Chronosome
Explorer
Overall, the changes done did good. 
3.5e One Year Later
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Galethorn
First Post
Dark Jezter said:
But not a d10 HD...and it gets crazy rogue-like-behavior-enhancing abilities like Hide in Plain Sight. Now, if barbarians had both of the 'sensory' skills, I would be fine playing one of them, spending the two skill points on literacy, and calling myself a 'ranger' or 'woodsman', but they don't get both.
re
For the most part I like 3.5 a bit better than 3.0.
Things I definitely like about 3.5
Monster Manual was greatly improved. Addition of BAB and Grapple modifier were very helpful.
I like the new DR rules though magic DR is a joke now. I completely eliminated adamantine DR. It just wasn't necessary.
I like the new weapon sizing rules. Once you understand how the system works, it is better than the previous edition.
The changes to the Ranger (still don't like the combat paths), Bard, Paladin (except the pokemount), and Barbarian were good. I like the addition of the Archmage and Hierophant as standard Prc's. I like the Mystic Theurge; I really missed effective multiclass spellcasters.
Item creation is a little easier to understand now.
I like that the ability buff spells don't last as long, though I do think 1 minute per level was taking it a little too far.
I liked the change to Haste. As much as I enjoyed the power while it lasted, I have to admit that it made Wizards and Sorcerers the star of the show when it came to taking down bad guys.
Things that I do not like about 3.5
I had to totally rewrite the Blast Infidel and Faith Healing abilities of the Hierophant to make them deity specific. I had to rewrite Forbiddance to make it deity specific (evil religions don't get along...no reason why followers of Cyric should be able to walk into temples of Beshaba because they have the same alignment). Using alignment for such abilities and spells is flavorless. I wish they stop shying away from deity specific spells in D&D or provide options for both.
I prefer the 3.0 cover rules. I understand that you don't use most of the options for cover, but they were nice options when the standard forms of cover weren't applicable.
Didn't like the alterations to Darkness. Just not good. Collins really dropped the ball on this one.
Invisiblity and Greater Invisibility durations did not need to be shortened. Invisibility is a great scouting ability. It is marginally useful for combat given the number of spells that can dispel or eliminate the advantage of invisibility. See Invisibility, Glitterdust and Invisibility Purge were good enough to stop invisibility. There are many, many creatures that can detect invisible enemies. Just not a necessary change.
Hold Person and Hold Monster are now useless for anything but a Coup De Gras. We used to use these spells for capturing an enemy or to eliminate a enemy while we took on other bad guys. Now that you receive a save every round, they don't last long enough for anything but a Coup De Gras. Even a dumb orc fighter is bound to get lucky and break the hold. I think there has to be some happy medium between the one die roll save and the roll every round save. I am thinking about giving hold spells a mechanic similar to Charm Person. If someone is preparing to take violent action against you, you receive another save. I think it would work better from a balance perspective, though I can see problems from a flavor perspective.
They went WAAYYYYY to far to make sure arcane and divine casters can't boost their DC's. I understand the change to Spellpower. They should have kept Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus the same. There are alot of ways to increase saves and attack bonus, but there are very few ways to raise spell DC's. Arcane casters do not receive magic weapons that raise their DC's. DC's are everything to a caster. They even went so far as to nerf the Spell Enhancer spell from the Magic of Faerun, and it only provided a +2 DC to one spell. Taken way too far. They need to give a little love to the arcane and divine caster's spell DCs. They are already limited and become often moreso as they reach higher levels and fight creatures with all good saves and stronger resistances to their magic.
Death Ward's duration should not have been lowered. Energy draining creatures slow down play tremendously, especially incorporeal draining creatures or Shadow Dragons. A spell to resist the effects of energy drain and death magic should last for more than one encounter IME.
I don't know that I would spend the $90 again. I might just download pieces of the SRD that I wanted to use. Overall, 3.5 isn't much different from 3.0. The parts that are different could have been compiled into an errata book.
For the most part I like 3.5 a bit better than 3.0.
Things I definitely like about 3.5
Monster Manual was greatly improved. Addition of BAB and Grapple modifier were very helpful.
I like the new DR rules though magic DR is a joke now. I completely eliminated adamantine DR. It just wasn't necessary.
I like the new weapon sizing rules. Once you understand how the system works, it is better than the previous edition.
The changes to the Ranger (still don't like the combat paths), Bard, Paladin (except the pokemount), and Barbarian were good. I like the addition of the Archmage and Hierophant as standard Prc's. I like the Mystic Theurge; I really missed effective multiclass spellcasters.
