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[Queekitch]

Hello everyone. I'm new to dwarf fortress and, even though I read part of the tutorial,  I have some questions.
1.) what dwarfs and equipment should I start with?
2.) Sometimes, my dwarves just don't follow orders. For instance, in the beginning of the game, I ordered some plants to be gathered. But over a year later, not a single plant has been gathered. Also, I ordered a still to be built, but the dwarfs never seem to do it, despite the fact that there are quite a few idle dwarfs. These seem to be the only orders my dwarfs don't follow for now.
Also, do you guys have some starting tips?

[Chewykittens]

You have to make sure a dwarf has the proper labor to do things. (v-p-l) to see the list for a dwarf. It's pretty much logic as to which lines up with what once you see the list.

[Queekitch]

I have some dwarfs with plant gathering and carpentry, but they still won't budge.
Oh, nevermind. They're doing it now. Thanks.

[Albedo]

1.) what dwarfs and equipment should I start with?

You will get as many answers as people who post.  It's extremely personal, all depends on your playstyle, what sort of game challenges you enjoy, and your experience.

I think(?) most would more or less agree that starting out on your first fortress, you want the something close to the following, just for simplicity while you make your inevitable mistakes and figure out what you want:

1 anvil
1 axe
2 picks
5-8 each seed type (esp plump helmets?)
11 plump helmets
~20 cheap meats and fish, 1 each (cheaper the better, they're all the same for now.)
11 turtle meat
64 alcohol, (16 each x 4 different)
4 wardogs
1 cat
5 wood
2 copper ore (malachite, copper nuggets, tetrahedrite)
4 bauxite stone (if available)

Now, like I said, there are INFINITE personal variations and tweaks to that mix - but for a no-brainer, "this will work out" start, that's a good one.

2.) Sometimes, my dwarves just don't follow orders.

Welcome to Dwarf Fortress.

To get a job completed, you need 3 things - 1) a dwarf with the right "labor" designated (<v>iew the dwarf, and <p>rofile, <labor> will show you the labors that dwarf has designated); b) a workshop, or part of the map with a <d>esignation for that labor (plants are <d>, <p>, etc), and iii) a valid path to the raw materials and any workshop and tools (if any). 

Also, do you guys have some starting tips?

Read the wiki.  Keep it open while you play.  Surf as things catch your eye.

http://www.dwarffortresswiki.net/index.php/Main_Page

Especially any of the guides/tutorials on that main page, but also the "starting build" article.

It will answer questions you haven't even thought to ask yet, and save you much "GAME OVER/START AGAIN".

[Judas Maccabeus]

1.) what dwarfs and equipment should I start with?

As mentioned, there are innumerable combinations that work to varying degrees.  I often go with:

2 miners, also masons/stonecrafters/engravers
1 woodcutter/carpenter/woodcrafter/emergency axedwarf
1 smith/furnace operator/mechanic
2 farmers/cooks/brewers
1 "leader" type (broker/bookkeeper/manager)

Don't feel like you have to give each dwarf 10 levels in skills; just novice in everything you plan on using them for will work.  They'll gain skill in them through use, and you'll have more points for equipment.

With variations, of course, such as splitting the farmers and making one a hunter/butcher/emergency marksdwarf.

Also, do you guys have some starting tips?

1.  Don't neglect defence.  Doing so will cause you to die horribly; on the other hand, it's fairly easy to make one's fortress unconquerable by using traps, fortifications, siege weapons and marksdwarves.

2.  Keep a close eye on your dwarves' overall mood.  It doesn't always take much for one to slowly go insane; if that happens, and they either die or kill another dwarf, others become unhappy and then snap, making others unhappy, and so on.

3.  If you're starting a military, and you have close-fighting dwarves like hammerdwarves and axedwarves training, make sure they and the people they're sparring against have armour.  Otherwise they'll drop like flies from training injuries.

4.  You will lose fortresses in rapid succession early on to things you didn't think about, unless you're either lucky or surprisingly skilled.  Don't worry about it, Losing is Fun, after all. 

[Jreengus]

As the above said pretty much, the one thing I will say is while you're still new drop the anvil for your first few forts, if your forts succeed and do well you can trade for one easily but if you drop it you can bring extra food and war dogs, these will help give you more time to work a food/alcohol system and the war dogs will help greatly with defence. Plus I doubt you will be jumping right into smelting while still trying to get to grips with the basics.

[Shiv]

Also, it may be helpful to disable hauling for any dwarf that you want to be semi-productive. 

It gets easier as more dwarves immigrate to your fortress (and you can have more people dedicated to hauling) but starting out is always a slow bitch.


Welcome to the Asylum.

[Shadowex3]

The only things I'd say you absolutely need are novice in the usual useful skills (masons, carpenters, etc), some turtles, a single cat, a little silk (for your first moods), and then whatever else you feel is necessary/recommended and then with whatever you've got spare get one guy as high as you can in the grower skill. A high level grower can easily have you drowning in shrooms and booze pretty quickly.

[Atarlost]

Going without an anvil is tempting.  You should be able to defend yourself with wood or bone crossbows and wood or bone bolts for a while on the calmer biomes (I wouldn't try it on anything evil or haunted though) and make enough stone crafts to buy an anvil by the time you need one, especially if you've got obsidian and wood.  Ditching the anvil lets you get a bunch of extra picks and lots of food and alcohol as a buffer. 

[Skorpion]

Things I say are absolute essentials:
A stonecrafter. This guy will make sure you can top your supplies up from the first caravan, by turning worthless rocks into valuable trinkets.

A grower. You will need food.

A trader. At least novice appraisal, to get prices on caravan goods.

Turtles. For shells! Don't cook them.

Bauxite if you can. Magma-safe mechanisms.

Tower-cap logs. Essential if you suddenly discover there are no trees anywhere on your map.

No more than one cat. Two will cause trouble!

[Shiv]

Turtles. For shells! Don't cook them.

What do you then use the shells for?  Armor?  Or just have them for moods?

[neek]

Turtles are a good beginning source of shells and bones. You can make crafts out of them as soon as they're consumed. As you just said, though, they are definitely required for strange moods (at least, in a fortress I'm running, EVERY strange mood has demanded shells, and it gets annoying not having them.)