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[bshore]

I tend to start in safe-ish areas and prefer the fort building puzzle to the military conquest part of things.  I do a lot of above-ground building, hence the masons.  The start I'm working with now is:

Mason/Arch [untrained wood chopper]
Mason/Mechanic
Trader/Manager [untrained bone carver]
Doctor/Brewer
Herbalist/Carpenter
Armorsmith/Leatherworker [untrained miner]
Weaponsmith/Blacksmith [untrained miner]

The thinking behind this is that mining, chopping and bone carving train up so quickly it's inefficient to use starting points on those skills.  I'll use the first few seasons to dig out the majority of my fortress (which I design ahead of time) and then once I have the metal working areas set up I'll turn mining on a couple useless migrants and set my starting smiths to their original tasks. 

I butcher my starting wagon animals almost immediately, along with any migrant animals that are big enough so the bone carver stays pretty busy.

I won't set up farming till I get a migrant who can farm (or one whose otherwise useless that I decide to turn into a farmer).

What's the thinking behind starting with a gem cutter or setter?  I've seen that a lot, and can't figure it out.  Gems alone aren't worth much, and encrusting things seems time consuming, and I can never get them to encrust the things I want with the gems I want.  Is setting up a gem industry really worth it?

[Tsuchigumo550]

I generally make someone a gemcut/setter if my first migrant wave dosen't have one- you can increase the value of trade goods fairly well, and considering most gems will net you 100-200U of worth after being cut alone, they're great trader fodder. There's probably better ways, but gems are relatively easy and your gemcutter can reliably function as something else when there aren't many gems to process.

[Mushroo]

I'm currently doing a fun "challenge" embark:

cook, peasant x 6, 1 pick, lots and lots and lots of rock nuts

The fort's sole export is biscuits consisting of 1 rock nut oil and 1 rock nut press cake. The 6 peasants are trained in: miner/herbalist (the pick helps vs. wildlife), mason/stonecrafter, miller, presser, brewer. Farming is not allowed.

[Sutremaine]

On my last embark I brought a load of military* and forgot to assign anybody the leader skills. One of the military dwarves ended up as expedition leader, and it may work out in the long run. Once I reshuffle the other three dwarves into squad leaders, I can keep the expedition leader in reserve so that he can be always available for meetings and the fortress's last store of military knowledge in case everybody active dies. Right now it's rather annoying to get him to conduct meetings.

*Five dwarves, one of whom broke his neck sparring within six months. Turns out that leather isn't quite enough to break the impact of a dwarf being thrown into another -- I thought it'd be a bit on the weak side, but was waiting for the RNG to give me a lizardsplosion of snake eyes.

[wierd]

I'm currently doing a fun "challenge" embark:

cook, peasant x 6, 1 pick, lots and lots and lots of rock nuts

The fort's sole export is biscuits consisting of 1 rock nut oil and 1 rock nut press cake. The 6 peasants are trained in: miner/herbalist (the pick helps vs. wildlife), mason/stonecrafter, miller, presser, brewer. Farming is not allowed.

What?

How do you get the rock nuts to make press cakes and oil, if you aren't allowed to grow rocknuts? Do you at least get to use a big growing chamber to set your herbalists loose on?

[Mushroo]

I'm currently doing a fun "challenge" embark:

cook, peasant x 6, 1 pick, lots and lots and lots of rock nuts

The fort's sole export is biscuits consisting of 1 rock nut oil and 1 rock nut press cake. The 6 peasants are trained in: miner/herbalist (the pick helps vs. wildlife), mason/stonecrafter, miller, presser, brewer. Farming is not allowed.

What?

How do you get the rock nuts to make press cakes and oil, if you aren't allowed to grow rocknuts? Do you at least get to use a big growing chamber to set your herbalists loose on?

I embark with 1,000+ rock nuts, which lasts the first few years, then beyond that, I get more rock nuts from the caravans.

