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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Neonchameleon" data-source="post: 5840680" data-attributes="member: 87792">I actually see a substantial difference between Essentials and 3.5. From what I can tell, a number of the changes in 3.5 (square horses) were made for the sake of change as much as anything.  Some were genuine fixes (Bards, Rangers, Haste) or failed fixes (Monks, Polymorph).  And the game was genuinely expanded in some ways with prestige classes that looked overpowered but really, really weren't unless you abused the entry requirements* (Mystic Theurge, Eldritch Knight, Arcane Trickster). But all in all, other than the Mystic Theurge & Co, I see very little difference between 3.0 and 3.5.  And certainly nothing that couldn't have been in 3.0. Essentials on the other hand, I simply don't believe WoTC had the skill to produce.  Every Monster Manual has been significantly better than the previous one at a technical level (even if the MM3 is arguably the worst due to being most obscure).  Learning how to balance classes with significantly different power structure is hard, especially to the levels of balance 4e works to.  And I simply do not believe that the writers of the PHB had the skill to produce Essentials at the time the PHB was written or were even close.  Further, although I consider Essentials a vast improvement over the PHB, I consider the results of a game that starts out with mechanical parity between fighters and casters to be superior to the hypothetical version that had the Slayer, the Knight, and no Martial Dailies. Essentials changed fewer rules, but did IMO far more to broaden the game and what people could viably play. * Mystic Theurge on top of Ur Priest was just ... unpleasant.  Or, worse yet, Ur Priest and Nar Demonbinder and a caster level running out of control.  But that's not what was intended at all.  The intended entry method (Wiz 3/Cleric 3/Mystic Theurge 1) can only cast second level spells at level 7.</blockquote>

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