3.0 must have books

[Ron]

Oriental Adventures is the only one I kept. Not only is an excellent book but also has no counterpart in 3.5.

 

[DanFor]

As others have before me, I would recommend "Manual of the Planes" (WOTC) and "Tome of Horrors" (Necromancer). I also like "World Builder" from Troll Lord.

 

[Psion]

I'll second Ghostwind and Voadam's lists and add Plot & Poison.

 

[Jdvn1]

I think the Stronghold Builder's Guide is a good book--not really covered by any 3.5 material either.

 

[scourger]

Besides the PHB, the book I'm most likely to keep when I purge all my d20 stuff is Dungeon issue 94 for the awesome Omega World mini-game on the Polyhedron flip side of the magazine (published by Paizo). It really is a great little game. I would still DM it or play it even though I am pretty much over d20 & D&D right now. It presents in about 40 pages what many (many) other books (or whole product lines) fail to do in hundreds (and hundreds) of pages. Jonathon Tweet does a brilliant job of adapting the d20 engine to capture the true flavor of the classic Gamma World game. As far as I'm concerned, it's a steal at $10 for a back issue (I bought 2 in 2002 on stands in addition to my subscription copy):

http://paizo.com/dungeon/products/issues/2002/94

There are a few more books on my shelf that I really like for 3.0, but I can't say they're essential.

 

[Asmo]

The Sunless Citadel and Forge of Fury is a must in my book!

Asmo

 

[Sebastian Francis]

"Must avoid":

- Hero Builder's Guidebook

I have to disagree with you here. Hero Builder's Guidebook is, in my opinion, an excellent resource for helping new players create a character. It's so good that I own several copies and hand them out to people new to D&D.

However, it is useless for a seasoned player and/or DM. Perhaps that's why you described it as "must avoid".

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Another one, if you like stuff from non-WOTC publishers:

Fast Forward Entertainment's Book of All Spells. Like WOTC's D&D Spell Compendium, this is a compendium of spells...but its from non-WOTC sources originally published by FFE, Mongoose, AEG, Bastion, Fantasy Flight, Sword& Sorcery Studios, Paradigm, and Sony.

440 pages of spells.

The only downside is its a softcover...but it's already pre-punched for placing in a 3 ring binder, so even that is mitigated.

 

[Imruphel]

What is meant by the term "threadcrap?"

The best examples are Diaglo's posts (at least most of the ones I have ever seen) as they are pretty regular. Someone asks for information and he dumps his tired "OD&D is the only game" schtick in the middle of the thread.

Back on topic:

WotC:

Fiend Folio. It's not really 3.0 but it's also not 3.5 either. Profoundly superior to MMII which, IMO, should be subtitled, "How to ignore the monster design rules that we established and include bad art at the same time."

Fantasy Flight Games:

Portals & Planes and Cityworks. These may be 3.5 (I can't remember) but they've got some great ideas for campaigns.

Green Ronin

Legions of Hell and Armies of the Abyss (LoH is better, IMO).

 

[Psychic Warrior]

As I understand it, threadcrapping is basically coming into a thread and pointedly causing a problem, usually because you don't have any interest in it or disagree with a poster or his posts.

See also - 99% of posts by diaglo. But he's a regular so it's OK, right?

Must own 3.0 books aside from the core 3 would be, imo

Tome of Horrors (it is a simply outstanding monster book with so many 'classic' monsters as well as new and original one that it is a bargain even at full price)

The WotC classbooks with the exception of Song & Silence (terrible art and worse mechanics)

That is about it, again imo, for rules books. Really those would give you so many options that you'd be almost drowningin them. If you are interested in a post apocalytic D&D setting I can't recommned the Scarred Lands highly enough. Core books for that (and still 3.0 compatible) would be (in order)

Scarred Lands Campaign Setting: Ghelspad
Divine & Defeated
Creature Collection 1 & 2
Reilcs & Rituals 1 & 2