When I see:
« previous next »
On about the same line as a list of pages, I don't assume they refer to threads.
So I click them, expecting to go one page forward or back in the thread.
Instead, I am catapulted to a new thread, screwing up my read/unread flags and generally confusing me, the user.
I suggest either adding a couple of 'previous PAGE/next PAGE' buttons RIGHT NEXT TO the page selection at the bottom of a thread if the SMF fans are amenable, or altering the function of the « previous next » buttons to work with pages, if phpBB-fanboi hegemony is unopposed and palatable to the SMF crew.
I do so because the stuff that I intuitively feel should act a certain way isn't, rather than because I want more familiar shit from phpBB. The less things one has to learn about and conform to that don't feel natural, the better. But the validity of such a complaint is determined only by community opinion.
Soooo. Yeah.