Cause, i have a bought and patched copy of rpg maker xp for the pc, and am having tremendous trouble finding a beginners guide online. i've searched google, etc., but to no avail. so if it isn't against the rules of this site, any one mind pointing me in the right direction? on a side note, i plan on buying rpg maker 3 once it comes out.

Well, since you bought XP, we don't have a problem with you. However, I don't personally know of a beginner's guide for the game.

I also own a legit copy of RMXP. If you need any help, I might be able to help. So long as it's not something like "what do all the battle system stats do", as I have yet to fiddle with any of that.

(On a side note, here's hoping that when I get a new computer and get the net connection required at my new home, I'll be able to still use the darn thing.)

cool, I'll keep that in mind. here's the story idea i'm working with:
Main Characters:
Cass Bahn- Age 17, daughter of the insane Duke Bahn.
Ran away from home 2 days prior to the start of the game. Her mother died of the Sleeping Sickness when she was 15. Her father started losing his mind as a result. He became paranoid, and started seeing threats everywhere (he never accepted that his wife died as a result of sickness, insisting that she was murdered). Finally, he began to suspect his own daughter. Her brother stood up to the Duke Bahn, demanding that the insanity stop, after Cass was forced to become a maid by her father. Zane, her brother, and heir apparent to the duchy dies under charges of treason. Cass doesn't find out for another week. Finally, she understands the depths of her father's insanity. No one is safe close to him. He must be stopped, before he kills everyone, but in her present condition, she has no way of doing that. She flees the castle. Two days later, she meets Raihne.

Raihne Ceem- age 20 ,
Lives in the Bahn Forest. He is a former soldier out of the State Wars, that established the current boundries, three years past. He joined the army at the age of 14, out of a sense of nationalism, and fought for his city Shantum (hometown). As most soldiers do, he came to hate war, and the atrocities that went along with it. He quit the first chance he got. He was 17. For the next year or so, he worked in Shantum as an agent for an underground society known only as the Brotherhood. After a particularly gruesome mission, he quit the Brotherhood, and decided he was entirely fed up with the world he lived in, and all its corruption, cruelty, and inhumanity. He spent the next 2 years hiding from both the Brotherhood’s assasins, and the rest of the world. Cass’s arrival in the forest reminded him of his duty to the people, which he took upon himself when he became a soldier. He had spent his life running from those oaths, vows, and promises. But does he want to pay up?

Esan Nasciya- age 23,
Lives in the tiny village of Headholm. 5 years earlier, he lost 2 friends to an ill-fated hunting (prologue). One was his best friend Rote, who began to act strange upon finding a ruby-like jewel shaped like a lion’s claw. Minutes later, a boar charged, and mauled his other friend, John. While John lay dying on the forest floor, Rote, who seemed to be having a fit, attacked Esan. The pair dueled, with Esan coming out as the victor. He wounded Rote, who promptly screamed and ran into the thicket. John was dead before Esan got back to his side. He never saw Rote again. Now, Esan is the town blacksmith; an accomplished man with a wife, and child. But he still hasn’t gotten over the incidents of a half-decade past. He still keeps the jewel they found that day as a reminder of the events that transpired. When Raihne and Cass arrive in his village, looking for Rote, he joins them.

Rote Dousa- age 24,
location unknown. After the mysterious events surrounding his disappearance, Rote began to surface in towns and cities, and following him was chaos, and a new religion, with him at its head. Preaching the arrival of a god, he arrived in the New Bahn Keep two years ago. A week after the conversion of the populous, and his departure, the Lady Bahn succumbed to the sleeping sickness, and died a month later. He still bears the scar from his wound, and a deep hatred for the man he believes to have destroyed his old life: Esan Nasciya. His church now is in control of all the various states in the world. The construction of a basilica in his honor is under construction in the, now commonly accepted, world capital: Cindentin, located in the center of the south eastern part of the main continent, Aresia. If Rote is actually there, its not known. But travelers aren’t allowed into Cindentin, supposedly because of the holiness of the basilica under construction, and how it shouldn’t be despoiled by the footsteps of the impure. All other religions have been made illegal by Church law. Church agents scour the known world for a certain jewel, ruby-like in appearance, and shaped like a lion’s claw.

I'll post a brief summary a little later.

Sounds interesting.