Why was D&D 3.5 so bad?
It wasnt, it was the ogl that let people make splat books daily
Why do butthurt folk always make reactionary threads?
If your intention in making a thread or post is to spite someone, you're really doing everyone a disservice, yourself included.
Too many rules, too many tables, too much carried over from previous editions that didn't fit this one, too much new stuff added that was terrible.
I started with 3.5 and after working my way backwards, I kept realizing, "Oh, so THAT'S why that was there!" even though whatever "that" is makes less sense in 3.5 and they should have scrapped it.
Too many books adding traps that turned out to be much worse than just refluffing the base classes in the core manuals, HP bloat in encounters that was just a way for martials to be irrelevant while save or die ruled high level play, giving some classes a ridiculous amount of skill points so you couldn't do shit besides the one you were supposed to be good at, but really weren't.
>its balls-to-the-wall magic item economy
>the FUCKING bonus-stacking rules
>overabundance of classes and prestige classes with large gaps in power between many of them
>and some of those classes can't even properly perform the job they're supposed to
>the ability for some caster classes to functionally replace non-caster classes
>its *horrific* statblock layout for NPCs
>>44452000
It was a byzantine mess with no eye to class balance and a CCG mentality towards trap options.
>>44452093
>dat projection
>>44452000
Too many people had fun with it despite its flaws. Few here will stand for such nonsense.
>>44452222
>the FUCKING bonus-stacking rules
This is one of the things that is pushing me away from the game--if I have to add 3 different +1s on top of the usual two modifiers, then think "oh, wait, I forgot Point Blank Shot again", something needs to be streamlined.
It doesn't help that 'optimized' play revolves heavily around buffs, which have all different durations to keep track of, some situational perks that you'll forget about, and are a bitch to remember in general.
I much prefer games that streamline that sort of thing these days. Exalted 3e is still pretty damn math-heavy and fiddly, but stacking dice is so much easier and you don't have to worry about goddamn buff durations when they're generally Scene-long.
It wasn't.
Or well, it kinda was.
What really fucked it up was Core being horribly balanced along with the perception by many players that using splat content might make it MORE unbalanced, despite the complete opposite being true.
>>44452438
If you're playing with friends, you'll have fun regardless of how shit the game is.
Of course, you wouldn't know.
Give no shits about the edition/system drama that gets reposted around here every week.
What I am looking for is something for fighter I saw years back. A alternative or add on to bonus feats for fighter where they got some form of stances or something that focused on maneuverability, defense and offense or something and grey with level like combat styles for ranger.
Been a bitch to find and this seems like the best place to ask as no one post 3.5 threads that are not bait or filled with people complaining anymore.
>>44452000
Bloat. Too many situational rules. Too many broken spells. To much ridiculous number inflation. Too much bonus stacking. Too many broken class options.
It was all just too much.
Oh castor supremacy.
>>44454489
>Bloat was the problem with 3.5
This is so utterly fucking wrong.
3.5 was NEVER more broken than when it there were only 3 books.
The fact that casters got marginally more broken because of splats matters so much less than the fact that splats also brought martials out of living in the complete fucking gutter.
Splats raised casters from 85% to 95%
Splats raised martials from 15% to 50%
>>44454604
OP didn't ask it was *broken*, he asked why it was *bad*.
Later supplements tried to fix class balance but it only turned it from a broken but playable game to a functional bad game. It was adding the Band-Aid onto of a Band-Aid.
>>44454760
But it was bad to begin with and splats made it marginally less bad.
Sure you had to read a lot of bullshit which was a bother, but the actual play experience improved, unless all you wanted in the first place was to play Caster: The Castening
>>44454842
> it was bad to begin with
Now that I can agree with, but I'd reckon it was bloated on arrival as well. It had the crust of three decades worth the rules on it.
Monte Cocks
>>44455196
Monty cook as an impressive track record of other games under his belt which while not a fan of not personally are not noticeably flawed.
He may have coined trap options but he didn't invent them.
>>44454317
Book of Nine Swords, but it was done better in Pathfinder with the third party Path of War system.
>>44452000
3.0 worked as a decent dungeon-crawling game and was clearly balanced around it. 3.5 tried to make the game more cinematic and failed around it while keeping the mechanics of 3.0, which did not work at all for the new framework.
>>44452000
Better question, why 4rryes keep bringing the old war up? Let go nigger, there's 5th now.
Do we need to have this thread every day now?
>>44459663
We need it twice daily. It distracts those who cannot into pattern recognition so they shitpost here instead of elsewhere. One for why 3.5e was terrible and one for why it was great.
>>44452000
It had some good ideas, but often executed them poorly. The saving throw categories, for instance, make sense, but the actual numbers are fucked up, allowing casters to overcome weak saves too easily, and not progressing in the way they did in old school D&D, where high-level saves being easy to make helped to counterbalance growing caster power.
Also, while the level of detail for any particular part of the game was probably okay when taken alone, it turned into a bloated mess when you took everything together. At the very least, this should've become apparent in playtesting, resulting in the system being pared down and simplified, even if they didn't take a radically new approach with it.
There's too much in the game based either on what makes sense from a simulationist perspective or on what seems cool, with too little careful consideration for game balance and facility of play.
>>44452000
DESU, it wasn't bad per-se, you're just looking at it as a role-playing game, which in my opinion, it isn't. 3.PF is a character optimization puzzle game, and a DAMN GOOD ONE at that.
The only hitch is that you have to play the sub-par role-playing game to see how well you did at the optimization puzzle game.
>>44452000
>It wasnt, it was the ogl that let people make splat books daily
Sorry man, but core was easily the most broken part.
