Posted June 14, 2020
kmonster: The problem is that after reading you only know that you don't know and cannot reliably plan ahead since it's unclear to which game if any from the series the numbers apply. The level 18+fighter thac0 numbers look just like fantasy numbers since they don't apply to any game, in combination with "This table varies by specific Gold Box games" the reader can't rely on anything.
It looks a bit like a "I know it but I won't tell you" mockery, doesn't fit to the depth of detail in other parts of your FAQ.
They do apply to a bunch of games; several apply the 2nd Edition rules. Pool/Curse both behave as if they're trying to do that, so that's what I wrote. It looks a bit like a "I know it but I won't tell you" mockery, doesn't fit to the depth of detail in other parts of your FAQ.
The Gold Box games also typically support THAC0 some distance above the level caps, and there are ways of getting around those. It doesn't take much hacking to train a fighter to level 18 in Secret of the Silver Blades; that fighter will have better base THAC0 than a level 40 fighter in Pools of Darkness, which suddenly has the level 17 cap rule from 1st Edition.
I left it this way partly because I didn't thoroughly check all of the other AD&D games; people do make decisions for other games not in this series based on what I write.