A bunch of dings and such don't bother me much at all. To me, it just gives the instrument a bit more character. But, I do know that some people are put off by blemishes.

The cheap route would be to get some good quality wood filler, from a hardware store, and fill the dents, and add enough to bring it back to shape, then paint over it. You would probably need some type of hardener or something to put over the filler so it doesn't fall off.

The more expensive, much better, route would be to sand off all the paint, then smooth out, and reshape all the dings, and then repaint it.

There are probably other way's to go about it, but that's all I can think of.

Not too sure about the no nickle bass strings either.