Okay I am going to make an online game for RPG Maker XP or VX.
I need to know the benefits and drawbacks of each.
Does one have hosting for you? i.e. I don't have to pay for a site or anything?
I already own both XP and VX.
I need some help with this decision.
and I know about needing to learn a program language. Please stay on or at least close to the topic.

If you want to make an online game, don't use RPG Maker period. I would suggest Torque, as it's very powerful and not that expensive (99$). It obviously requires more experience that RM (this includes programming experience, yes) but the fact is, you will never, ever, complete a MMO with RPG Maker. The only one who got close to do it is Wyatt with Vengeance, and he ended up with making it PHP-based instead.
There's also Charlie Fleed with Hartacon, but it an Arena game, and Charlie is an experienced programmer.

I'd strongly advise that if you plan to make an MMO that you learn a real programming language.

@kread-Can I get some links where to get it at or more info on it. Thanks that was ...close to what I asked.

@Vanit-recommendations?

I've actually only just started learning networked games programming myself and I'm writing the clients in actionscript3 with Flash and I use Electroserver as the server. I recommend you start from the ground up with maybe Java though and go from there once you can program a text based game.

A link to what? Torque? Here: http://www.garagegames.com/. This engine uses a proprietary language by the way, and it isn't particularily easy, so if you are a beginner in programming, maybe it isn't for you yet. Note that even Torque might not be the ideal engine for a MMO; Eclipse may be a good choice as well.
Personally, the only MMO I've worked on has been coded from scratch in C++, with Irrlicht as a 3D engine, so I'm not that knowedgeable on the various engines available out there; but what I do know is that RPG Maker is a really bad idea.

Vanit has a point, as, for training purpose, starting to learn Java to create a browser MMO, even if only text-based, is a good idea.

Java is a good first language to start with. I'm learning it myself. Anyone would suggest getting The Java Tutorial to start with.
Also, if you want my opinion, I wouldn't make a very liner MMO with servers and everything. I'd go along the line of letting people download the server software and setting up their own servers, like what Minecraft does. Then maybe set up an official server list so people could join servers from that list. Not only do you not have to worry about maintaining a server for the game (excluding the website, which is easier than maintaining a gaming server), but people will be more free and not have to worry about putting up with players, they could just move to another server. For this it'd probably be best to keep the player's inventory in a master server, unless you want it to be unique every server.

But that's just how I'd make an online game, I don't know anything about your game or how you want it. I'm just saying, that way it's way easier and cheaper to maintain rather than just running big servers for players, who will complain if the server's down for even a second. This way there's no blood on your hands.

I think he has a long way to go before he can begin to consider what kind of server architecture he wants.

Pff, yeah, that's true. I just usually have the habit of writing all that stuff alongside the game's story script.

Speaking from experience, here's a few things you might want to try for a modern online RPG:

• LAMP as server
• Drupal as the community platform
• RPG module (there is one that coul be expanded)
• Custom PHP code

We have found the RPG module to be better suited for an adventure type game or more of a text MUD. So we had to create our own modules (in PHP) for the RPG stats, equipment, etc. The games are instanced and are working on a custom C++ game server that we've outsourced to a good C++ programmer. The game client (for battles) is HTML5/Canvas.

So you can create a basic RPG with just the RPG module. You can make it visual with Flash or HTML5. You can add more complex skills and actions with a custom server (c++ or python).