I was hoping this'd be mood priority rankings... I had a dwarf who had higher weapon or armoursmithing than engraving, with both at Dabbling level. When she mooded, she had an Engraver mood.
Assuming there are enough raw materials to be able to use the mooded skill, and that the mood gives XP:
1 ) Weaponsmith / Armoursmith
On the one hand, armour is more useful for its protective qualities. On the other, it can be raised more quickly without a mood, because you can make two items with one job and get more XP. On the third hand, artifact weapons are generally better, unless you can accumulate a full set of steel or adamantine armour, or a heavy artifact shield.
3 ) Glassmaker
Glass can be used to make a lot of different things, and the relative weakness of glass trap components can be compensated for by making a whole lot of them.
4 ) Bone Carver (better when early)
The artifact itself is rarely anything useful, but due to my liking for an armed populace I get through a lot of bolts. As with glass, quantity makes up for a lack of material quality, and there's not much else to do with bone anyway. There's nothing else to do with hooves, horns, and skulls.
5 ) Leatherworker
Leather is another multi-purpose material, and having a dwarf who can churn out good leather items leaves you really nice items to use yourself, and not-so-nice items that are still moderately valuable. Leather items can also fill a bin without making it too heavy, which is a nice bonus.
6 ) Bowyer (worse when late)
Good-quality wood or bone crossbows are very nice early on, after you've slaughtered the pack animals and before you've set up a metal industry. The skill becomes more redundant as you get more access to good metal crossbows, but wood or bone crossbows remain useful for dwarves who'll never have to go into melee.
7 ) Mechanic (better when early)
Artifact mechanisms are like statues that you can weaponise, and skill makes a huge difference in the time it takes to link mechanisms. It's a solid skill to mood in, but a little dull.
8 ) Clothier (jackpot in first three seasons)
Cloth just about has a higher average monetary value than leather for me, since you can get hold of loads and loads of moderate-value plant cloth more easily than you can the more valuable leathers. If you can get a mood in this before the dwarven caravan comes, you can buy cloth from them and convert it into high-value crafts right next to the depot.
9 ) Tanner (
much better when early)
Skins rot really quickly, so having a dwarf who can get the job done quickly is good. Later on you can have enough labour to allow one dwarf per untanned skin, but a dwarf who can tear through a pile of skins and free up the low-skill dwarves is still useful.
10 ) Miner (better when dwarf isn't already Legendary...)
Legendary miners are good, but they skill up so quickly that you'll be lucky to get a Miner mood on a low-skill dwarf. At least you get a practical artifact.
11 ) Carpenter (prefer to have early)
Not much to say about this one -- I make beds, bins, and minecarts only as I need them, and the quality doesn't really matter.
12 ) Mason (better when early)
A Legendary mason early on can churn out blocks and make some really nice furniture, but as you get more dwarves for block-making and more value boosters for rooms the skill stands out less.
13 ) Weaver (much better with a good Clothier)
Clothing is an industry I use mostly for its value, and a good weaver makes valuable cloth. They're very useful in a fortress I've geared towards cloth production, but lately I've been using other industries for trade items.
14 ) Woodcrafter
Something of a luxury skill due to my dislike of lugging wood around, but I won't say no to an instant source of quality bolts.
15 ) Blacksmith / Metal Crafter (pretty good in first three seasons)
Everything these skills do can be done by other skills on the list. Would be more desirable if I had a broader focus on metalworking than arms and armour. As with Clothesmaking, if you get this before the first caravan you can buy bars of metal and process them for a pretty hefty profit.
17 ) Engraver (better when early)
Nice source of room value if you can get one early, but I don't do much engraving and enable the skill on everybody for large-scale smoothing projects. Some dwarves will end up as Engraving mood candidates from that, and if they do mood then I encourage them to use their new skill.
18 ) Gem Cutter (prefer to have late)
A real luxury skill -- I'd rather keep rough gems for moods, and making rough glass means I'm not making glass items I can use. I do like it when I get gem crafts with interesting bits of history on them, and incongruous gem artifacts are pretty neat, but I just don't have much use for gem cutters.
19 ) Stonecrafter / Gem Setter
I have no use for either of these skills, and am unwilling to divert resources to them even if there's a skilled dwarf.