Here are the different problems I'm having:

1. The skirt doesn't stick to the platform. It helps if I make the skirt larger, but it seems no matter what I do, the first bit of the skirt never sticks to the platform and gets in the way of the first layer of the print (I've tried wiping the nozzle off even as the print job is starting). I use an acetone-ABS mixture to prime the heated platform and that works for the first layer, but not for the skirt.

2. The nozzle is hitting previous layers of the print. This is a new issue I'm experiencing. When I do get the skirt out of the way, after the first two or three layers, the nozzle starts hitting and peeling up previous layers of the print. I recently moved and just started working with the printer again. Before I moved this was not a problem (for 3 or 4 completed jobs);

3. The first layer of the finished job is really low quality. Whether I do .3 or .1 mm layer heights, the first layer is always awful. Even if I try to smooth it with acetone upon completion, it still looks really, really bad (worse, actually).

4. Slic3r is printing parts with separate perimeters as one perimeter. Specifically the gear bearing from thingiverse (since it's a recommended starter print job). I think this might just be because I need to increase the size of the actual part, but even at .1 mm it connects the gears to the ring (or prints them so close that they fuse). Is there another setting I'm missing that would improve this?

I've been printing small cubes (~1 cubic inch) as my test prints for all of these problems, 215 degrees for the nozzle and 105 for the print bed. I've been fiddling with the Z-axis and it looks to be about .3 mm away from the the nozzle tip (using calipers). the first layer of the print is always done at .3 mm.