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[Aquillion]

Dwarf Fortress' Adventure mode doesn't tend to have as much staying power as its Dwarf Mode right now.  There's a lot of reasons for the difference, but I feel the big one is that there's not enough room to define your character, mechanically, in a unique way.  At the end of the day most characters play very similarly, with just a few differences based on your skill selections (and even those are often slight.)

Personality attributes and things of that nature don't significantly change how characters play, and even with a hypothetical "complete" implementation I don't think they'd offer what I'm thinking of - ultimately every Adventure Mode character shares roughly the same capabilities, so they play very similarly even if they have different goals.  Right now this is pretty inherent in the structure of Adventure Mode, so I'm not sure it's going to change much.

The Magic and Artifact arcs might change it a bit, yeah.  But I feel that for adventure mode to be fun long-term, there needs to be more attention specifically payed to giving characters ways to develop mechanically-distinct capabilities and playstyles, whether it's by making your followers and position in the world matter more, making weapon / equipment choices more interesting (rather than just the best you can get your hands on, which it usually comes down to now), having more options for skill development, adding talents and secrets and techniques characters can learn on top of their skills, and so on.

[Putnam]

if you've been keeping up on the devlogs, you'd know that having more options for followers and equipment choices is coming... next version.

adding talents and secrets and techniques characters can learn on top of their skills

this is way more than just an adventure mode suggestion

[Aquillion]

if you've been keeping up on the devlogs, you'd know that having more options for followers and equipment choices is coming... next version.

No, that's mostly unrelated to what I'm saying.  Your combat options will still largely be bumping into things, wrestling, shooting, and throwing; most followers will be slight variations on that.  And a character, once generated, will mostly play exactly the same for their entire existence, with little room to develop or customize them mechanically.  The current adventure mode system mostly doesn't support mechanically-interesting play over an extended period of time because of this.

adding talents and secrets and techniques characters can learn on top of their skills

this is way more than just an adventure mode suggestion

It is something that is mostly important for Adventurer Mode, though.  While dwarves might learn, practice, and teach them in Dwarf mode, and while you might face sieges led by heroes wielding deadly techniques, none of that is core to Dwarf Mode.  The customization and mechanical depth of Dwarf Mode already exists due to the broader scope of what you control - different forts end up playing differently.

Whereas without that sort of individual customization, Adventurer Mode quickly gets repetitive because the basic actions available to each adventurer (especially in combat) are fundamentally identical, with no meaningful room to develop them through play beyond increasing their numbers a bit.

[Bumber]

Combat styles

• Combat styles involving weapons or natural attacks with associated stances and moves
• Ability to learn moves, etc. from others with whom you have a high enough reputation
• Certain moves may only be available as specific counters, while others might just be regular attacks
• Ability to create new moves/styles when highly skilled

Obviously, we've got magic stuff coming, too.