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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Whizbang Dustyboots" data-source="post: 5614309" data-attributes="member: 11760">My 3.5 campaign is almost over, after five years. (One branch is on the final part of the Freeport Trilogy, where the roguish characters fled to after things went pear-shaped in an early adventure, while the other branch has two adventures to go to save the barony against the local kobold tribe summoning an aspect of Tiamat to lead their army pouring down out of the hills to wipe out the humans, dwarves and gnomes.)The sequel will not be 3.5. Even at level 6+, things are starting to become a real pain in the rear for me as DM, and I've let it be known that I will be running the sequel (which I've got big plans for, since saving a barony/city will have to be upped with even bigger threats at higher levels) in another system.My personal preference is Castles & Crusades, partly because I started with 1E, and I love C&C's 1E-reminiscent tone, and partly because it eliminates many of the problems I have with 3.5. But several of my players, who only started D&D with 3E, don't like the return to more traditional D&D multiclassing, and are suggesting Pathfinder. I'm not opposed to Pathfinder, necessarily, if it addresses my problems with 3E:1) Creating NPCs and monsters is way too time-consuming after level 5 or so. I have a job, a kid and a demanding life. I can't find time to spend several hours to prep adventures, even if I could justify it to myself.2) Juggling all of the different feats and sources of magic items from various supplements means being asked to make game balance appraisals all the freaking time, especially given WotC's pretty rocky record with balance for much of the 3E era.3) If the sequel campaign goes all the way to 20 -- a not unreasonable scenario, although Gygax only knows how long it'd take for that to happen -- I don't want to have to read through a three-page character write-up for the BBEG, like the Age of Worms featured. That was my first moment that I really realized that I wanted to get out of DMing 3E. Although, obviously, I am responsible for knowing what a major NPC can do, I don't want to have to search through three pages in the middle of play so that I don't miss a major ability, nor do I want to have to rewrite every NPC in a Cliff Notes version.4) The flavor of 3E turned into something unrecognizable to me over time. Some grognards like to say this is an anime-ification, but I really think that D&D had turned into its own genre. I don't know what a character with five different classes, a templated race and a sack full of magic items is supposed to resemble, but I want characters who could rub shoulders with Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser or Bilbo or Harry Potter: I want players playing "characters," rather than "builds."Obviously, different strokes for different folks, and there are a lot of people happy with Pathfinder (and 3E and 4E, etc.), but I just want to know if Pathfinder is a good fit for me without dropping $100 and a year of play on it to find out.Thanks in advance for any help that you can offer.</blockquote>

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