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[Mythos]

I guess it's due to me being on my first remotely successful fortress (I'm at 103 population right now) but I don't understand the hatred of nobles. My Captain of the Guard is my best soldier and has single-handedly stopped a goblin attack, my Mayor/Town Manager/Hoardmaster/Town Broker is a Legendary Miner and still works whenever I need anything mined, and though I haven't had much experience with him yet, my Dungeon Master has worked fairly well with my smelting and metalworking needs. I haven't gotten any annoying mandates either. Once a noble banned the export of things made of a material I'd never even seen, and then later he changed his mind and wanted them made, but nothing happened when they weren't. So yeah, kinda confused over why everyone hates them. Do they get mind numbingly annoying later on, leading to me being filled with bloodlust towards them?

[Comrade Ankh]

So, your captain of the guard? Let's say you build a jail for him. Then, let's say a mandate doesn't get completed. That's a crime, sir. Your captain of the guard locks up one of your workers, and roughs him up a little. Once the Hammerer shows up, he takes over the 'beatings' job. If you let Justice get started, you're going to end up pleasing the Nobles or losing your dwarves.

[G-Flex]

Or one or your nobles bans the export of something while the caravan is still leaving. It's still considered a crime. Everybody who brought the offending material to the trade depot is guilty, and since you probably don't have enough jail cells, most of them will get severely beaten and incapacitated, crippling your fortress.

That, and nobles (aside from the appointed ones and the Dungeon Master) don't actually do anything. At all.

[GreenMarine]

Sounds like your count and his family hasn't shown up yet. Just wait until you're juggling 10 or so mandates at a time.

[moki]

Just wait until your legendary armorsmith gets hammered for not making green glass cabinets on a sandless map.
Nobles like certain stuff, like any other dwarf... if a regular dwarf likes something, he can't get, it's okay. He'll just be a very, very little bit less happy. If a noble can't get something he likes, some random and possibly useful dwarf is going to be punished and possibly die in the process.

If a noble likes plump helmets, some common stone, copper or dogs, he can live a long and happy life in my fort, but if one shows up, demands large gems and bans the export of crafts, he may have a little accident involving 20 level freefall, magma or defective plumbing in his room.

[MoonLightBird]

The reason I hate the nobles is because everytime I get a legendary weaponsmith, the noble mandates something made out of stuff we don't have. Then the hammerer turns my legendary weaponsmith in to a gimp that can't do shit.

[SkyRender]

 The worst of the lot are the nobles who love diamonds, Clownium, crystal glass, and have a demanding sort of personality (which leads them to constantly make mandates).  More than a few unfortunate fools claiming to be nobles have been summarily executed in a drowning trap for mandating that I make Clownium items, construct waves of specific crafts or toys that I have no ability to mande construction of specifically, or that I construct 50 anvils a year and not export them.

 Bottom line: players hate nobles because nobles tell the player what to do and punish the player for failing to do so by crippling their worker Dwarves.  And they often demand things that either cannot even be made on the current map or will never be used and of course can't be exported since nobles are ban-happy about anything they like (which is exactly the sort of thing they mandate the construction of).

[Jacob/Lee]

I've never been capable of getting a goddamn baron/count.

[Magil]

I am very tolerant of nobles. Even if I can't make their mandates domestically, I'll go out of my way to request imports for their likes if possible. Count loves zinc on a zincless map? Better put in an order to both humans and dwarves to bring me plenty of zinc bars. Oh, and 1 zinc bar made into zinc goblets fulfills that 3/3 zinc items mandate in one go.

It's the nobles who demand things that I can't import that irritate me. Especially if I lose the dwarven liaison (to becoming the adviser or the like), and thus lose the ability to reliably import stuff like bismuth ore and giant mole leather.

Oh, and I don't play on sandless maps anymore. That's just asking for trouble. With sand, I can fulfill glass mandates AND large gem mandates easily. I believe people run into terrible noble trouble when you settle in fringe regions that don't have access to some resources and have difficulty with importing for whatever reason (sieges, bad relations, etc.).

