Perhaps I misunderstood what you mean by liking the "building challenge" of having an aquifer. The only challenges to it are (a) constantly unsuspending jobs to build/smooth the walls that block off the aquifer and (b) keeping your fort alive in the intervening months. You're "throwing a tantrum," as you put it, about the first one, and the true challenge of the second is what you enjoy about the game.
You said that you "can't believe that it's a intentional game mechanic to be forced to unsuspend thousand of times," and I think you're right. The only reasons the suspension happens in the first time are either to keep your dwarves safe (so they don't keep running out into an oncoming siege or magma river to build the wall) or to prevent spam ("Urist cancels Build Construction: f'ing water everywhere" x10000000). The fact that an impermanent obstruction in an otherwise safe zone causes a permanent suspension is an oversight, and I don't see any reason to avoid correcting the problem in a least-intrusive-available manner just because it's an "exploit." In fact:
I like to use utility that make accessing the game easier, like the interface mods from falconne and dwarf therapist, things that don't change the game mechanic, just the interface or the way you give commands.
Your response to me seemed to indicate that I'm the sort of person who likes to go on WoW and spend an evening collecting 50 Bear Asses to trade in to a generic NPC to get a fancy sword so I can sell it to buy potions to use while I go collect the 75 Demon Clothes for the next quest to get a fancy robe to sell... and so on. But really, that's stupid. I play DF for the same reason you do: it's a thinking game. And I use DFHack for the same reason you (presumably) do: it makes the game less tedious. I personally think the workflow plugin should be integrated into the game, because in a game where the characters are supposed to be somewhat autonomous, they should behave like somewhat-autonomous people. My boss doesn't have to come tell me every day what to do to make sure my department runs smoothly; he tells me something once (or with my memory, sometimes twice) and I maintain that standard. And I don't have to tell my wife to add something to the shopping list every time we're almost out. She sees that we're almost out of milk, and puts milk on the list. And you should be able to tell your dwarves that you want fifty drinks in the pantry at all times and then leave them to maintain that, or to tell your dwarves to build a wall and have them automatically go back to it when a temporary condition that causes them to suspend the job has passed.
So yeah, I'm all in favor of various hacks and modifications to ease interfacing with the game while still playing it in the intent and spirit given to it by the Adams brothers. Toady didn't intend an aquifer to cause repeated suspensions any more than he intended dwarves to stand in the same tile where they're trying to build a wall or tame elephants to starve to death because they can't eat fast enough. Those are coding and design oversights that, assuming he lives forever, he'll eventually fix. Using "exploits" to fix problems in the present that Toady likely won't get around to for years hence is not cheating in any way, and in fact many of them are simply in-game ways to do the same thing that third-party mods do for you. As an example, using an Atom Smasher to clear up all the thousands of single bones, worn clothing, vermin remains, cartilage and nervous fiber that a mature fort can create is sometimes very helpful for increasing FPS to "make accessing the game easier" in a way. Same thing with stuffing a hundred puppies in a cage (rather than pasturing them) in order to cut down on pathfinding calculations, or making your pump stack reservoirs three tiles wide to reduce temperature calculations. On top of that, most of them can be role-played in ways that turn them from exploits into challenges; try disposing of all your junk by digging a "landfill" that you fill in with constructed walls proportionally to the amount of trash you "compact" under a bridge.
I'm just the slightest bit offended in my human sensibilities by your attempts to mock me for purism when my suggestion (paraphrased, "suck it up") was based on your opening statement that you didn't want to use an "exploit" and remove the aquifer because you "like the challenge," while complaining about literally the only 'challenging' thing about an aquifer. On top of that, after stating that you like to use third-party utilities that were neither suggested, condoned or approved by Toady, you referred to intended behaviors such as pressure reducers and atom smashers as "exploits." It seems to me -- note 'seems' as a hypothesis, not an accusation -- that you have decided upon your preferred gaming ethics and procedures and decided also to treat all other methods with derision, without noticing the circumstantial hypocrisies that such a behavior gives rise to, as noted previously.