Item creation is a little easier to understand now.
I like that the ability buff spells don't last as long, though I do think 1 minute per level was taking it a little too far.
I liked the change to Haste. As much as I enjoyed the power while it lasted, I have to admit that it made Wizards and Sorcerers the star of the show when it came to taking down bad guys.
Things that I do not like about 3.5
I had to totally rewrite the Blast Infidel and Faith Healing abilities of the Hierophant to make them deity specific. I had to rewrite Forbiddance to make it deity specific (evil religions don't get along...no reason why followers of Cyric should be able to walk into temples of Beshaba because they have the same alignment). Using alignment for such abilities and spells is flavorless. I wish they stop shying away from deity specific spells in D&D or provide options for both.
I prefer the 3.0 cover rules. I understand that you don't use most of the options for cover, but they were nice options when the standard forms of cover weren't applicable.
Didn't like the alterations to Darkness. Just not good. Collins really dropped the ball on this one.
Invisiblity and Greater Invisibility durations did not need to be shortened. Invisibility is a great scouting ability. It is marginally useful for combat given the number of spells that can dispel or eliminate the advantage of invisibility. See Invisibility, Glitterdust and Invisibility Purge were good enough to stop invisibility. There are many, many creatures that can detect invisible enemies. Just not a necessary change.
Hold Person and Hold Monster are now useless for anything but a Coup De Gras. We used to use these spells for capturing an enemy or to eliminate a enemy while we took on other bad guys. Now that you receive a save every round, they don't last long enough for anything but a Coup De Gras. Even a dumb orc fighter is bound to get lucky and break the hold. I think there has to be some happy medium between the one die roll save and the roll every round save. I am thinking about giving hold spells a mechanic similar to Charm Person. If someone is preparing to take violent action against you, you receive another save. I think it would work better from a balance perspective, though I can see problems from a flavor perspective.
They went WAAYYYYY to far to make sure arcane and divine casters can't boost their DC's. I understand the change to Spellpower. They should have kept Spell Focus and Greater Spell Focus the same. There are alot of ways to increase saves and attack bonus, but there are very few ways to raise spell DC's. Arcane casters do not receive magic weapons that raise their DC's. DC's are everything to a caster. They even went so far as to nerf the Spell Enhancer spell from the Magic of Faerun, and it only provided a +2 DC to one spell. Taken way too far. They need to give a little love to the arcane and divine caster's spell DCs. They are already limited and become often moreso as they reach higher levels and fight creatures with all good saves and stronger resistances to their magic.
Death Ward's duration should not have been lowered. Energy draining creatures slow down play tremendously, especially incorporeal draining creatures or Shadow Dragons. A spell to resist the effects of energy drain and death magic should last for more than one encounter IME.
I don't know that I would spend the $90 again. I might just download pieces of the SRD that I wanted to use. Overall, 3.5 isn't much different from 3.0. The parts that are different could have been compiled into an errata book.
Inconsequenti-AL
Breaks Games
Initially I wasn't taken with the idea of a +.5 patch and the changes didn't sound particularly sweeping. After finding out about it, I started playing from the SRD.
Lots of small changes - that work together extremely well. Found it has improved the game no end. To the point where I bit the bullet and picked up the 3.5 core books.
There's still a few niggles with it - darkness doesn't sit well. Or the Keen/Improved Crit stacking. Easy to house rule.
There was a bit of a learning curve to it and even now I find a spell here or there that works differently to how I *know* it should.
Lots of small changes - that work together extremely well. Found it has improved the game no end. To the point where I bit the bullet and picked up the 3.5 core books.
There's still a few niggles with it - darkness doesn't sit well. Or the Keen/Improved Crit stacking. Easy to house rule.
There was a bit of a learning curve to it and even now I find a spell here or there that works differently to how I *know* it should.
MonsterMash
First Post
I prefer 3.5, but have got some house rules in place, these are:
Buff spells at 10min/level rather than 1min/level
Not all creatures are square. At some point I'm going to do some changes to the combat rules to add facing as I don't like how AoO work on movement much. Actually the combat rules are something I'm not overly fond of in either 3 or 3.5 and as an experienced miniatures gamer I'm sure I can improve on them :\
Gnomes still have wizard as a favoured class
I'm tempted to change the ranger class as I'm not keen on the animal companion or d8 hit die.
