Maybe you will interested in Automation or Wizards. They are great to improve what you mention here.
Could be nothing for solid communities or societies with discussing on their day-by-day basis but I think we are agree that for the rest of the world, Discobot is useless like the ‘newcomers guide’ Discourse shows by default.
Discourse UI/UX needs to improve a lot (we can leave transitions, gradients and small texts on the 80’s 
) but those plugins could handle the situation while Discourse continue understanding how the outside world really is.
Chat and sidebar are aligned with the same, so it’s good to enjoy and be patient. It’s always a matters of time!