Imaro
Legend
And how does this in anyway impact whether there is rules support or not for solving certain issues?
Misconceptions about 3.5...Answers
- Thread starter Imaro
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And how does this in anyway impact whether there is rules support or not for solving certain issues?
Imaro
Legend
Uhm...UA was released around 7 months after the 3.5 players Handbook, I don't necessarily consider that a later release. But if you do, ok.
Well, it's only a problem if you don't like that consequence.
3E was pretty good about noting potential unintended consequences of optional rules, and I felt that this was one of its strengths. However, if you dislike those consequences, sometimes the cure could be worse than the disease. The extent to which a person will feel like 3E "couldn't" handle that optional rule is pretty much going to match how bad they think the unintended consequences were.
4E took some of these options and made them core assumptions, and did the work of rebuilding the rest of the system to mitigate these consequences (in some cases) or integrating the consequences into the rules (in others). The extent to which a person will feel like 4E did a good job will depend on how well they like the mitigation or integration of the consequences.
Vyvyan Basterd
Adventurer
I think I'm on the same page with Mustrum. Except I'll take it a step further.
Each additional rule in 3E led to the bloat that eventually drove me away. I bought new books because I like new options. And I like to include new options not exclude. (Someone will jump in at this point and blame the rules-bloat on me.) But two fundamental flaws in the system cause the problem in my opinion.
Feats: This was a new toy in 3E. I don't think the designers decided what they wanted these to be. Some feats were small perks (Toughness) and others were cool powers (Whirlwind Attack - although I'm sure I could find better examples that aren't part of a long feat chain). Without a strong codification of what a feat should grant, power level of feats varied widely. It wasn't just a matter of making bad choices, it was the effort of determining which feats were the duds. I remember reading that one designer regretted designing the system in such a way as it hindered those that weren't playing the game for the love of system mastery. I do believe this has been corrected in 4E. Some people look at it as depowering feats, but I am just happy that most feats are on par with those in the same tier. And so far the design team has seemed to stay on course with the design goal of what a 4E feat should grant.
Multiclassing: New classes and prestige classes seem innocuous to some, but each new one stacks a new batch of options to cherry-pick. It makes it difficult to continuosly design balanced classes. Each new option must be weighed against everything that came before. And as time went on this became too difficult for designers. Again system mastery came into play. I believe that this has been corrected by 4E. Multiclassing in 4E is a shock to many when compared to 3E, but I really believe the change needed to be made. I also think that multiclassing in 4E hasn't been explored well enough and those that have delved into it find it to be a better option than it how it reads.
System mastery caused the death of 3E for me. Casual players, IME, are frustrated when a system master trumps them continuously just because they don't want to (or can't) make the investment of time and money to master the system. DMs can even fall into the casual category. A recent poll showed that many of us here are in our late 30's. We have jobs, family, etc. to take time away from gaming and not all of us have the desire to master a system any more. Personally, I DM for a mix of people, some of whom do have the time to master the system and other that don't, and I became frustrated with 3E. I couldn't provide a worthy challenge for the system masters without over-challenging the non system masters. YMMV.
This is one reason I think the fixes in this thread don't necessarily help. They tack onto a system that has some fundamental flaws that didn't rear their ugly heads until years after release.
Each additional rule in 3E led to the bloat that eventually drove me away. I bought new books because I like new options. And I like to include new options not exclude. (Someone will jump in at this point and blame the rules-bloat on me.) But two fundamental flaws in the system cause the problem in my opinion.
Feats: This was a new toy in 3E. I don't think the designers decided what they wanted these to be. Some feats were small perks (Toughness) and others were cool powers (Whirlwind Attack - although I'm sure I could find better examples that aren't part of a long feat chain). Without a strong codification of what a feat should grant, power level of feats varied widely. It wasn't just a matter of making bad choices, it was the effort of determining which feats were the duds. I remember reading that one designer regretted designing the system in such a way as it hindered those that weren't playing the game for the love of system mastery. I do believe this has been corrected in 4E. Some people look at it as depowering feats, but I am just happy that most feats are on par with those in the same tier. And so far the design team has seemed to stay on course with the design goal of what a 4E feat should grant.
Multiclassing: New classes and prestige classes seem innocuous to some, but each new one stacks a new batch of options to cherry-pick. It makes it difficult to continuosly design balanced classes. Each new option must be weighed against everything that came before. And as time went on this became too difficult for designers. Again system mastery came into play. I believe that this has been corrected by 4E. Multiclassing in 4E is a shock to many when compared to 3E, but I really believe the change needed to be made. I also think that multiclassing in 4E hasn't been explored well enough and those that have delved into it find it to be a better option than it how it reads.
System mastery caused the death of 3E for me. Casual players, IME, are frustrated when a system master trumps them continuously just because they don't want to (or can't) make the investment of time and money to master the system. DMs can even fall into the casual category. A recent poll showed that many of us here are in our late 30's. We have jobs, family, etc. to take time away from gaming and not all of us have the desire to master a system any more. Personally, I DM for a mix of people, some of whom do have the time to master the system and other that don't, and I became frustrated with 3E. I couldn't provide a worthy challenge for the system masters without over-challenging the non system masters. YMMV.
This is one reason I think the fixes in this thread don't necessarily help. They tack onto a system that has some fundamental flaws that didn't rear their ugly heads until years after release.
