It is confusing at first but if you look closely you can see the circle around a trait you already have is slightly brighter than the trait that is next on the same path. It would be easier if the next trait had a different color circle but it does help to show that there is a sort of path you need to follow to get that trait. Then again the UI does sometimes misbehave on it's own.
No, unfortunately. If you can't see it as soon as you settle I don't think you can ever build either one. I've had many cities build up and down the edge of a river without being able to put in a dock. Not only that but if you start a lumber camp and then delete it to put it elsewhere in the queue you sometimes can't build one ever. It clears the forest as soon as it's queued so remember just to move it in the queue instead of stopping construction.
Blunt weapons are very useful in the early game. Once I have a few groups with ranged frost weapons though I can take down hammer-wielders before they're in range to hit my units. It does help to have a mage there casting freeze to slow them down further. On low-metal maps I often bypass all armor and metal weapons and just use ranged magic weapons. Since they ignore armor a 13 damage staff wielded by 6-member parties do a lot of damage but it's useful to boost their initiative with p
When my sov trades with Henchmen I sometimes see duplicate weapons and equipment but never a mount. I think they fixed that bug.
I've placed Arcane Monoliths in desired territory but the AI was still able to build settlements nearby and gradually "steal" the resources away from me. I don't know what the game mechanic is but it doesn't seem to recognize my absolute control of resources in that situation. I've done the same myself, expanding a city to the point where I gain control not only of the resources but the enemy's outpost by manually expanding towards it with new construction. But I agree it
Same issue, having to move cursor below and to get key info is annoying. Not quite a deal-breaker but enough to make me re-start after a bit of this hassle which is not what I want to spend time doing every hour or so.