tinyE: I seriously need to start that.
It's been installed for two months now.
I think I get intimidated by character builds.
I just started by picking a character I like and pick skills one at a time as points became available, taking what I found useful from the available slots (or would be useful in the very near future). I found it wasn't necessary nor did I plan a certain build in advance. Just start and go with the flow.
It got me al the way down the first 4 acts, until the game bored me when after a long, long journey, the story takes you back to the shores of Wraeclast at some point, at the beach where you start the game only more powerful and with more powerful monsters to defeat (that was what bored me, I've been on that beach months before, yet now I had an ever toughing going there because the monsters where of a way higher level on the same beach then those months before when I started the game).
*edit: but I had lots of fun inbetween. It's a great recommendation. But for me the game would have been big enough (and my progress would have finished the game) without the two (maybe it's even more now?) expansions.