what he meant is if you want to restore with firmware 4.2.1 on an iphone 3g with 6.15.00 baseband then you MUST use custom firmware 4.2.1 and NOT stock firmware 4.2.1

It worked! Thanks again Olethros for all your help. I'm currently running 4.1(8B117) on 06.15.00 baseband. Just some more info about the restore/jailbreak/unlock in case it helps you guys or anyone else out there. When option+restoring to 4.1 the process would repeatedly freeze at "preparing iphone for restore", I tried it three times with no luck and then tried booting up the older library on my external hard drive to try the process there and SHABAM! Unlocked.

Truly I can't thank you enough, I don't have much but considering you all saved my phone for me I'll definitely be donating to the site. Thanks again!