It would be most beneficial, to me anyway, to have Expandable/Collapsible buttons on the main page with at least 5 trending topics within the respective specific forums, with at least 5 stickies above.
Expandable/Collapsible is so that a member can have an option to not view a topic this wish not see; on that note, have such feature savable.
Also, I too agree that NSFW should not appear on the front page.
In addition, many, with I included, would like to reduce clutter and prevent multiple same topics, I would then suggest to statically keep the headline/topic located in the top section in a thread.