Refer to my #5 question. The current value of the location will not show up in a LD command even when online. You can open a dataview, fill it with V3000 and make sure to turn on the status, to see what value is stored there dynamically.
The format of the number is up to your project.
Please refer to my intro on AD
http://www.theplcguy.com/ABtoAD/Introduction.htm especially the section on numeric types. Note that the BCD or standard integer form can occupy one location (which would nead a LD command) or in a double word (32 bits) format which would require an LDD command. The LD commands don't care what the format of the number is. They either bring 16 bits into the accumulator (LD) or 32 bits consisting of the referenced 'V' location and the following one (LDD). By the way this is a 'little-endian" storage whic means that for a 32 bit value the least significant 16 bits are in the lower numbered 'V' register.