Well this will essentially a beginners guide to first playing the game. It undoubtedly will look like a lot of text but I assure you, it's easier than reading the entire books. Which...I recommend you do anyway

NUMERO UNO
WHAT IS DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS, Mr. Si_l_nub sir?

Well ya see kiddos. Dungeons and Dragons is normally a tabletop structured and ruled, roleplaying medeival adventure game. Sander has gone through the trouble of adapting it to the internet for your entertainment. Be thankful.

But yeah Roleplaying. This means you make a character based on the rules of whatever campaign you enter. Then you take on the persona of that character. That character can be one of endless and possibly infinite combinations of Abilities, Skills, Feats, Classes, and styles which will be explained later.

Then you take this character, you join other people's characters to form a party, or a group of adventurers, and then you go on adventures. That are defined by the DM who will be covered later.

NUMERO DOS
HOW R THIS GAME PLAYED?

Well let's start off first by introducing the structure of the game. The makers of the game had to find a way to balance freedom of movement, defined rules, and customization. In my opinion, v3.5 perfected this balance.

Now the game is made and ruled over by the DM, or DUNGEON MASTER. He is god of your game-world. He runs all that is and will be in the world of your game besides you. He created that world. He created and controlled the creatures in that world. He controls the story-line. The map, the Nonplayer Characters, the creatures, the cities, EVERYTHING. He essentially runs your game without controlling you. He presents you with situations and allows our character to make a choice.

It is the DMs job to keep the game running smoothly without overlimiting what your characters can do. For example, if you walk into a bar and a man calls you over to ask you to do something for him, you are not required to walk over to that man and do his quest. You can pretend he doesn't exist. Hell, you can go on a killing spree for all I care (Though I wouldn't recommend it because as with real life, the cities do have law enforcers that will stop and/or kill you).

NUMERO TRES
WHAT AM I 'SPOSED TO DO here

1. Pick a campaign to join if you've never played before, preferably one that is just starting out, or one designed for beginners.

2. Make the type of character you want to use for that campaign.

3. Post it in the Character list forum

4. GO GO GO, when the campaign starts.

Other things to do include
-Arena, PvP or Player vs Player battles
-...That's really it...What more do you want?


NUMERO CUATRO
BUT I NO IS KNOW HOW TO MAKE A CHARACTER!

As well as I think we did adapting the Dungeons and Dragons rules to online play. You will need at the very least, a players handbook to play. I would recommend the Dungeon Masters Guide as well for some Prestige Class information so you can plan ahead.

But when making a character for the first time, it's best to have someone walking you through it while you tell them "this r what I wantz" so they can tell you what's in or out of the rules.

For 3.5 you can also follow Sander's Character Creation guide.
Located in this Link

If you want to play 4.0 that I am DMing currently (despite the lack of people) there is a character creation program made by the nice people at Wizards of the Coast. That is linked in my Character Creation guide in the 4.0 Forum
Thar it be
Also in that topic is a link to a torrent that contains most of the 3.5 DnD books as eBooks, which means you can access them on Adobe Reader or another reading program. It is incredibly useful to have them as data.
If you need more information on torrenting or the Character Creation Program, contact me.

NUMERO CINCO
WHY ARE THESE NUMBERS IN SPANISH!?!?

Because I felt like it

NUMERO SEIS
FINE. BUT HOW R THIS GAME PLAYED SOME MORE!?

Well as you should know by now, the DM is your game god, enemy, referree and such. But you are the player. So what do you do? You play.

You can do a variety of things in DnD. Travel, Adventure, Conquer dungeons, Assassinate nobleman, take jobs, do quests. Hell you can conquer a city should you gather an army, or your character ends up that godlike in the end.

Now the game is played by taking turns with the other players to do stuff.
Typically out of combat, a turn at most is five minutes. Except in the case of entire party long distance travel. In combat, your turn is 6 seconds.

NUMERO SIETE
WHAT CAN I DO OUT OF COMBAT!?

Don't interrupt me again or I will stop this tutorial now. Out of combat you can do a variety of things to prepare, like shopping, preparing divine spells, or sleep. You can gather story information from Non player characters controlled by DM. Hell you could team up with another player whose good at forgery, break into someone's house, replace all the locks, destroy any evidence of them living there, and forge a deed that claims the house belongs to you. Surely you'll go to court in DnD which is something I've yet to see but would find quite hilarious.

Essentially out of Combat=Story, Preparations, Shopping, Roleplaying, anything else.

NUMERO OCHO
SO WHAT CAN I DO IN COMBAT!?

Combat turns are described by the rules as roughly 6 seconds (give or take). You get typically, 1 Move Actions, 1 Minor Action, 1 Major Action and Many Free Actions.

But first allow me to paste a very useful section from the book here.

"PG133 How Combat Works

Combat in the D&D game is cyclical; everybody acts in turn in a
regular cycle of rounds. Combat follows this sequence:

1. Each combatant starts out flat-footed. Once a combatant
acts, he or she is no longer flat-footed.

2. The DM determines which characters are aware of their
opponents at the start of the battle. If some but not all of the
combatants are aware of their opponents, a surprise round
happens before regular rounds of combat begin. The
combatants who are aware of the opponents can act in the
surprise round, so they roll for initiative. In initiative order
(highest to lowest), combatants who started the battle aware of
their opponents each take one action (either a standard action
or a move action) during the surprise round. Combatants
who were unaware do not get to act in the surprise round. If
no one or everyone starts the battle aware, there is no
surprise round.

3. Combatants who have not yet rolled initiative do so.
All combatants are now ready to begin their first regular
round of combat.

4. Combatants act in initiative order (highest to lowest).

5. When everyone has had a turn, the combatant with
the highest initiative acts again, and steps 4 and 5 repeat
until combat ends"

That is a great section to understand how combat starts.

Honestly, there is too much about combat for me to summarize in here because to be honest, it is all important, I recommend you just read the combat chapter on this one.

TO BE CONTINUED