I've been messing around with the various civilizations, adding [CIV_CONTROLABLE] and related tags to see how much of them already work in Dwarf mode. Goblins, it seems, work almost perfectly; the only issue being that the strings still refer to them as "Dwarves". (You even gain access to constructing different things, like bows and arrows. Interesting.)
Kobolds, however, have a serious issue. (I don't count "They point-buy copper weapons instead of iron", or "you need to add [DIGGER:ITEM_WEAPON_PICK]", or the like. Different starting materials is pretty cool, potentially, although some sort of digging item really is needed for any DF mode game.) The issue is: while Kobolds will do jobs set by starting them with points in those areas, the game apparently considers your Kobold underlings to be animals, thus giving the message "This animal can't work" if you try to change their jobs.
I just looked through the file "creature_standard.txt", and I believe I have found the problem: for whatever reason, kobolds are not flagged intelligent. I'll have to see if changing that will fix the problem.
(Note: I'm not complaining or asking for all other civilizations to work perfectly with dwarf mode; this is all just experimentation for my own sake. That said, if Toady does read this, you might want to add [INTELLIGENT] to kobolds.)