I gotta say, I was in the same boat as Amitabho a few years ago. I hated Halo, just because it was such a fad. EVERYBODY loved it, so I just decided I hated it. These days, I can play it, and even have fun, but I don't drool over it like so many people do. If somebody says, "lets play Halo!" I'm much more likely to say "sure," "okay," or "naw," than "yeah!" or "dood, I was just thinking of plastering your brainz with a sniperz rifel!"...
What I'm trying to say is, I think a lot of things are over-rated. More than the general public realizes. It's our job as individuals and responsible play-testers to sift through threads like this, determine what the general public is begging for, reason why or why not those features would be good, and come up with some kind of logical argument in favor for or against these features, or even for some other thing that would solve the problem in a creative way that sets this game apart from all the others.
SO... I'm not gonna sift through +98 pages of repeated posts here, just cuz that would be unnecessary and I've seen the trends of complaints already. I'll just give you my little bit on what small bit I've seen and let someone else handle the rest.
I'll start with Amitabho's post, as it caught my interest. First off, while technically ANSII is correct, most people will just say ASCII. if you say ANSII, you sound like an elitist turd who thinks he knows everything. So remember; it's ASCII, not ANSII in your PANTSI. Second, you're thirteen. You need to realize the world doesn't revolve around your opinion, and if someone finds it more enjoyable to look at a 6x6 pixel comical representation of a dorf than a simple colored smiley, then that's their choice, freedom, and right, and it in no way makes them more shallow than you, in and of itself. Their motives for doing so MIGHT, but you can't read their minds so don't judge them on that preference alone.
I'm 19. I like the mayday tileset. I also like to play stock nethack, without any graphical additives. Knowing those things alone, would you say I'm a shallow, Halo fanboy, who only cares about graphics? Would you still say that, if I told you I was about to join the Air Force, go Special Forces, and never even see a computer game for up to nine months at a time?
I think I've made my point.
Now, my opinion is that it should be *much* easier to configure df, from editing the init.txt, to adding graphics packs, to even upgrading to a newer version. I don't much care for having to splice a new version into an already configured older version, realize I accidentally overwrote my init.txt, forgot to replace the raws folder in my save folder, and after I fix those, low and behold my plump helmets look like trees! (still don't understand that one.)
As far as interface goes, I'd like to see consolidation of options like the [k], [t], [v], and [q] menus. I had trouble starting out when I'd loo[k] at a workshop and not be able to see what my moody dorf already had.
For tutorials, I think an easy fix would be to choose a safe biome, embark, spend a year or two digging out and setting things up for a basic fortress(maybe turn off migrants), load the place up with notes("this is your sleeping quarters, make sure you have enough rooms for all your dwarfs! use [q] to set up bedrooms like these!" or "see how I channeled out this reservoir for my well?" or "make sure you embark with this stuff. Its called 'lignite,' and you use it at your foundry to make coal, so you can make metal stuff"). then save it, and bundle it with the game. Add some stuff in the help files pointing to it, and presto, you've got a tutorial. Also, the help files should be reorganized. I think windows help might even be better than that thing right now, and that's saying something.