Hi all!

I, for as long as I can remember, have never played and RPG before! Recently a friend gifted me Oblivion on Steam, I have downloaded it and started a game, but just curios, what sort of mods, enhancements, etc. are available for the game? Anything to make the controls feel less 'clunky' (thought that might just be me, my normal genre is FPS or RTS).

Take into consideration I have to play on an Intel GMA x3100, as my gaming computer has died... again....

Pretty much everything is available... I'm lazy right now, maybe I'll post some specifics when I get home, but the top list on elder scrolls nexus should give you some ideas: http://tes.nexusmods.com/downloads/top/alltime.php (you can also filter by the different categories)
I'd recommend at least one of the big overhaul mods like Oscuro's Oblivion Overhaul.

Note, however, that once you really get started with Oblivion modding, you'll likely spend at least half of the time modding instead of playing for a while :D

There can't be a game on the planet with more modding guides out there, use google.

The clunkiness is probably due to the low hardware specs of your machine (and the inefficiency of the engine, but that can't be helped). This also limits the amount of mods that I could recommend since many mods would require a beefier machine.

There was a mod called Streamline which I used on my old PC, it made gameplay smoother. However, it's very old now, it never went out of beta, it may cause occasional crashes, and it needs OBSE (Oblivion Script Extender) to work at all. There may be better alternatives by now, my info about Oblivion is several years old.

With regard to other mods: I suggest to play the game a bit without mods, but don't invest too much in the character you do that with. The unmodded game becomes rather silly once you realize how broken some of the mechanics are, but it's fun until you reach that stage, and playing unmodded for a while will allow you to make better decisions about the mods you want.

Personally, I was using FCOM, which in itself is an amalgamate of Oscuro's Oblivion Overhaul (fixes a lot of the silliness mentioned above and adds lots of new stuff), Francesco's mod (adds tons of new items), Martigen's Monster Mod (tons of new enemies and smarter / more plausible behavior of them), Warcry (more enemies and items) and an armory mod that adds more weapons and armor. I also used a levelling mod (since I couldn't stand the way the unmodded game handled skills and perks) and an economy mod ("Living Economy", dynamically adapts item prices over time, might be outdated by now). I also remember using COBL (general framework for more items IIRC), and mods that added more hotkeys, bundled the mess of in-game keys in a keyring, or allowed the complete change of one's gear with a single keypress. Then there were some companion mods I quite enjoyed, and of course graphics mods for enhanced view distance, but the latter won't do any good with the graphics chip you're using. But as I said, there are tens of thousands of mods, so perhaps play the game first, and then decide in which direction you want to mod it.

A mod that I think is essential is the Quest Award Leveling at: http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=230
Oblivion has some unique quest rewards that have a strength dependent on the character level when you receive them. This mod changes it so that every five character levels those items are upgraded. That way you are not punished for completing certain quests at lower levels.

... and this excessive auto-leveling of stuff in order to remove any possible source of frustration is exactly what made Oblivion feel so bland to me. I used lot of mods to _reduce_ the auto-leveling after I realized how broken the game mechanics were; I wouldn't touch a mod that introduces even more of it with a 10-foot pole. ;)

That said, I do remember that this mod was quite popular among the people to whom it felt silly that a mythical artifact acquired at a low level would soon become useless. In the end, it all comes down to preference (which is why I keep recommending to play the unmodded game first for a bit, it helps sorting out one's preferences). ;)

I'm not sure what kind of "clunkiness" you're talking about, but here's one tip to fix some sound-related performance issues:

If you have the ffdshow codec, get into its settings and add oblivion.exe to the blacklist, so fddshow doesn't mess with it. Both for audio and video fddshow.

There is another one called Oldblivion which works great on lower spec older hardware :

http://www.oldblivion.com/index.php

Probably well worth grabbing and trying out, screen shots look promising. It makes the game run on pre DX 9 cards. Could work wonders and possibly worth a shot.

I would also grab OBMM (Oblivion Mod Manager) for installing the mods you want, makes life much easier.

Once you get your gaming rig back up and running a must have mod is Quarls Texture pack. It reskins virtually the entire game with high res textures and looks amazing (Download is around 1.5 Gb of textures!). I wouldnt try this one though with what you are running on now!

Oblivion is basically RPG made for newbies in the genre. If I were you, I'd probably just leave it as it is. Also... Eh, for FPS player it just is clunky, controls aren't as responsive as in a FPS for a reason.

It's for noobs? I've played and loved a bunch of RPGs in the past, but I'm about 3 hours into Oblivion so far, and still don't have any idea what I'm supposed to be doing. I was just running around the mountains for a while shooting fireballs at deer, then when that got boring I went to explore a cave, which took forever and led to a dead end, so I ended up going back out to shoot fireballs at the deer again. When I try to follow the red points on the compass, it doesn't seem to lead me anywhere.

I take it I'm doing something wrong? <.<

Nope, you got it. Just do whatever the hell you fancy. If you want some direction, get your ass to the nearest city and talk to locals, you will eventually stumble upon some tast. And following red points does lead you somewhere, just check your map (intentory - click on compass)

The levelled crap is annoying for hardcore RPG fans. I would understand quest award leveller althou he probably wouldn't even notice leveled revards if you guys haven't mentioned it, but OOO? Are you serious? Unless it's your goal to completely ruin his game, just let him play the game as FPS, OOO is incredibly hardcore mod for people who know their way around RPG.

Perhaps instead of Oblivion being RPG 1001 for the noobie mcnoob, it would best be described as a standardized experience. Like you pointed out everything is stream-lined so there is no depth and little need for exploration. Leveling is a joke for an experienced player and you can become so good at everything there is really no challenge. It's so by the letter that there is little chance to get out of the mould and create your own adventure.
A You took the words right out of my mouth. OOO is an excellent collection of mods btw. Seconds from me.

Ok, I guess I'll just keep going with it then. But presumably the world will run out of deer at some point, at which time things will get pretty boring :/

I did meet one person that actually spoke instead of just attacking me like the people in the cave I mentioned, but she was pretty rude. She just made some racist comment about Elves, then left. :( Oh, and I found a horse at some point which I thought was going to be exciting, but I left him for a minute to go up some stairs and when I came back he was gone :(