>>44459663
There are still some butthurt 4rries that haven't gotten the message yet they lost the editions wars bad and that their MMO is dead and buried; and thus they must shitpost in the vain hope of denying reality rather than face it, deal with it and go on with their lives.
>>44459620
>bringing the old war up? Let go nigger, there's 5th now.
>Implying 5e is noticably different from 3e, 3.5, or PF
You must have played a LOOOOOOOT of OGL games to think that any of those 4 games are different in any meaningful way. Each is a minor variation on largely the same game, barely warranting a free-to-download Updates-PDF, much less a full game.
>>44460709
>Boo hoo my game is better than yours so I'm a better person
You 3aboos are pathetic.
>>44452315
>projection
Dude, we have this thread every day, sometimes the same thread twice a day, and every day ends in 3aaboos fighting 3haters, no, is not projection, these threads are made to spite people and nothing else.
>People mad that magic beats all
It's the most realistic fantasy system out there
>>44459620
5e isn't that good either, sure, is an improvement from 3.5, but almost anything is. Like any D&D edition ever it needs a more than competent GM to work.
>>44460709
As a proud 4e fan, you misunderstand what exactly we're upset about.
> their MMO is dead and buried
Honestly, not really. What exists of 4e is already perfect, like Firefly, and much like Firefly, I don't want more seasons. Honestly, I wish it'd ended earlier, because towards the end, the (admitedly slower than 3.5 but still present) power escalation had begun to become noticeable.
What DOES upset us is that, instead of inovating, even in a way that's drastically different from 4e, 5e is just 3.51.
I can't speak for others, but if it'd moved forward in a way I didn't like, but that was new, I'd be happy for the medium, but that's not what it did. 5e is just more OGLd20, and it's proof that D&D has become the EA games of TTRPG, pumping out the exact same game over and over, with merely a face-lift and a new number.
>>44452222
>its *horrific* statblock layout for NPCs
pcs and monsters being built the same way was one of the best things about 3e
>>44459620
because 5e does not have enough content to war about
its not an edition its the framework of an edition its been a year and we dont even have a manual of the planes or dieties and demigods to show for it.
>>44460709
even as a 3e fag the idea that 4e played like an mmo was retarded.
>>44452000
Ivory tower game design.
>>44461207
You are an idiot
>>44461207
>pcs and monsters being built the same way was one of the best things about 3e
>one of the best things about 3e
>best
That's a strange way to spell worst
>>44452000
It was written by Satan. Festering hatred and permanent damage's only what you'd expect, really.
>>44452222
At least they substantially improved the layout of statblocks in later splats.
Arguably came 4 years too late though.
>>44452000
The idea that players should "research" the game, learning to differ bad choices from good ones, first ones being the most common, instead of trying to make all choices different but entirely equal in interest of playing. This isn't mark of RPG game; this is a mark of character creation game, with creator of most optimised build being victorious.
>>44461313
i dont know what the worst part of 3e but the first bad part that always springs to mind for me was the lack of rules for fighting on narrow beams and shit
i want to be able to shoot people off high tightropes/get such a high balence score that people cant shoot me off tightropes
as for the monster stats its great because it makes it extremely simple to have exciting exotic races
it also ensured that players would get the same benefit from a template as monsters would so you dont have things like a massive imbalance in player/npc lich power
>>44461397
I don't necessarily see that as a weakness
I still feel like the greatest strength of 3.5 is the crazy shit the stupid rules let you get away with, even outside of spellcasting, especially outside of spellcasting
>>44452000
...The irony.
I remember the 4th ed edition wars. Everyone agreed ADnD was crap, but 3.5 was the bomb and 4th was Satan's shit-jizz.
How times change...
>>44461449
>Everyone agreed
Are you fucking mental?
Why do you think there were edition wars in the first place?
>>44461443
>I don't necessarily see that as a weakness
You think that content bloat and class imbalance isn't a weakness?
>>44461397
I disagreed
I'm the kind of person who loved and still loves to slam my head into RPG books for hours and smack numbers together to see what I could make, so this aspect of 3.5 was great for me.
Granted it's certainly not great for players that DON'T care about that kind of shit, but I don't see "inaccessible" and "bad" as the same thing.
>>44461465
I see class inbalance as a weakness, but not content bloat.
I don't like the idea of their being "correct" or "incorrect" builds, but I love being able to optimize for silly things, like dealing more damage to my attackers than my attackers do to me when they attack me on their turn, or attacking 20 times every turn I get, or throwing a fuckton of katanas to maximize iaijutsu focus bonus
>>44461397
I abandoned 3.PF years ago, and it still feels weird when I can read a rulebook in an afternoon and know everything there is to know about a system.
The level of system mastery required for d20 is completely insane, and I didn't realize it until I stopped playing it.
>>44461449
You are delusional.
>>44461486
>>44461492
Okay, we just want different things out of RPGs then. I am not interested in theorycraft and optimizing. Reading and analyzing book for hours, looking for best combinations of classes and class options and feats and stats isn't interesting to me. And situation when my character is totally redundant in play due to other characters being optimized isn't selling game for me at all. That is that was bad in 3.5 for me personally, and why I never could got into system entirely.
>>44452000
I don't think it was bad. It definitely had some weak points, but it was and still is a fine game.
Powerlevel gap between strong and weak options was really big, so you had to know what you were doing not to screw up fun for everyone. Sometimes wording was terrible. But it had more meaningful choices than any other game around and you could play exactly the character you wanted to play. It was much more about fine tuning than about balance.
>>44461528
>tfw I moved from 3.5 to Shadowrun and things only got worse.
