D&D 3.x I miss 3.5 edition

koumpou · Monday at 7:04 PM

Desdichado said:
3e was great. That said, I never played with a table of powergamers, so most of what most people complained about with regards to the system never applied to me. If I could get a bunch of people together to run some shorter campaigns in 3e (avoiding the higher levels, but level scaling is a problem in every version of D&D, not just 3e) I'd do it in a heartbeat.

as a powergamer that plays with other powergamers i both disagree and respect that

Willie the Duck · Monday at 7:13 PM

koumpou said:
i am currently running a 3,5e epic campaign and playing in 2 more epic campaigns as a player, the scope of all three campaigns is so high so schizo for most but its so damn epic man, i wish more people could enjoy that level of scope and heavy lore, for example one one campaign we are all around 25 level, the campaign has been ongoing for around 14 years now, the xp system we use is slightly different and more hardcore compared to normal dnd 3,5e, when we level up we reset our xp to zero so for example you need 1000xp to go lvl 2 then you need 3000xp to go lvl 3 and then 6000 to go lvl4 etc etc, the dm has done away with epic spells and has created his own lvl 10/11/12/13/14 spells and there is basically this assasin cult of hextor that is controlling everything from the shadows, and it all boils down at the seven great wizards from 100.000 years ago that created this plane how its not the real material plane how the leader of the assasin cult is a god that wants to destroy this plane and kill anyone that wont follow him to his campaign to reclaim the real material plane that is now almost completely ruined due to the whole universe going through a greatly unstable period that causes planar breaches to happen and how the rest of the planes want to fight over for control over our fake material plane so that even if we defeat that damn god we will have to find a way to deal with the rest of the verse instantly invading to lay claim to our home ohh and to top it off one of those great seven wizards that created that fake plane 100.000 years ago is still "alive" (technically a vampire thus undead) he is also the cause of all the instability of the rest of the universe and has the backing of at the very least two deities a dagger that can unravel divinity and plans to kill all the gods and all living things, ohh by the way he is the necromancer and he created every living form in our fake plane before pelor the god of life said a massive naughty word you and turned his undead creations into alive ones, currently we are in sigil seeking the help of the lady of pain, we are locked outside of our fake material plane where the god is in the process of subjugating or killing anyone that wont join him and ultimately i would say we are kind of ducked but we will pull through somehow

A thing of beauty. I think describing one's epic level campaign ought be required to be done in a single run-on sentence.

Brendan Byrd · Monday at 8:10 PM

koumpou said:
as a powergamer that plays with other powergamers i both disagree and respect that

One of those moments when “don’t argue with success” applies…

koumpou · Monday at 8:30 PM

Brendan Byrd said:
One of those moments when “don’t argue with success” applies…

ultimately is up to us to make it work for all of us in the same group, someone who refuses to do that isnt a powergamer or a ruleslawyer or whatever, he is an naughty word

BryonD · 2026-03-17T19:18:35+0000

Maxperson said:
Some players. Mine weren't like that, and I played with lots of others who weren't like that as well.

Yeah, I still love 3X.
In my experience, every problem that people talk about with it tends to be true.
But also every problem that people talk about with it CAN be mitigated by a good group of players who all want the system to work well. (And "broken" as fits as a definition of "work well" if that's what the table wants.)

There are some great modern innovations since then. I think the modern range of games is excellent.
But for my taste 3X is still the peak.

Voidmoji · 2026-03-17T21:42:36+0000

Desdichado said:
3e was great. That said, I never played with a table of powergamers, so most of what most people complained about with regards to the system never applied to me.

My group weren't powergamers, really. Certainly not the kind that read CharOp boards and guides, or scoured the books for anything breakable. But high level 3.5e was still problematic. I mean, the easiest way to make an OP character was to pick any primary prepared spellcaster and realize that some spells were really darn good, or that Natural Spell for a druid sounded great. Or that making your own magic items was awesome. And so on.

I loved much about 3.5e back in the day. I just didn't like running high level 3.5e D&D, and it took me running 4e up to level 18 to fully realize it.

Desdichado said:
If I could get a bunch of people together to run some shorter campaigns in 3e (avoiding the higher levels, but level scaling is a problem in every version of D&D, not just 3e) I'd do it in a heartbeat.

This is why I have been reacquainting myself with the E6 framework for D&D (or in my case, Pathfinder 1e).

Whizbang Dustyboots · 2026-03-17T21:46:10+0000

Voidmoji said:
My group weren't powergamers, really. Certainly not the kind that read CharOp boards and guides, or scoured the books for anything breakable. But high level 3.5e was still problematic. I mean, the easiest way to make an OP character was to pick any primary prepared spellcaster and realize that some spells were really darn good, or that Natural Spell for a druid sounded great. Or that making your own magic items was awesome. And so on.

I loved much about 3.5e back in the day. I just didn't like running high level 3.5e D&D, and it took me running 4e up to level 18 to fully realize it.

Yeah, I have thought off and on over the years of making an E6 3E fantasy heartbreaker (each PHB race gets their own WoD-style standalone game, with their own versions of the core classes, their own mini-setting, their own set of monsters, etc.).

It'd work great, so long as it never went to high levels, when the wheels not only come off the vehicle, but the whole thing eventually just explodes.

Autumnal · 2026-03-18T05:47:15+0000

3.5 is far more mechanically involved than I could have fun with now, but it remains a fantastic mine of ideas for use with the sorts of system I can have fun with now. So many wonderful bits.