Are people still mad about . . .

[Wik]

Hey...that's an idea!

I have $22.43 to spare- anyone else?

I have a one dollar american bill that I found on the grungy floor of a strip club saturday night... oh, and I also have a toonie, three quarters, and maybe a couple of dimes.

...is that enough to buy the spellthief?

 

[Chris Knapp]

However, with just slight tweaking one can easily play an 1e or 2e adventure using 3e rules (same is true for Pathfinder rules) - change some monster stats, replace NPCs with more appropriate to current rules version, some trap and spell mechanics changes, but that's it.

Trying to do that using 4e is problematic at best. Pacing is different, the mindset is different. You could use an old map, perhaps, but the adventures need radical changes to be compatible.

In my experience, NPC creation and Spell compatibility between 1/2E and 3E were pretty drastic, and were some of the more difficult aspects of adventure conversion. I had a heck of a time converting my stuff over. Converting from 3E to 4E is also a challenge. But, converting from 1/2E to 4E is much simpler than from 1/2E to 3E for me. I guess I never really got my mind around 3E's mechanics. I think it has much to do with the fact that I love 4E and am motivated to build with it. 3E felt like a chore from day 1. I do agree that 4E made it much more difficult to convert our PC's over from 3E. From 1/2E to 3E was a snap concept-wise, just maybe not mechanics-wise. Again, this probably reflects upon the fact that I never cared that my own PC couldn't be converted 100%. Heck, as long as my "upgraded" character had the same name and still swung a sword or used a magic stick, the details behind it were inconsequential.

 

[Votan]

Half Priced Bookstore for me. I don't like pdf's much. Nothing beat paper for reading, and by the time you pay to get a pdf printed up it costs as much or more than a book.

I've managed to get quite a few nice treasures from used bookstores. None of them are in collector's condition, but they are still more servicable than I find pdf's.

So it's hard for me to get excercised about them taking away something I've no real interest in anyway.

While I agree with this in general, the PDFs had two nice aspects:

1) It was possible to obtain otherwise very rare gaming material (stuff with a limited print run, for example). SO playing things like Planescape was more viable

2) It gave me confidence that one could recruit new players to older edition games as they had a reliable way to obtain books or source material (if interim measures, if nothign else)

So, even if it as an overall good decision, it was not something that I enjoyed. I actually lost PDFs in a computer crash not realizing that the PDFs had been withdrawn and assuming my back-up plan was re-downloading.

 

[wedgeski]

Absolutely the only thing that still annoys me is how (what I perceive as) half truths and untruths about the whole run-up and release of 4E still get perpetuated as gospel years later. That's about it, and is more of a general bugbear of mine that anything specific to the hobby.

Overall the game (whatever edition) and this board seem pretty healthy lately.

 

[Windjammer]

I'm still mad at Paizo for this:

'No, we aren't going to reprint the 3.5 SRD and only create new stuff when it's needed to make it a complete system (e.g. provide "alternative" charts for stat point buy and XP progression). Here's what we're doing instead:

You see, while some of the changes are merely revisions, many are also completely different rules. Despite what Paizo has said, there are conversion issues between 3.5 and Pathfinder RPG (your half-orc barbarian is going to be a fairly different character in PF-RPG). Many of the changes, some of them even good ones, are ones I would never have allowed in a "revision," but only in a new edition.

Allow me to clarify. If I were in charge of the world (or at least D&D), I'd make sure that in a revision, there were no actual rules changes that could retroactively alter a character or a campaign. Changing the price of magic item, clarifying an unclear rules, even adding a new piece of equipment or tweaking a spell is not going to significantly alter anyone's character or campaign. But if I'm running a 3.5 game (which I am) and was going to switch over completely to Pathfinder RPG (which I'm not), I'd have to deal with all kinds of changes to the game. Suddenly the most important spells in the game no longer cost XP. Suddenly dwarven armor is made of adamantite rather than mithral. Suddenly devas are called angels. Suddenly half-elves are the best diplomats in the game. And so on. You might see some or all of these things as good changes -- some of them are. But in my definition of a revision, they just shouldn't be part of these books. This is 4th Edition material. I shouldn't have to change my campaign just because Paizo needed cash.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

I'm still mad at Paizo for this:

'No, we aren't going to reprint the 3.5 SRD and only create new stuff when it's needed to make it a complete system (e.g. provide "alternative" charts for stat point buy and XP progression). Here's what we're doing instead:

That's a stupid quote, because none of those are changes.