It may not have any real splatbook bloat, but the mental effort required to fully understand all the sub-systems of Shadowrun to the level required to just run a game is fucking ridiculous.
It doesn't help that the core rulebook is somehow worse laid out than the 3.5 core rulebooks.
>>44461577
For the record, I'm not saying all games require less work and system mastery than 3.PF. No way.
>>44461556
I completely understand the objection.
The real bugbear of 3.5 is that the party basically NEEDS to have some kind of agreement about what "power level" you're going for before starting character creation, a conversation that requires an unreasonably high level of system mastery to even have in the first place.
Some of the best RPG campaigns of my life have been 3.5 games where everyone agreed to settle in the middle of the power curve, and some of the worst campaigns I've ever had were games where there was no kind of agreement between players.
>>44461640
Yeah, it's fine if there's one new player, the rest of the party can build around what the new player builds, but with more than one new players a lot of coaching is needed
>>44461640
>party basically NEEDS to have some kind of agreement about what "power level" you're going for before starting character creation, a conversation that requires an unreasonably high level of system mastery to even have in the first place
That's the point of my original post: 3.5 REQUIRES system mastery, in one ways than one: to create character, to design the game, to design the party, etc. It's pretty hard to get into, and then after that you can still play only in genre of dungeon fantasy. I would look at this more favorably if 3.5 was generic universal, like Fate ot GURPS, but it isn't.
>>44452000
It wasn't.
It was simply the most popular of its times, and so a lot of people decided that they don't really like it. Many others learned how to break it, so now everybody knows how inbalanced it was in certain aspects. Funnily enough it's not worse in the balancing aspects than other p&p games (I've seen gamebreaking characters in Shadowrun, Exalted, RT etc.) it's just that everybody and their mother knows (or at least - was told so) how imbalanced the game is.
It's also been 12 years since it was released (15 since 3ed) . It might not be a lot of time, but due to sudden increase of tg popularity, a lot of people thought about what tabletop games should and shouldn't be like. This means that now we know more about what works and what doesn't - something 3rd ed devs had less of.
Besides, 3.5 evolved from 'crawls and so is best suited for playing them. It relies on DM to create social/ exploring challenges that won't be solved with a single roll of dice, which bothers some people.
>>44460842
>This
>>44452000
It's interesting how the "Why was D&D 3.5 so good?" threads seem to get more replies than these ones.
>>44461775
People relish being able to tell other people that they're entirely wrong, so it's only natural
>>44452000
Lack of testing and balancing. That's it.
They should have created a format where everything can be slotted into "power categories" then populated them accordingly. This way at a glance people can tell exactly how powerful a spell or ability is. Then they should have used it so every core class was perfectly balanced in power.
With that foundation the splat books would have been fucking golden. Even if they made broken classes both DM's and players could at a glance tell exactly how powerful they were and act accordingly.
The splats and the choices made the game. The number of possible combinations is what made it good. The sheer complexity you can chose to have is perfect. They just needed a foundation to order the chaos.
>>44452315
>shitposting this hard.
>>44452685
The worst part about the modifier rules was how bonuses of the same type didn't stack, and many times it felt completely arbitrary what type of bonus a particular feat or item gave, making it unnecessarily complicated to add bonuses onto rolls. Just the fact that there are different types of bonuses to begin with is bizarre in itself.
>>44463750
I understand what they were going for, they were trying to limit bonuses going insanely high by grabbing heaps of the same type of bonus, but it was poorly done
I love how desperately people want 5e to suck. It's faster, easier to learn, easier to GM, and easier to homebrew than 3.5 and 4e is only easier to GM. It's also much more lethal, which is something D&D has had a major problem with 3e on.
It's not innovative or a new direction, it's a fun game that condenses the best parts of d20. And thank God 3 year campaigns are dead with 5e too, 1-15 takes a year at a leisurely pace.
>>44464062
Define "suck".
Because it already sucks, even if it has a moderate commercial success (considering the fact that it has almost no releases besides the core).
>>44463786
Yes, in the end it became "try to stack as many different sources as possible". As a guy once put it, a collectible bonus game.
>>44460869
> 5e isn't that good either, sure, is an improvement from 3.5, but almost anything is. Like any D&D edition ever it needs a more than competent GM to work.
Sorry if this is a stupid question, but seeing all these edition wars around, which edition of D&D actually IS good then?
I'm only familiar with editions 2e and 3e, but they seem to have filled the niche of dungeon-crawling and adventuring quite nicely.
This is not trolling. I have not played these games very much, I'm honestly curious.
>>44464062
>It's also much more lethal, which is something D&D has had a major problem with 3e on.
Depends, anon.
I have the highest pc death count with 2e and 4e, respectively. Healing in battles being inherently limited in 4e meant that if the fight dragged on, or you got hurt bad early on, you were in all kinds of fucking trouble.
>>44452000
The devs misunderstanding the core math of the system, along with the viability of class abilities feats and skills compared to magic, which could replicate all of the above.
>>44464221
All editions of D&D are very flawed games.
>>44464062
5E is more lethal when it comes to monsters killing PCs but it's definitely not more lethal the other way around.
Rolled 14, 1, 1, 3, 14, 18, 19, 17, 1, 16, 19, 6 = 129 (12d20)
I would say it was a combination of number bloat, lack of effective mechanical balance, and the fact that it was just too complicated for what it was designed for.
That last one was probably most damning.
>>44464221
Only 3.x is really bad, and even that can be salvaged... it's just really isn't worth it when you can play games that don't need so much tinkering.
Not saying the other editions are perfect, but they are much more playable out of the box.
