Does 3E/3.5 dictate a certain style of play?

[Bacris]

Oh. Well, no, I don't agree with that. But whatevs.

But what is there to disagree with?

The DMG is pretty clear that an encounter of CR = party level is designed to use up about 20-25% of the party's limited resources (spells / hit points / potions, etc). It even says what to expect using encounters 2-3 above or below the party level. Nowhere does it say "you cannot use encounters 5 above the party" - but it does say that such encounters are likely to have PC death.

That's the difference between dictate and recommend. The DMG / MM recommend using CR = party level. It does not dictate it - it even gives recommendations if you choose to not use CR = party level. Hence Psion saying your use of dictate is inaccurate - and dictate carries some heavy connotations that aren't correct.

It may be STRONGLY recommended, but it's still only a recommendation

 

[Psion]

Is there a reason why you can't use the 3.0 cover rules in a 3.5 game?

No reason at all. That's why I do.

My point was, speaking in degrees, that this represents a modest push in the game between 3.0 and 3.5 being more dependent upon the battlemat.

 

[Clavis]

AD&D seemed designed to recreate the worlds of classic fantasy fiction. 3.X Edition seems designed to recreate the worlds of computer gaming. The first was intended for a literate audience (although it didn't always work out that way in practice, of course). The designers of 3.X edition seem to have realized that few people read classic fantasy anymore, so they changed the basic assumptions of the game accordingly.

Trying to play 3.X edition without buying into the whole powergamer mentality is an ecercise in frustration. The ENTIRE game is balanced in a way that penalizes any player whose character is not maximized for tactical combat and dripping with magic items. I also absolutely refuse to DM a 3.X Edition game, because I find its magic-heavy premise ridiculous, adventure prep about as much fun as doing taxes, and its combat system excruciatingly slow and boring. I have tried adjusting the rules to my style of play, and found that I had to change so much that it became just too much work for something that's supposed to be fun.

The old-style game is now represented by Castles & Crusades. It should tell you something that the co-creator and main creative mind of D&D prefers C&C to the overgrown mess that is 3.X edition.

 

[Jim Hague]

AD&D seemed designed to recreate the worlds of classic fantasy fiction. 3.X Edition seems designed to recreate the worlds of computer gaming. The first was intended for a literate audience (although it didn't always work out that way in practice, of course). The designers of 3.X edition seem to have realized that few people read classic fantasy anymore, so they changed the basic assumptions of the game accordingly.

I was wondering when someone would trot out the '3.x is teh 'putar gamez!' fallacy.

Trying to play 3.X edition without buying into the whole powergamer mentality is an ecercise in frustration. The ENTIRE game is balanced in a way that penalizes any player whose character is not maximized for tactical combat and dripping with magic items. I also absolutely refuse to DM a 3.X Edition game, because I find its magic-heavy premise ridiculous, adventure prep about as much fun as doing taxes, and its combat system excruciatingly slow and boring. I have tried adjusting the rules to my style of play, and found that I had to change so much that it became just too much work for something that's supposed to be fun.

Go read the Story Hours on this very site and try to say that with a straight face. Go on. You don't like it? Super. That's differing tastes. But don't try to roll out tired old saws that have been disproven to the point where bringing them up is quite literally a joke.

The old-style game is now represented by Castles & Crusades. It should tell you something that the co-creator and main creative mind of D&D prefers C&C to the overgrown mess that is 3.X edition.

It tells you that the co-creator also made games like Cyborg Commando and Lejendary Journeys, both considered pretty wretched games. It also tells you that your statement has absolutely no bearing on the discussion at hand, other than to ham-handedly bash a game you don't like and hype one you do. Gary's views, while I don't share them, are pretty well known as far as D&D 3e goes. I don't think he needs someone putting words in his mouth.

 

[pawsplay]

A lot of the "few magic items" nostalgia people have is probably related to the fact that campaigns used to routinely peter out in their teens. Up through 6th to 9th level, each character is likely to have only a handful of magic items. At higher levels, characters have an amazing amount of crap. That is essentially unchanged.

Several things have. First of all, the "magic shop" has appeared, suggesting a staggering surplus of wealth and professional spellcasting in the standard world (easily ignored by limiting cities to 50,000 people or so, but that creates an interesting scarcity problem). Second, magic item creation has been streamlined to make it the province of PCs, if they wish to go that route, whereas before, it was rare for a PC to make a magic item, which typically involved an idiosyncratic formulation and a certain amount of adventuring. Third, higher level encounters involved simply adding more and more magic items to the hoards, for no really apparent reason... they are unlikely to be extremely useful, so this is essentially just more cash and magic that has to be explained. Fourth, NPCs are routinely equipped with magic items, whereas before, this was mainly the province of adventurers and creatures with hoards, rather than a function of level itself.

Just as a for instance, in AD&D, a death knight was 75% likely to have a magical sword. Ha! Nowadays, he probably has a +1 unholy humanbane longsword. But in either case, there are enough death knights in the world that a 10th level fighter is eventually going to end up with several backup magic weapons.

