[GrantSolar]

The UX is a hurdle. There are inconsistencies and the last time I played, third-party utilities were pretty much mandatory in order to manage your dwarves effectively.

That said, the great thing about the UI is that once you've learned it you can discard it. If you know the commands you need, you can hide the 'commands' area to give you more information on the current gamestate.

FWIW, DF is absolutely fantastic at doing what it's designed to do. It's primarily a story generator not a game, which is partly why interactivity is almost an afterthought