D&D 3E/3.5 3.5 revisions I'm not going to use!

Iron_Chef · Jun 8, 2003

All "animal" buffing spells will remain at 1 hour/level duration. Making them 1 minute/level is the worst idea I've ever heard. They are easily the most important 2nd level spells in ANY caster's arsenal and the most used on a daily basis. I've found that they don't interfere with PCs wanting stat boosting items, as a stat boosting item means that's probably one buff spell they don't have to cast every day.

Spell Focus will still give +2 DC and Greater Spell Focus will still give +4 DC. Dropping them to +1 and +2 each makes them useless as feats and not even good for flavor. I've always felt that specialist wizards should get Spell Focus for free in their chosen school at 1st level, maybe instead of Scribe Scroll, you know, as a flavor thing. Maybe bump their Summon Familiar ability up to 2nd level too, and make Greater Spell Focus their 5th level bonus feat. Would make them very different from "generic" mages.

Nerfing casters, esp. wizards, is bad, because without their spells, they are useless wimps in pointy hats waving sticks around. Trust me, I know.

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What changes are you PLANNING on not making when upgrading from 3.0 to 3.5? I know it's too soon to tell for sure, but it never hurts to have a list of house rules ready ahead of time.

Ankh-Morpork Guard · Jun 8, 2003

I'm waiting to see the books before I start House Ruling...but I expect to make only a few minor changes like I've done now.

Coredump · Jun 8, 2003

They are easily the most important 2nd level spells in ANY caster's arsenal and the most used on a daily basis.

Thats funny, that is the usual reason given by those that want it nerfed/balanced.

Hey, I have an idea; up the bonus to 1d8+6 and it will be an even MORE important 2nd level spell, and ALWAYS used every single day. By your logic, that makes it an even better spell.

While I can understand the 1min/lvl problem, maybe try 10min/lvl.

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Aust Diamondew · Jun 9, 2003

1 minute a level does seem rather short. 10 minutes sounds better to me. I think greater spell focus was to powerful personally do I don't mind (instant death spells with DCs so high that even fighters with high constitutions only have a 50-50 shot aren't fun).

Olgar Shiverstone · Jun 9, 2003

Sounds like House Rules territory to me ...

Ranger REG · Jun 9, 2003

Not gonna use race's Weapon Familiarity. The fighter and any combat-heavy classes are strong enough as it is.

Fenes 2 · Jun 9, 2003

I will not use the following changes from 3.5E:

- Weapon Familiarity for Dwarves (Dwarven waraxe, dwarven ugrosh)
- Weapon Familiarity for Gnomes (gnome hooked hammer)
- Revised Core Class: Ranger
- Prestige Class: Mystic Theurge
- Feat: Manyshot

Edit:
- Revised feat: Power Attack, instead keeping the old power attack feat

Li Shenron · Jun 9, 2003

My attitude with 3e has always been to try using everthing for a while before applying my own changes or house rules. I think my attitude with 3.5e will be to either take it all or take nothing.

Currently, I consider many things an improvement, mostly all, with few notable exceptions, among which I now remember only some latest changes to the Ranger class (HD and SP) and the Spell Focus feat. Everything else is either a change I like or somehow trivial and sopportable, but if there is going to be a couple of more things like those 2 above, I think I am going to have a hard time switching. After all, I still haven't used a lot of the 3e books I own, so I can probably survive with 3e until 4e.

Numion · Jun 9, 2003

Hmm.. IMO all the changes have been good this far. In our games the use of buffs was pretty rampant because it saved spellcasters a ton of money, so much that they were pretty much independent of any magic items. (why spend 36k on stat boost +6, when you can just spend a 4th level slot for empowered stat boost? 16k for pearl of power if you fail the roll and want another one). It was also stupid that each day started with the dicerolling of three buffs per character.

Spell Focuses were an unexpected change, but for the better I think. High DC instakills ruined one adventure for our group, so anything to make it better is welcome. I also liked the change of insta-kill -> high damage.

Bauglir · Jun 9, 2003

High dc instakills ruin the fun for other party members.

Low dc instakills ruin the fun for the caster (wasting spell after spell to zero effect is quite possibly the least fun aspect of D&D)

Instakills are just bad. I hope to see them all go the way of disintegrate, with the caveat that they are perhaps a bit easier to land: I'd rather see a 65% chance to contribute to an encounter than a 35% chance to dominate it (and hence a 65% chance to do nothing at all)