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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Irda Ranger" data-source="post: 3692108" data-attributes="member: 1003">Right.  Those pics from PHB II that the Gneech linked to are "cool in context", but there's far too little of that in the new artwork.  Even M:tG cards have more context than most of the 3e art I've seen (admittedly not a lot - but the Core stuff, certainly).Although I'm not fan of what Korgoth is calling 3e's "anime" style either, a 3e supplement that has a high number of "cool in context" art is <a href="http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ag/20061117a" target="_blank">Cityscape</a>. But there's precious little of that.To use some modern art (not to hearken back to some old books where nostalgia may be effecting judgment), compare this:<img src="http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/cw_ag/75396.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />with this ...<img src="http://www.goodmangames.com/images/5501-2.jpg" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" />The former of course is the Hexblade from Complete Warrior.  But he's just a visual stat blocked, ripped out of all context and story.  The latter warriors aren't nearly as obviously bad-ass or graphically detailed, but you can sense that they're part of something bigger.I actually don't like the 1e picture posted by the OP, but I think what he's getting at is that the older art felt less like "a portrait of my Hexblade 4" and more of a window into the campaign world.  You got the feeling that if you could just see around the edges of the painting, it would keep going off to a far horizon.I do not want to make this an edition war though, because really, a lot of that old stuff just stank.  The production values were very low compared to the new stuff.  Their only edge at all was that they were more likely to paint "scenes", like a photographer on the scene taking a snap shot mid-adventure.  It might have been "bad", but it was inspiring.  The 3e art usually doesn't inspire me any more than a mini in someone's display case does.For the curious, the second piece is from Goodman Game's Iron Heroes adventure: To Duel With Dragons (levels 4-6).  Like Piraecat said, they'll make you happy.</blockquote>

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