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A thought had just suddenly crossed my mind.

What kind of experience did people who has NEVER touched anything AD&D, D&D, or any pencil and paper RPG have with the game?

I'm fortunate (or unfortunate) to have a little AD&D experience when I started playing this game, but I can't begin to imagine the confusion those people encountered when they looked at all the charts, the savings throws, the thac0's, the AC's, and all that stuff. Especially considering how backwards most things are. Some scores are lower the better, yet others are higher the better.

How long did it take for you guys to get into the swing of things?

I remember when I first started playing AD&D. "A 20-sides dice?! You're joking right?" "4D6, now is that four rolls with a six-sided dice or six rolls with a four-sided dice?"

At least with the Pencil and Paper games, you know what you're getting into when you first see the size of the books you had to read. But I'm picturing people out there who bought the game just for a simple relaxing gaming experience. Then, looked at the manual and said, "Ohhhhh crap."

[This message has been edited by Yuusuke (edited 11-03-2000).]

Ok, I have played Fallout 1 & 2. Thats about it. Oh, I played Hero Quest when i was younger. Simple rules... But then, in BG2 there was AD&D rules, I thought: OK, what the **** is AD&D? I dont undertand a bit of it. thac0, saving throwes meens squat to me. I dont understand it at all.
But hey, that doenst stop me from playing this superb game. I really love it. Baybe even more if I understands the rules of it...

Well, dwarf, if I can be of little help...

THAC0 (that's a zero at the end!): This is the roll you must make (or above) 'To Hit Armor Class 0' (note the capitols, forming THAC0). A bit counterintuitive perhaps, but if someone has a THAC0 of, say 10, and wants to hit someone with AC 5, he must roll equal to or above (10 - 5) = 5. If that same person would like to hit someone with AC -5, he would have to roll equal to or above (10 - -5) = 15. You can figure it out for yourself for other AC'ses. Note: 1 is ALWAYS a critical miss, while 20 is ALWAYS a critical hit.

Saving Throws: these allow your characters to ignore possible negative spell effects. Like Save vs. Death might enable you to ignore the effects of a Finger of Death spell. Each negative effect has its own category, like Poison, Death, Breath Weapon, etc... To make your saving throws, you must roll ABOVE or EQUAL to the value listed for that character. Note that some spells and effects modify the value against which you must make the saving throw (e.g. save at +4 vs. Poison, save at -3 vs. Death, etc...)