Stuff you did when you were a D&D noob

[oslecamo]

First character was a paladin. In a campaign where we started whitout gear and aparently 90% of enemy weapons either broke during combat or had specific penalties when wielded by us, and money was almost nonexistant. When I got a wooden shield, it freakingly broke when an oponent threw me a javelin!

In a mission where we had to escort a caravan, it almost broken from being hit by enemy shurikens.

 When I salvaged a (broken) crossbow and got enough money to get it repaired, me and the party almost worshiped it as an holy relic.

On the other hand, neither us or the DM seemed to have noticed the charge rules, so "shoot and move away" was suprisingly effective against most monsters that didn't have ranged attacks, even whitout any speed boosters.

[Necrosnoop110]

I was 8, and it was first edition.  I played a pygmy giant (only 10 feet tall!) who carried a halfling around on his shoulders (my 5yo little brother).  The halfling threw arrows at people.  Didn't shoot them, just threw them.

LOL! That's awesome!

[veekie]

Yep.

[Necrosnoop110]

Started out DMing for 2nd Edition. All of us were total noobs. Misreading rules and mispronouncing games terms. Took us about a year or so just to get up to speed. We thought the initiative value for spells was the number of rounds it took to fire off.

The best was arguing over rules. We would interrupt our gaming sessions (which lasted like 10+ hours, all nighters baby) for an hour or two and go back and forth over the rules. Sometimes we'd take a smoke break out in the back yard and continue the arguing there. Good times. 

[RobbyPants]

We thought the initiative value for spells was the number of rounds it took to fire off.

Oh my god that must have been horrible.

I don't think I ever applied the reaction adjustment to Initiative properly.

I played 2E for about six years, and it wasn't until the last year that I finally understood how incredibly awesome dual classing for humans was. I'm kinda pissed I didn't take advantage of that earlier.

[LordBlades]

I started playing in 3.5. My first character was a human cleric of Kord with awesome rolls (17 str, 13 dex, 17 con, 12 int, 17 wis 13 cha; one of the 13 was a 7 initially, but DM asked me to reroll it because 'clerics need all stats'). He later on got almost the full benefits of a paladin level (minus HP and BAB) for completing a quest for his god. Played him until level 8 or so (when he was the sole survivor of an almost-TPK and we scrapped the campaign), and all I can remember was that Divine Power+Strength domain+Greatsword kicked ass. I tried to play it like a healbot like the book advised, but I just couldn't keep up with monster damage so most of the time the fighter would drop and I had to do the killing.

Next character was an elven sorcerer that thought Sudden Maximized Fireball was the best thing since sliced bread. Died pretty uneventfully at the hand of a vampire that the DM didn't read the rules for (he thought Gaseous Form made him invulnerable to damage).

And then I discovered the Druid and fell in love with it, while the rest of my group was still messing around with fighters, monks and rangers. For a rather long while I kept outshining everyone(and everytime somebody complained, he got told 'system is balanced, he just plays better' by the rest of the group), and then somebody else discovered the wizard, and we started outshining everybody together.

As a DM, I can only recall one big rookie blunder: party did a service to a balor druid (back then I thought both balors and druids were cool; druids I still do)and they got rewarded with his weapons(sword and whip) and a Staff of the Woodlans, at level 5. Weapons didn't do much (apart from a couple of lucky beheadings here and there), but those 16 charges of SNA VI did.

[RobbyPants]

As a DM, I can only recall one big rookie blunder: party did a service to a balor druid (back then I thought both balors and druids were cool; druids I still do)and they got rewarded with his weapons(sword and whip) and a Staff of the Woodlans, at level 5. Weapons didn't do much (apart from a couple of lucky beheadings here and there), but those 16 charges of SNA VI did.

When I first started running 3.0, I loved how you could mix and match weapon qualities, so I went a little nuts. I hadn't yet read up on WBL or anything, so at 3rd level, someone had a Brilliant Energy greatsword.

[Shadowhunter]

One of my first characters was a Monk wielding a nunchaku and I believed that his AC 16 was over average.
The other character was a Human sorcerer with Toughness as his racial feat.

And then there's the one thing I remember most vividly, when I thought that a Fighter 6/Sorcerer 4/Order of the Bow Initiate 10 was the shizznit. 2 rounds spent for a True Strike and a +5d8 arrow shot in round 2.

[Agita]

One of my first characters was a Gnome Monk. No, I don't know what I was thinking either.
After that came a Bard, who ended up being one of two PCs still alive after the boss battle, and the only one conscious.
Then came a Dwarf Cleric. I wanted to be all edgy and innovative and stuff, so I avoided the healer cliche and accidentally made a CoDzilla. It was rough around the edes, using sword&board and dropping a feat on a dwarven waraxe, but still.

[Nagukuk]

My first character was a Rogue ... then spelled THIEF, he rolled PERCENTILES for all of his cool skills.
and he could backstab but never did. His first fight was in "a tavern" it started down stairs and proceed up stairs and out the window, I believe he jumped out of the window and beacuse he was getting his butt kicked he died on impact.

 He carried like 15 Glaives in addition to his daggers and maybe a sword. Because Glaives were obviously "switch blade throwing stars" As per the Movie Krull    Not bladed polearms.