>>44464062
My problem with 5.0 is its just way to simplified. There is no puzzle there, there are no choices to be made. Its like a video game with a set progression. Every once in a while you get a new toy.
I've played about 50 games of 5.0 each lasting 5ish hours. Outside of the initial "new system hype" no one cared that they leveled. In fact a few got annoyed they leveled so fast because it meant they would be facing harder challenges.
In 3.5 leveling is a time of rejoicing. Everyone is eager to get to it and build their character. They are in control of what happens and work together to get new things. If they know they will be facing specific things they can build to that and prepare. They feel like they are in control of their destiny and are ready for harder challenges.
>>44452000
Cause they honestly attempting to just make something fun without realizing the loaming new event called the "internet" would reveal so many butthurt people who have too much issues concerning proper balance.
>>44464416
You started with 3E, didn't you?
>>44464221
>Sorry if this is a stupid question, but seeing all these edition wars around, which edition of D&D actually IS good then?
Different people are going to have different opinions. Old school D&D (anything pre-3e) tends to be something of a hodgepodge of rules that developed somewhat haphazardly and organically out of miniature wargaming. They all use the same basic core system, but with varying levels of crunch. Base-level original D&D and Basic D&D being lighter, while OD&D with the supplements, and both editions of AD&D are heavier. 2e is very similar to 1e, if a bit more polished and presentable, but without the same kind of energy.
Moldvay Basic, the simplest of the Basics that's a full edition (Holmes Basic only goes to level 3 and is more of a starter set), is better put-together, in my opinion, but is significantly more restrictive in your choices (less classes, spells, etc.). Essentially, the additional stuff that got added to the game to expand it to what you see in AD&D is less well-designed than the core of the system. Much of the added detail does little to enhance the game, but amounts to more restrictions or additional stats that don't really need to be there.
The core rules for Moldvay Basic are two sets, each of which contains a 64 page book. That's it. Character creation, spells, monsters, treasure--everything. And I respect it for this. Even later editions of Basic started getting junky and move towards AD&D.
>>44464459
I started with L5R then moved to Rouge trader and then 3.5. From there I played a lot of SoE and then 5.0.
This is a strict 3.5 vs 5.0 comparison though. The other systems are different games with different objectives.
>>44464490
So yeah, effectively you started with 3E. 5E wasn't 'too simplified' in that regard - it's much closer to how D&D was prior to 3E because character building was supposed to begin and end at character creation.
>>44464484
4e is much more tactical than other editions, but can play more like a wargame than a role-playing game, hurting cinematics and immersion. Whether it works for you probably depends a lot on what you're looking for in an RPG.
I'm not really familiar with 5e, but from glancing over it (and from what I've heard), it seems to be a sort of compromise between 3.x and old school D&D. It at least looks to be a decent game, though it's a bit more involved than I want D&D to be, seeing as it's a gateway game (or at least a first-step game, as some people never really move beyond it).
>>44464535
Ahh well that sucks. If they are doing that 5.0 will never be anything anyone at my lgs will like. We have much better games for that. SOE is perfect in that regard.
We like 3.5 because it was all about getting big and beating down gods. Roleplay was secondary to that. So many other games are better for role playing.
If they wanted to do that with 5.0 why diden't they just chop off most of the number bloat? It feels like its trying to have the best of both worlds while failing and geting the worst from both instead.
>>44460885
Bro that's retarded.
5e is about as different from 3e as 4e is from 3e. You're right in claiming that 5e didn't innovate off 4e, but you're dead wrong in saying that 5e didn't innovate at all. They went back to 3.5, forgot all the 4e innovation, and then innovated differently.
In short, 5e is the 4e that the 3aboos wanted.
>>44464863
>5e is about as different from 3e as 4e is from 3e.
Now THAT'S retarded.
5e might be more different from 3.5 than 3.5 was from 3e, but saying that it's as different from 3.5 as 4e was is utterly ludicrous.
Part of what made 4e so unsuccessful was that people were expecting minor variations, maybe on-par with SW saga, but for fantasy, and they got a fundamentally different game from what the majority of the market-share had been playing for almost a decade (i.e. nothing but OGLd20 games.)
Part of what made 5e so successful was that it was what people were expecting of 4e before 4e came out: a variation on the OGL format, roughly on-par with SW Saga Edition, but for fantasy... or as you put it:
>5e is the 4e that the 3aboos wanted.
>>44464553
>4e is much more tactical than other editions, but can play more like a wargame than a role-playing game, hurting cinematics and immersion.
Only if you play it that way. It's a fucking meme at this point.
>>44467666
>4e
>unsuccesfull
>not blowing out sales for the first half of its run
>5e
>successful
>has no people working on it and basically no new releases
Oh, how the facts are spun in the edition wars.
>>44467996
>That feel when I want prestige classes that add flavor
Sure some archetypes add flavor but not enough for me
>>44464062
>easier to GM
4e is the easiest edition to GM since the basic sets. Even if you hate 4e this is hard to deny.
>>44467666
Why do people keep saying 4e is really different?
4e is literally just a refined 3.5e. Outside of the class rules, almost everything is the fucking same. AoOs, grid rules, bull rushes, BAB, it's all fucking there.
That's also why it contains some of the failures of 3.5e, like the reliance on escalating magic items (until they added inherent bonuses) and escalating monster HP (until they did the Monster Vault and MM3).
The only thing different is that each class follows the same consistent formatting. That's it.
Did people really get so terrified when it was shown that an RPG could be consistently well-formatted and laid out?
>>44464863
>In short, 5e is the 4e that the 3aboos wanted.
