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[ElChad]

Realising that Fish need Fisheries and that farms exist were mine. Had a friend from Norway who I harrassed with questions until I found the wiki. Then it was usually rage abandons due to carp.

[FallingWhale]

I didn't learn the whole 'only farmers farm' thing for a long time, many strawberry harvests fell short, many rats were eated.

[dwarfguy2]

design is still something impossible.

[Lytha]

I was obsessed for a very long time to first draw some water from the water source (subterranean rivers, preferably) down to z=0. Up from that (badly de-pressured) pool, I would build a pump stack for the water, to have it back at the top levels and to have a water source on each z-level.

Imagine now a world without erosion cycles and with settings allowing for mountains of 99 z-levels next to low plains, with ~120ish z-levels in total. Think of the subterranean river being somewhere around z=75, inside of that mountain.

Ayup. All the way down and then all the way back up.

It never ever occurred to me that all I would've needed to achieve just the same would've been one pipe full with water leading to the lower levels (just poke into it if you actually need water on that z-level), and to build a small pump stack up from the z-level of the subterranean river towards the surface.

No wonder that I suffered from low FPS in these fortresses.

[Horizon9]

I remember how on my very first "fortress", nothing got built.
At all.
My dwarves sat around the wagon while I attempted to understand the controls for the game.
There was much fun had as I started understanding the game.
Although my largest fortress was only 3 z-levels deep, with barely any rooms.

[Samuel]

Nobody told me about the dangers of rotting meat inside caverns.

[Horizon9]

I just had fun.
I don't have a farmer.
I hope my Dwarves enjoy prickle berries and whatever food that is left until a farmer comes.

[sinister agent]

I built pretty much everything in one area, close to the entrance, with a tunnel down to everywhere else right by the entrance.  Also, stockpiles were absolutely everywhere, just shoved in any old corner and loning every corridor, wherever there was space.  I produced thousands and thousands of food and booze, so most of my dwarves spent half their time hauling.

I also didn't realise that you could make mechanisms out of rock, and as I had trouble getting metal (I barely dug down at all, and only had a couple of picks), ended up draining a pond halfway across the map because I couldn't safely channel the river.  This also meant that I had no traps until it was too late.

All that combined made for lots of Fun when some gatecrashers arrived.

On my second fortress, I'm not certain what mistakes I've made yet.  I'm sure I'll find out soon enough, as I've just breached my second cavern and not prepared, as I didn't expect there to be two.  Ulp.

[Evergod41]

My very first fortress, I didn't understand the Z-lvls and I was on a mountain, cause I went with the first spot it gave me, and did the PLAY NOW! I dug into the mountain, but I didn't understand the whole workshop creates things, so it took me a season to get a bed, then the whole "inside only" i never got, I hadnt dug that far in and I still hadnt got the z-lvl, come fall I was behest by troglodites, everyone died. next fort, exact same thing, only this time I was next to a river, so I had fish lieing all over the place. It was then I just started pressing buttons, got to the ? menu first, and found the wiki... Now I somehow create perfect utopias, of 50-80 dwarves with at least 20 idles, never get economy, though I do mint coins, easy trading with caravans, and I never get any of the really annoying nobles, well, I dont GET nobles AT ALL. In the last 40d the ONLY noble I had was my all purpose expidition leader, oh and a sheriff... now in 2010 I have finally gotten a mayor and a doctor.

[Tsarwash]

I embarked in a temperate area, and the caravan was half on a frozen lake. I didn't move the stuff off quickly enough, so when it defrosted I lost two dwarves and most of my booze. The booze still showed up on the z screen (without a bookkeeper), so i thought that i was alright. But i think the next winter everybody else dehydrated when the water froze again.

[NewoTigra]

Losing an entire fort to dehydration because I ran out of barrels for making booze and forgot to make any more.
Took a year or two down the line for the entire supply to run out, but I somehow managed not to notice my dwindling stocks throughout the entire time. The first I knew of it was when several "Urist McParched has died of thirst" announcements popped up.
At first I thought they were migrants I had locked outside, until my mayor died. By this point everyone is miserable from thirst and losing friends, so a tantrum spiral was pretty much inevitable, with everyone tantrumming, going insane and dying of thirst, and the fortress guard running around beating dwarves for tantrumming, which only made things worse.
And so my fort was reduced from a thriving 100+ dwarf metropolis, providing crafts and goods to the outside world, to a maze of corpse-ridden halls, cloaked in miasma, with various pets and animals running around amid the dead.
All for want of something to drink.

The fort was somewhat salvaged by setting up a second outpost with some of the aforementioned migrants I had locked outside. A river, a single miner, and some stone meant that I could scratch survival for these few dwarves by digging a moat and building a fishery.
Unfortunately a goblin ambush showed up and shot all of the dwarves but the miner who was digging out storage underground. Evidently dismayed at losing his only 3 companions in the world, I decided to let him attempt revenge, or at least a blaze of glory.
Dug stairs up to where the goblins were and had the dwarf leap out, pick at the ready, determined to take a few gobbos with him, whereupon he was promptly dogpiled by 12 goblins and killed horribly in very short order.

1st tragedy could have been avoided by simply building a well of some sort, or keeping a better eye on booze stocks.
2nd tragedy could have been avoided by telling the dwarves to stay in the dugout underground storage, where they couldn't be shot at.

[Zaik]

for the first week i assumed there was a way to make a military be able to fend off invaders in iron armor with no traps for backup

[Vercingetorix]

for the first week i assumed there was a way to make a military be able to fend off invaders in iron armor with no traps for backup

Hell, I didn't realize iron armor generally sucks until two months ago...

[Horizon9]

One of my metalsmiths got possessed, and I couldn't provide what she wanted.
She is right now running around babbling while nude.
She hasn't died yet but I fear bad things will happen when she does.

[Khift]

I built a wall around the entrance to my fortress, expecting it to help defend me.

I forgot to remove the up/down ramps inside the courtyard and near the walls. The goblins walked right over them and I could not figure out why.

Thinking in three dimensions.... it took some getting used to.