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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Magus Coeruleus" data-source="post: 1003854" data-attributes="member: 1704">Here are my thoughts on Monte’s “bad things” section of the review. Rectangular squares created serious headaches for my game, especially for mounted combat.  Recall that 3.0 designers initially had facing rules and decided to scrap it because it would be too cumbersome if D&D was not to become a wargame.  I think this was a good choice, but rectangular figures is not really compatible with it.  Changing to squares is a good thing, IMO.  If Monte considers it too much of an abstraction, I think it behooves him to at least acknowledge (or deny) the problem of rectangular figures.  If he would rather see D&D with full facing rules, then he should come out and say it.  If he would not, then he should suggest how the problem should have been dealt with.As far as the facing change relates to miniatures, I don’t see it as compelling miniatures play, and to the extent that it facilities such play, I see not problem.  If you don’t use a grid, then the shape of figures is irrelevant, and the change is meaningless.  No problem there.  I would have to see the actual text to see to what extent the new language for combat forces you to think in terms of miniatures.  If it’s by and large just using “squares” instead of feet, that’s really not so bad.  And the notion that using both is a step backwards is rather boggling to me.  Shouldn’t we want to facilitate play for everyone, minis or no minis?  I respect non-mini play, as I played OD&D all the way until 3e, but when you use 3.0 or really any version of AD&D, where spell ranges change with level in as small as 5’ (or one square, sorry to use the term), it’s hard for me to imagine how someone can’t use some sort of grid.  If you don’t, that’s fine, but then clearly you are making some rather intricate judgment calls or you’re abstracting away the fine-grained ranges.  I’m at a loss as to how someone can complain about excess abstraction of square figures but have nothing to say about how you avoid serious abstraction when using 3.x spell ranges without miniatures.Oh, and I don’t doubt that WotC wants to sell people miniatures and want people to think minis with the newly-scripted rules for that reason.  But really, we’re not talking about mini-based rules, just a grid-based rules.  Pennies, dice, graph paper all work fine.  If the books make shameless plugs for their minis in the midst of the rules, then I’ll be upset.  Otherwise, come on.I’m surprised Monte doesn’t mention the weapon equivalence rules in the DMG.  If they didn’t include that, I could see the problem.  Otherwise, I’m assuming there is a 3.0-like table that merely replaces small medium and large with light, one-handed and two-handed, and then does this again for multiple sizes of characters.  I don’t know what the tables look like, but I’m not sure.  Assuming it’s not a table nightmare, then I think this is a good thing.  Why?  Because if you want to use the same thing as 3.0, you just use the medium-sized character table and take the 10 milliseconds to convert, in your brain, light into small, one-handed into medium, and two-handed into large.  You forget the penalties for being differently-sized, end of story.  On the other hand, if you now want to play an all-halfling campaign (e.g. a Mystara Five Shires campaign) you don’t have to force Halflings to use human-sized weapons or come up with prices, weights, etc. for halfling versions, because they’re there.  The weapon-equivalence table essentially gives you advice on which weapons to allow without penalty, but ultimately the DM doesn’t even need it.  He or she can just think “does this sound okay or would this be so awkward that the character should get a penalty?”  If it’s awkward, give it a -2.I tried but never found those NPC tables useful, because they fit only one stereotype for each class, and if your campaign doesn’t fit that stereotype, they are totally useless.  If you have campaign-based restrictions on weapons, magic items, feats, anything, you may not be able to use them.  I would never use an NPC straight off the table.  I would be more likely to use one as a development aid, as Monte thinks they intended, but only if certain things were generalized, which it sounds like they did.  I doubt I’ll be able to use them anyway, but my point here is that I think NPC tables are always going to fit only some people’s uses and be useless to others.  Personally, I wouldn’t have minded if they canned them completely in favor of something else.I don’t think an honest person can call this unequivocally a design flaw or bad move.  It’s a matter of preference.  If you don’t like the change, I respect that, but it’s not bad design.  Some people (like myself) DON’T like the idea of PCs serving ability buffs with breakfast every morning around the campfire.  And I know my players are not terribly happy (you can see it in their faces, although they never complain) when they roll a 2.  A flat +4 for a short time may make these spells less popular, meaning casting them very often rather than always.  