 

[Crothian]

Trying to play 3.X edition without buying into the whole powergamer mentality is an ecercise in frustration.

Maybe for you. But it is has run perfectly smooth for me for almost 7 years now. And I'm about as anti power gamer as you can get. THe game is what you make of it, and if you can't have fun without power gaming in d20 the fault lies not with the game.

The old-style game is now represented by Castles & Crusades. It should tell you something that the co-creator and main creative mind of D&D prefers C&C to the overgrown mess that is 3.X edition.

It doesn't really. There are enough people like myself that perfer the old style and use d20 to do that and choose that over C&C. There are plenty of people that choose C&C over d20. But the true fans I think stuck to the old system

 

[billd91]

Several things have. First of all, the "magic shop" has appeared, suggesting a staggering surplus of wealth and professional spellcasting in the standard world (easily ignored by limiting cities to 50,000 people or so, but that creates an interesting scarcity problem). Second, magic item creation has been streamlined to make it the province of PCs, if they wish to go that route, whereas before, it was rare for a PC to make a magic item, which typically involved an idiosyncratic formulation and a certain amount of adventuring. Third, higher level encounters involved simply adding more and more magic items to the hoards, for no really apparent reason... they are unlikely to be extremely useful, so this is essentially just more cash and magic that has to be explained. Fourth, NPCs are routinely equipped with magic items, whereas before, this was mainly the province of adventurers and creatures with hoards, rather than a function of level itself.

Just as a for instance, in AD&D, a death knight was 75% likely to have a magical sword. Ha! Nowadays, he probably has a +1 unholy humanbane longsword. But in either case, there are enough death knights in the world that a 10th level fighter is eventually going to end up with several backup magic weapons.

This is really different from 1e? We had backup weapons in 1e as well, quite likely several if we had played through more than one TSR-published module. Magic shops appeared in campaigns back in those days as well, and the typical treasure haul was even more cash than under 3E recommendations.
Of course in those days, you had to spend unholy gobs of cash to level-up. So the money tended to get sucked away pretty quickly.

The main real changes that I see in 3E out of the ones you cite are the easing of magic item creation rules and the likelihood that the death knight has a tricked out sword rather than an unspecified magic one. Everything else I had encountered fairly regularly in 1e.

 

[billd91]

AD&D seemed designed to recreate the worlds of classic fantasy fiction. 3.X Edition seems designed to recreate the worlds of computer gaming. The first was intended for a literate audience (although it didn't always work out that way in practice, of course). The designers of 3.X edition seem to have realized that few people read classic fantasy anymore, so they changed the basic assumptions of the game accordingly.

Trying to play 3.X edition without buying into the whole powergamer mentality is an ecercise in frustration. The ENTIRE game is balanced in a way that penalizes any player whose character is not maximized for tactical combat and dripping with magic items.

3E may include some elements that work with computer gaming, but that's also a part of catering to the audience. A lot more kids approach gaming from that background and so the game has adjusted to have some appeal to them.

But I disagree that 3E penalizes any player who doesn't powergame their characters. It rewards ones who do, sure. But as long as the play styles of the DM and players are a good fit, there's no reason to expect the game to penalize non-powergamed characters.

 

[Cthulhudrew]

This is really different from 1e? We had backup weapons in 1e as well, quite likely several if we had played through more than one TSR-published module. Magic shops appeared in campaigns back in those days as well, and the typical treasure haul was even more cash than under 3E recommendations.

Beat me to it. I was just going to say the same- there were tons of magic items to go around back in the 1E/OD&D days, and in the campaigns my friends and I ran, we routinely ended up introducing magic item shops in the major cities to buy and sell things we got that we did/didn't want.

Of course in those days, you had to spend unholy gobs of cash to level-up. So the money tended to get sucked away pretty quickly.

That part must have been an aspect of the game we didn't use (sounds like it might have been Unearthed Arcana?). We didn't have to spend cash to level up when we played OD&D, and since there really wasn't a lot to spend it on otherwise (aside from the aforementioned magic item shops) we had PCs running around with gobs of cash. It didn't really help matters that you got xp for gp, so they ended up completely looting dungeons down to the last tiny shred of tapestry even though there really wasn't any conceivable way for them to make off with the sheer tonnage of it all.

The main real changes that I see in 3E out of the ones you cite are the easing of magic item creation rules...

As far as magic item creation, Gaz3 for OD&D was the first time we ever really had any substantial rules for magic item creation (wasn't playing AD&D at that time, at least not very much). The costs were pretty exorbitant (but, again, PCs had tons of cash to throw around), but wizards actually got xp for creating items rather than losing it. I'm still not entirely sure I like the switch, but I can see the rationale for it.

 

[MerricB]

There was a thread that compared Keep on the Borderlands with Sunless Citadel and Forge of Fury.
The Keep was ridiculously packed with magic items. Lots of magic weapons and armor, but then, these could easily be destroyed.

Actually, they couldn't. The Keep was Basic D&D, and didn't have rules for magic item destruction.

Cheers!