Board Thread:Off Topic/@comment-27614308-20160117232300/@comment-4715955-20160120005459

XxEllieHasGoneMadxX wrote: I would honestly like to be taught how to play the game ;-; I've always wanted to know but I've never really gotten the hang of it (obviously I'm fluffing retarded,but what are ya gonna do,eh?) I think it's fun hearing people talk about it but I think it'd be even better playing it for once :p Can anyone direct me to an online game of D&D,if possible? Maybe even a how to guide? I just want to bookmark so I have something to go back on. As has been said above, mainly the one who needs to know the rules is the DM. If the players don't know them, they tend to pick them up as they go. Usually D&D boils down to "roll a 20-sided die whenever you try to do something remotely difficult, add the appropriate ability modifier, and hope you met the target number." Saying hello to somebody wouldn't take a roll because it's easy and casual. Convincing a noble not to execute your friend, on the other hand, would require a diplomacy check: the DM secretly decides what the target number is, and you roll a d20 and add your persuade/diplomacy modifier to the total. So if the target number was 16, and you rolled a 10 on the die, and your modifier was 7, you rolled a total of 17, which barely beats the target number. So the result would be, you just barely talk the guy out of killing your friend, but he'll probably leave him in prison for life, forcing your party to decide whether to let him rot or spring him from jail. If you'd rolled a natural 20 on the d20, that would mean a super success and you'd probably get your friend released and pardoned; and if you rolled a natural 1....well, you'll probably be sharing the chopping block with him.

That's a bit of a dumbed-down explanation, but it's basically what every die-based decision comes down to. Everything else is the players making decisions in character, and the DM telling you what happens as a result.