What is 3.0 & 3.5 missing that previous editions had?

Rather than steal a discussion about a problem player who wants to go back to 2E I thought I'd start my own. A lot of people talk about the new editions of D&D missing that special something that previous editions had. Heck, Goodman Games has started publishing a series of modules that harken back to the early TSR modules in look and feel.

In your opinion what is that special something that the earlier editions had that all of us old gamers are now missing with the new editions?

The nostalgia value of something that you got into when you were a little kid.

5 minutes to create a new character... for a newbie.

Gotta chime in and say 3.X is much closer to OD&D IMO than any of the other versions, including 1st Ed. Most of the grim fury that is adventuring is back, and not as much time is spent calculating and recalculating bonuses and such. It brought the game back around to players caring about the adventure they were on, not their magic/steroid PC that they have created to be competitive with everyone else. Once again it is becoming a team oriented sport, where each component is appreciated but not overwealming vital.

That said, if they want to go back to 2E, just add more rules to you 3.5 game to take a PC's eye color into account for a bluff check and some other unnecessary tweaks that 2E players seem to just love. Ask them if they have ever played OD&D and if they liked it. Chances are they want a different type of game that rewards the players by adding to the PCs, not progressing in a story or doing cool actions. I like to escape those groups as those players are not the type I want to game with. As you can tell, I like to have plots that progress, storylines that reveal themselves as the players unlock certain clues, and baddies that have motivations other than just slay the PCs cause they showed up.

To me all of these issues were revolutionized with 3E vs. 2E, and brought the game around from appeasing twink-maniacs to inspiring imagination once again. As a DM, if you don't like the game system, no prob, run your own. Leave my choice to run 3.X alone, I like it.

Davelozzi said:

The nostalgia value of something that you got into when you were a little kid.

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What about players that got into gaming when they were in their 20's a few years prior to 3E? I've spoken with some and even they say that 3E is missing something. I think there is something more than that.

Darklone said:

5 minutes to create a new character... for a newbie.

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The standard templates in the PH help a good bit with that and are intended for that. They take most of the time consumption out of character creation (At least at first). At least in my experience, most of the time in chargen comes from selecting skills + feats.

reiella said:

The standard templates in the PH help a good bit with that and are intended for that. They take most of the time consumption out of character creation (At least at first). At least in my experience, most of the time in chargen comes from selecting skills + feats.

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If you please, the discussion is on what OD&D had that 3E doesn't... not what 3E has.

Clerics were much more customizeable in 2e. Of course, that customization eventually became horribly unwieldy, but it could make for some fun PCs.

Calico_Jack73 said:

In your opinion what is that special something that the earlier editions had that all of us old gamers are now missing with the new editions?

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It's not an old gamer / new gamer thing.

Pick up a 2nd cover 1st edition players handbook, or a 2nd edition players handbook (either cover.) Now, compare the art that you see to ANY picture in the core 3rd edition line.

This is a clue to what's missing. It's not just that the art has changed to a more cartoonish style. It's that WotC didn't try and make D&D into a serious RPG. They've thrown in that towel, and D&D is very much a campy, shallow, dungeon-crawl game.

Fortunately, they didn't leave the market of rabidly creative GMs out in the cold. The Open Gaming License lets us take what might be the most developed rules system of any RPG, and use as much or as little of it as we like in making our own RPG.

Calico_Jack73 said:

If you please, the discussion is on what OD&D had that 3E doesn't... not what 3E has.

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Heh, well, that was in reference to a comment made that implied 3e lacked something that it did not .

In anycase, if ya want my contribution it's dingo kidneys, but hey. To me, the only bits I reminsce are the more open ended/less structured nature of adventuring in prior editions of D&D. Which is ironically often one of my complaints about the prior systems .

To me at least, the formulaes are now well known, and most can expect to "level up" after every 13 1/3 encounters and you can expect that the DM has less of a chance of unintentionally throwing an encounter far too difficult for your baseline. In older editions the potential for unintentional over-rewarding seemed greater as well.