I don't think so. After all, I am a 3aboo, and I think 5e sucks. The 4e I wanted had more to do with the Tome of Battle than either 4e or 5e.
>>44469338
what do you feel the Tome of Battle had that 4e didn't? That's a surprising thing to hear.
>>44452000
because monte cook did the rules:
Martials fucked by:
New stats bonuses
Feats to do things that could be done without them
hp bloat of other classes (the thing of the martials in D&D 2º was that a warrior class had like 100 hp by lvl 10 and a wizard around 40)
Attacks (needing a complete action for full attack or the penalty for each attack after the first).
Killing the original weapon styles in flavour of dull tactics feats.
Magic got fucked by:
Giving a lot of spells slots while doing spells less important except for OP ones.
And cleric were overpowered, capable of everything for no fucking reason.
>>44469338
Mah nigga.
>>44469998
Not the same guy, but here's what I like from ToB:
Refreshing maneuvers, instead of 1/encounter.
Cool effects on some maneuvers, some of which have some neat out-of-combat utility.
The Crusader's delayed damage pool mechanic.
>>44452000
I'm going to jump in here and add my two cents:
>Wealth by Level
This is the most glaring problem with the game. The assumption that at a certain level, you should have x amount of wealth in magic items, with all the challenge rating system completely geared around this assumption.
>Stacking Bonuses
This dumb ass shit not only requires some dedicated tracking, but it also creates a situation where the person who can stack the most bonuses is the winner of the game, and generally, it's full casters who have the ability to do it.
>Fighters not having the best saves in the game
In AD&D, Fighters not only hit harder than anyone else, but they also had the best saves, and a whole pile of HP. In 3.5 they have a high base attack bonus, more feats than they need, and shit saving throws. Their reliance on magic items is exacerbated from previous editions, and they're basically at the mercy of mid-level casters.
>Caster Supremacy
This wouldn't have been as much of a problem without the above two problems. There's always been some imbalance with regard to casters vs. non-casters (in that spells like fly really fuck over non-casters), but it wasn't until 3.x that casters got the ability to stack bonuses like crazy, and something like 60-75% of the 3.x splats only make casters more powerful by creating these synergistic combinations that pale in comparison to the scant bonuses one gets from say, a Belt of Giants Strength.
>Crafting
This is my biggest pet peeve. From a mechanical standpoint, crafting is fucking stupid. The more expensive an item is, the longer it takes to make, regardless of the materials or complexity involved. This means that it takes less time to build a siege engine than it does to make a gold candelabra.
This completely fucks the NPC economy, and while you can handwave this away, it still presents problems when PCs try to make something themselves.
>>44467996
5e has been incredibly successful with a skeleton staff compared to 4e, their revenues are guaranteed to be higher.
>>44468657
I did say 4e was easier to DM.
>The only thing different is that each class follows the same consistent formatting. That's it.
I never understood why people insisted that was a bane and not boon. The emphasis was with a different strengths and weaknesses with a variance of play styles.
Well at least it's better than second ed. which didn't even have uniformed levelling or experience rates.
>>44470335
> their revenues are guaranteed to be higher.
Keep dreaming senpai
>>44470267
>PCs making magic items
This exacerbates the Wealth by Level assumption the game has. The reason is because PCs making their own items can pay less for said items, thus getting more magical bang for their buck.
And yeah, the DM can say "No, you can only have as much wealth in magic items as it says in the Wealth by Level table, you just pay less and get to keep some of your money", this is most likely going to start an argument because what reason (aside from game balance) is there to deny the crafting PC spending all of their hard earned cash on magic?
Furthermore, on a narrativist note, crafting PCs sort of ruin some storytelling potential. Siegfried didn't craft his dragonslaying sword, he went on a quest to get it. It's what heroes are supposed to do. This one is personal preference, not really a criticism of those who like to make crafter characters.
>Back to Wealth by Level
Seriously, I hate it. And I'll tell you why, aside from the mechanical aspect: It kills ingenuity and exploration in a game about exploring ruins and surviving the perils of such adventures. It kills ingenuity because players EXPECT to get certain items. The Barbarian SHOULD get a Belt of Giants Strength. The Wizard SHOULD get a headband of Intellect.
In previous editions, neither of those outcomes were a sure thing, and players had to use what they had on hand to overcome problems, sometimes in really creative ways. Some people think this creates a DM versus player situation because it's up to the DM whether or not players get these items, but the truth is, things like this should be up to the random treasure tables. It should be a surprise to both parties.
Because players are "assured" in getting these items at some pivotal point in their levels, there's no reason to explore dungeons thoroughly. The DM is expected to provide the items, or else the game balance suffers.
>>44470523
A smaller development team is generally a good thing any way. Too many cooks spoil the broth.
>>44470562
>Game balance
And by suffering, I mean that casters find themselves unable to affect monsters with their magic, because their DCs more or less stay static without magic items, and martial characters are seriously fucked if they can't get a hold of special material/magic weapons to defeat Damage Reduction.
And that's not even getting into the partial caster/supernatual/spell-like ability monsters that will outfight save or die your ass if you don't have items that improve your saving throws.
>>44469998
Tome of Battle manoeuvres have a wider range of effect than 4e martial powers, and they can be recovered, so there isn't any of that "daily" or "encounter" nonsense. In Tome of Battle, the designers were willing to try anything and everything. In 4e, on the other hand, they were terrified of their own game, never veering from narrow definitions of what a power is supposed to do. The AEDU system was the worst idea Wizards ever had. Plus, Tome of Battle characters got a lot more powers than 4e characters.
>>44468657
>4e is literally just a refined 3.5e. Outside of the class rules, almost everything is the fucking same. AoOs, grid rules, bull rushes, BAB, it's all fucking there.
