1. Personally I have grown rather fond of it. Just think of the greydwarves as being drunk and stumbling all over the place. The neat thing is if you copy their moves they can't seem to hit you either ha ha. Bow skill lets you shoot faster as well so as you get your skill up hitting a moving target gets easier.

2. It would seem the devs want people to not just sit in one area. Getting out for stuff and having to transport things like metal make people move around the map more. I've gone whole games without finding the trader. You don't "need" him at all... but does make life easier. Fine wood trees are in pretty good supply. And the 5th biome trees are mostly fine wood.

4. Bit of an odd dilemma on the weapon swings. Every intersection of the arc is considered a hit. So side swings tend to be limited since you don't want to hit the ground and lose damage to the target. Stumps can almost be better removed with a pickax in some cases.
So if they give a more vertical hitbox on side swing weapons they would probably need to remove considering the ground as a target that changes damage. Personally I have learned to deal with it and try to engage targets where it is favorable, makes me have to be more aware of my situation/surroundings.