The barbarian is somewhat different, but remains the same class. You're still using a two handed weapon and throwing yourself into a rage, and all the flavor has gone unchanged.

Half elves in 3.5 were supposed to be the best diplomats.

Dwarven items were supposed to be made of adamantite.

And the devas -> Angels change is such a small issue it's laughable.

When you can point me out a solid and concrete change between 3.5 and Pathfinder that alters the world, by all means, list it. But none of those things fall under that category. It's just whining for the sake of whining.

 

[Windjammer]

That's a stupid quote, because none of those are changes.

I certainly haven't made the effort to update every detail in the original quote (from 2003, and linked to) to bring it up to 2009.

Doesn't change the fact that by Paizo's own admission the change from 3.5 to PFRPG is on the same scale as from 3.0 to 3.5.

If the situation of 2003, then, is structurally analogous to the current one, the same spectrum of reactions is legitimate. Personally, I didn't like the way WotC handled the "revision" in 2003, and I don't like how Paizo handled it either. And if one thought that Cook's analysis of the situation in 2003 was salient (as I did), it would be incoherent not to extend it to the exact same situation in 2009. If anything, I recommend people to read the review I linked to (preceding my fabricated quote) and re-assess the current situation with respect to it.

I'm fine if not everyone agrees with that review or agrees to extend its conclusions to the situation generated by the 3.5/PF split. But I'd rather that any disagreements on this be expressed without resorting to derogatory language ("Stupid", "Whining just for whining's sake.") as that makes it harder to take the opposing view seriously.

 

[Starfox]

...most of what they said sucked [in 3E] seemed to suck in my own games.

It is kind of funny that I used to agree very much with this but have changed completely since then. When 4E was coming I was very fed up with 3E and wanted to get away from it. That's why I embraced 4E back then. Now, having played a but of 4E, 3E doesn't seem so bad anymore. I guess its all about perspective.

PS: My next campaign is probably going to be completely homebrew.

Back on topic, a few things from the edition change still bothers me, but that's not really things that appeared on ENworld - it was in the 3E and 4E games, ENworld was just the forum to discuss it in.

 

[aurance]

I was never really that fired up about any of this stuff.

Back in 1988 I found a Red Box to play with. Anything after that is just gravy. I mean, no company really "owes" me anything, eh? I either buy their product or I leave it, it's as simple as that, I don't stress about it. Especially about a hobby.

 

[Dice4Hire]

Well, most of the things mentioned in this thread do not anger me, at least in a historical sense. Most of my annoyances are things happening now, like the stealth edition war (people sniping at each other in one-line posts) and other things, but hey, an ignore list is a good thing and I make good use of it.

Looking at historical things, I am glad they did not try to shoehorn 3.5 into 4E and jsut make a few changes, while keeping it backwards compatible. 3.5 is 3.0 is 2E is 1E, as far as I am concerned, an evolution of largely the same system, each edition built on the previous one.

4E took the feel of D&D and made a new ruleset. While I do not think it is perfect, and things could be better, the change was needed, in my opinion. 3.5 took things as far as they could go, and I could not see any more evolution possible. From what I have seen, people who change 3.5 wither 1) make a game justs as complicated (Pathfinder) or simple versions (Castle and Crusades, to name one of many)

So I am glad for the change, and still play both 3.5 and 4E.

As for the PDFs, I am still waiting for the other shoe to drop and WOTC to tell us how the older pdfs are going to be available again, and wondering why they needed to alienate that much of their fan base. It makes sense to say 4E is their MAIN seller, but why di it have to become their ONLY seller.

Most other points raised in this thread never bothered me much at all even at the time, though most discussions did add to my ignore list.