D&D 3E/3.5 Worst 3.5 rule from core books?

[freyar]

Though one of the Arcane magic splatbooks introduced a way to Master another wizards spellbook.

Magic of Faerun, maybe?

 

[Jeff Wilder]

But yea, I could sit around in the D&D world and order take-out and never get up from my seat and never get tired.

Even better, after all that take-out you'd never have to sit in the privy, because there are no rules for it!

D&D clearly needs rules for going 1 and 2.

 

[Delta]

Massive Damage. A core rule so nuts (and so unlike the rest of D&D) that most people assume it's some crazy variant option from the DMG. (Better to make falling damage, etc., cumulative like in 1E AD&D UA.)

Iterative Attacks from BAB. Easy to overlook -- but 3E should have folded that into a feat like other cool Fighter abilities from early editions. Complicated and giving giants double-fast attacks just because they got real big is pretty counter-intuitive.

Needing to pick so many Feats for a simple 1st-level human Fighter.

The way Encumbrance gets counted.

Skill Points. Ech, too fiddly.

 

[Jack Simth]

Yeah, but how often are you going to find a half-dragon gargantuan monstrous scorpion? I try to keep my rare crossbreeds rare.

I ran one; in that case, it was the result of deliberate experimentation by the BBEG. Successful experimentation, I might add, although when I saw what killed it, I stopped and laughed for a bit.

See, it's mindless, so didn't know to make the DC 10 Heal check (Wisdom check, essentially) to stop the bleeding caused by a single round of being in a Bat Swarm that the party Warlock summoned up.

 

[Angrydad]

Even better, after all that take-out you'd never have to sit in the privy, because there are no rules for it!

D&D clearly needs rules for going 1 and 2.

Really? Really really? I think that's a bit unnecessary. It's a bit like The Sims. Why I'd want to make my digital character go potty makes no sense. I'd rather be taking a deuce myself instead as it's much more satisfying. When I play a video/computer game I really only want to think about going pee when my Dr. Pepper catches up with me. Same goes for D&D. Micromanagement can get stupid in a hurry. Of course, if you're just joking about it........

 

[billd91]

Like my first sentence explicitly stated, I don't think wizards are weak or need a helping hand. I DO think making them go through all that tedious bs just to fullfill their function (know lots of arcane spells) is a dumb way to "balance" them and makes the game (remember? game? supposed to have fun?) a lot less enjoyable for the person playing one. Hmm...how about I make up a class that always scores a confirmed crit on every hit. But, in return to "balance" it, the DM gets to punch the player in the face every time he attacks with the character.

That's not even an apt comparison because it makes the player only pay for something the PC gets. At least with the spellbook issue, it's the PC that's getting nickeld and dimed with all the costs.

Ultimately, if you don't want to put up with the onerous expenses of being a member of the powerful, intellectual elite, play something else like the sorcerer. For some people, the extra hassles of the spellbook feel quite fair for their character's power. And for some people, the fun of doing things as a wizard is made sweeter because it feels deserved once they've paid their spellbook dues.
Or is that the wrong kind of fun?

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Wu Jen also keep spell books. How can you feel like a member of the intellectual elite standing next to a guy who has some taboo with bathing?

 

[Trouvere]

Gah, the disarm mechanism! Here I am with my whip, facing a tiny creature with Dex through the roof. I'd probably have no chance of even getting close to hitting it with my whip for damage. I probably couldn't even make a successful touch attack for a chance to trip it. But I can lash a tiny dagger out of its tiny hand, and there's nothing it can do stop me.

 

[Bob the Destroyer]

Where's that fluff from? It certainly doesn't match the crunch. If that were the case, then all spells would be standard actions (or faster) to cast since they were 'stopped at an almost complete state'. Many spells have casting times of full round, one round, or longer.

I would say that it matches the crunch just fine. We don't know the fine points of how magic works in the D&D game, and it could be that for some reason a caster can't "tie off" a particular spell at the most convenient point. For instance, maybe with Identify (1 hour casting time) you can only cast say... ten minutes' worth of the spell, and, if you try to save the rest of the casting for later, the spell just unravels.

Bob the Destroyer

 

[aboyd]

The worst rule concerns sneak attack. Did you know that you may not sneak attack a creature who has any type of concealment?

This means that the shadowy rogues attacking in dark places cannot sneak attack because even shadowy illumination provides concealment.

Wow, I just tried to make a house rule for this, but it got complicated fast. My ruling was going to be that partial concealment didn't negate, only full concealment did. But then I start reading up on spells like Blur, which would seem to be exactly the kind of thing that should confuse a sneak attack. The problem? It provides partial cover. So a blanket rule that partial cover isn't enough to negate a sneak attack makes no sense. I immediately wanted to make 20 exceptions to my house rule. Ridiculous.

So now I'm thinking that maybe just "shadowy illumination" is the exception.

Or, I was also thinking that the sneak attack damage could require a confirmation roll in cases of partial concealment, sorta like critical hits. Ugh. This gets difficult.