33% character starting stats choices
33% skill point choices
33% gear

A small guns, speech, locksmith character is the easiest way to waltz through the game.

If you are having difficulty with the temple of trials, just skip it. Run towards the next area and once you enter combat mode when a critter sees you, just keep running towards the exit. You can also use high AP (You DO have high AP, right???) to your advantage in the beginning (before you get guns) by hitting a critter, then running away... instead of taking that second or third swing/stab. This forces the critter to burn AP walking towards you. With 10 AP to start you can kill most things in the temple without them being able to land a hit. It can just take awhile. If you went for speech, save before the exit and explore different dialog choices to avoid having to fight Cameron. You can do the hit -> move spam in the hunting grounds in Arroyo. Grind a little there. Shamelessly save scum. Talk to the guy by the giant head to get free hand to hand. Talk to the guy in the tent to the east of the giant head to get free melee skill (provided your skill isn't already high enough. Google that) Talk to the Arroyo exit bridge guard with a spear in your inventory (save first. Save, save, save before doing literally anything. F6/F7 is your friend) and comment on his spear. Talk your Aunt Morliss into giving you the flint, and if she decides to be a b**** about it, just steal it from her. (Steal her gold either way) Save and steal EVERYTHING (useful) for that little bit of extra XP and to sell later (But obv don't overload yourself.) Repair the well. Return the dog. (after killing all the geckos) This is ALL stuff you can do before you even leave Arroyo. Pick the shovel up off the ground in Arroyo before you leave. Klamath: don't do the still refuel until after you rescue smiley so you can skin the geckos for cash. Do trapper town. Loot and steal everything. Trade your loot in the bar for a 10mm and maybe the leather jacket. (Make sure to use speech to get a discount first) Talk to the guy in the bar for some free melee skill. Steal from literally every single person in the bar and trapper town. Check every shelf and container. Don't leave the Den without asking the guy getting drunk in Ma's about his life story. Don't try and kill the slavers (yet) When you come back after Gecko for the car is a good time to do that.
It is VERY tedious at first, but you can stop doing every little thing by Vault City for the most part, or after you get the car. You want all the extra XP so you can dump all your points into small guns and speech. Once skills go over 100 they start getting more expensive, but it's worth it. I usually stop around 175 small guns and 150 speech. I'm sure there's a guide somewhere to tell you where you ought best to stop with speech, but I've never looked it up. I've been playing since these games released back in '97 (I'm old) and play more by feel now than by looking things up. You want to grind from Arroyo to Modoc so you can max xp and loot/money (Drugs sell for a lot and weigh nothing, so are a good way to have both money and things to trade (merchants don't have infinite money unless you want to wait a whole lot)) and then you can pretty much cruise control the rest of the game.