[The Procrastinator]

You asked excellent questions and got equally excellent answers from Gimli. I totally agree about the power of the bard: he's even great as a melee fighter. I'd add that if you want to try a non-hybrid fighter, give the rogue a go as a front man, you will be pleasantly surprised. A ranger is very useful for a first game, since he's permanently searching for hidden items. He's a great archer, too.

Hybrids can be quite disapointing if you don't develope them properly. I'd say, try a lord or a valkyrie for divine spells if you want only one hybrid and don't feel like bringing a priest along (they can be a bit boring the first 14 levels...) But even there, you meet a very fine valkyrie NPC very early in the game.

Monks and ninjas can be interesting, but difficult to develop. There's the famous case of the faerie ninja, of course. You will meet a great monk NPC in the midgame (maybe earlier if you know exactly where to go), so maybe you can pass on the monk for your first game.

In the pure spellcaster field, I'd say the alchemist is perhaps my favorite. Good combo of offense and defense, and the extremely lucrative potion mixing ability. Mages are a classic and get bonus spellpoints. Psionics can be cool, but there is definitely a problem with the concentration of spells and spellpoints in the same realm. Priests are useful, but a bit on the boring side for most of the game. Maybe you should get their spellbook covered by a hybrid or a bishop.

Finally, the bishop can get incredibly powerful, but develop slower that a pure spellcaster.

This would be my favorite first-timer party if I could replay my first game:

Fighter
Rogue
Bard
Ranger
Alchemist
Bishop working on mage and priest spellbooks, then psionics