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Message: <blockquote data-quote="velm" data-source="post: 1854185" data-attributes="member: 25998">"I still use my 2e core rules CD for flavor text on core monsters. Habitat, ecology, and society were much more fleshed out back then and provided more hooks for me to use than the raw combat stat emphasis of the current set. And I can get the color pictures off the WotC site for the current incarnations.So while I like the rules of 3.5 creatures, I prefer a bunch of 2e descriptions of the same monsters."I saw this, and I do so much have to agree with it.  I think the habitat, ecology and such allows the DM to get a good feel for the creatures.  It allows the DM to get a good 'feel' of them and maybe do them 'right'  sure, you can throw a group of goblins in the grasslands, the hills, or whatnot, or come up with your own ideas of them, but by reading about the habitat, ecololy, and such, it can plant seeds of imagination into the DMs head and maybe more will come of it.I must admit, it has been a while since I have been in a steady group, but I did like the the general 'flavor' feeling of 2nd ed.  Did it have to be pages and pages and pages as some have said, no.  But the flavor did put you in a certain state of mind.  I liked the idea of needing certain spell components to make scrolls/wands/staves and such, after all, you need items for spells.  Got any bat guano for that fireball?  Sure, there might not be many that enforce the material component side of the house, I must admit that I have found it somewhat annoying myself.  The need to have certain components for magic items makes them 'special'.  This way the market will not get flooded with them.  Does it make them difficult to make, yes it does.  But when you are getting that cockatrice, I am hoping you are getting more than just ONE feather.  Also, by making components necessary for the creation of magic items, you are also opening up the PCs to quests to obtain them from other sources.  Someone could approach the PCs about requireing Gorgon blood.  The PCs could go look for some gorgons and have 'x' happen to them either there or on the way.  I am very much opposed to the 'walmart' approach to magic items.  I have seen DMs have pretty much supermarkets with magic items where you can get it IDed, and told how many charges are left and every single little subtle detail.  That takes a fair amount of fun out of the game.  I do not mind the occasion NPC who will have a small amount of magic that they are either willing to sell or trade away, but the walmart thing is something that I disagree with.I have seen some say that the rules were never clear.  Well, sometimes, yes and sometimes no.  It just depends on the situation.  I have been in many situations where I had to think on my feet, rules not withstanding, so I guess that aspect never bothered me much.  I found PC's can do some of the darndest things to a DMs well made plans, no writer can think of every rule possible.  That leaves it up to the DM to come up with a solution, on the fly sometimes.  Now, I do think 3rd is a leaps and bounds better than previous editions.  I love how they streamlined everything.  Skills and feats are a great thing, a player now actually has to think about their character.  In the past, I could make a character in less than 5 min.  Now, it is a different story, the characters are no longer cookie cutter.  The CR aspect of challenges is a brilliant thing, it is about time they came up with something like that.  It never did make any sense to me how that Ogre gave out the same xp to a group of 3rd lvl characters as it did to 10th lvl.</blockquote>

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