Utterly Mad

Righto, so, what's the difficulty of Kobold Kamp vs. vanilla? If we went that route, would we still need a nasty embark or modded villians, or are things already a bit trickier?

Things are trickier if you jump right into combat with anything available, at least. Kobolds are smol, plus you lack metalsmithing and mechanics. You do gain more options for stone-age weapons and ammo, so finding some obsidian or native copper (or you're indeed 'bold, raw adamantine) will make it easier.

A lack of mechanics cvan at least be worked around, if you know the few things that'll still halt a building destroyer.