***Begin Part 5***
For Player's Eyes
33:  What books do I need in order to play?

A:  Technically, as a player, you need absolutely nothing.  Nada.  Zilch.  A
    pencil, paper, and dice certainly are useful, but can easily be borrowed;
    rules can be explained by the DM or more experienced players.
      However, it is usually easier to have a personal copy of the rules for 
    easy perusal in and outside of the gaming sessions.  To this end, it is 
    advisable to get the Players Handbook (preferrably the same edition which 
    the group is playing).  The Complete * Handbook for your character's 
    class may be a welcome addition, but is not really necessary.  Beyond 
    that, it is just personal preferences.  Nothing else is really needed, 
    despite what the promotional material TSR puts out may say; but some 
    people like having a little more than just the PH when they play.

34:  Is the use of poison automatically an evil act?

A:  If depends on how the DM rules.  Some DM's feel that use of poison is
    an inherently evil act, and its use by a character causes an alignment
    switch.  Others feel that, while it is not a particularly good act, it
    is not particularly evil, either, and can be used with caution.  Still
    others feel that poison is just a weapon, as is any other, and thus
    may be used by any and all characters without impunity.  There are
    equally persuasive arguments for any of these positions, and it is
    really best left to individual DM's.  Here to help with the decision are
    three of the various points of view.

      Poison is a cowardly way out of a situation.  It is best left to those
    who wish to skulk in the shadows and strike from afar.  It is also good
    for those people who like to make sure their enemies suffer horrible
    agonies before dying.  Since poison is essentially a tool for cowardly 
    bullies and torturers, it is a proper tool of those of evil alignment.  
    Everyone else should stay as far from it as possible.

      The use of poison is not inherently evil, but, by the same token, is
    not inherently good either.  Thus people who wish to stay pure should
    avoid its use, but any others don't have to worry much about how they
    accomplish an end.

      Poison is a weapon, just like any other.  Thus it can be used like
    any other weapon, whether to strike down otherwise-unreachable fiends,
    or to put an end to the overwhelming righteousness of a paladin, or to
    have a political superior suddenly leave his position vacant for the
    taking.  Poison may be used in much the same way as a sword, but has less 
    of a chance of maiming and is thus possibly more humane!  In any case,
    poison is just the tool--it is the heart behind the action which
    determines one's good or evil nature.
  

35:  What about slitting throats?  Anything else?

A:  Once again, this is really a decision for individual DM's.  However,
    there are hardly any situations where slitting a throat could be 
    considered a good act.  In most cases, it requires having an otherwise 
    helpless victim, one which good characters should be trying to reform or 
    turn over to the proper authorities for suitable punishment.  Killing 
    someone in cold blood, regardless of their past actions, is an action 
    which any character should seriously think twice about.  In the heat of 
    battle is one thing, but in cold blood (and especially if premeditated) 
    is something else altogether.  A character who consistently does this
    sort of thing should do some serious introspection on his outlook on
    life and consider an alignment change to something more suitable.
      Nevertheless, there are a few situations where slitting a throat might
    be a necessity.  Mercy killing is one, as the onset of death is quick.
    Dealing with guards who would otherwise raise an alarm is another, but
    more questionable one.  In either case, if the action does not
    haunt the character for a long while, then it is quite possible that the
    character is a closet sociopath, and therefore not of the intended
    alignment.

36:  Are all orcs inherently evil?  What about orc babies?

A:  This one is a tough ethical question, and one which many DM's like to
    through at their players.  After a party sacks an orcish camp and
    completely annihilates the entire adult male population, they are left
    with the women and children.  If they kill them, they are denying that
    orcs have any chance at all at redemption, regardless of whether or not
    the orc in question is a newborn.  If they do not kill the orcs, then
    the party is leaving behind a future horde of orcs who want revenge for
    the slaughter of their fathers.
      This is a perennial problem which each character must sort out on their
    own.  However, it is much easier for evil characters to make a decision
    than neutral, and somewhat easier for neutral than good; but knowing
    this does not make the decision simpler.
      One question which good characters should weigh in their minds: is it
    better for me to not kill in cold blood, or for the potential for
    future difficulties be taken care of while the solution is easily 
    accomplished?

37:  Can mages wear armor?

