D&D 3E/3.5 Retro-cloning D&D 3.0

[SpellObjectEnthusiast]

Does anyone have a working link to download the original 3.0, not 3.5, version of the SRD? (in .RTF)

 

[Edgar Ironpelt]

Here's a commentary/rant I wrote back in 2006

The Things I Love and Hate about Third Edition D&D
(AKA the Good, the Bad and the Ugly)

This rant has been building pressure in my head for some time, but only now has it burst out in actual written words. It's divided into three sections, the "Things I Love" about 3.0/3.5, the "Things I hate" and the stuff I have mixed feelings about.

Things I Love
1. Skills: At last D&D has a decent skill system. I have quibbles about it (e.g. the cross-class penalty being too big), but my quibbles are just quibbles.

2. Feats: I first went "huh?" when I first encountered them, but they've grown on me since as being a really good idea.

3. A set of battle-mat combat rules actually usable by Mere Mortals, as opposed to the 1e rules that were only usable by Total Wargaming Geeks, and that most players (including myself) therefore ignored.

4. The d20 mechanic itself: A nice job

5. The general rationalization and simplification of saving throws, xp needed per level, ability score bonuses, etc.

6. The rules for creating magic items, and the wealth guidelines in general. It is a good thing that the rules no longer try to stupidly pretend that a +1 sword is a [reverberation]BENISON BEYOND PRICE[/reverb] And I have no sympathy for the DMs who whine that they can no longer act like Gawds; that they no longer have the unquestionable authority to insist that their players smile and say "thank you sir" if they choose to inflict such poverty and suffering on the PCs as would make a sane person envy Job.


Things I Hate
1. The double-power-every-two-levels power curve: Works OK up to about 8th level, starts to break down at levels 9-12, completely wonky at levels 13+

2. Magic as a Trump Card: The general philosophy that has magic trumping non-magical abilities, and that only more-powerful magic can counter less-powerful magic. There are exceptions, yes, but they strike me as being rare and grudging.

3. Disposable/expendable magic items: Some items do have to be consumable, like potions or scrolls. But I find it annoying that so many other items are consumables as well. Wands. Staffs. A lot of the miscellaneous magic. And it really bugs me that it costs xp to create those consumable magic items.

4. Spellcasters as the ultimate source of all good things. This is related to (2) above, but the issue would be less annoying if non-spellcasters had a greater ability to create magical or otherwise special items. For example, if crafting magic arms and armor were something fighters could do. Or possibly even something they could do better than wizards.

5. Prestige Classes. Bah! I say, and Bah! again. They're munchkin-bait; things that actively encourage the unspeakable practice of trying to produce the uber-build. ("Rogue 1/druid 1/milkmaid 2/divine rennet 1/munchkin cheese 15 - ha! Let's see you beat that build")

Mixed Feelings
1. The great number of magic items that characters have. Yes, magic items are a necessity given how D&D is set up to be a high-magic game. I'd prefer, though, that characters have a smaller number of really cool & powerful items, rather than the larger number of weaker ones that the game gives by default.

2. Multiclassing. In some ways 3e fixed multiclassing, and made it sane and rational. In other ways, it created new problems (with those unspeakable "prestige classes" then being offered as the kludge to "fix" those problems).

3. The rigidity of the wealth guidelines. It would be nice to have an analysis of just how much extra wealth boosts a character's power, and just how much relatively poverty diminishes it.

4. Rangers. I imprinted on the 1e ranger as "the" ranger, and I though the 3.0 ranger was almost perfect - it just needed to be a little less front-loaded, and to have more combat flexibility than that hard-coded TWF ability, and it would be good to go. The 3.5 ranger felt like a step backward to me; a change to "wilderness ninja" from "Paladin of the Forest" (Which is what a ranger should be, in my completely arrogant opinion). And that TWF or Archery choice, while an improvement, still felt like a horrible kludge.

5. Healing. Healing via divine magic is such a deeply rooted D&Dism that any change will have huge, far-reaching effects. On one hand, I'd like to see less dependence on the party medic, er, cleric. But on the other hand, it just wouldn't be D&D without this element.

 

[miscreationist]

Does anyone have a working link to download the original 3.0, not 3.5, version of the SRD? (in .RTF)

It is in several pieces here: https://web.archive.org/web/20030803122218/http://www.opengamingfoundation.org/srd.html

 

[DeadlyUematsu]

c) Drop the rule that the level of a spell adds to the DC to save from the spell. This requires a few other rewrites, but it is worth it as this change alone goes a long way to producing parity between casters and non-casters. Additionally, go ahead and drop the rule that half the HD of the monster adds to the DC of saving versus its non-spell abilities. One problem with the 3.X design is that unlike 1e/2e, as the consequences of failing a save increase the chance that the PC succeeds in the save doesn't go up, producing a situation where in order for high level PC's to survive they need magical aid in the form of immunities. And that blows the balance between casters and non-casters completely away. With these changes, save or suck stops being the obvious winning strategy. After banning PrC's you'll probably also have gotten away of a lot of the easy ways to up DC to the point that spells reliably succeed.