Here's everything that 4e has that 3e doesn't
>Everyone is useful in combat
>Combat is in-depth enough to be a game in and of itself
>PC's and PC obstacles are built on fundamentally different chassis, making PC's feel genuinely special/heroic (for some this is a bad thing, but to each his own)
>Despite the low likelihood that an individual encounter will kill a party member because of formalized plot-shield, universal diminishing resources maintains tension through the adventuring day.
>All classes have interesting things to do
>No more vainly attempting to balance vancians with at-wills, because it's a fool's errand that's never succeeded.
That's quite a bit.
>>44469338
>The 4e I wanted had more to do with the Tome of Battle than either 4e or 5e.
My suggestion, if that's what you want
>Read SW Saga
>Change space fantasy to fantasy fantasy
>Done
>>44470647
All this being said... I still use the system. I'm aware of its flaws, and I use some house rules to combat some of them, and common sense to combat others (I don't allow the Craft or Profession skills, and making magic items beyond scrolls and potions is a no-no). I also pretty much only use the core rules, and whatever setting I'm using, and remind my players that Prestige Classes have to be approved by me, since they're an optional rule (don't believe me? Check page 176, under the heading Prestige Classes, third paragraph).
Even so, I'm trying to branch out into stuff I've been dying to try, like Pendragon and Alternity.
>>44470562
>"It kills ingenuity because players EXPECT to get certain items. The Barbarian SHOULD get a Belt of Giants Strength. The Wizard SHOULD get a headband of Intellect."
>Not putting bonuses of necessary items like Belt of Giants Strength onto other things or doling them out as plot relevant inherent bonuses
Step up your game Senpai.
I know it's houseruling, but it's not like it's hard to do or tough to balance.
Occasionally have a goddess bless them or let them drink from a magic spring or something, makes the same old wrote crap much more engaging.
The best thing is that players will think they got away with murder "Wow! I got to get +4 charisma and I don't even need to wear a stupid cape?!"
>>44470766
Dude, Star Wars Saga Edition is not like Tome of Battle. Star Wars Saga is basically 3.5 using generic character classes (like from Unearthed Arcana): everybody gets bonus feats and nothing else. Except it is worse, because Saga kept only the lamest and most boring feats, and the talents were just like feats except even more lame and boring. Star Wars Saga is like playing D&D 3.5 with everyone being a Fighter, plus healing surges and action points. Or, in simpler terms, SWSaga is SHIT.
Please do not assume I like 3.5 just because I haven't played [insert other game here]. Whatever you've played, I probably played also.
>>44470940
>I also pretty much only use the core rules
Okay, I was with you for the entire tirade right up to this.
What the FUCK are you thinking?
Core on it's own is the worst balanced chunk of all of 3.5
>>44460709
>MMO
>3aboo not realizing that spells/powers/abilities that work once per combat/min/hour/day are just encounters/dailies in disguise
>>44469338
>>44470197
ToB people, I respect and sympathize with your position. However, most of my d20 gaming friends are Pathfinder people these days. What do you think of Path of War?
>>44471009
Is it just like ToB except for Pathfinder?
>>44470948
Magic springs are already a thing in 3.5: magic locations have GP values and everything. Making magic items non-physical does not address the problem, namely that rewards are tied to progression rather than in-game actions. The fact that your players got an ability bonus from a goddess instead of a cape does not address the fact that they expect the ability bonus because the game demands it.
>>44470956
How about Burning Wheel and its descendants? What about L5R? How about Runequest? How do you feel about the Gumshoe system? How do you feel about Star Wars d6? What're your thoughts on Iron Kingdoms? Did you enjoy Shadows of Esteren?
>>44471069
I've heard that said, but the same sources claimed that Pathfinder fixed all 3.5's problems.
>>44470523
4e is dead and never coming back no matter how much you shitpost :^)
>>44468657
Because literally no where in any core book, ever, was any ability ever called a 'Once Per Day'. They just said, in their ability description, 'Once per day, you can do ______'. The transparency somehow ruined it for a lot of people. They really just didn't want to see how the sausage was made.
>>44471009
Path of War is okay. It isn't as good as Tome of Battle mechanics-wise, but it gets the general idea and they get the fluff right (i.e. it is generic and widely-applicable, and thus does not require refluffing like Tome of Battle does). If I had to play Pathfinder and 3.5 material is not allowed, I would use a Path of War class.
I generally do not like Pathfinder, though. It is almost the same thing as 3.5, but the differences are for the worse, not the better.
>>44470335
>5e has been incredibly successful with a skeleton staff compared to 4e
Don't kid yourself friendo.
Say what you will about 4e, but love it or hate it, it was being talked about and everyone had an opinion on it.
Fucking nobody is talking about 5e. I've even spoken to people who've played D&D for years who didn't even know 5e was a thing, and no one in any store I've been to actually runs 5e.
>>44471989
Well that depends who you talk to, my local game store 5e has being a colossal success. There hasn't been this much of a mass exodus since pathfinder.
>>44461449
What?
4e was designed the way it was because by the end of 3.5's lifespan everyone thought it was a broken pile of bullshit.
People fucking HATED that there were class tiers, and the whole "casters operate on their own completely different set of rules that let them just ignore half the mechanics that everyone else has to deal with".
Which was why 4e was designed around class balance and everyone playing by the same set of rules.
Then everyone bitched about all the classes feeling samey.
>>44471989
5e is annoyingly popular most people I know that played pathfinder have moved over. I don't really like 5e though.
>>44472350
My group's not really a fan.
