silly things like cursed items on death and incense-dmgbuff are long gone, money is only a booster now, so you can get things faster/instant if you have only little time to play or if you are not a patient player
due to gold / BC exchange you can get anything for free, its just a matter of time (LONG time if you want certain things- but again- totally free)
about class, summoner is the most "universal" class i guess, but there is so much variety among the classes you really should take a look yourself, maybe play every class till level 10 or something
regardig "Universal-builds" (those who can do everything but nothing good) it would be critical to take all rubies which grat you a special skill, otherwise your build will no longer be universal - ofc this means less dmg
so as psi loop of time and the sharp incursion alsong with mindfire for example, without them it certainly is NOT an universal build since these skills are strongly pvprelated
but for a new player it seems almost impossbile to know what is important / special skill etc... so rather just make a levleng-build (pve dps + survivability) and once max level respec with the free respec you get then to pure pve or pure pvp, depending on what you desire