Well, these are all great questions, and this is getting into the "two schools of thought" on how to vape RBA's.
first off, yes, if I were completely new to rebuildables, I would buy a clone and either a cheap mechanical mod + multimeter, or a VV device that does resistance readings like the V2 lavatubes, vamo, etc. If you go the hybrid route, be prepared to stick with it, and make sure you have a multimeter handy to check resistance between the posts.
Second question, the Provari used to be the un-questionable king of VV. Nowadays, things like the Sigeli Zmax variable-wattage devices, and others like the Vamo, are giving it a run for its money. The gripper and other VV's from the past were tuned differently, so their actual voltage is much higher than what you see on the screen.
So, back to the two schools of thought: One is, using mechanical mods with low-resistance coil setups to achieve higher wattage. The benefits of this are that you don't get a ton of error messages on your device because there's no circuitry, and arguably, everything will last longer because there's no circuitry to fry. The negatives: if you go this route, there's a higher chance of batt failure due to unseen shorts, or other problems. It hasn't happened to me, but it CAN happen.
The second school of thought is using a VV device, with a higher-resistance coil, and setting it at high voltage/wattage. This can be a great option because you can dial in your vape without removing coil wraps, etc, and you MAY be able to skip the multimeter if your device has resistance checking capability. The negatives are that it can be a real pain to get your VV device to fire the atomizer, due to micro-shorts or other anomalies in the current flow. Provaris in particular are very finicky, and if they detect anything- and I mean, even if they think it's too cloudy outside, or if they're just having an off-day- they will throw error after error message, and will refuse to fire your device. Technically though, VV devices are a bit safer to use, but such a giant pain in the ... that I won't use them unless I absolutely have to.
Whew. Lots of info, let us know how it goes!