I could never understand how, when told *nothing* more than to roll percentile, a person would make an angry grab for their backpack, start pulling out books and start a misguided argument.

sounds like your problem is with assholes at the table, not with power-gamers. I'll tell you this: RP-ers can be just as bad when they try to hog all the attention to their 50-page back-story about some edgelord they wrote and expect DM to cater to ad nauseam. and throw a temper tantrum if their character dies.

It is a matter of what the focus of play is. I have played with both, I prefer to play with statistical players as the "role players" I have played with tended to completely disregard the rules and systems claiming that freedom of expression was far more important than the "game" aspect. The result was often more of a LARPing session than an actual game. I had a friend who played Vampire in the early days. The extent of "game play" was that of doing "ro sham bo" to resovle conflicts while the rest of the session was play acting their characters. To each their own, but imo that is less of a game and more of just a themed drama club.

I have also had some "role play" types play with my statistical friends and they objected to being held to the rules. For instance they got angry that the DM drowned their character because they jumped off a ship into the bay in fullplate armor. The claimed the rules were irrelevant and that the point of AD&D was to experience the interaction of roles, not lament over "stupid restricting rule systems".

So both sides certainly are capable of playing to the theme of the other (I knew some who played a paladin to the complete letter of the system without straying and did so while never breaking out of character, even when we took a break from play to grab a bite to eat).

For me personally, I dislike the play acting, it isn't my thing. I speak in 3rd person consistently in play and the game is treated more as a statistical board game with a story of interaction. I don't play with the non-statistical players who think rule systems get in the way of play and I certainly don't agree that a cRPG is a game of such nature, being that a cRPG is much closer to that of a board game in its concept than that of a role interqaction game (which as I said, adventure games seem to be closer to in nature). If you look to most cRPGs, they are very rule centric, very focused on the systems, the combat, etc.... and I think we can safely say that Pathfinder leans more to the "rules" focused game of AD&D than most versions of AD&D.

I find myself somewhere in the middle. I enjoy RP unless it gets in the way of a game too much(I don't think full session of going around and talking with pretty much no dice rolled is a good thing). And I do believe in creative aspect of pnp RPG's. I do however think that players should agree to a framework they play in and not to subvert the rules. PC's should die if they are unlucky or dumb. Verisimilitude is important and deus ex machina that suddenly saves them is not something I would like. At the same time I am all for DM winging it without referring to a book about some obscure mechanics of the game. It can be looked up later for education, but flow of the game is more important.

In short, I usually treat the game as having two distinct parts. out-of-combat where you RP voice-act , fool around and all that and combat/crisis where it turns into a "wargame" - no fooling around there.

I never saw any such thing as that (though everyone who lost a character they had for a while was upset). Maybe it's a new thing. I was rping in the 70s and early 80s. It does sound like the stuff that people on the internet like to be outraged about, though.

Here is your problem. If you have to rely on high dice rolls to win you are doing it wrong. this game is essentially a number-crunching puzzle or tactical puzzle. If you ignore both parts of the puzzle and just randomly fiddle with it it is understandable why you are not having fun. It does not invalidate your opinion by any means, just explains why this game might not be for you.

PS. Nok-Nok is a wonderful little fella. love that guy.

yeah... I am useless when it comes to numbers. I think if I had played D&D growing up it wouldnt be as daunting.

I do think people saying "this game is bad" is a frustrated opinion. It isn't bad. Just not for everyone.

Are the kingdom events controlable dice roll wise? I have been failing way more than i have been succeeding. I put all "good" alignment characters does that have something to do with it? Or is it luck/leveling up? My kingdom is "troubled" but i've been dong everything I can. (I know this is completely off topic but i dont want to start a new topic)

I haven't gotten Nuk-Nuk yet... or did i kill him?

kingdom management is a bit of a mess and is real hard for non-lawful characters as a those get access to bulletin board that gives +2 to all problem-solving checks in the region. And it expects you to manage your time leveling advisors/exploring near perfectly. I can agree they put DC's and time needed for promoting advisors too high there. You can negate most of the problems with gold injections, buying BP and throwing 1000GP events to the poor. afaik the kingdom part is meant to be a gold sink and was not meant to be self-sustainable for the 1st part of the game to be able to have good economy late so you won't need to buy BP by then. after bulletin boards you should keep attention to +X to solving Y problems in the region buildings as that gives immediate results, unlike stats.

Advisor Alignment mainly affects what solutions they offer to problems. If you disagree with them too much they will leave the position, but that's about it. Having Harrim as a priest will not harm your lawful-good kingdom as much as you'd think. those extra points he has on solving problems though will have a tangible effect.

and as for number-crunching part of combat there is my guide somewhere near that is made exactly for new players like yourself so they avoid gimping themselves and can enjoy the tactical part of the game, while they are getting used to the system.

Nok-Nok is a goblin fella from the goblin camp. I think event to get him starts when season of the bloom quest starts.

Yes, I also think this is one of the best RPGs ever. With all the bugs and balance issues. I honestly think it's better than all IE games.

I think it would have been even better with combat system similar to ToEE, but that's just my personal preference for turn based combat.

Anyway, I wonder how many people actually played BG 1 when it came out and know all the issues it have. Great game, but the beginning was pretty slow, anyone remember having 1-level character running around that many enemies can one shot with ease? Or fake animations that developers added to avoid characters standing idle for majority of turn? It wasn't that buggy, though :)

I have a total rush at the moment, going through the plaque storyline! After fighting endless really bad enemies, loosing someone and now in this weird area... which looks like a point of no return...

The quests are brilliant, thrilling, not too much information given but enough to go on.

I have to say though, I use 25% of the event/project time and recently also made it so I do not need to attend to Kingdom tasks (still need to travel back to the main city). And I changed it now to tripple experience (current level ~10) with overall normal difficulty, but 100% enemy damage and no info about the enemy.