d20 that should have been core

[der_kluge]

What should have been core?

Bullywugs!

TESTIFY, BROTHER!
Amen!

 

[Darrin Drader]

Mass combat, rituals, Airships, and Manual of the Planes are on my wish list. Some of the monsters from Monsters of Faerun, Monster Manual II, Beholders, Mind Flayers, Carrion Crawlers, Umber Hulks, Githyanki, and displacer beasts are all items that I consider core, but are not open content.

 

[Gellion]

Anybody who says Psionics should not be core, deserves to be Mind Blasted.

 

[Darrin Drader]

Anybody who says Psionics should not be core, deserves to be Mind Blasted.

Hello Cthulhu!

 

[woodelf]

What should have been core?

Bullywugs!

You mean they're gone! That's a travesty! I just assumed they weren't in the D20SRD.

 

[woodelf]

Dynasties & Demagogues. Or, more generally, mechanical detail for social/intellectual activities that at least approaches that provided for physical/combat activities.

 

[der_kluge]

Mass combat, rituals, Airships, and Manual of the Planes are on my wish list. Some of the monsters from Monsters of Faerun, Monster Manual II, Beholders, Mind Flayers, Carrion Crawlers, Umber Hulks, Githyanki, and displacer beasts are all items that I consider core, but are not open content.

AIRSHIPS?!? Good grief, I wonder why you'd mention that?

Dude, no way should Airships be part of the core rules.

And last I checked, a lot of planar information was in the new DMG.

I also don't agree that rituals should be core. I've played D&D 15 years now and have never used, nor needed rituals.

 

[Tarrasque Wrangler]

The flumph, yo.

 

[Faraer]

One of the decisions the creators of 3E made was where to place the game along the spectrum that ranges from focused Gygaxian Greyhawk AD&D, through tighter and looser interpretations of the D&D fantasy subgenre, to catering to heroic fantasy in general. If you think it 'should' be at some particular point on that scale, what's the authority or criteria of the should? The reason 3E generally doesn't enthuse me is that I like AD&D with its original rationales and world, and I like fantasy fiction, but not D&D fantasy per se.

One of the things that defines D&D is the way it has more rules for fighting than anything else. That's fine on its own terms; adding a mass combat system, though, would skew the game further in a direction plenty of players and potential players aren't fond of.

I don't think anything else 'should' be in the core rules partly because apart from anything else, the D&D rulebooks are too big already.

 

[Darrin Drader]

AIRSHIPS?!? Good grief, I wonder why you'd mention that?

I also don't agree that rituals should be core. I've played D&D 15 years now and have never used, nor needed rituals.

Hmm, you're absolutely right. The less options you have in the core rules to incorporate into your campaign the better. According to that logic they shouldn't have bothered with superfluous elements such as magic items or prestige classes. All that's really needed in core rulebooks are core classes and a robust combat system.