[Dantes]

The encumbrance of armor is only a temporary problem. Using your starting stats to boost STR is not worth it. You will be able to get items like a Hero Bracer (10 STR), TBB (15 STR) or Mithril Plated Girth (9 STR). There's jagged bands, the jewelry you mentioned, and much more.

The problem is: bronze sucks. Avoid it like the plague. Get yourself a full set of small banded and wear that until you can start questing crafted. You can wear more armor before you'll be encumbered and get more AC for your buck. When you start questing crafted, resize all of your pieces to small via the dwarves in WC. Get some weight reduction bags to carry your spare weapons in.

Low STR was a problem for me as a DE starting out, but at level 37 with the gear I have now it's never a problem. I don't think you made a mistake. DEX and AGI are important, more so than STR. Your role as a warrior is not to DPS, it's to take damage. If you can't proc, you won't keep aggro. If you have low AGI, you'll get the shit beat out of you.

And novelty guy, I'm not so sure you HAVE to be an Ogre or a Troll to solo. I didn't get that memo, because I can solo Cyclops and Hill Giants just fine in mid 30s. Course I have to sit on my ass for a half hour to get all the health back, regen is a good point but I wouldn't go so far as to say smaller warriors are less capable. We can hold our own.