OK, like a good deal of people, with Skyrim upcoming I have decided to revisit the old Elder Scrolls - I have of course been working through TES IV (as documented http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1161691-what-did-your-character-do-today-3/page__pid__17392628__st__120#entry17392628), but I also wanted to try Daggerfall again, as I'm too much of a cheapskate to get Morrowind.

So, I did a fresh re-install of Daggerfall, this time managing to get it running fine in DosBOX (yay me!), now I need some help.

First of all, what should I do? I'm used to exploring the countryside, but last time I checked the DFall countryside was pretty sparse. Should I join a guild? What should I am for? Is there a good province to go to where I can do lots of fun stuff?

What class is best for a beginner? Should I answer the lifestyle questions, or let them autogenerate, and how should I assign my skill/attribute points?

Also, the dungeons are big, so is there a cheat or trick when they get too hard to teleport to the victory place, and then teleport out? What tips would you give for navigating those massive dungeons?

Thanks for all help in advance!

Answer the questions to get the ebony dagger for a starting character. I'd say making a character who is a battlemage of sorts is the best bet, using the x3 mana advantage in character creation. This lets you get quite a few enchanted items from the mages guild to make up for the attributes you don't have lots of points in.

Don't explore the countryside, fast travel to points of interest. If you need a big location, look for Daggerfall the city. If you want more loot, go looking through graveyards. The Fighters guild will provide you with a free place to sleep if you need it, or joining a knightly organization can provide you with free hotel rooms. Also once you can buy magical items from a mages guild, you can travel to other cities with guilds to find different stuff. They tend to have quite a few daedric items too, for really cheap prices.

Don't rob stores in the daytime.

Answer questions. Get ebony dagger.

Melee Fighter: Speed, Agility, and Strength are most important. (and, imo, in that order).

Offensive Magic: Willpower is important.
Support Magic only: Willpower not very important.

Personality: Almost useless
Luck: I like it, some people don't

Advantages: 3x Intelligence, Immunity to Magic (which gives you immunity to Disease, Paralysis, and Poison)
Disadvantages: Critical weakness to Disease, Paralysis, and Poison.

Join Mages Guild (for the following perks)
Rank 0: Spellmaker
Rank 3: Buy magic items
Rank 5: Make magic items
Rank 6: Daedra summoning, 24/7 acess
Rank 8: Teleportation service (with this service and the "teleport" spell travel to and from any place is instantaneous.

Some nice support spells:
Teleport: (i.e. anchor and recall)
Open: a 1pt / 2lvl spell will open any outside door
Breathe Water / Walk Water: use both in 1 spell for fast travel through water
Restore Health
Restore Fatigue
Levitate (although a levitate magic item is better)

Dungeons: See http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/29065-the-elder-scrolls-chapter-ii-daggerfall/58121129

To enable cheats go to the z.cfg file (in your Daggerfall file) and add the line:
CHEATMODE 1

Dungeons contain huge, premade building blocks that link together on the sides. Each premade block contains several hardcoded quest objective locations- locations where a quest objective (like a rogue mage, a prisoner, an ingredient, etc., etc.) will possibly spawn if there's an active quest inside that dungeon. You can see how many blocks are in a dungeon by examining a small 2D graphic on your automap screen. This graphic also reveals your general location and the exit.

With a lot of practice, we can learn the basic outlay of many dungeon blocks as well as their possible quest objective locations. One good way to explore dungeons is to hug one the left or right wall. Then you can retrace your steps.

There really is no one place to go to, any city with a guild is pretty much the same, although Daggerfall is nice with pretty much every store you need. I like to head straight out of Privateers Hold, there's a small town there with a mages guild and fighters guild which is a good way to start out. When heading to Daggerfall I like to pick off all the tombs on the way there, its about 6 or so, there are the dark red dots on the map (filter it so only dungeons show up) It'll get you a nice starting cache. Once you obtain the letter to start the main quest, do it get it out of the way (you can miss the deadline, which after you get one more meeting then after that you can't do the main quest anymore) at that point, explore the different regions. See which one you like the feel of and stick it for a bit.

Just do whatever (not explore the wilderness, its lame) Daggerfall is much more sandbox than Oblivion.

Also, if you're low on cash, one thing you can do is go to one of the small provinces in the outskirts where none of the quests send you, like on the northern edge of the map. Go to a bank and take out a loan for as much as possible. (It'll probably be in the form of a letter of credit.) Take it back to somewhere you'll be a while - like Daggerfall or Wayrest or somesuch - and deposit the letter at their banks. Voila! Instant fortune. Just remember which provinces you took the loan from, because the guards there will arrest you for not paying your debts if you return.

BAugustus,

some excellent time-saving hints here.

The only thing I have to add is that I wanted to be able to enchant the most powerful items that I saw fit for my characters, so I joined one Temple that allowed me to buy Filled Soul Gems (believe it is this one http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Daggerfall:Order_of_Arkay). Why? Because imo, the best soul gem is the one that contains Dragonlings. It adds some horror-show enchantment power to your capacity with no setbacks (well except they are obscenely expensive) AND.... if you do not find one at the merchant, just restart the diaog to get to buy soul gems and the stock changes.

The Dragonling Soul you want for such high enchants can only be found this way or thru specific Knight Order Dragonling Quests (which svck, coz you have to do time-consuming dungeon crawls).