I go away, and I miss a whole edition - Help?!

[Herschel]

I'm much more interested in running games; I do apologize if I wasn't specific on that in my OP. I haven't gotten to PLAY in years - I always end up running the games (people like my games, and I'm happy to do the work)... which is why my question is truly about the investment - I'm going to need a gad of books (as Alzrius pointed out) to get all the nuggets I might want/need; I'm familiar with the WotC model of breaking up material into multiple books (TSR pioneered the model, and it works).

Then you should LOVE 4E. One of the great strengths of the game is how much easier it is to run the mechanical side of it so you can have more time for designing the actual world.

 

[mach1.9pants]

I will just point out that the 3 core books of 4E (even the 3 book with early errata silver collectors set) are riddled with errata. Some of it is very very important. Also the early Monster Manuals (1&2) did not do a good job of many monsters, 3 is good and they have released 'fixed' versions of a very few on DDi (free? I don't know). So personally, unless you don't care about the very poor initial release I would go for the 'heroes' series books, they also give a good range of character styles, like very simple fighter for those that like it.
4E is great for DMs and so easy. My beef after a year and a half was the grindy-ness of the combat. But there are a vfew guides around to how and avoid that.
The PDF for errata for 4E weighs in at 139 pages, of which 26 are PHB compared to Heroes of Fallen Lands and Heroes of Forgotten Kingdoms with only 1/2 a page each.

 

[S'mon]

I'm much more interested in running games; I do apologize if I wasn't specific on that in my OP. I haven't gotten to PLAY in years - I always end up running the games (people like my games, and I'm happy to do the work)... which is why my question is truly about the investment - I'm going to need a gad of books (as Alzrius pointed out) to get all the nuggets I might want/need; I'm familiar with the WotC model of breaking up material into multiple books (TSR pioneered the model, and it works).

OK, well then the minimum you need is a PHB and the Monster Vault, the PHB is rather dry and inaccessible in tone but it does have plenty of classes, all the actual game rules, magic items, and rituals in there. To get the equivalent with Essentials the alternative would be:

Heroes of the Fallen Lands - traditional 'Basic' classes & races
Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms - additional classes & races
Rules Compendium - combat & skill rules
Mordenkainen's Magnificent Emporium - magic items

And you still would not have Rituals, which Essentials abandoned. So I'd suggest getting a PHB to start with and you can buy more books later.

Edit: I would ignore the errata, it's nearly all changes in design preference. The one important thing IMO was the change to monster design, which is available here: http://blogofholding.com/?p=512

 

[haakon1]

I never had overt issues with 3.5 other than the power-creep that came with mixing and matching prestige classes from different sources

I've been playing Core Rules only 3.5e for years. Not need for splatbooks, IMHO.

I had the same opinion of AD&D . . . tried UA, then decided "AD&D 1.5e" wasn't worth it except for the polearms and non-human deities . . . the original core AD&D was good for about 12 years (1981-1999, minus 6 years of dropping out in the 2e era) of gaming for me.