A:  This question has been endlessly debated.  First of all, if he is not
    casting spells, any mage can wear any armor he wants to, unless the
    armor in question is magic and only wearable by warriors, but that's
    a different story.
      The question arises when a mage attempts to cast spells while
    wearing armor.  While the rulebooks state that wizards may not wear
    armor while casting spells, many players do not like this rule, as lack
    of armor gets many a mage killed.  Here are several possible solutions
    to this situation:

    1) All mages may wear any armor, with no penalties, whatsoever.

    2) No mage may wear chain mail or better armor, due to the interference
       of the metal with magical energies.

    3) All mages may wear any armor, but doing so incurs a possible chance
       of failure.  The wizard must roll percentile dice to see if the spell
       successfully goes off.  The roll must be equal to or under 50% plus 
       twice the armor's armor class.  For example, a mage in chain mail
       must roll (50+(2x5)=60% or lower each time he casts a spell to see
       if the spell was successful.  If the roll is not successful, the
       spell fizzles.  For armors with negative AC, either the AC is doubled 
       and subtracted from 50 to find the target number, or, since anything
       better than 0 is enhanced armor anyway, just use 50% as the target
       number.

    4) All mages may wear any armor, but wearing any mass of metal causes
       the mage to check to see if a wild surge occurs every time he casts a
       spell, due to the interference of the metal with the magical energies.

    5) Fighter-mage dual- or multi-classed characters may cast spells in
       armor, as they have learned to move in armor and thus can make the
       necessary gestures to cast spells.

    6) Elvish chain can be worn by any wizard without penalizing spell-
       casting at all.  This may be due to either the mail's comfortability
       allowing easy movement or its inherent magical nature not disrupting
       magical energies.

38:  I don't like the spell memorization system for clerics & wizards...

A:  Take a number and get in line.  There are a seemingly endless list of 
    solutions to this "problem."  The ideas differ for clerics and wizards,
    though.
      For priests, the solution is simple.  Have the character pray for
    miracles, and let the DM decide which spells the cleric gets that day.
    Level doesn't matter, and the deity is seen to be more omniscient if it
    can provide in advance the spells which are most likely to be needed.
      For mages, there have been several good solutions posited.  One is to
    do away with the memorization time.  Another is to use some sort of mana
    point system.  A third is to let the mage cast any spell in his grimoire,
    without memorizing it first, but with a chance of spell failure.  There
    are an infinite number of variations on these and other themes.
      Rewriting the entire spell system is a task not fit for an FAQ, but it
    is not too difficult to construct your own based on the rough ideas
    above, or to just take a system from some other game and transplant it
    into your campaign.

39:  What does "Lawful/Neutral/Chaotic Good/Neutral/Evil" really indicate?

A:  Good/Netural/Evil should be fairly obvious, but Lawful/Neutral/Chaotic
    is often trickier to pin down.  The easiest way to remember it is that
    Law is more concerned with the letter of the law than with the people.
    Chaos can be anti-law, but it can also just not require set rules of
    conduct.  The PH contains a fairly decent description of the nine
    alignment's typical mindsets, but that is just the tip of the iceberg.
    There are so many variations on each alignment that it is very difficult
    for any two people to agree on even the vaguest definitions.

40:  Is alignment really necessary?

A:  For many people, no.  For just as many others, yes.  Alignment itself is 
    not meant as a straightjacket, but as a tool for playing the character.
    There are as many different ways of playing a LG character as there are
    LG characters, so the argument that the alignment system stifles
    creativity doesn't hold water.  However, there are just as many
    characters who don't fit any alignment whatsoever, and should not have
    an arbitrary label forced on them.  Whether or not to use alignments is a 
    question for the entire group to decide, and not one that should be
    handed down from above.

41:  But medieval combat wasn't anything like the way it is in D&D!

A:  You're right!  Congratulations, kid; you win the kewpie doll.  The
    combat system in *D&D is a gross simplification of real combat, designed
    to streamline the process of determining the outcome of such a situation.
    Many arguments about the reality of such-and-such a weapon's speed,
    damage, use, size, etc. are often seen on rec.games.frp.dnd, usually
    based on personal observations and/or on SCA tournaments.  One thing to
    keep in mind is that this is just a game; it is not real life.  It is
    not meant to be extremely realistic.  There are other, more detailed
    combat systems out there in other games, several of which take hours to
    determine one simple combat.
      The best thing to do, in any case, is find a system which the group
    prefers to use and stick with that.  If the group doesn't feel like
    taking the time to learn a new system, then the current one still works
    just fine for thousands of players, especially with a few house rules
    to customize it to the specific campaign.

***End Part 5***