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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Staffan" data-source="post: 7084547" data-attributes="member: 907">To be fair to Gary, the original rule was that you used attack matrices to figure out whether you hit or not. Find your class's attack table, cross-reference your level with your opponent's AC, and you'll find the number you need to equal or exceed to hit. Looking at it that way, it's... well, not intuitive per se, but you can see the origin in miniature wargames. That's also why new classes or monsters for AD&D (both editions) often say things like "uses the thief attack table" or "attacks as a 7th level fighter" instead of just giving a THAC0.THAC0 was a deconstruction of the earlier system. It missed out on some of the finer details (like the repeating 20s - above each "20" entry on the to-hit-tables there were five entries of "20*" which indicated you needed a natural 20, not a 20 including bonuses - and above that, you needed a natural 20 plus bonuses), but I don't think anyone really missed those. It was included as early as the 1e DMG in the monster reference table, but there it wasn't used as a mechanic but instead as a reference. The person most responsible for using it as the core mechanic of AD&D 2nd edition is probably Zeb Cook, who was lead designer, and I'm pretty sure I've read somewhere that they were discussing reversing AC as early as then, but didn't because of backward compatibility (1e and 2e are about as compatible as 3e and Pathfinder).</blockquote>