We tried it and agreed it definitely wasn't a bad game, and one we wouldn't be opposed to playing if someone wanted to DM it...but nothing really stood out to us as a reason to actively go out to play it.
Maybe it was that we were a 4e group, but 5e just seemed like a step backwards.
>>44470743
>All classes have interesting things to do
My 4e telekineticist psion objects to this assertion.
>>44472350
For what it's worth I do think concepts like bound accuracy and and an upper limit on situation on modifies make for a better play experience.
It's still got flawed but they were the main problems with d20 in general.
>>44470948
You're just substituting one for the other. It ends up the same, which is the problem with 3.x
>>44470979
At the request of my players, actually. I realize that by itself, there's a huge gap in capabilities between martials and casters, but the only way to fix that is ban 50% of the core classes and use ToB (which I don't have) and the partial casters from half a dozen splat books.
Moreover, spontaneous magic and psionics aren't a thing in the setting I'm currently using (again, at the request of my players). That kills most of the suggestions right there.
Ultimately, I'm trying to move toward other systems in the future. But they wanted a "classic" D&D experience in an old setting, and even though I have 2e, they wanted 3.5.
>>44470743
I was being positive about 4e when I said it was a refined 3e.
My point is that people have this weird idea of 4e being 'weird and different' when it is LITERALLY 'improved 3e'. There is almost nothing in 4e that wasn't attempted in 3e in some splat or another.
>>44472434
you get living missile, the most fun level 1 daily
>>44474700
>I was being positive about 4e when I said it was a refined 3e.
>>44474700
>My point is that people have this weird idea of 4e being 'weird and different' when it is LITERALLY 'improved 3e'
As much as I think we both enjoy 4e greatly, and are "supposed" to be on the same side of this holy edition war, I'm going to have to disagree with you almost entirely. Beyond a basic mechanic of d20+modifiers vs DC, some common names for similar but different mechanics, and the vestigial 6 stats (which should honesty should be collapsed into Power, Finesse, and Spirit for a better experience) the core assumptions of the system are vastly different.
The largest, and most signifigant to me, is that in 3e, everything in the universe is built off of the same mechanics. You aren't exceptional, you're just... well... optimized because of the internet. In 4e, Heroes are genuinely heroic (in the Greek sense) as they are built on fundamentally different mechanics, and PC obstacles only have those statistics that the player is likely to encounter.
On a basic "what type of game is this system suited to play" that's a MAJOR difference. One's about individuals exploring a world that's built on assumptions and mechanics. The other is about heroes in a story that's centered on them, and driven by their actions. Granted, either system CAN run either type of game, but, you have to twist more if you reach out of its comfort zone.
I think we both like 4e, but I think we might just dissagree on whether we liked OGLd20. When 3e and 100+ [insert genre]d20 games, I gave the system a fair shake, but after a few tries literally swore off D&D and all other d20 games because I hated the system so much, and it wasn't until 4e that I even agreed to try D&D again. I suspect you're one of those rare breeds who likes both 4e and OGLd20, which to me is odd, because while they share some basic framework, what they accomplish in terms of game style and storytelling is vastly different.
>>44452000
It had like twelve designers, who were never in the same room as each other and seemingly never compared notes, so you got stuff that just didn't add up with itself, totally broken stuff.
>>44452098
Pretty much, it was a plastered together mess. It was less put together than 4e but people loved it just because it had a lot of content
>>44474701
That still doesn't help the fact that literally every single power I get does some combination of the following, and never anything else:
- Move enemy
- Move self
- Deal HP damage
All my phenomenal psionic might is completely fucking useless outside of combat.
>>44461577
>>44461604
Shadowrun is its own nut because of it was designed in mind with the players knowing everything they needed to and the gm knowing how to react.
It was never built or advertised as easy to pick up and play, or as a mainstay in the market. It was meant to sell you the books you had already bought for 1e,2e and 3e with a different system so normal groups found it too hard to convert.
That said, I love me some shadowrun and I learned to do what 3.5 nerds have done, move off site or just ignore anything posted about shadowrun because /tg/ is shit at fixing problems or advice.
>>44476312
"move enemy" powers can be used to move objects so long as the attack in question doesn't target will
Because Gygax was no longer at the helm.
>D&D in the Lorraine Williams & Wizards of the Coast eras
disgusting. you should be ashamed
>>44476454
If that's the case, then my DM was way too much of a literalist.
>>44476480
Having played under Gygax inspired gms, he and his cult can fuck right off.
>>44476496
It's in the DMG, you can attack objects as if they're enemies. So it's not your DM being a literalist, it's your DM being wrong
>>44475615
gradenko, is that you? If not, ignore this sentence.
I didn't like 3e or OGLd20 as a whole. But I did like some of the splats to come out of it - Incarnum, Tome of Battle, the warlock , and so on. All of which got filtered through to 4e.
I think that 4e is a very direct look at 'what made 3e work, when it did work' and then building the rest of the maths around that. But I don't think it's so very different.
>>44476693
>gradenko, is that you? If not, ignore this sentence.
It's not, though I'm glad there are others who's feelings on 4e are so similar that I can be mistaken for them. Good not to be alone
>I think that 4e is a very direct look at 'what made 3e work, when it did work' and then building the rest of the maths around that.
I can sort of see that: a "we're throwing out the bathwater, let's see if we can fish out the baby" sort of deal.
>But I don't think it's so very different.
Still can't agree, but I suppose if you compare it to systems like 7th sea, Legends of the Wulin, or Classic Deadlands, that use fundamentally different dice mechanics (or card mechanics,) the fact that it still uses D20+Modifiers vs DC is enough to make it look similar.
