Here's my recommendation:

Research the shit out of recipes that seem interesting to you, even before getting them. Err on the side of caution and start with popular or highly rated recipes. They won't always be good (since taste is subjective), but generally you'll get a bunch of recipes that you like.

The strategic part of this is getting recipes that share flavorings with each other. It won't always be so, but eventually you'll see that some flavorings are popular and used in a particular way. For instance, many people like cap vanilla custard v1, and it's almost ubiquitous in cream/desert recipes.

Eventually you'll have a sizeable collection and an excel full of recipes. The more you have, the easier it is to try out new recipes.

Please don't buy random flavors id say start out with the 26 and fill in the gaps on what your recipes need as you go! You don't want to buy random assortments of flavors friend because some are not okay to vape like oil solubles or those that contain simple sugars, as far as suggestions for the flavors you listed above : For the Tea I don't have a ton of experience with it but I have been playing with Fa Black Tea water soluble , for the peach on that one id check out this recipe ... for the Blue Raspberry I've heard of people liking Liquid Barns Blue Raspberry... For the apple what type of green apple are you looking for like a candy-ish jolly rancher type or more with peel notes like a fuji apple if so with a peel (which i have experience with more than candied apple) Id reccomend the FA Fuji

If you want a green apple Jolly Rancher, try /u/concreteriver's Camp Tigerclaw. 3 flavors, tastes amazing.

If you're very particular about what you like, I'd say buy for specific recipes rather than a list of flavors that you might end up not using - but bear in mind that taste is a subjective thing and not all peach tea, blue raspberry or green apple candy recipes are created equal.

If you plan on going full tilt boogie into mixing and developing your own recipes, lists can be helpful because they give you a foundation of flavors that you can try on their own and then try in combination with others to build up an understanding of what you like and what you don't. Alternatively, just buy what you need to mix some tasty stuff (pick recipes from here or on All the Flavors and order only what you need for them), then see if you get bitten by the mixing bug and want to experiment more.

I'm also older than your average Redditor, and I went down the tasty recipe from someone else, reverse-engineering, what if I...? route at first, until the bug really bit.

I didn't trust myself to be able to just come up with a recipe, that seemed entirely impossible. Over time though, I had friends asking me for juice so I experimented more to suit their palates. I guess what I'm saying (it's early here and I'm only half-caffeinated) is there's no right way for everyone, and it's fine to start out mixing other peoples' recipes so you get to have tasty things to vape every day. It's even fine to only do that, if it's what works for you.

What scale did you order?

If random means buy and try then, yes. Especially so if you’re particular which it seems you are because no one will be able to tell you what you are going to like. Until then, you can sift through people’s notes and make an educated guess as to what you may like.

Are you look for flavors to buy or recipes to try?

I'm also very new to DIY and when I placed my first order I bought "flavor packs" that contain all of the flavors for a recipe. I bought 2 different recipes this way, plus a couple extra bottles of flavors that can be used by themselves so I could start with really simple mixes.

I would definitely recommend starting off with a recipe and then modifying it as you to your taste. Heads up that they're going to specify the actual **brand** of flavor, as each brand's taste is slightly different. Also if you're coming from commercial juice be aware that commercial manufacturers put a HUGE amount of sweeteners in their products, so even the most highly recommend recipe probably isn't going to taste the same as whatever commercial juice you're vaping.

Good call for the nobs. But I believe they are called Community Recipe Packs if my memory is still serving me.

I second the "community recipe packs" from bull city. You also need to find recipes that you think you will like and order the flavors for that recipe. I have ordered the "community recipe packs" from bull city and they work great for me. Here's what I done. I know I liked strawberry milk juice, I found the recipe and ordered the flavores in that recipe. I know I like strawberry/watermelon and strawberry/kiwi juice. So I already have strawberry flavors so then I ordered some watermelon and kiwi. I created my own recipe from some I found online and added watermelon or kiwi to strawberry. If you go buying just random flavors without a recipe you won't get anywhere. It's just like finding a food recipe and trying to make it with just one or two of the ingrediants. Not going to be right. Find a recipe you think you might like, say you like tea, look for tea recipes and then order what the recipe calls for.

Welcome to Reddit! We're glad to have you!