[Pancakes]

1 Miner              (Mining=Proficient)
1 Woodworker     (Woodcutting=Proficient, Carpentry=Proficient)
1 Stoneworker     (Masonry=Proficient, Detailing=Proficient)
1 Mechanic         (Mechanics=Proficient, Stone Crafting=Proficient)
2 Farmers           (Farming=Competent, Threshing=Novice, Weaving & Clothesmaking = Adequate, Dyeing=Novice, Milling=Novice)
1 Leader             (Appraisal=Adequate, Judge of Intent=Adequate, Bookkeeping=Adequate, Organizer=Adequate, Leader=Adequate)

Note:
-Leader gets a pick to help mine at embark
-Enough food/drink are brought to last without cook/brewer in first year
-All migrant men are enlisted for duty as soon as they arrive
-The main export of the fortress is clothing, with dye & fiber grown on-site

[Koremu]

I've generally found that Woodcutting takes too much time to be combined with anything else that is time intensive like Carpentry. So my Woodcutter might get some skills I want to have and rarely turn up in migrant waves, or I might save the points & buy something else. Or you can give him one point in a moodable skill that you don't want to have to train later on in the game.

Anyone with a useful combination of material & item preferences gets the appropriate skill.

Someone compassionate gets a full set of medical skills.

Miners, like the Woodcutter, get a moodable skill that's not necessary early game but will be handy later on.

If there's an appropriate Mayor candidate (good preferences), they get the necessary skills.

I don't generally bother with a carpenter. I'm not bothered about quality of beds before migrants arrive, and Carpentry skills up fast anyway. Plus there's usually a carpenter arrives.

[Tsuchigumo550]

I'm trying to think of a way to never need carpentry at all, but beds are wood only right? If only you could make sleeping mats out of cloth or something...

[Koremu]

I'm trying to think of a way to never need carpentry at all, but beds are wood only right? If only you could make sleeping mats out of cloth or something...

Yeah Beds are only wood. And Carpentry is essential, because it annoys Elves. But that's not a reason for spending starting points on Carpentry when you could just get someone who has other skills that are harder to train (Medical, Broker) to do it unskilled.

Hell, the fact that it annoys Elves is a reason to take an unskilled carpenter, because it means you have to chop down more trees to skill up!

[doublestrafe]

Miners, like the Woodcutter, get a moodable skill that's not necessary early game but will be handy later on.

Mining is moodable, so don't waste your points.

I really feel that either mining should not be moodable, or moody miners should go dig a legendary hole somewhere.

[Lielac]

Miners, like the Woodcutter, get a moodable skill that's not necessary early game but will be handy later on.

Mining is moodable, so don't waste your points.

I really feel that either mining should not be moodable, or moody miners should go dig a legendary hole somewhere.

All fortresses are legendary holes! That's why miners tend to be your first legendaries. (Well, they're sure mine...)

[AWellTrainedFerret]

I used to have 2 miners, 1 mason/mechanic, 1 carpenter, 1 broker/manager/ 1 farmer, and 1 brewer/cook

However, I just recently came back after a 3 year pause in playing, and apparently the mining skill is worthless now because ores and gems have fixed drop rates. So now my new set-up is:
1 weaponsmith, 1 armorer, 1 broker/miner, 1 carpenter, 1 mason, 1 farmer, and 1 brewer.

I took the mechanics skill off the mason because I need the mason working pretty much full time on doors, tables, chairs, cabinets, and coffers to keep up with migrant waves, and the mechanic skill is easily trained up. Same with cooking on the brewer. I have forgone cooking until the farmer reaches a high enough level that he can actually supply a full sized fort, and once that happens it's easy to train up an unskilled migrant.

[blue emu]

... and apparently the mining skill is worthless now because ores and gems have fixed drop rates...

I took the mechanics skill off the mason because I need the mason working pretty much full time on doors, tables, chairs, cabinets, and coffers to keep up with migrant waves, and the mechanic skill is easily trained up. Same with cooking on the brewer. I have forgone cooking until the farmer reaches a high enough level that he can actually supply a full sized fort, and once that happens it's easy to train up an unskilled migrant.

Not sure that Mining skill is useless, since the speed of mining depends on skill level. During the Fortress's first year, speed counts. I like to bring along an experienced Cook/Brewer (with one level of a moodable skill added, like Weaponsmith) just for the morale effect of good food and drink.

"Oh, Armok! The Carp ate my wife and children! And that Forgotten Beast... hey, WOW! These kitten-burgers are GREAT!"