>>44474700
3e as it was played in the end was a game with a million different resource schemes, generally occurring in one and the same game.
In any version of D&D other than 4e, higher levels gradually unlock highly flexible and powerful magic the form of flight, walls, illusions and invisibility with very few strings attached.
3e as it was played in the end generally had martial characters without significant dailies (lets ignore the core shit). The similarities between ToB and the 4e power system are superficial, the differences fundamental.
>>44479427
>In any version of D&D other than 4e, higher levels gradually unlock highly flexible and powerful magic the form of flight, walls, illusions and invisibility with very few strings attached.
You know this happens in 4e, right? DMG2 even says that in epic levels your terrain probably should be fields and other airborne stuff because the characters have easy access to flight and other special forms of movement.
>>44479468
Epic and 6th level are slightly different, every thing I mentioned is locked either near level cap in 4e or absent completely (flexible illusions, decent walls).
>>44452000
It wasn't.
>>44479713
It really isnt, it is reaction fishing.
This is literally shock site bullshit posted by an op that fired and forgot.
>3rd edition regarded boardwide as shitedition, 4 4rryes for every 3rdaboo WoTC widely regarded as "I do what I want" devs.
>Why should wizards listen to the grognards, 4th sold clearly a fuckload more of copies, there's even a testimonial in forbes saying that their market clearly expanded and is well established, 3aboos and pathabbos are just a minority of uncouth savages.
>Same article, the writer implies some doubts about this related to pathfinder. Numbers appear in D&D forums given by one user "on the inside", but no official papers are revealed (and really why should they reveal shit, truth or not).
>5th edition backpedalling edition (Why?)
"Let's bring that classical feeling from the old era of AD&D"
>3aboos regard it as "better than 4th" while 4rryes declare it "salvation from 3rd". Again, boardwide because hype.
>Drow playable from veganning very subtle gaytranspandering antiproblematic paragraph during turbulent times at /v/ and everyone flips their shit.
>Succubus and nymphs are now one step closer to PG-13.
>4rryes claim they won the war, yet they bitch about the other edition constantly and provoke the 3aboos.
>3aboos claim that they won the war, yet most of their niggership moved to PF.
>PF basically 3.5 with team fortress hats thrown around. Even PF fans used to bitch about how instead of getting fixes, they'd get more hats.
>5th edition not being discussed currently. Getting larger but not talked about as much.
Something tells me that nobody won.
Wizards couldn't possibly have such an astounding commercial success if they finally gave in to the 3aboos, there would be literally no reason to do this. 4th received excellent criticism, and by the end of its life found little resistance to its claims (4rryes were certainly vocal), so it's the only thing that makes sense.
Accurate pic from this nigger. >>44479713
>>44480013
>Something tells me that nobody won.
5e is the Dennys of TTRPG. It's nobody's favorite edition, but with a few exceptions, it's an edition that nobody can say no to a game of. Gotta love that post-internet-era marketing optimization where the best sales position is to be "good enough" for the largest market-base, rather than being genuinely good for any sub-market.
>>44480013
>4rryes declare it "salvation from 3rd".
This never happened. 4rries have always been resistant to 5e since the playtests showed how little of the things they liked was in
>people claim they won the war
Only the most pathetic ones
>>44480102
>It's nobody's favorite edition
It's my favorite edition.
>>44479704
Confirmed for not reading the books
>>44480130
Second.
>>44480130
>>44480362
Why? Other than "get combat over with quickly" what does it do better than any other edition?
>>44480531
I like its streamlined nature and simple resolution mechanics. I like bounded accuracy and advantage/disadvantage. I like the subclass system making character concepts at least partially realized early. I like the subclass setup making many types of characters fit into one class rather than depending on full class progressions or prestige classes. I like that feats are generally meaningful and important, rather than required parts of numeric progression, and that races generally give some unique, iconic ability to your character. I like that its simple resolution mechanic and subclass layout combine to make homebrewing stuff for it a relatively simple task. I also like that magic items aren't a hard-coded part of power progression but that you can add a good amount of them in without destroying the game.
It might not be the best at all of those things, but all of them together is why it's my favorite.
>>44479704
How's having flight at 5 gradual? You go from "can't fly" to "fly" in 1/4th of the total number of levels.
>>44452000
>3.5
>bad
take that back you piece of shit
Ridiculous imbalance between character classes.
Ridiculous imbalance between item costs and wealth by level.
Ridiculous imbalance between party abilities and enemy abilities.
Ridiculous imbalance between CR scaling, to the point that CR may as well not represent anything.
Arbitrary and overspecific skill system.
>>44480531
Combat flow is an important part of the game.
Also, easy character creation.
>>44482794
The skill system bothers me more than anything else for some reason. I guess because it is fucking awful both from crunch and fluff perspectives, rather than one or the other.
Actually wait, stupid feat chains bother me just as much
>>44479704
>decent walls
>illusions
Wizards have an illusionary wall that can hold off a ton of enemies way better than wall of stone etc. can.
Invokers have a wall that is plain indestructible.
>>44452268
>Balance
>trap options
>I regurgitate
How about realizing that not every option in every book was appropriate for every campaign style? Nope, of course not! I'd rather play DnD "The Game Builds My Characters for Me Since I Don't Want to Choose" Casual Edition!
>>44483458
Speaking as someone who loves 3.5 and especially loves the character creation aspect, could you please shut your fucking gob?
When the lead designer of a game admits that a problem is present maybe that's the time to accept that it in-fact is.
Fully 1/3 of the feats in the Player's Handbook have no reason to exist and serve only to fuck over people who don't understand the system.
