i liked the garak character but some of the writing for him was a bit over the top, by the end of the series he was basically a star trek james bond. it was a little TOO much.
id say my favorite characters from DS9 were sisko and dax. sisko, well because he was sisko. he wasn't some over the top PC liberal like Picard, he even gassed a planet to get 1 guy. and Dax because she seemed extremely comfortable in her role and it just seemed very natural. she wasnt trying hard to prove herself like everyone else was (Kira, Nog, Bashir, etc.), she was just easy going and chill all the time.