Points to note...

[Umbran]

... a DM who's about to start a Pathfinder campaign and so is somewhat partisan in Pathfinder's favour.

Just to be clear, when I mentioned partisanship, I was talking about the corporate kind. Assume I am not taking business decisions by one of the companies as a reason to choose one game over another.

- Golarion is a very good setting - although from other posts of yours, I assume you'll be homebrewing.

Yes, but I am hardly above stealing good bits from published settings

 

[Anguish]

Given those assumptions, tell me why you think I should look at Pathfinder as the basis of my next campaign instead of 3.x. What's different in the rules and flavor that makes you prefer it?

PFRPG builds on nearly a decade of gaming "research". We as a community know what bits of 3.5 were less-than-smooth and how mechanics play out in the real world. We've got the benefit of post-3.5 innovations like the Tome of Battle introducing more or less at-will "powers" for melee classes. Basically, we as a community are smarter now. PFRPG contains a bunch of reasonable updates that reflect better understanding of what makes 3.5 fun and balanced.

A huge example is the cleric's new Channel Energy ability. Clerics have been powerful, yes, but have had to frequently consume their precious and interesting spell slots as cure spells. Now clerics (and paladins by the way) have a different ability that is usable to dish out the healing without impacting the cleric player's ability to use his spells to do interesting things.

PFRPG is somewhat more powerful than a base 3.5 core game, but not problematically so. The same modules and adventures you have laying around should be completely usable as-is and the new mechanics can be used on-the-fly. You don't need to upgrade the bad guys to maintain a challenging game. I tend to view it that PFRPG PCs have a wider range of abilities, not deeper abilities. A cleric (to use the above example) can spend a precious action either healing his friends or casting a spell, not both. The nuts & bolts of selection actions remains the same, but most classes end up with a couple extra options that make the overall gaming day more fun and reasonable.

You can use a screwdriver as a hammer, but once someone invents a dedicated hammer you'll never want to go back to only having one tool.

 

[frankthedm]

Pathfinder has more good that bad from what I have seen.

 

[ruemere]

The best thing about Pathfinder BETA, was the breath of fresh air. Apart from
that, quite a lot of changes make a lot of sense in the context of classic character concepts. Finally, you get numerous options to customize characters without a need to haul in other books.

In addition, thanks to some tweaks, your character may act like badass and then support their act with a good deed. No magic items required. Several examples follow:

Barbarian uses Strength Surge (Rage Power) to break down icy wall and then scale wall and get to the roof of the building (Raging Leaper Rage Power). All in a single action. And since this actually happened during the course of play, let's add that the said Barbarian was half-drunk, had only a sword and yet he still managed to give Hamatula a good whipping...

Paladin. Self-heal. Smite. And can truly go mano-a-mano with an evil monster.

Fighter. Critical mastery and weapon training. And bravery.

Regards,
Ruemere

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

So, something nice happened to me today. The Universe hasn't been terribly kind to me recently.

Isn't he becoming father these days? I guess he is in a good mood.

 

[Umbran]

Isn't he becoming father these days? I guess he is in a good mood.

There is only one appropriate response to this:

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

Given those assumptions, tell me why you think I should look at Pathfinder as the basis of my next campaign instead of 3.x. What's different in the rules and flavor that makes you prefer it?

Well, my experience is different from the others in this thread. I'm not running a Pathfinder game, I'm liberally borrowing rules from Pathfinder for my heavily modified 3.5 game.

I'm borrowing a lot. I'm adopting most of the extra class features wholesale and modifying my non-core classes accordingly. I was using a lot of the same changes to the skill system when I got my copy, and I've ended up adopting most of their reforms, even if I hadn't considered them before. Since you're already holding the book, it's worth the effort to flip through the chapters on Races, Classes, Skills, and Feats at least.

Sorcerous Bloodlines are pretty darned cool, and add flavor to what I, personally, considered the blandest class in 3.X. How your line got its magic now affects what your character can do.

Yeah... I'm tying Sorcerers even closer to dragons in my game, but I can't deny that what they did with the different bloodlines-- including the basic arcane "bloodline"-- is an incredible piece of work. Shapes your spell selection and gives you special powers, so Sorcerers really stand out.

Low levels are improved for almost all classes without a serious hike in overall power.

I wouldn't say that. Clerics and Paladins in particular gained a lot of power in the lower level ranges-- though the Cleric's gain is mainly in being able to heal without sacrificing his other abilities.

I'm keeping the new Channel Energy and Lay on Hands rules... but it would take a lot of convincing for me to be willing to accept the Paladin's new Smite.

 

[ruemere]

[...] it would take a lot of convincing for me to be willing to accept the Paladin's new Smite.

New smite power depends heavily on the types of encounters you run, much like Ranger's Favored Enemy and Rogue's Sneak Attack.

For example, if you bombard your players with single melee mobs of outsider (evil) kind, then you are likely to get what you are worried about.
On the other hand, if your bad guys come in crowds, use elemental minions or mercenary troops, and if the real villains use ranged attacks, than the new smite as good as non-existent.

My advice is to vary encounter types - let the character shine during one, and allow someone else take the spotlight during next one. You won't regret it, I promise.

Overall, the new version of Paladin repairs class reputation (i.e. Paladin being a hot air balloon) since, unless GM pandered to paladin needs, the class played as underequipped version of a Fighter. Yes, the save bonus was nice, but once a few levels flew by, class weakness was becoming pretty obvious... (I'm talking about core paladins, not optimized monstrosities from 1001 books of power).

Regards,
Ruemere