Taking this in a different direction, much of the the OP's "misconceptions" (prolly not the right choice of word, but whatever) to me point to the idea that there is some kind of argument against 3.5's versatility: i.e., 3.5's rules were limiting, straight-jacketed creativity, and caused there to be a smaller set of options.
IMO, 3.5's strength is that it has tons of options because it has a lot of very specific rules that can be interacted with. This is exageration, but it seems like every piece of gear has its own little rules, every spell has its own fiddly bits, different interactions exist between indoor/outdoor movement rules, some class abilities trump feats and some later feats trumped class abilities (I mostly mean Prestige Class abilities here), and so on. Basically, there were a ton of rules on every page of the PHB, and later books expanded on those, redefined some, fixed others, created combos that broke still more.
Anyway, 3.5 is what I call a player's paradise: player's can go through and look at all the little rule interactions, meticulously pick each item, feat, skill rank, skill trick, and class ability to maximize their character's specialty.
Other editions were more about either limiting the choices (early editions, with level caps, small numbers of classes, equipment largely being defined only on their cost, damage die, and weight), or about making the choices less about the individual rules and more about the overall gameplay (4e, with its more ingrained "teamwork" mechanics and the much more obvious similarity in how all classes operate on Powers).
I personally don't think that makes any edition better than any other on principle alone. If I want an ultra-detailed character, I'd play 3.5. If I want a tactical character with a more defined role and not as many "fiddly bits", I'll play 4e. If I want to just pick up a character and bust down the dungeon door, I'll go with 1e.
IMO, 3.5's strength is that it has tons of options because it has a lot of very specific rules that can be interacted with. This is exageration, but it seems like every piece of gear has its own little rules, every spell has its own fiddly bits, different interactions exist between indoor/outdoor movement rules, some class abilities trump feats and some later feats trumped class abilities (I mostly mean Prestige Class abilities here), and so on. Basically, there were a ton of rules on every page of the PHB, and later books expanded on those, redefined some, fixed others, created combos that broke still more.
Anyway, 3.5 is what I call a player's paradise: player's can go through and look at all the little rule interactions, meticulously pick each item, feat, skill rank, skill trick, and class ability to maximize their character's specialty.
Other editions were more about either limiting the choices (early editions, with level caps, small numbers of classes, equipment largely being defined only on their cost, damage die, and weight), or about making the choices less about the individual rules and more about the overall gameplay (4e, with its more ingrained "teamwork" mechanics and the much more obvious similarity in how all classes operate on Powers).
I personally don't think that makes any edition better than any other on principle alone. If I want an ultra-detailed character, I'd play 3.5. If I want a tactical character with a more defined role and not as many "fiddly bits", I'll play 4e. If I want to just pick up a character and bust down the dungeon door, I'll go with 1e.
Well, you said it way better than I did.
Obryn
Hero
Sure. I consider PHB2, though, to be a firm part of the third "era" of 3e. The first was 3.0 and its stuff, the second was 3.5 and the early Complete line, and then splats like PHB2/Bo9S/Complete Mage mark the third.
My point was only that I agree with you that 4e's rules are a direct descendant of 3.5's rules (including optional rules), and that it took many lessons from where people had problems with 3.5.
-O
Imaro
Legend
I can understand that, so far, the ones I listed don't help the problems you are citing here... but I never claimed they did. And I never claimed I could fix every problem everyone had with 3.5...
I claimed they gave rules support to eliminate certain problems I specifically cited (and these are really only problems for some people, which is why I love the options approach as opposed to the we decided and "fixed" everything for you approach.)
NOTE: Some of these don't lead to rules bloat as they are replacing other rules, not adding to them...but that's really just a side point.
I feel like some people are using this as an opportunity to throw out how much they don't like 3.5 with irrelevant dislikes, and really want to tear these solutions down with such absurd claims as they aren't part of the game...(Really, because I don't know what game they go with then), or pulling out rules I never even cited as fixing anything (Bell Curve rolls, when did I actually suggest Bell Curve rolls as a fix for anything?)... In the end it's not a thread bashing 4e, though for some reason many are taking it that way... it's a thread citing that yes, 3.5 did address many of the problems the designers and certain fans of 4e claim there was never any rules support for. Simple fact of the matter, for the issues I have listed there was rules support for solving them.
It doesn't. But neither does it matter because, there's obviously another misconception:
1. misconception: having support =/= providing a good and balanced solution.Imaro said:
2. misconception: there are things that aren't supported in 3E.
P.S.: After having read the thread this far, I'd rather I didn't have bothered replying at all. This discussion will go nowhere.
Hussar
Legend
So, just to be absolutely clear, you are claiming that there are a large number of 3e critics who claim that there are no rules support for tweaking the 3e system? That the five points you list in your OP aren't covered by a number of alternative systems?
Who are these critics? I've never seen anyone try to claim that there weren't alternative rules given for pretty much any element of 3e. If you're willing to break into 3pp land, there's probably a baker's dozen options for changing/tweaking pretty much any and all elements of 3e D&D.
Anyone who claims differently is woefully ignorant of the huge amount of material out there.
However, I have a sneaking suspicion that there aren't all that many people who would seriously argue that there are no solutions to the problems of 3e. I would think that there are lots of people who have no problems pointing to the problem, but, I have trouble thinking that a quick search on Amazon would net you any number of solutions.
Can you point me to these critics? They are, as you say, woefully underinformed.
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