1 year of 3.5e...How has the conversion gone?

[Li Shenron]

I have been playing in one 3.0 and one 3.5 campaign simultaneously for about a year now, so I have had chances to compare the two ruleset.

From a strict point of view of how they are written, I'd say the 3.5 is better, in the majority of the changes done, although none of them seems to be "way better", and there are changes which are worse. This is however only a matter of my taste, when I read the rules and see if I like the ideas.

When it actually comes to play, there is basically no difference however.

 

[diaglo]

i'm still working on converting the usable 3.11ed for workgroups stuff to OD&D.

so far i haven't found much that is worthwhile to convert.

 

[Hollywood]

I fear WotC will try and force a 4e on us in another year or two, and hopelessly fragment the gaming public between 3 popular editions of D&D, and a lot of players will just stick with 3.x (or some house-rule hybrid of 3.0, 3.5, and their favorite house rules and variants). The uniformity that was a selling point of 3e, putting everyone back on the same page, will be completely lost. Every 3 or 4 years is just too soon for a complete new version of the core books, they had a nice cycle going of once every decade, which was working well.

Nicely said!

 

[Hollywood]

The class tweaks were urgently needed, Bards were beyond useless, Monks were a headache, and well, Ranger was a one level class.

I agree about the 'Ranger' class, but then again as a DM I never let any player just grab 1 level of anything. Perhaps its a throw back to the years of playing 1st edition, but mixing ~5-10 different classes (prestige classes too) at 1 or 2 levels a piece always seemed extremely silly to our group.

That being said, Bards in 3.0 definetly were NOT beyond useless, and definetly not even useless. Perhaps a power gamer might find them useless, but the bard I have in my 3.0 group continually surprises me with the things he can and will do. Perhaps he's not a combat artist, but there are a lot more things that can be done in D&D even for a tatical gaming oriented group.

I think it'll be a while before 4E, I'm tipping 2007 at the earliest. This close to 3.5, it'll be an obvious cash grab.

And how would that be different than 3.5? 3.5, whether you like the new rules or not, *was* a cash grab, plain and simple. Way too much was changed in 3.5 that it has essentially become it's own version and isn't straight-forward in compatibility with 3.0; although its easier to convert to 3.5 than 3.5 to 3.0. 3.5 should have been at most reprinted manuals with all the published errata compiled plus any new errata and clarifications; not rash changes to the core of the system. Wait until the next true version comes out to implement lessons learned rather than do it as an update.

Frankly the cost doesn't concern me, and for awhile I considered buying my entire group new books, but I frankly was annoyed enough at the cash grab ploy by Hasbro that I did not. If I want to do 3.5, the SRD will have to suffice.

 

[WizarDru]

Liked it since the day it was announced. Made a clean migration to 3.5 with little fuss, and I think the game is better overall because of it. 3.0 was leaps and bounds better than what came before, and 3.5 was a fairly logical progression from it.

All in all, very happy.

 

[Desdichado]

Still haven't completely converted. I use the SRD for some things, and I do have the Monster Manual, but in general, I still prefer 3e undiluted by a largely unnecessary revision.

 

[GlassJaw]

I still prefer 3e undiluted by a largely unnecessary revision.

Well maybe it didn't require 3 new hardcovers (although the MM revisions are nice) but saying that changes to things like Haste, Harm, the ranger, etc were "unnecessary" isn't very accurate.

 

[Desdichado]

Well maybe it didn't require 3 new hardcovers (although the MM revisions are nice) but saying that changes to things like Haste, Harm, the ranger, etc were "unnecessary" isn't very accurate.

Haste and Harm are improved, but two spells does indeed qualify, as far as I'm concerned, as making the revision as a whole largely unnecessary. And I'm not so sure the ranger is all that much better than it was before.

 

[diaglo]

Well maybe it didn't require 3 new hardcovers (although the MM revisions are nice) but saying that changes to things like Haste, Harm, the ranger, etc were "unnecessary" isn't very accurate.

changing the classes from fighting man, cleric, and magic-user to their current versions i wouldn't call necessary.

so saying that the older versions were needing change i wouldn't call very accurate either.

edit: it just proves the adage that YMMV. and things look different from the other side of the fence.

 

[Whisper72]

Hmmm... have not yet played with either 3.0 or 3.5, tho bought the books of both. Haven't read them very thoroughly, but at first glance 3.5 seems more 'complete'. OTOH, I see many issues on these boards which I never had any problems with in my old '1.5' (using the DMG, UA(DM parts) and other guides etc. fom 1E, using the PHB and MM from 2E) games, so I am seriously thinking of sticking to them, simply tinkering a way to add the concept of feats into the mix and some stuff from the new UA (VP/WP and the paragon/elemental races etc as monster types), so I voted 'other'