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Simulationist doesn't have to mean realistic, in any way relating to the real world. A system with giant space hamsters where gravity fluctuated based on the day of the week could be highly simulationist, if it had internal logic and stuck to it. It just means that the system has internal...

I don't see why secondary items being powerful is a problem, honestly. Yes, a character with plenty of items is more powerful than a character without items ... as they should be! Plenty of people, including myself, like having magic items and want those items to actually do useful things...

I honestly don't see how a dinosaur is "more exotic" than a dragon. But I don't think people would be so quick to decry the DM for not specifically mentioning dragons existed before using one. It's been said that what the DM should specifically mention are things that don't exist in the real...

So if the DM doesn't mention during the first couple sessions that Apes, Baboons, Badgers, Bats, Bears, Bison, Boars, Camels, Cats, Cheetahs, Crocodiles, Dogs, Donkeys, Eagles, Elephants, Hawks, Horses, Hyenas, Leopards, Lions, Lizards, Manta Rays, Monkeys, Mules, Octopi, Owls, Ponys, Porpoises...

One last thing (bolding mine): The Druid in question is not one of the existing characters. The fact that they existing characters haven't been to place has no bearing on whether a new character could have been to that place before joining the party. Again, PCs have lives before they meet the...

Here's the thing though - a dinosaur wasn't unsuitable for the DM's setting, it was unsuitable for the way one player incorrectly imagined the DM's setting to be. I find it likely that the DM had never mentioned previously the presence or absence of dinosaurs in his campaign. Now you might...

It's entirely possible to have the classes be balanced as PCs while unbalanced in the setting. For instance, let's say that in a given setting, warriors were limited to normal human capabilities, and mages had virtually no limits. A level X Fighter and a level X Wizard should still be the same...

From what I've seen of the feats, they're not so much weak as non-cumulative. There seem to be no feat chains, so while you've got plenty of decent first-tier feats, second-tier feats don't even exist. Additionally, if combat feats give you mostly additional options rather than bonuses to...

Well sure, summoning in 3.5 has issues. One is that the primary summoner is a Druid - it's not a good idea to have the summoner also be the one with an animal companion and who's engaging in melee themselves. Plus, animals are not ideal summons, often having multiple attacks. And in melee at...

Incidentally, the fact that multi-target attacks are common enough to warrant speeding up, whether or not that includes all AoEs, gives me another reason to be pissed off about the apparent removal of summoning: "Summoned creatures monopolize the game! You'd be rolling three attacks to...

The thing about "simple, descriptive" feat names, is that they becomes less descriptive the more feats you have, and may not have been that simple in the first place. For example: Combat Reflexes is not related to Lightning Reflexes, nor does it modify your reflex save, give you a better...

Advancing even every two sessions isn't as fast as you might think. Let's consider a group that plays once every two weeks (or once every week but with two alternating campaigns). For them to go from 1st to 30th level would be 60 sessions, aka 120 weeks, aka more than two years. How many...

Oh I'm fine with the actual mechanic, just not the explanation of it. It'd be like saying "the reason Wizards can only cast Fireball a certain number of times is because that's how many balls of bat guano they have, and you can't carry any extra or have someone else carry it ... for some reason".

A "one minute rest time" refresh is implicity per encounter, without the awkward edge-cases that making it literally per encounter raises. And seriously, if someone is willing to stand there for ten rounds doing nothing, then let them have their manuevers back. Secondly, I really hope they...

Metal armor is the simplest solution. For non-Druid shapechangers, putting them in a solid box with air holes smaller than their smallest form will do fine. Make sure the box is either strong enough they can't break it, and/or has spikes on the inside walls. Note that a suit of Half...

As mentioned, PCs past 5th level or so have gone outside the normal human range. By 10th level, we're not talking Conan - we're talking Hercules. But that's been said. What hasn't though, is that there's a risk to adding any kind of "compensating" rules to make groups of mooks more...

That's why I prefer abilities to be implicitly per-encounter, but defined as an actual length of time. For instance, the Swordsage's manuevers are basically per-encounter. But that's not how they're defined. It takes a full-round per manuever to recover them, thus around a minute to restock...

Combat is far from purely character-based. For one thing, only non-spellcasters even come close to character-based - when playing a spellcaster, correct spell choice/usage is primary. Then even with non-spellcasters, positioning, correct weapon choice, and knowing when to charge in and when to...

I'm guessing the Tome may make a comeback for rituals.

Likewise, I'd like more destructable terrain. I once tried calculating how deep a crater fireballs and other destructive spells would be causing - a few inches deep, at most. Worried about that off-target lightning bolt bringing down the cavern? Don't be, it barely puts a scratch on stone, or...