[NW_Kohaku]

Hammerers, in the game's own language, "Exist to despense dwarven justice."  That is, they have no other function but to kill your own dwarves. 

I built an "execution chamber" for my hammerer off of the jail cell for her to enjoy immediately.  Full of spike traps, with windows for nobles to watch some good ol' dwarven justice.  Unfortunately, the lever the Hammerer pulled, to see the spikes in action, only locked her in!  Clearly, some miscommunication about which lever does what... Unfortunately, she couldn't tell the operator of the switch on the other side of the hall, who, due to this same miscommunication, and wound up spiking the hammerer in her right arm!  With a red wound, she has since spent her entire stay in my fortress recouperating, completely unable to execute any dwarves who can't produce windows or bucklers because my magma forges were still filling up with lava, and so the job was left to my pathetically weak sheriff, whose beating dealt practically no damage to my dwarf who had been drafted into military service, and was wearing full plate mail at the time.

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Basically, you can choose who your mayor will be.  If she's very nice, friendly, takes pity, doesn't care much about rules, etc.  she probably won't do much to your dwarves, especially if she likes, say, cabinets and cats.  Some noble dwarves demand crystal glass or other extremely difficult-to-find objects, as determined by their preferences.  They then demand that you make some of that type of object for you, and they don't care if you can't make it or not.  Conversely, they may like something like, say, rope reed cloth, and if you don't buy EVERY SINGLE ROPE REED CLOTH from the merchants, they will start beating, jailing, or executing your dwarves for this "crime".  Better still, they can effectively declare it "retroactively" by making it a crime to export random things after the merchants are already leaving. 

In short, sometimes, nobles make impossible to fulfill demands.  The only way to get a noble that has possible to fill demands is to "dispose" of the ones with impossible demands.  If you get a noble who really likes windows, microcline, and silver on a map when you have a large glass factory going, and can import or mine plenty of silver reliably, then they get to live a long, healthy life.  If that's what you already have, then congrats... but you should still probably show the baron's consort your new base diving attraction with his almost functioning backpack filled with what really should be a parachute... I mean, really, what purpose does that dwarf have?  It's one less mandate to worry about.

[Mythos]

Oh, I guess I just lucked out with my current nobles... note to self: commence the construction of a room designed to flood with lava when a certain lever is pulled.

[Phil_Z]

Because all DF players are commies

but mainly because of what other people have said.  a room like you suggested is definately a good idea, but instead, make it flood with water. this wawy you can put a bed in it, assign the noble to it, kill them, and reuse the room (and the bed)

[Djohaal]

Seeing we'll get dwarven healthcare next version, impaired laborers won't be much of an issue, as long as the hammerer doesn't have anything sharp to dispense dwarven justice...
Do remember the king and queen are NOT replaceable nobles (fortunately they seem to not make mandates at all), nor the advisor (which I think does some mandates). The philospher also appears to not be replaceable (although he'll be dropped on the next version)

[Magil]

Seeing we'll get dwarven healthcare next version, impaired laborers won't be much of an issue, as long as the hammerer doesn't have anything sharp to dispense dwarven justice...
Do remember the king and queen are NOT replaceable nobles (fortunately they seem to not make mandates at all), nor the advisor (which I think does some mandates). The philospher also appears to not be replaceable (although he'll be dropped on the next version)

I don't believe any of those nobles you listed make mandates. The baron, baron consort (and their upgrades), tax collector, and mayor are the only ones that actually make mandates, I believe. The others may make "demands," but those never get your workers killed--they just make the nobles unhappy if they're unfulfilled. And I don't think the philosopher even makes demands.

I'm not 100% on this, but going on what I can remember I believe it to be true.

[Diablous]

I know the philospher makes no demands, mandate, etc. He doesn't even ask for a decent room.