You are implying that the problems that you were facing would be a problem for every potential Lua user. This is certainly not the case. The biggest use of Lua

You are implying that the problems that you were facing would be a problem for every potential Lua user. This is certainly not the case. The biggest use of Lua is scripting for games and non of the shortcomings you mentioned relevant in that context. Other than that, as others pointed out, most of your complaints are addressed in 5.3.