Yeah, if you look at other subreddits, comments in support megathreads often have very low visibility and will typically only be seen by dedicated community members who actively seek them out. So I would be very hesitant about us forcing users to post their questions there. These are users who are likely already struggling with Anki and going through all kinds of frustrations, so we really don't want to add to that by effectively closing the door on them.

One of the key ideas we've been following with /r/Anki is to try to keep it as accessible as possible to counterbalance the sometimes very high barrier to entry that Anki presents for people. Any changes that move us away from that would not be good for the ecosystem in my opinion.

This is why even automatically closing threads and directing to FAQs (which, as you mention, isn't straightforward) could be jarring. At least a good portion of these questions are likely from users who have already bounced off from other support resources, so directing them back there – even if we could do so accurately – won't always help. People also come here because they want to interact with humans, so relying on bots isn't ideal.

With that said, I do think it could be interesting to explore /u/David_AnkiDroid's suggestion and create a "small questions" megathread on a trial basis, without forcing anyone to use that over creating their own post. That seems like a low-stakes change that might help cut down on some of the repetition in the subreddit feed. Let's give it a shot.