Okay NobleNick. Ask and ye shall recieve. In answer to your prospective builds question, i've come up with what i feel is a very good starting character for someone who is new to Vvardenfell. Though i'm probably not the best person to be doing this, for reasons that i'll share later. But here goes. The All Rounder:
Race: Dark Elf. 75% fire resistance is handy right the way through the game. 50 pts of Sanctuary for 60 secs should keep you alive long enough to despatch the odd tougher baddy early on. You'll not be using this before long though.
Sign: The Lady. 25 pts in Endurance and Personality is a BIG boost right through the game. With this particular configuration, none of the other signs are worth looking into.
Specialisation: Stealth. This choice will give a nice boost to your primary skills which should tide you over nicely in the early levels.
Favourite Attributes: Agility, Intelligence.
With the race, sign and specialisation and favourites set like that, your starting stats will look like:
Strength: 40. Nothing special here, but you won't be relying on it too much. And there are many ways to increase this temporarily when you need to...
Intelligence: 50. Without an intelligence/magicka multiplier from race or sign, your magicka pool is going to be pretty low. But again, you won't be relying on it. The magick is gonna come from other sources... What you are going to need this value for is a healthy multiplier to the skills that you are going to be using.
Willpower: 30. In every build, there's a trade off. This time it's Willpower. But that's okay, the melee baddies are typically more deadly than the magick ones. She'll be right, mate.
Agility: 50. As with intelligence, this value is gonna help you with the skills you'll be using.
Speed: 50. Again, skill related. And without Athletics in your skill line-up (more later), it'll keep you running along at a nice trot. Though you probably won't need to be running from anything.
Endurance: 65. Now you see why i chose The Lady. Although you won't be needing this for skills, it will help to keep your hit points up.
Personality: 55. Gotta love The Lady. This is often underestimated by first timers, but with a starting value of 55, you won't be having too many arguements.
Okay, now for the skills.
MAJOR:
-Speechcraft: 35. This is a nice value to start at. Combined with the Personality multiplier, it's not going to be too hard to get your way. Usually underestimated by first timers.
-Mercantile: 35. Money is tight at the early levels and abundant at the latter (when you don't need it, mind). These two skill selections are a wise choice for any starting character. Especially considering they're amongst the hardest skills to raise...
-Sneak: 35. You'll be making good use of this. Early on, it's sometimes better to remain unseen until you've decided on a course of action. And it will definitely help to keep the coffers lined.
-Marksman: 40. Nice huh? 40 seems to be the point at which you start hitting your targets with a high rate of accuracy. And combined with a decent Sneak value from the start, you'll be hurting 'em too.
-Light Armour: 40. Amongst the major skills, this was the floater. I could've gone with Medium (Orcish armour is usually found pretty early) but the Stealth specialisation and racial selection favoured the Light. If you had the Tribunal expansion, then there would be no question. Light all the way (Dark Brotherhood armour at an early level
).
MINOR:
-Long Blade: 20. I went with Long for a few reasons: It combines nicely with the Dark Elf race selection to give a good starting value; they're cheap; they're common and they have a decent amount of power. You'll want to be getting a bit of practice on rats 'n kwamas 'n stuff before you can relax with it. And you may also want to swig some sujumma before swinging it at something big. Early on at least.
-Alchemy: 15. If you play this character right, you won't be needing to make your own potions. But with a starting level of 15, you'll be able to see 2 of the 4 effects on potions and ingredients. Which is
very handy for someone without prior knowledge of what the potions and ingredients will do...
-Alteration: 15. This was the floater selection for the minors. You could easily substitute this for Illusion or Restoration, but i went with Alteration for the handy spells in that school - water walking, water breathing, levitate, jump... These are also the only spells that you'll be casting from your own reserve. But with a low Willpower, you're going to need some Flin or Cyrodiilic Brandy. And some practice.
-Security: 20. A nice starting value. Together with your Intelligence attribute and the right tools, this should see you through most of the locked and trapped objects that you'll come across. And it raises rather quickly too.
-Enchant: 15. This is where most of your magick is going to be coming from. At 15, it's not high, but it's good enough for the myriad of enchanted items that you'll come across. You'll want to locate a soul trap spell/item and start raising this skill by recharging items. It is not good enough for DIY enchanting though. But, if all goes well, you'll soon have enough money to pay others to do it for you.
MISCELLANEOUS:
I'm not usually too concerned about these, but in this build there's a couple of nice bonuses. Most notably Short Blade at 20 - there are a few nice daggers around the place... A Mysticism score of 10 is also going to be handy for the Soul Trap or Mark/Recall spell, but you'll need some training. 15 in Destruction may sound nice, but you're not going to find an opportunity to use it. Your offense is going to be coming from Marksman and Long Blade.
And that about does it. About the "no no" list, i've decided that it'd be more practical to have a "do do" list. I'll follow up with a list of tips for smooth transition into the economy and society of Morrowind. If you have any questions about this build?..
Oh, and as for why i'm not the best person to be doing this: I sabotage all my characters. Apart from Speechcraft, Mercantile and one or two other variables that i want high starting values for, i choose the skills that i
won't be using in the game. I love the early levels...