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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Darrin Drader" data-source="post: 4080219" data-attributes="member: 7394">It was really just a couple of seemingly small things that pushed me over th edge towards getting off the fence. The first is story based XP rewards. Sure, any DM could already do that just fine, but bringing the story back into the equation in more than just a background sort of way really makes me happy as someone who runs story based games. The second seemingly small issue was that it has actual rules for the DM setting the rate of advancement for the party. Like many, I feel that the sweet spot with 3.5 ends somewhere around level 14. If this extends that to level 20 and then has good guidelines for making that range last even longer through judicious XP rewards or alternate advancement tables, then great.The third issue is the nixing of prestige classes. Yes, I've designed my share of them, some of which have apparently proven popular, but I was never that big of a fan of them. To me, a prestige class is just an alternate set of class abilities with some flavor text tacked on. I'd much rather see the rules support sticking with the original core class with some ability to multiclass. Looks like that's what they did (and I'm sure the min-maxers out there are getting their torches and pitchforks ready for me right about now).Another main factor is that it sounds like its easier for beginners to learn. Sure, I'm no beginner, but I often have at least one beginner in any of my games. 2E was great for beginners. I ran a campaign back in 1998 where there were six of us and only me and one other guy had done any amount of RPGing in the past. The others picked it up really fast because the system was easy to learn. I had a little more of a hard time getting beginners to "get" the game with 3E. They often seemed confused about their options and felt that many of the rules were difficult to grasp, like grappling, overrun, etc.I also like that the game does not assume that you will be loading up your PCs with magic items. As a DM, I have always tried to create an epic but gritty feel, and one of the ways I accomplished that was by being notoriously stingy with the magic items. It's a good thing that the game no longer gets messed up if the 5th level fighter's best weapon is a +1 longsword.So in essence, it was the Ain't It Cool News review that pulled me over to the dark side. Now that I'm onboard and have preorderd the books, I have to sit patiently for the next three months while we wait for the new rules to release. I have a feeling that's going to be somewhat more difficult.</blockquote>

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