I'm curious about how you would handle no save spells like ray of dizziness, solid fog, wall of force, etc. IME, players have worked around DC corrections by going hard on DC-less spells. I've floated a resilience system where ongoing magic effects could be suppressed or broken effects could be broken on the fly at the cost of HP (sorta like Iron Heart Surge w/ cost) but I like hearing from others.

 

[DeadlyUematsu]

I don't call it E12 because classes are limited to 6th level (with the exception of fighters). So the 12th level characters would be things like 6/6 paladin/ranger, 6/6 barbarian/fighter, 6/6 rogue/wizard, 6/6 sorcerer/cleric, etc.

E8 was already an E6 variant out there when I went looking, with E10 and E12 being obvious extensions. I decided against a straight E12 extension of E6 and E8 in favor of this thing I call 2E6.

That's a very neat idea! Maybe I'll try it myself.

 

[Alzrius]

I don't call it E12 because classes are limited to 6th level (with the exception of fighters). So the 12th level characters would be things like 6/6 paladin/ranger, 6/6 barbarian/fighter, 6/6 rogue/wizard, 6/6 sorcerer/cleric, etc.

E8 was already an E6 variant out there when I went looking, with E10 and E12 being obvious extensions. I decided against a straight E12 extension of E6 and E8 in favor of this thing I call 2E6.

How does that work with something like the mystic theurge prestige class? Because a wizard 3/cleric 3/mystic theurge 6 could end up more powerful than most other casters could be under that paradigm.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

I don't call it E12 because classes are limited to 6th level (with the exception of fighters). So the 12th level characters would be things like 6/6 paladin/ranger, 6/6 barbarian/fighter, 6/6 rogue/wizard, 6/6 sorcerer/cleric, etc.

E8 was already an E6 variant out there when I went looking, with E10 and E12 being obvious extensions. I decided against a straight E12 extension of E6 and E8 in favor of this thing I call 2E6.

So, no such thing as a single-classed character? What player in their right mind would have a PC with only a single class, and thus limited to 6th level in that one class, as opposed to ALWAYS having a PC with two classes and thus twice the character levels?

 

[Celebrim]

I'm curious about how you would handle no save spells like ray of dizziness, solid fog, wall of force, etc.

Ray of Dizziness is a Spell Compendium spell. It doesn't exist in my version of the rules. It's straight up obviously broken. I'd fire a designer that submitted that to me.

In my game, Wall of Force like all force effects are high DR objects that can be broken by sufficiently powerful attacks. I don't play at that high of level often though, so not really convinced that it's easy to balance casters and non-casters at above 11th level. However, it took 7 years of play and like 600 hours of game to hit 11th level in my last campaign. If high level play isn't fulfilling, don't be in a hurry to get there.

Solid Fog is IMO a reasonable crowd control spell with obvious drawbacks in that it breaks line of sight with the target and it equally effects both PC's and NPC's in its area of effect. It's primary purpose seems to be to allow a party to escape from situations by delaying opponents. I will say that if Solid Fog became a problem in my game, I'd probably do something like give it a strength check to overcome the movement limitations in a given round. I'm more OK with a "get out of encounter button" than I am with a "win button".

 

[Yora]

It is in several pieces here: SYSTEM REFERENCE DOCUMENT

I didn't remember what a nightmare that was.
Not even a compiled zip file.

 

[DeadlyUematsu]

Ray of Dizziness is a Spell Compendium spell. It doesn't exist in my version of the rules. It's straight up obviously broken. I'd fire a designer that submitted that to me.

In my game, Wall of Force like all force effects are high DR objects that can be broken by sufficiently powerful attacks. I don't play at that high of level often though, so not really convinced that it's easy to balance casters and non-casters at above 11th level. However, it took 7 years of play and like 600 hours of game to hit 11th level in my last campaign. If high level play isn't fulfilling, don't be in a hurry to get there.

Solid Fog is IMO a reasonable crowd control spell with obvious drawbacks in that it breaks line of sight with the target and it equally effects both PC's and NPC's in its area of effect. It's primary purpose seems to be to allow a party to escape from situations by delaying opponents. I will say that if Solid Fog became a problem in my game, I'd probably do something like give it a strength check to overcome the movement limitations in a given round. I'm more OK with a "get out of encounter button" than I am with a "win button".

Fair assessment. Looking over your posts, you're a wiser man than I in your assessments of supplementary material. I'll keep your words in mind when I move forward with my new 3.0e campaign.