I thought it was a general design philosophy that things that almost everyone always wants to choose (a.k.a. a no-brainer) means something is out of balance because it reduces choice.  Regarding the specific of (bear’s) endurance, I think hp for a fight or two is still useful, and let’s not forget the bonus to Fort saves and Concentration checks.  I think it’s quite logical that a wizard would choose this spell to get +2 Fort, +2 Conc, and +2hp/level for a fight, and then have the cleric heal him if he’s far down, before the spell expires after the fight.Okay, this is the one with which I would register the most agreement with Monte.  The only argument I have heard in favor of all of these “new” feats is someone saying that they could be important prereqs for other feats or for prestige classes.  Okay, I guess they could.  Have they, though?  Otherwise, what a waste!  When I saw this in the splatbooks I thought it was very cheesy.  Here’s what I would have done:  put a very few of the most popular twofers in the PHB (e.g. Alertness), then, in the DMG, have a section giving advice to the DM on allowing twofer feats.  A short section that pretty much just says:  ‘you can use Alertness as a model for creating other feats that provide a +2 bonus to two skills.  If two skills can logically be seen as two facets of a broader theme, and the feat seems appropriate for your campaign, go ahead and suggest it to your players.  Consider letting players propose a +2/+2 feat for your approval.’  Then, the DMG would list, without standard feat blocks, flavor text, or any of that garbage, a table of suggested feats.  Each row consists of just three columns: the name for the feat, and each of the skills involved.  The title of the feat should make clear how the two skills are related.  End of story.I don’t know what Inevitables are, so no comment there.  I thought Modrons were funny, but I don’t really care either way.  I’m not sure why Monte thought this admittedly personal preference-based issue was worth mentioning in the review, but whatever.Erratum.Can’t comment here since a) I don’t know how the new prestige classes look and b) I don’t use them anyway and if I did they would only be homebrewed campaign-specific ones that at most use printed ones as help.Double-edged sword here.  Who is 3.5 for?  Vets who have all the 3.0 stuff, or new players.  Vets may feel cheated since they already have the material, but for new players it may be a very good thing.  If this is all added content and didn’t push out other stuff, I’m not sure why vets should care that much.  Hopefully, they made choices about what to make core based on playtesting, in which case this is telling us that this drawn-in material makes the cut because it’s better balanced than stuff that didn’t make the cut (examples of the latter can be drawn from nearly every page of Sword and Fist).That does suck, especially if it says something about the playtesting (or lack thereof).  On the one hand, I don’t really care that much about seeing the names.  On the other, I think those folks deserve to have their names in the book.  If it’s a space issue, print it so small that you need a magnifying class so it fits on one page.  What matters is that they’re there.Irritating and extremely stupid.  It’s not excuse that this erratum didn’t get officially labeled as such for 3.0, because it should have been.  Fortunately, this, like the prestige class XP erratum is just a binary flip problem.  That is, instead of you do get XP penalties you don’t, and instead of caster level being a prereq it isn’t.  I’d be much more concerned about a pervasive or repercussive flaw.  Frankly, I’d even be more peeved about one monster having an attack bonus off by one, because I’d be less likely to catch it.  Errors like this are easy to fix in the brain, fortunately.So I need to see the implementation, but I REALLY like the idea of basing prices in part on spells’ normal duration, since that really seems relevant but was not a factor in cost before.  I’m disappointed that Monte didn’t laud or attack that change.  I’d have to see the level of noncomformity to see whether I think Monte has a real issue here, but again I’m surprised that he didn’t comment on that change, which seems significant.Why pick KO in particular?  How odd.  Anyway, KO is not a potion/oil because, unless it has changed, it allows for multiple different effects.  That doesn’t necessarily make it a good buy, but there you have it.  What this question is really getting at (or should) is how the magic item feats and categories are based too much on flavor and not enough on crunch.  Admittedly, 3.5 is too soon to revise that.  If anyone knows that, Monte should.Have to see to formulate an opinion, obviously.New art of the lack thereof is not a factor in my decision whether to purchase the books, and while I can see it mattering to some people, I don’t really see it as enough of an issue to deserve a negative mark in a review.  Especially when we’re talking about a revision.Well, that’s my two coppers.</blockquote>

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