Hey guys, I'm completely new to DnD and wanting to join in the fun. Well, there's no group around around my local area that i could play with. I found this site, so I think PbP is the best option for me to learn how to play. How do I get started and how do I learn to play?
(I don't know how much general gaming experience you have, so forgive me if I go over the obvious.)
Well, the first thing you're going to need to do is get a Player's Handbook, as this contains not only the basic rules but also a lot of the options available to you for character creation. Rules-wise, there are a lot, but in general, whenever you want to do something tricky like attack a goblin, sneak past a guard, or unlock a door, what you will be doing is rolling a twenty-sided die, adding some bonus representing how good your character is at attacking, sneaking, or unlocking, and comparing the sum to whatever the difficulty of the task is. You always want to roll high. For example, say you want to stab a goblin. The goblin has an armor class of 15, which represents a combination of his crummy goblin armor and his sneaking goblin dodginess. To stab him, you would roll a d20 and add your attack bonus, which is a number that represents your skill with the weapon. You want the sum to be greater than or equal to 15. Now, on a pbp setting we use internet dice rollers, but the principle is the same.
Really, the best way to learn the rules are to a) read them, and b) play them. People around here are fairly nice, and more than willing to help you along.
So, let's talk about characters. When creating a character, mechanically their defining attribute will be their class, which can be things like fighter, cleric, wizard, etc. Now, each class fits into a "role", which is basically an indicator of what their job is during combat. There are four roles:
Defenders stand in the front and take hits so their friends don't get hurt. They are tough, hard to hit, and when enemies try to attack their friends, the defender has some way of punishing them for it. They're the "tanks", if you are familiar with MMO terminology. The fighter is the classic defender: big guy in big armor with big weapons, but some are more subtle.
Leaders tend to make everyone else work better. They make their friends' attacks more accurate and more damaging, and they're the ones who can heal. Some of them like getting up close and personal, while some prefer to hang around near the back. The cleric is the classic leader, being able to heal allies but also hold his own in a fight.
Strikers bring the damage. Their job is to kill enemies quickly. There is a wide variety in how the different striker classes work; some use spells, some use melee, some use bows. The rogue/thief is the classic striker, being able to cause massive damage with backstabbings.
Controllers are sort of leaders in reverse. They focus on hindering enemies and using attacks that hit multiple foes at once. In general, they are somewhat fragile and tend to hang back, but this is not always the case. The wizard is the classic controller, with the ability to throw giant balls of fire at masses of enemies.
This was very general information. If you have more questions, ask away.
