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[VerdantSF]

I wish I knew that you can set all items to be forbidden as soon as they're dropped, the same way spent ammo is handled.  No more "inaccessible item" spam, no more dwarves rushing to parts unknown when the burrow alert is dropped.

[Puddingbane]

Covers obsidian casting with buckets, safe multi-level digging, and the art of doing things in the right order.

On this note, I've learned that the safest way to do multi-level channeling is to actually dig everything first, then punch through the floors with a cave-in.  It makes constructing magma pistons so much easier it's not even funny.

[wierd]

If you are going to do that, make sure that urist mcminer gets away before the floor falls.

A deconstructing support works well for that.  Channel 3x1 along the edge of the floor to drop, put the disintegrating support on the middle. Link to lever. Channel out the rest of the perimeter.

Wait for all bearded dipshits to get out of the way, pull the lever. BOOM. Big cave-in, no casualties, no dust injuries.

[Hamiltonz]

What do I wish I had known when I started?  How to avoid spoilers.

When I first started playing I didn't even know about magma.  While trying to figure out how to keep my guys from starving to death I discovered the happy fun place and all the wonderful people that live there.  Absolutely ruined one of the best parts of the game for me.

Can you tell that I'm still miffed?  And of all places to be spoiled, it was while visiting the wiki.

What is really needed is a noob only wiki.  A place where impulse ramps, atom smashers, danger rooms, and dwarven water reactors are not discussed.  Then we point the noobs there for pointers on how to set up a working farm/booze system (absolute minimum requirement) and with helpful suggestions, like stone crafts are easy to make right away and can help you buy your way out of a food shortage.  Also, putting a door on a cave makes for a safe place to sleep.

For what I needed to know.  How to set someone up as the trader and how to get his lazy butt to the depot.

[FritzPL]

I wish I knew how to farm and work with metals.

[Larix]

For what I needed to know.  How to set someone up as the trader and how to get his lazy butt to the depot.

What i found much more worth knowing was that you don't really need to move a lazy broker to the depot - there's no tangible benefit to dedicated traders; 'anybody may trade' performs about as well and would have saved me from a bunch of missed trades.
Performing the first trade, including chosing the broker in a productive fashion, would probably be a good thing to treat thoroughly in a tutorial, because the interface is quite confusing at first sight.

[Sutremaine]

What is really needed is a noob only wiki.  A place where impulse ramps, atom smashers, danger rooms, and dwarven water reactors are not discussed.

I think water reactors should make it in if you're dealing with waterwheels and power at all, since they're just a really small (and FPS-friendly) version of what you'd be making yourself, or a way of cutting out long power trains between natural flowing water and whatever you're powering.

But yes, a spoiler-free wiki could be useful. For example, the adamantine page would contain information about its properties, what this means for weapon and armour production, and which rock the metal comes from. It would not contain any information about where the rock is found (save for perhaps 'raw adamantine is always in the deepest stone layers'), or its mining drop rate, or what happens if you delve too greedily and too deep, or even that there is a possibility of doing so. The material information would exist because it shares a place in the job manager / workshop list like every other metal, and it would be odd to leave adamantine out when steel, (bismuth) bronze, iron, silver, and copper all have their own pages detailing what they're good and bad at. The spoilers for adamantine are not in the material itself, but how you get it.

[vjek]

I wish I had known
you can make a well without a forge (rope reed/pig tail rope, wooden bucket, wooden block, mechanism) for a long time there, until I had a metal industry, no well !  So now i just embark with a single rope, and have a well almost instantly.

Further, I wish I had known you can build everything above ground, or underground, and be perfectly safe and productive with both.  The above ground benefit is above ground farming (fisher, straw, prickle berries) and dwarves are perfectly content to eat all of them.  No need for any below ground crops, either, if you get the right embark.

Aquifers are your friend, especially given you don't need to embark on a river, if you can get an aquifer that doesn't cover the whole embark (two biomes on embark, one with, one without).  Then you just channel down into it, set up your well, and never worry about fresh water again.

You can build a perfectly awesome safe fort with wooden trap components, wood beds, and stone everything else.  Metal isn't required at all !

fps costs of breaching the caverns, forgotten beasts are in every world, some FBs are hella tough, cave-in traps are easy and awesome.

Also, one thing people seem to find really difficult is that you can just build a stairwell down from a flat embark, and you're underground.  For some reason, many new players seem to think you need a hill side or mountain to build in.  Nope!

noble assignments, which ones to do and which not to do (bookeeper, manager, doctor, broker are good, the rest carry risk) , workshop orders (I turn everything off now, by default) , refuse orders (i forbid everything now, by default) dump orders (i dump everything now, by default) and setting up a garbage dump right away.

meeting area designated areas. very important to get those in place asap, so dwarves always have a place to be.

Can't think of any other really big things..

[MasterCyria]

I wish I had known I had to set a training area for my military as well as a place for them to put their equipment. I didn't learn that until 6 months after I started :p

[Yurt]

I played for a year (started when DF first added different z-levels) without realizing that R would bring up combat reports. I would read other people describing the specifics of dwarven combat like dismembering or twisting embedded bolts in wounds and thought everyone had really great, though remarkably similar, imaginations.

[Azerax]

You mention megaprojects, but I would really like to know how to build a robust military.  I have the basics of the military down: I can handle upper-cave fauna and small ambushes.  But I am eventually overwhelmed by the non-stop invasions I seem to get after year 5.  Of course I can last longer by sealing the fort or using a ton of traps, but that seems unsporting...

This +1

I don't like to abuse of game mechanics and will try to fight with a mix of everything. In that case steady military is required and I have trouble setting it up to.

My basic setup:
1. carve a dry moat with drawbridge around your entrance.  Build stairs in the moat that lead to the far side of your fortress, just in case a dorf falls in.  Have it exit on the far side of your fortress so if it's an invader, they are still kept out by the raised drawbridge.

2. Build a couple 2 level towers only accessible from inside, put fortifications on top for your marksdwarves.
3. Get a squad of 10 marksdwarves (for the tower), don't worry about keeping them happy. 3x3 engraved bedrooms and good food will offset that.  Line your dining room with statues, place exotic pets where dorfs walk (peacocks) and they'll generally remain happy.
4. Create 2 man squads for melee types.  This makes them do nothing but train and they become legendary very, very quickly.

from there:
remove all the up-ramps (except a few) so you control where invaders come from
line the path to your drawbridge with cage traps, but leave row so caravans can come in.  you can then strip the prisoners of all their goods and thrown them into a pit.  I make a pit right above my training barracks, or you can sell them.

this basic setup will make most goblin/kobold/troll seige pretty painless.