1. The queen consort demanded a "box" in her room, then after a year of not being happy with anything I put in her room, forgot that demand and just wants an "item" in her room. But she still isn't happy with whatever I put there. What the hell does she want?
check your justice screen under <z> just to ensure that someone hasn't been ordered punishment for failing to fulfill her first demand. as for what a 'box' itself is, well, the wiki suggests:
Types of containers the game knows are chests, coffers, boxes, cabinets, bags, barrels and bins. Only chests, coffers, bags and boxes are explicitely called container in game as they can be placed as furniture by building.
but i imagine you tried those things right?
also, check her preferences to see what materials she like - it might be an item out of a favoured material that she desires.
2. Is there a certain number of shops that a fortress should have?
the wiki says there are 4 types of shop. i currently have 4, one for each category of goods, and 2 still haven't been bought. i think you need really high-earners with plenty of free time to end up actually selling from the shop. but i think 4 is all that is needed - more than that, you'll just have repeat shops....i suppose that does depend on fortress size, and i am sure there are many players who don't make any shops.
3. Most of my dwarves run around naked as the seem to have accounts of 0. Does this tend to happen in after quite a few years because I have a lot of legendary dwarves screwing up the economy parameters?
economy can be fairly difficult to manage. make sure you are providing a range of jobs for your dwarves to do, if you can. that way each can earn some kind of salary. i like to have a large chunk of my population as 'almost-haulers' - they are really just haulers but they also have one job each turned on (like tanning/weaving/plant processing) depending on their skills, so that they can also do a different job once in a while. this is not only so they can do different valued jobs (sometimes hauling will earn a dwarf the same as a 'skilled' job anyway) but also because i *believe* once the economy starts some hauling jobs become
very low priority. to the extent where dwarves will practically ignore them and even be idle while they seem to wait for more rewarding jobs.
(you might also see dwarves trying to attend a meeting with your manager to complain about lack of jobs) 4. Is there any way to keep children from going into fey moods other than butchering them? I have enough freaking legendary craftsdwarves from children going fey to last a lifetime.
search this forum for threads about 'moods'. there are certain things that can be done to try to ensure that your dwarves get moods that affect the skills you want. unfortunately, as it is children you are talking about, unless you are using an application like
dwarf manager you might just have to accept that they'll all get craft moods.
5. I have the long-standing problem that items on the ground I command dwarves to dump won't get moved. I've tried all sorts of dump zones and flagging/unflagging/reflagging items as dump. Is there any way to make them actually clean up?
if you have tried the flagging/unflagging and it's not working, and you've checked and rechecked the dump areas, i can only suggest three things:
i) try putting a dump area
right next to the item you want dumped
ii) check under 'refuse' in the <o>rders menu to make sure your dwarves are set to dump (and check outside/inside obviously)
iii) hide the items they won't dump: <d, b, h>
finalement:
6. I can never seem to get a windmill to actually operate a screw pump. I have windmills that read 20 power on floors constructed above screw pumps. I've tried centering the windmils on both parts of the screw pumps but they still never power.
I am afraid of windmills so will avoid answering this. obviously i recommend the wiki on windmills and pumps and the like, and a search here - but i am sure others will have better answers than i do. sevrun might already have hit upon the answer:
you need a Gear Assembly between the screw pump and the windmill and it'll work just fine.