fastest training method
**possibly the most dangerous techniques for dwarves
**can easily bring you too much meat and animal parts
**easily gets repetitive
**If training melee, dwarves spend a long time running after wildlife. "Yakety Sax effect"
**wildlife supply isn't infinite
**may generate unwanted [[hauling]] jobs
**requires oversight (repetitive kill orders)
**tends to train offense much more than defense

You can also improve on this by breeding wild non-[[grazer]]s in some room for your dwarves to slaughter periodically. It removes the limited wildlife problem, but has still most of the other drawbacks.

== Beating on Enemy Prisoners (aka Away with thee, accursed Geneva Convention!) ==

Quite a bit more efficient than the previous one, this consists of catching intelligent enemies (mostly [[goblins]]) in [[trap]]s, making sure they are well [[armor]]ed, then sending them against your armor-clad dwarves with training weapons. You can kill them anyways, other goblins will come next season.

'''Pros''':
*decent training speed
*beating on goblins is fun
*infinite supply of enemies
*more useful than tossing goblins in the [[volcano]] as a sacrifice to Armok
*trains all skills
'''Cons''':
*goblins are trained as well (although this may be a good thing) if you don't kill them
*still requires enough oversight to be a bother
*may be dangerous to your dwarves
*goblins tend to die easily due to poor armor coverage, you must replace a new batch
*more efficient with a training weapon : dwarves may get attached to it
*generates hauling jobs (although this may be a good thing)
*as offensive skills improve and goblin skill diminish, goblin defensive skills

== Flesh Ball Beating ==

This is a quite efficient technique to train offensive training skills. Just cage trap and then enclose [[flesh ball]]s in some room, arm your dwarves with [[BLUNT]] weapons only, armor your dwarves and send them beating flesh balls. Do NOT use this to train marskdwarves, it is a massive waste of time.

'''Pros''':
*good training speed on offensive skills
*totally safe if you armored your dwarves correctly
*requires little oversight, since flesh balls are immune to blunt
'''Cons''':
*may be seen as an exploit
*requires some flesh balls and a fair bit of building and preparation
*dwarves may attach themselves to a training weapon
*dwarves tend to bite and scratch, therefore making flesh balls die of bleeding sometimes
*flesh balls are in very finite supply
*doesn't train defensive skills much

== Bronze Colossus Dummy ==

AKA : using a [[bronze colossus]]'s toughness and high experience gains to get good skills easily and safely. 

For marksdwarves : catch the colossus, put it in a room, fire on it. You may want to use wooden/bone bolts to not damage it further, or iron bolts if you WANT to damage it further for melee training.
For melee : Remove it's arms and legs via falling and/or bolts, and then drop the colossus on a closed room, and send your melee dwarves on it. Remember, [[steel]] or better weapons will kill it, and that's not what you want.

'''Pros''':
*very good training speed, due to colossus giving a lot of experience
*generally not dangerous
*infinite training
*little oversight needed, since both sides doesn't do much damage
*easy to set up for marksdwarves
'''Cons''':
*endgame only, you don't get a colossus before 80 dwarves
*must actually have a colossus in the world
*dismembering a colossus without killing it isn't easy
*may be dangerous to dwarves with a low dodging skill
*limitation on quality material weapons => dwarf may like a poor weapon
*trains mostly offense skills, although Dodger as well
*melee may be seen as an exploit

== Undead Battle Arena ==

Using one or several imprisoned [[necromancer]]s to train your dwarves with a controlled, infinite stream of [[undead]].

You must first catch one or several necromancers, or use a friendly necromancer, then dump him/them in a small space (if possible 1x1) surrounded by [[gem]] [[window]]s or [[fortification]]s (so he can animate what is around without being murdered by a dwarf), make an animation room. You can replace the necromancer by an animating [[evil]] biome or a [[demonic fortress]], but necromancers raise undead faster and can be moved anywhere you like. As a bonus, add raising [[bridge]]s or [[floodgate]]s to block the necro's view and stop the reanimation on command.

Then drop whatever pile of [[body parts]] you don't need and want your necromancer to animate. Enjoy as undead are animated, dwarf kills it, undead are reanimated, dwarf kills it again, etc.

'''Pros''':
**decent skill increases
**only little hauling needed
**use for necromancers
**infinite training
**requires little oversight
**trains every skill
**controllable training aspects : difficulty level, depending on corpse (from dropping llama [[wool]] to dropping a [[cave dragon]] corpse) and number of corpses animated
*'''Cons''':
**can be dangerous, actually danger is proportional to your oversight and difficulty level
**requires more stonework than most other methods
**requires to actually cage trap a necromancer
**time between two reanimations is wasted time => more necromancers is better

== Giant Cave Spider Armor Training Program ==

Using a [[giant cave spider]]'s inability to bypass the armor or a webbed dwarf to train [[armor user]].

First you must prepare the terrain to separate wild GCS and dwarf when the dwarf gets hungry/thirsty/drowsy/sufficient armor user skill.

Set the training on a non-lethal pit trap consisting of a 2x2 or 3x3 retracting bridge, or a series of grates, all linked to a lever and on top of a 1z-deep pit. Fill the ground under the bridge with cage traps.

Set a military dwarf fully armored in metal, without any weapons against a wild giant cave spider. Wild GCS webs the still-conscious dwarf, wild GCS attempts a bite to the head but fails to penetrate metal armor. Dwarf gains armor user skill. Repeat a hundred times. You may want to find a way of harvesting silk for your [[loom]]s as well.

When you want to stop the training, pull the lever. Bridge or grates go down, dwarf and spider fall 1 z-level and get stunned, one or both get caged and separated.

You can also try a dwarf without full armor and only a metal helm, but in that case I no longer guarantee the safety of your dwarf.

*'''Pros''':
**can double as a GCS [[silk]] farm
**very good training rates
**Useful skill which normally increases slowly in combat
**No danger at all for both dwarf and GCS, provided you armored your dwarf well
**Requires only oversight each month
*'''Cons''':
**slightly exploity
**trains only one skill
**needs quite a bit of work to set up if you want to save the GCS and reuse it
**can't train several dwarves at once unless you have several wild GCS and several training facilities

== Killing Elf caravans ==

Exactly what it says on the tin. [[Elves]] don't get pissed at you killing their [[caravan]]s, nor do they seem to bring worse [[trading]] goods, they don't defend themselves when attacked, they're nearly perfect for training ! What do you mean they come only once a year and they're only a few ? Who cares about that ! Training is training !

*'''Pros''':
**<s>stolen</s> free stuff without paying
**everyone hates the elves anyway ! It's awwwright !
**no danger at all for dwarves
**elves come each and every spring => infinite training
**killing arrogant, tree-hugging hippies is GREAT fun !
*'''Cons''':
**Fills your stockpiles with wooden [[DF2010:Useless crap|Useless crap]] and [[rope reed]] [[cloth]]
**Ridiculously slow training
**Generates tons of hauling jobs, even if you don't stockpile all the wooden stuff and directly dump it in [[magma]]
**Not a serious training method at all



[[Category:DF2012:Military]]