[Loser]

A Strong DM addresses feat-creep during character creation. It's not that hard to tell your players "We're using 3rd ed (or 3.5, which is pretty nice), so make your characters with the book, nothing else." The people who want to bring in stuff from elsewhere are the same power-gamers and rules-lawyers that cause you trouble later on in the game, but a good DM can keep them in line.

For your first character you may want to keep it simple and go with Fighter or Sorcerer, keeping more complicated classes like Rogue and Wizard for later, once you are used to the basics of the system.

Try to make sure your DM can run a game that takes advantage of the way you spec-out your character. Few things are as annoying as having a talk-work Rogue in a game with little-to-no role-playing and a group that expects finger-work out of you.