My first character in a campaign was a DragonSlayer a homemade class based on the Paladin. made (by the DM and company not by me) He died fighting dragons, the only one to die on the adventure. It was heart breaking to ... the instant he was dead ... the players were dividing his loot ... the dragon that killed me was not even dead yet.

But this was only slightly after the game stopped coming in a "box" and one of the character class choices was ELF  yes class, not race.

and you could kill 10 or so dragons in an adventure and not really bat an eye. As the oldest and nastiest dragon had 88 hitpoints.


EDIT:  OH YEA ... i remembered a few 3.0 things ... the first character I wanted to play was going to be a Halfling Barbarian/Sorc, cause i thought true strike would rock! ... was right about true strike  ... but the rage.

Also the first time I play tested 3.0 i made a ranger, he use two weapons of course Long and Short i think, also he had power attack ...

 and he could power attack for whatever he wanted, (we/I missed the up to your BAB part on that one)

[zook1shoe]

i've only played 3e

low level game- trying to sleep an elf bad guy

low level game- color spray'ing a bad guy AND the friendly paladin, who then tried to assassinate me for the rest of the game.

mid level game- playing a frenzied berserker and about to fall asleep when a combat started... when it came to my time, my head bobbed back and i shouted "i charge the guy!" the entire group bursts out laughing

low to high level game- playing a CN wizard (in alignment only, looking back was definitely LN) on the verge of LE in an all good party, with exclusive access to vile spells that i love (finger darts and touch of juiblex), and pissing off the fighter/paladin played by one of my good friends that is actually LG in real life

[Periaden]

My first time ever playing....  Was a 12th level ranger.  I had absolutely no idea what I was doing.  First night in I had to roleplay with the party as to why I joined their group.  I was a bounty hunter and my mark was in a location the group was heading to.  I didn't know the setting at all, and I made some stuff up as to why I had to catch him (Five years later, that the DM admitted to me that he dropped the ball with me when I joined the game).  Anyway... I traveled with them and we found the guy, and I didn't participate in catching him at all.  The bard and the goblin rogue decided to do all the work for me.  That was the biggest thing for me.  In game my only reason for being there, and they all the work for me in one session. 

Later I discovered Spell Compendium, and I used the Arrow Storm for the first time when we had to rescue a lot of slaves from a warrior/slave pin that was designed to house hundreds and had cracked out security.   Needless to say, a slave pin that has like twelve ballistas and twenty four heavy crossbows, you don't want to draw attention to yourself.  I did.   And got critted twice by ballistas in one turn.  Fortunately, I asked for better details on the tower I was on, and it turned out there was a little wall that was about a foot tall, and the DM explained that dropping prone was a free action.   So that little wall saved my ass, as I learned that I could get up to snipe the people at the ballistas and then drop behind cover.

[Ithamar]

My first 3.5 PC was a cleric... that PrC'ed into War Priest. 

My first 3.0 PC was a dwarf ranger... that TWF'ed with dwarven war axes.

And of course when I first started DM'ing I didn't understand (actually had never read) the rules about bonuses stacking.  So level 2 PC's were walking around in armor, drinking potions of Mage Armor before each battle, wielding shields and casting Shield, etc.

[Satori]

Rogue4/Bard8/Arcane trickster8.  Thankfully someone corrected me before I actually tried this.

[littha]

My first D&D character was a level 6 druid with natural spell... To me it seemed super obvious that it was better than all of the other classes in the players handbook, I even spent a while riding my horse animal companion and charging. My feats did include weapon proficiency(Lance) but for a first try it was pretty good.

My second character was significantly worse, Half Celestial Cleric 2. Took ancestral weapon and monkey grip... Still sorta rocked the rest of the party some how but yknow.

[Mooncrow]

My first D&D character was a level 6 druid with natural spell... To me it seemed super obvious that it was better than all of the other classes in the players handbook, I even spent a while riding my horse animal companion and charging. My feats did include weapon proficiency(Lance) but for a first try it was pretty good.

My second character was significantly worse, Half Celestial Cleric 2. Took ancestral weapon and monkey grip... Still sorta rocked the rest of the party some how but yknow.

Full casting can cover a multitude of sins^^

[littha]

Actually thinking about it the only time I have ever played a core character that wasn't druid/cleric/wizard was the first game of pathfinder I played with my friends (Who are super bad at optimisation). I played a barbarian that focused on throwing javelins at people and still managed to be basically the most important character in the group.

[SneeR]

I remember now:

Paladin with feats instead of spellcasting.
Ranks in intimidate, constantly pressing my luck with "interrogating" enemies Batman-style.
DM made me wait an extra level to get a Drakkensteed, so my ranks in ride were useless.
All the steeds I bought/found got scared in battle.
Only thing I did right was use a scythe with improved trip.

Of course, my party had a scout and a bard/duskblade/beguiler amalgamation. I was absolutely the damage dealer, though, sadly...

[McBeardly]

When I was still learning to play I thought the pieces of advice given by the writers in Sword and Fist and the other class books were good.

[SolEiji]

I had a character with a motorcycle and who was Str focused.  At some point I ended up using my motorcycle as an improvised weapon, then convinced my DM to allow me to make it a Motorcycle +3.  Good times, good times.