races of destiny --has D&D 3.5 jumped the shark?

[The Shaman]

Due respect, but its beginning to look like your opinion is in the minority. I, too, agree with many of the others and find Draconomicon a well-written and inspired work. It is almost useless in my current campaign, but that does little to detract from the quality of the work itself. You are, of course, allowed your opinion. I would not try to sway you as you seem adamant in your disdain for the book. I might ask that you give it another look at some point and see if you cant find some nuggets of gold in there that would at least inspire you in your games, if nothing else.

I'm also in that minority, b.diddy (sorry, I just couldn't resist that one). I've plucked Draconomicon off the shelf several times, and I end up putting it back every time. The nugget-to-tailings ratio is just too low for me to consider adding it to my collection - and like Brennin Magalus, I don't care for the iconic D&D dragon either, which no doubt contributes to the fact that the book holds very little appeal for me.

I had a similar reaction to Libris Mortis, the "Book of Undead in faux-Latin," but after a few months and several readings, I finally found enough material to justify the expenditure - a lot more months and a lot more readings, and I still won't pony up the drachmas for Draconomicon.

I liked Frostburn, and I hope Sandstorm is of similar quality. I bought the first two Complete... books, and I may buy the last two at some point in the future, but as of right now I haven't even thumbed through Complete Arcane yet despite walking past at my FLGS every other week.

I've yet to peek inside a Races of... book yet - no appeal whatsoever.

 

[Psion]

Personally, I think the insta-dragons of Draconomicon were a good idea,

As do I. They so immediate and repeated use in my game. Not only is it convenient, but they also help you immediately apply the rest of the crunchy bits in the book.

 

[Nightcloak]

I can't BELEIVE he's the "sage" now.

While I have no problem with Andy Collins I do think Dragon missed the boat on one thing:

They should of hired Hypersmurf to be the sage.

 

[Brennin Magalus]

While I have no problem with Andy Collins I do think Dragon missed the boat on one thing:

They should of hired Hypersmurf to be the sage.

I concur.

 

[shady]

Just sat and read through this thread, it passed me by when it started a couple of weeks ago.

Personally, I think the issue is that WotC's D&D group has too small a number of outlets for genuine creativity. It only supports two campaign settings - Eberron and FR. Greyhawk it barely supports. Everything else comes out in formula books (which claim to support GH, but I don't think there's anything in RoD about fitting it into GH, as an example).

Looking at RoD, it follows exactly the same formula as races of stone. The Dwarf write-up in RoS consists of:
- a day in the life
- description
- psychology
- dwarven life
- society and culture
- attitudes to other races
- religion
- history & folklore
- language
- cities and settlements
... of generic dwarves. Gnomes went along the same lines. Now, take this formula and write about generic humans, and - no surprises - you get something completely bland and thoroughly pointless.

The extra races (Goliaths, Illumians) are part of the Races of ... formula. I don't think it's that bad an idea. Once you've contained yourself to ultra-generic statements, there isn't that much you can say about the existing races, and I'm pleased they didn't go on saying nothing in particular just to fill further pages. I actually prefer the Illumians to the Goliaths, and I think they're both reasonably usable and interesting.

I'd have preferred a very different formula to the books, in particular about using these races in new and non-generic ways ... in fact I was kind of expecting RoD to have a heavy emphasis on templates, given the pointlessness of re-applying the Races of Stone formula (I was wrong).

There are a couple of other formula lines running, the "environment series" - frostburn, etc. - and the "monster series" - draconomicon, libris mortis. I've got a general concern that these are going to get samey rather quickly. The reason for being concerned is that if Wizards think D&D3.5 has run its course (to use a less annoying phrase) they will move to D&D4 and we all have to buy upgrades of the same stuff over again.

The most encouraging thing they are doing is Eberron. I was struck in MMIII how the quality of the stuff being brought in from Eberron was higher than the stuff that wasn't. I personally wish they'd have licensed a bunch of the other competition finalists and put them out on maybe a smaller scale (say a book each), which would provide more interesting input to a potential Monster Manual IV, and more impetus and new material to these other formula books they are publishing.

That of course isn't the only potential source of new material - they could revive older settings such as Dark Sun, or (being repetitive) reuse material from other lines such as MtG.

I don't think D&D3.5 has run its course, but on the other hand I don't think WotC is working hard enough at being creative in its new material, and it may be easier in the end for it to just revise the ruleset and use that as an excuse to republish the existing stuff.