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[lolghurt]

1. How many dwarf migrants should be accepted before I seal off the passage to the outside world?
2. How many z-levels can a "Basically unbreakable" dorf fall before taking damage?
2.5. How many layers of cavern can collapse on the above dorf before he takes damage?
3. If there is no way to get to your dorfs, will besieging enemies mine into your fortress?
4. I really don't understand how the perpetual motion water pump/water wheel works. Help.
5. Would a fortress constructed entirely out of wood float on water without being attached to it?
6. Will a dorf with sufficient toughness and swimming be able to survive a dive into magma?

[Flaede]

1. How many dwarf migrants should be accepted before I seal off the passage to the outside world?

How many do you want?

2. How many z-levels can a "Basically unbreakable" dorf fall before taking damage?

Last time it was rigorously tested, I recall bones starting to break reliably at 4 z levels. Unless it's into water, which gave an edge. That was in .40d, however.

2.5. How many layers of cavern can collapse on the above dorf before he takes damage?

You get hit by even ONE whole z layer of natural rock and you're in trouble.

3. If there is no way to get to your dorfs, will besieging enemies mine into your fortress?

Nope. But as with many things in DF, the more accurate answer is not yet.

4. I really don't understand how the perpetual motion water pump/water wheel works. Help.

Ehat's to understand?
Build a waterwheel. Attach it to a pump. The pump supplies the moving water to the waterwheel. The waterwheel provides like 4x the power a pump requires to operate.  Just add water to jump start the process. Once started, it will never stop.

Best method of adding that initial water - a second screw pump, manually operated.
Alternatively, a bucket chain can work. Maybe.

5. Would a fortress constructed entirely out of wood float on water without being attached to it?

No. (Though again, the more accurate answer is not yet.)
Wooden walls are just like any other walls. They don't even burn, for Armok's sake.

6. Will a dorf with sufficient toughness and swimming be able to survive a dive into magma?

Well, a dive may be pushing it, and good covering of Steel helps, but magma is not instantly fatal, just nearly so. At least last time it was rigorously checked. The physics of magma may have changed with the new release, and the introduction of the magma sea and whatnot. There have been forts with shallow magma flows guarding the entrance (so long as they have shoes, and walk fast, and aren't distracted...), though it never seems to end well.

[Sphalerite]

1. How many dwarf migrants should be accepted before I seal off the passage to the outside world?

No need to seal yourself in.  You can set the population cap at which immigrants will stop coming in the d_init file.

2. How many z-levels can a "Basically unbreakable" dorf fall before taking damage?

A single Z-level drop causes no harm.  More than that and even a vry tough dwarf is likely to suffer injury.

2.5. How many layers of cavern can collapse on the above dorf before he takes damage?

A single layer of cavern collapsing on someone is universally and unavoidably fatal.  Even creatures which can't be killed any other way will die if you drop a single tile of floor on their head.

3. If there is no way to get to your dorfs, will besieging enemies mine into your fortress?

Nothing but your dwarves can mine at the moment.

4. I really don't understand how the perpetual motion water pump/water wheel works. Help.

See the wiki, the design is explained well there.

5. Would a fortress constructed entirely out of wood float on water without being attached to it?

Nothing floats in dwarf fortress.  Even wood sinks straight to the bottom.

6. Will a dorf with sufficient toughness and swimming be able to survive a dive into magma?

Depends on how long they're in it, I've had tough dwarves survive brief splashing with magma with only some burns and melted fat.  It helps if they're not wearing anything flammable.

[Urist Imiknorris]

Full nether-cap armor helps the magma-swimming issue, but you can't make wooden armor in vanilla.

[Flaede]

Full nether-cap armor helps the magma-swimming issue, but you can't make wooden armor in vanilla.

Oh! That's right!
And folks have been experimenting with various versions of "freezium", too, haven't they?

[lolghurt]

Last time it was rigorously tested, I recall bones starting to break reliably at 4 z levels. Unless it's into water, which gave an edge. That was in .40d, however.

2.5. How many layers of cavern can collapse on the above dorf before he takes damage?

You get hit by even ONE whole z layer of natural rock and you're in trouble.

He fell about 5 z-levels, no injury(well, unconscious/stunned for a couple of seconds)

1. How many dwarf migrants should be accepted before I seal off the passage to the outside world?

No need to seal yourself in.  You can set the population cap at which immigrants will stop coming in the d_init file.