Buff spells at 10min/level rather than 1min/level
Not all creatures are square. At some point I'm going to do some changes to the combat rules to add facing as I don't like how AoO work on movement much. Actually the combat rules are something I'm not overly fond of in either 3 or 3.5 and as an experienced miniatures gamer I'm sure I can improve on them :\
Gnomes still have wizard as a favoured class
I'm tempted to change the ranger class as I'm not keen on the animal companion or d8 hit die.
Li Shenron
Legend
3.5 improved the rules which seem to go smoother in more cases and have less problems.
However, it had a bad effect on our games. Most of the players bought 3.0 books and didn't want to spend more money on 3.5 books, but are still using the old books to look up for rules. This makes a lot of confusion and lead players to make tactical mistakes.
The best thing to do is either stick to 3.0 or move to 3.5 completely, but that wasn't eventually possible in our case. We are actually playing different campaigns with the two ruleset, to please everyone.
Another bad effect was to partially invalidate some published material. I would have preferred 3.5 to invalidate everything, but this is just my own preference, that I hate having a book which is only partially valid such as FRCS or DotF, and I have to buy a new equivalent book (PGtF or CD) which updates only part of the old book... then I am left with the doubt of what I have to do with the material that was not updated, and with 2 books to use in place of one.*
Since the 3.5 material is anyway better on the overall, if there is something to blame WotC about 3.5 is that it should have been the first version of 3rd edition since the start, or at least it should have come out much earlier, before releasing so many accessory books. Some of the 3.5 bits were so clearly troublesome that it is hard to believe that good playtesting would have missed them.
* (edit) I think this is especially bad for FR players.
If you play 3.0, more or less you have to live with the books published before the revision, otherwise you will buy books with are not fully compatible, and you'll have to "retro-adapt" with 3.0.
If you play 3.5, you STILL have to buy a FRCS, a Magic of Faerun, a Monster of Faerun, and/or old regional books, for some important information, only that you already know that only part of those book will be usable - except that you have to pay all of it.
From a customer perspective, it's a very bad result.
However, it had a bad effect on our games. Most of the players bought 3.0 books and didn't want to spend more money on 3.5 books, but are still using the old books to look up for rules. This makes a lot of confusion and lead players to make tactical mistakes.
The best thing to do is either stick to 3.0 or move to 3.5 completely, but that wasn't eventually possible in our case. We are actually playing different campaigns with the two ruleset, to please everyone.
Another bad effect was to partially invalidate some published material. I would have preferred 3.5 to invalidate everything, but this is just my own preference, that I hate having a book which is only partially valid such as FRCS or DotF, and I have to buy a new equivalent book (PGtF or CD) which updates only part of the old book... then I am left with the doubt of what I have to do with the material that was not updated, and with 2 books to use in place of one.*
Since the 3.5 material is anyway better on the overall, if there is something to blame WotC about 3.5 is that it should have been the first version of 3rd edition since the start, or at least it should have come out much earlier, before releasing so many accessory books. Some of the 3.5 bits were so clearly troublesome that it is hard to believe that good playtesting would have missed them.
* (edit) I think this is especially bad for FR players.
If you play 3.0, more or less you have to live with the books published before the revision, otherwise you will buy books with are not fully compatible, and you'll have to "retro-adapt" with 3.0.
If you play 3.5, you STILL have to buy a FRCS, a Magic of Faerun, a Monster of Faerun, and/or old regional books, for some important information, only that you already know that only part of those book will be usable - except that you have to pay all of it.
From a customer perspective, it's a very bad result.
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After a good year of gaming since it came out, I would have to say that 3.5 was a disappointment.
There are a few things that are good, such as the class changes and a few spell changes. The 3.5 MM was a great improvement.
But I believe that 3.5 was a collection of poorly tested house rules combined with some questionable re-direction of traditional D&D flavor such as gnomes / bard and half elven diplomats.
Of the 4 groups that I know who game on a regular basis, not a single one runs a full 3.5 game. Yet when 3E originally came out, all of them changed within the first month. Today they have all gone the route of adding a few 3.5 rules to their 3E game.
IMHO that is a solid indication of 3.5 being a disappointment.
There are a few things that are good, such as the class changes and a few spell changes. The 3.5 MM was a great improvement.
But I believe that 3.5 was a collection of poorly tested house rules combined with some questionable re-direction of traditional D&D flavor such as gnomes / bard and half elven diplomats.
Of the 4 groups that I know who game on a regular basis, not a single one runs a full 3.5 game. Yet when 3E originally came out, all of them changed within the first month. Today they have all gone the route of adding a few 3.5 rules to their 3E game.
IMHO that is a solid indication of 3.5 being a disappointment.
