[Cerek the Barbaric]

Originally posted by Illumina Drathiran'ar: That's evil, Xen. I'm guessing you're early in the game, AMS, and without knowing party members and levels, I can only suggest that you do the Copper Coronet quest. Not the quests people there give you yet, but explore the building itself. After that, head over to the Docks and talk with Renal Bloodscalp. After that, you should be ready to help the young lady from the Copper Coronet who would have approached you. After that you should be ready to explore on your own.

That sounds like a pretty good plan to me. That first sidequest is fairly challenging, but doesn't get really difficult until the very end. In the meantime, you find LOTS of nice items, including one of the "marquee items" of the game.

One alternative I would suggest is perhaps going to the area of Trademeet first instead of the quest listed above. You still get some good XP and find some nice items and scrolls, but the enemies aren't quite as challenging there (to the best of my knowledge, anyway). That might be a good "warm up" to get you ready for the quest alluded to by Illumina