Best Skills for a newb?

[sir_real]

What are the best skills to take as someone completely new to the game? I've tried several but I usually can't make it past the first floor. I'd love an easy kit to try with which to level first.

Thanks!

[Mazey]

Taking a weapon skill and Master of Arms will mean you start with some armour and a weapon. Plus you could take some aggressive magic and lay-lines/blood-mage to regenerate mana.

But, really, what matters the most is learning the game and being very very careful. Watch your health with every turn, always know your escape routes, and other things like that.

Edit: Plus, when fighting or running away, always take it one turn at a time. If you're losing it's tempting ot just click as fast as you can, but that just means you take turns faster, so the enemy takes their turns faster, so you end up with less thinking time.

[Haldurson]

I find that defense-based melee builds are great to start out with, or some build that includes a very early pet. Try some variant of this:

Dual wield
Master of Arms
Berserk Rage
Axe
Burglary
Fungal Arts or Fleshsmithing
Thrown Weapons

You can substitute the weapon of your choice for axes (maybe mace or swords instead).
For thrown weapons, you miight substitute Battle Geology or communism, if you have the appropriate expansions.

If you want to try your hand at crafting, try something like this:
Dual Wield
(axe, sword, or mace)
Master of Arms
Burglary
Smithing
Perception
Tinkering or Alchemy

This gives you a really good trap affinity for removing traps, especially with Tinkering. But you have to learn how to manage your inventory since you'll need to collect crafting materials. I've won the game more than once using pure crafting builds. Crafting is more powerful in Dredmor than many people realize. But as a beginner, maybe familiarize yourself with it first. Keep in mind that:
1. Each additional point into perception will improve your chances of getting crafting materials that you'll want/need
2. You can use your pocket dimension to store your extra stuff (including crafting materials) until you need them.
3. Read my guide on crafting:http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=164426644

[intok]

Yeah, I'd sub Axe for Maces just for the for Ragnor's Meteor skill, it'll let you knock back enemies, reveal hidden items in breakable walls, rearrange dungeon furniture to make barricades and choke points, knock items off of those water surrounded pedastels to a spot you acn reach them, kick traps under closed doors and even hit enemies through closed doors if they are right up on the door.

There are more powerful skills in other classes, but Ragnor is just a very versitile skill.

[Bearded Dream]

Fleshsmithing
Blood Mage
Psionics
Mathemagic
Magical Law
Archaeology
Wand Lore

Use zombies for the first floor, put all your level ups into Psionics until you get the fire spell, then coast through the next couple of floors one shotting most enemies. It's the best scaling spell in the entire game. Put some levels into Blood Mage for mana recovery and level Fleshsmithing for your heals and primary AOE attack. With this build it's the traps and lack of attention that will kill you, assuming you don't die in the first few minutes of the first floor.