Hi, I'm new! And.. uh.. help?

[reverend]

Gandalf Parker said:
I think Ulm is a good starting nation. Its benefits are heavily armored troops. Most people tend to understand what those are for.

I second that opinion.

Ulm is rather straightforward and easy to play, little magic, but good troops. You just need a few mages for site-searching and forging, most of the time, you can overcome your enemy without hand-scripting every mage in battle. At least against normal AI, which you probably will be playing when starting out.