2nd vs 3E rules. Most difficult transition?

[Storm Raven]

I also found creating monsters to be more difficult. Old nebulous abilities need to be more concrete for use in the 3e combat round. I used to say things like, "They can fight in ranks". Now I have to figure out reach weapons and facing issues.

Just a question: what facing issues? 3e doesn't have facing, so I don't know what sort of facing issues you might be referring to.

 

[DWattsoner]

He means Reach/Face rules for monsters, Face being how much room on a grid the monster takes up.

As for myself, the hardest part was AoO. That made zero sense until Eric Noah's diagrams explaining the rules.

 

[WillieW]

Hey WillieW

I just got done springing "nine tenths" on my party last week. What do we need to do to get you to write more modules????

You're doing it..! I need to have as much information as possible about players/DMs experiences of the 3E before I can get myself to grips with it again.

Not writing is like not walking. It needs patience, understanding, and hard work to get this invalid back to the game. Thanks, everyone, for continuing to help.

Attacks of Opportunity... These seem to be the biggest hurdle to people transferring from earlier versions to 3E. I'll mark these off for special attention.

 

[Tiberius]

Attacks of Opportunity made perfect sense to me when we started playing 3e. My biggest hangup was "knowing" what the spells did without carefully reading the new descriptions, such as assuming that casting any spell still negated Invisibility. I'm still finding examples of slight modifications to the spells that I have ignored. It also took me a while to realize that getting a rogue "behind" a creature to attack != sneak attack without flanking coming into play.

-Tiberius

 

[Rugger]

The thing that STILL gets me, is the "fine print" changes in spells... Whenever someone casts "Identify", I wanna remind them of the temporary CON loss....or the care needed in bouncing Lightning Bolts.....lotsa little things like that....

-Rugger
"I Lurk!"

 

[EricNoah]

What would you consider to be the most difficult rules area to (re)learn since the changeover from 2nd-Edition to 3E...???

OH MY LORD!!! When did you start posting here?? I've said it many times, your adventures in Dungeon absolutely rule the school. What a treat to have you around!!

AoOs were a little tough but not too bad. What actions you can do in a round was a bit of a trick to figure out. I still have no clue how to do item saving throws, or how to do spot/listen checks with two groups who are both initially unaware of each other's presence. Oh, let's see, what else... the invisibility rules (how you can listen for invisible characters, etc.). There's a lot of stuff I'd consider a challenge to learn, actually, especially if you're used to something else.

 

[WSmith]

Re: Re: 2nd vs 3E rules. Most difficult transition?

Oh, let's see, what else... the invisibility rules (how you can listen for invisible characters, etc.). There's a lot of stuff I'd consider a challenge to learn, actually, especially if you're used to something else.

Eric, thanks to one of the best threads I have seen here, I have a quick fix. You may or may not like it, but I love it.

Do away with Invisibility. Instead of being invisible, the character goes ethereal, via a cloak, ring, boots, amulet, etc. That way there is no real issues to resolve. There are there but just not there. I love the way it has turned out in the few games I have used this idea in, and will retain it for future campaigns.

 

[Benben]

Rugger has the right idea.

The thing that STILL gets me, is the "fine print" changes in spells... Whenever someone casts "Identify", I wanna remind them of the temporary CON loss....or the care needed in bouncing Lightning Bolts.....lotsa little things like that....

-Rugger
"I Lurk!"

First time a character casts a spell, look it up in the PHB. It has undoubtably changed in minor, yet powerful ways.

 

[Ealli]

Humans.

I was so used to humans being worthless as an adventuring class that I built my campaign world around explaining why all player characters were demi-humans. Curse you 3E for making humans worthwhile and ruining my game. *Sob*

Oh, and AoO, we had at least one of the conditions incorrect for the first 4 months. Can't post to this thread without mentioning AoO.

 

[applenerd]

One thing I'll say that I definitely DON'T miss is THAC0. What a pain that was! But I'll have to agree with everyone that AoO was a sticky point. Now it's not so bad though because it's generally understood and there are a lot of good explanations in various books/ web sites etc. Plus there's boards like this which help!

3e has been awesome though! It brought me back to gaming in a BIG way after a (roughly) 6 year hiatus from 2e. It is fairly lean cutting out the menial number crunching and table drudgery while leaving the fun bits in and making it easier to remember, play, and make judgement calls as a DM. Good stuff all around!