You've chosen the very same class and race that I did on my first time through Vanilla Baldur's Gate, Bungleau! Good stuff, Dwarven fighters rock.
Dun and dun!
It is true that Mages are somewhat cumbersome in the early levels of BG, since they will spend more of their time fleeing and pelting darts from the rear of the party after their small arsenal of spells are spent. If I ever retry BG, I might try a Necromancer actually and combine it with the most unlikely and challenging party ever with some rare NPCs. (I've never used Yeslick, Tiax or Quayle extensively for instance...)
I get the impression that you're relatively new to the wonders of Faerun in the original Baldur's Gate or is my assumption simply the result of your naive sounding enjoyment?
Whatever the case, enjoy the game my friend!
Its very open ended and I'm sure Stumblebum will hackily gibber and frolick his way through many more gibberling and yipping dog-kangaroos (i.e Kobolds) yet! [img]graemlins/hehe.gif[/img]