Dark Jezter
First Post
Hopefully this thread will be a nice switch from the rants about 3.5e that have been popping up lately. 
Earlier today, all three of my 3.5e books arrived from Amazon.com. Since then, I've been looking through all three of them and so far I'm very happy with my decision to purchase them
I'll start off with the Player's Manual. I'm very happy with the class balance changes. Bards are no longer as weak as they once were, there is now a reason to stick with the barbarian class past level 5, and reasons to stick with the ranger class past level 1. I also love the new combat chapter. I don't know how they did it, but WOTC managed to make the combat chapter shorter, simpler, and more informative than it was previously. There are loads of cool new feats, and seldom-used skills have been combined with more commonly used ones. Oh, and the sorcerer in my campaign has taken a great interest in the new spells that have been added.
Now, on to the Dungeon Master's Guide. This is personally my favorite of the new books, because it's practically bursting with new stuff. The DMG now contains information on the Planes, Epic Level Characters, prestige classes, visual aids, rules for underwater combat, suggestions for wilderness-based campaigns, suggestions for urban-based campaigns, and more information magical items. Heck, it even has some cool new illustrations. I personally like the illustrations of Krusk wading through the swamp (page 85), the demonic armies battling (page 160), the Blackguard (page 182), the Thaumaturgist (page 196), and the illustration of what elven chain looks like (page 220). The only things I didn't particularly care for in this book is that prestige classes can now incur expirience penalties for multiclassing (but I'll just house rule that one out), and the fact that they stuck with that awful illustration for the Arcane Archer. Other than that, though, I'm very happy with the new DMG.
The Monster Manual is now better than ever. Skeletons and Zombies are now templates, so if you've ever wanted to send a skeleton monk at your PCs, you can now. The grappling rating for monsters is now included in their stat blocks, which should save a bit of hassle for DMs when they're planning encounters. Many of the nastier critters now have round-by-round rules for what they're most likely to do in combat, and each monster entry comes with a short paragraph that a DM can use to describe the monster to the players. Also, some of the new artwork in this book is absolutely fantastic. The succubus and the nymph are suitably sexy, the drow is dangerous-looking, the githyanki looks alien and dangerous (as well it should), the half-fiend looks scary, and the vampires are cooler looking than ever (the vampire spawn still looks stupid, though). I was also pleased to see that a few of the tougher good-aligned outsiders are now known as angels instead of just celestials. I never understood why it was okay for evil-aligned outsiders to be referred to as Demons and Devils, but there was some sort of taboo against referring to good-aligned outsiders as Angels in D&D books. Now, that problem dosen't exist anymore.
All in all, I'm happy with these three books. I wasn't expecting a completely new edition of D&D, just a fine-tuning of the rules I've been using for the last few years. I've already adapted my characters and NPCs to 3.5e, and it took surprisingly little time. Can't wait until next week when me and my friends will be testing them out for the first time.
Now I've had my little rave about the 3.5e books, I want to hear from other people who were similarly satisfied with the revised rulebooks. Anti-WOTC people and Monte Cook sycophants please go somewhere else.
Earlier today, all three of my 3.5e books arrived from Amazon.com. Since then, I've been looking through all three of them and so far I'm very happy with my decision to purchase them
I'll start off with the Player's Manual. I'm very happy with the class balance changes. Bards are no longer as weak as they once were, there is now a reason to stick with the barbarian class past level 5, and reasons to stick with the ranger class past level 1. I also love the new combat chapter. I don't know how they did it, but WOTC managed to make the combat chapter shorter, simpler, and more informative than it was previously. There are loads of cool new feats, and seldom-used skills have been combined with more commonly used ones. Oh, and the sorcerer in my campaign has taken a great interest in the new spells that have been added.
Now, on to the Dungeon Master's Guide. This is personally my favorite of the new books, because it's practically bursting with new stuff. The DMG now contains information on the Planes, Epic Level Characters, prestige classes, visual aids, rules for underwater combat, suggestions for wilderness-based campaigns, suggestions for urban-based campaigns, and more information magical items. Heck, it even has some cool new illustrations. I personally like the illustrations of Krusk wading through the swamp (page 85), the demonic armies battling (page 160), the Blackguard (page 182), the Thaumaturgist (page 196), and the illustration of what elven chain looks like (page 220). The only things I didn't particularly care for in this book is that prestige classes can now incur expirience penalties for multiclassing (but I'll just house rule that one out), and the fact that they stuck with that awful illustration for the Arcane Archer. Other than that, though, I'm very happy with the new DMG.
The Monster Manual is now better than ever. Skeletons and Zombies are now templates, so if you've ever wanted to send a skeleton monk at your PCs, you can now. The grappling rating for monsters is now included in their stat blocks, which should save a bit of hassle for DMs when they're planning encounters. Many of the nastier critters now have round-by-round rules for what they're most likely to do in combat, and each monster entry comes with a short paragraph that a DM can use to describe the monster to the players. Also, some of the new artwork in this book is absolutely fantastic. The succubus and the nymph are suitably sexy, the drow is dangerous-looking, the githyanki looks alien and dangerous (as well it should), the half-fiend looks scary, and the vampires are cooler looking than ever (the vampire spawn still looks stupid, though). I was also pleased to see that a few of the tougher good-aligned outsiders are now known as angels instead of just celestials. I never understood why it was okay for evil-aligned outsiders to be referred to as Demons and Devils, but there was some sort of taboo against referring to good-aligned outsiders as Angels in D&D books. Now, that problem dosen't exist anymore.
All in all, I'm happy with these three books. I wasn't expecting a completely new edition of D&D, just a fine-tuning of the rules I've been using for the last few years. I've already adapted my characters and NPCs to 3.5e, and it took surprisingly little time. Can't wait until next week when me and my friends will be testing them out for the first time.
Now I've had my little rave about the 3.5e books, I want to hear from other people who were similarly satisfied with the revised rulebooks. Anti-WOTC people and Monte Cook sycophants please go somewhere else.
Last edited:
