New user here, terribly confused.

Greetings everyone. I'm really new here, and new to tabletops in general, and I want someone to help me. I am looking for someone to teach me how to start playing games around here. Like, what rules I need to know, what guidelines, I need to be taught. :/

1. First choose a genre: Sci-Fi, Modern Warfare, Fantasy... 2. Choose a Game System: D&D(1-?),GURPS, Whatever. 3. Shop GMs, in LFP, and read forums. 4. Join a game, this is not a marriage, you may not fit with GM or players or system, play a few before you go out and buy a lot of books. Role Playing is like dating, you may fall in love the first time, but more than likely you will need to cast your line a few times before getting hooked.

I agree with what al.e. said. You can find pathfinder rules on the various ogl sites like pazio or you could go to another site that support 3.5e for free. There are companies that publish free beginner books like WoTC and 5e. Fate by evilhat publications and there are others.

I actually had a player with a similar question. He logged into the Pathfinder campaign I started and was like, "What the heck? I can't do anything, I don't have any buttons..." I tell people to think of it just like a tabletop with plenty of pens, paper, dice, and calculators. Just like a normal tabletop session, I find that if you come in with a decent grasp of the rules of the game, the DM will likely have most of the stuff set up so you won't need to know much aside from that. I do agree with Pat, 5e and Pathfinder have pretty low barriers to entry and free starter rules. Plus there seems to be a lot of Pathfinder played here....

There's a ton of Quickstart rules for different systems out there but I'd even suggest (depending on your preference) you may want to mkx up step 2 and 3 in Al's excellent suggestion. You could browse for a group and if the GM (the person who sort of runs or marshals a small gaming group) they could teach you a little up front and more as you go. I think you've ended up in the best place for new players to get into the hobby and try out new games and groups, so you're already off to an amazing start :) Welcome to Roll 20 and happy gaming!

If you are new to gaming, I think it is especially important that you find an experienced GM to teach you whatever game system you might like. Avoid newbie GMs. Their weaknesses will only make it a bigger challenge for you to enjoy the game as a player, and that is not what you need when learning a new game.

Andrius P. said: Greetings everyone. I'm really new here, and new to tabletops in general, and I want someone to help me. I am looking for someone to teach me how to start playing games around here. Like, what rules I need to know, what guidelines, I need to be taught. :/ If you want to try out some games, you could hop in on fridays ( Basic Fantasy group friday night pickups ) and just tryout the games. I ran a very rules lite horror/mystery session recently. It was all text and the players seemed to enjoy it. There are other games people are running also. Just a quick note; It is a central gathering hub where us gm's select and give join links to our game boards.in the chat on friday. Some fridays are a lot of GM's running one shots and some nights it is only one or two due to real life. If you like a rule lite games then drop by and try us on for size.

Well, all of you give excellent tips, thank you for that, however, you seem to miss my point. I don't mean I'm new to roleplaying. I've been roleplaying on different platforms like gaming and PbP, and I know how tabletop works. The thing I'm confused at is how to start playing, because all the game systems have rule sets, and without those rule sets a person cannot just jump into a game. That's what I want to learn. I want to learn the rules of a certain system, so I could start playing, and eventually learn all the others. I am new to tabletop, yes, and I don't have friends to play with, so I'm hoping I could do it here, that's why I want someone to teach me or at least point me to where I could learn myself. :)

<a href="http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/82093/Basic-" rel="nofollow">http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/82093/Basic-</a>... <a href="http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/127458/Scarl" rel="nofollow">http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/127458/Scarl</a>... <a href="http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/115309/Prowl" rel="nofollow">http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/115309/Prowl</a>... <a href="http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/116662/Shadowrun-Fifth-Edition-QuickStart-Rules?term=shadowrun+qui&filters=0_2144_0_0_0" rel="nofollow">http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/116662/Shadowrun-Fifth-Edition-QuickStart-Rules?term=shadowrun+qui&filters=0_2144_0_0_0</a> ....and so on. Or buy the full rulebook of a system that interests you. Or ask your GM to explain the rules to you.

Thank you Alan.