I want to seal it off to have a self-sufficient fortress

[gtmattz]

He fell about 5 z-levels, no injury(well, unconscious/stunned for a couple of seconds)

You got lucky.

[Lemunde]

1. As many as you can stand.  As said, there's a setting in the d-init file but it doesn't work very well.  You may get 20+ dwarves over the limit you set which can be a real pain if you want it low.  I usually keep it around 30.

Sometimes if I get a really excessive number of migrants I'll dig out what I call a Chamber of Attrition(tm).  It's just a normal room with a grate or bars covering the entrance. (I could just use a locked door but I like to be creative)  I assign all the unwanted dwarves to a squad and give them a move command into the room the slam the bars shut behind them.  It takes a couple of months but soon dehydration and starvation kicks in and...well you get the picture.  I also forbid all the corpses in there, just so any future residents can have something to remind them of their fate.

[Particleman]

Immigrants are what atomizers and drowning chambers are for. I built a pretty neat automatic dwarf smasher a while ago, but in this fort I'm using a drowning chamber because I want to hold on to the bodies for use in a megaproject.

[melomel]

1. How many dwarf migrants should be accepted before I seal off the passage to the outside world?

The question is not how many, but which.  If you are on a map with a volcano and sand everywhere, you do NOT want to exterminate that High Master Glassworker just because she's an immigrant.  Same with HM weaponsmiths/armorsmiths.

Legendary cheesemakers are a different story.

And while YMMV, sealing off the outside world is not necessarily the best thing to do.  You miss out on so much...  Fun.

2. How many z-levels can a "Basically unbreakable" dorf fall before taking damage?

There is no such thing as an unbreakable dorf.  If there was a dorf that could survive a 100 z-level plunge, he would probably die by tripping over a kitten corpse.

2.5. How many layers of cavern can collapse on the above dorf before he takes damage?

Generally speaking?  None, IIRC.  Some may heal fast with no lasting effects, but generally speaking, dwarves are not immune to the Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies effect.

3. If there is no way to get to your dorfs, will besieging enemies mine into your fortress?

In this version?  No, not unless I've missed a lot.  In fact, enemies without the ability to destroy buildings tend to be thwarted by a door that you tag "forbidden".

4. I really don't understand how the perpetual motion water pump/water wheel works. Help.

You got me there.  I don't know how to make one, either.

5. Would a fortress constructed entirely out of wood float on water without being attached to it?

No, alas.

6. Will a dorf with sufficient toughness and swimming be able to survive a dive into magma?

oh god no and how.

[JAFANZ]

5. Would a fortress constructed entirely out of wood float on water without being attached to it?

However rumor has it that if you manage to cast obsidian on the highest z-level, it will attach to the ceiling, this allowing you to suspend stuff from it... (so, you know, cast One tile of Obsidian, then build the remainder of a 3x3xZ mast down from it. if it works).

But my most recent attempt to experiment with magma didn't go so well (Everyone went on a 'Journey to the Center of the Earth' via the volcano after an accident installing a support holding up the floor over the crater).

[Flaede]

5. Would a fortress constructed entirely out of wood float on water without being attached to it?

However rumor has it that if you manage to cast obsidian on the highest z-level, it will attach to the ceiling, this allowing you to suspend stuff from it... (so, you know, cast One tile of Obsidian, then build the remainder of a 3x3xZ mast down from it. if it works).

But my most recent attempt to experiment with magma didn't go so well (Everyone went on a 'Journey to the Center of the Earth' via the volcano after an accident installing a support holding up the floor over the crater).

I have not heard this rumour.
Someone needs to start a new Mythbusters thread. Clearly.

[ungulateman]

Or you could turn caveins off in the init.txt.

Instant boat / airplane!

[lolghurt]

New question:
Will a Fey mooding dwarf refuse to move because they don't have their skill-specific workshop or will they just claim a different one?
If the answer is the latter I have a new subject for "What can you do to a dorf before it dies: Pincushion edition" very soon
Why has my Fey mooding dorf only taken three items?

[Flaede]

New question:
Will a Fey mooding dwarf refuse to move because they don't have their skill-specific workshop or will they just claim a different one?
If the answer is the latter I have a new subject for "What can you do to a dorf before it dies: Pincushion edition" very soon
Why has my Fey mooding dorf only taken three items?

From the wiki:

Once a workshop is claimed, the dwarf will begin collecting materials. Each artifact will require between one and ten materials to complete. If the moody dwarf remains idle, then the necessary materials are not available.

read the rest for how to check.