For the folks on the site that have built a few items, what would you tell someone to stock who has next to no parts? Is it worth spending a few dollars to buy a series of resistors?
Yes, probably, if you can get a kit with, say, two or five resistors of each E12 or E24 value, that's not too expensive, that's probably a good idea. I tend to use certain values much more often than others - I prefer the 10 and 33 values in each decade, and the most common values I use are 10k, 33k, 3k3, 1k, 100k, in order of decreasing frequency, probably. If I did a lot of work with LEDs I would stock lots of resistors in the relevant range - 100Ω to 680Ω or so. If I did a lot of power work, I would stock 5W and 10W resistors in low ohms ranges. I would also get familiar with my local and e-order suppliers and what stock they had.
What range of caps would you recommend? Electrolytic, ceramic, tant? All kinds?
Not tantalums. Well, perhaps a few values. Electrolytics, ceramics, and some film types.
Standard small signal transistors - in America, 2N3904/3906, some small Darlingtons (MPSA14,64), and some resistor-equipped transistors (FJN33xx) - and some small and medium power transistors in TO-126 and TO-220 packages, like BD139/140 and TIP1xx (including some Darlingtons), and TO-3 if I was doing power stuff. Also BS170 small-signal MOSFET (or 2N7000 in USA).
1N914/4148; 1N4004,7; 1N5404,7; 1N5819; other high-speed, high-voltage and Schottky types if I was working on power supplies.
Maybe, if there were specific voltage/power combinations that I needed often.
Anything else that you can think of would be appreciated, thanks!
Potentiometers. Trimpots! LEDs. Stripboard. Jumper pins. Connectors. IC sockets. Resistor networks. Pushbuttons and small toggle switches. Rotary switches. Crystals. Microcontrollers. FPGAs. CMOS or 74HC or 74LV logic. It all depends what sort of stuff you're doing.
I'm keen to hear what others suggest!