D&D General Refresh my memory on the lethality of 3rd ed

[Voadam]

How did the Assassin find out they could even make poisons? Gary is explicit that you should never tell them, and make them ask the DM about it, lol.

They networked and got training with an assassin's guild/individual assassins in Nulb and elsewhere. They had access to poisons they could buy and then training on making it.

 

[Voadam]

And, no doubt, xp-for-gp.

If only. I was playing a politically ambitious viking merchant turned merchant prince who became ridiculously wealthy.

It was a flat xp amount for playing each night, with adjustments for roleplay and tactics. I came in with an existing character from another campaign. It took four years of weekly gaming to go from 7th to 20th as an MU.

A 20th-level MU who's also got some Fighter to it - i.e. a character that's been through a bunch of adventures - must have come across a Ring of Protection better than +1 at some point. Either that, or your DM was uncommonly stingy.

There was a lot of politics and roleplay focus. I had a lot of magic items though, the big ones were robe of the archmagi, a hammership spelljammer (and eventually a fleet of smaller flying ships), staff of thunder and lightning, winged boots, a cloak of useful items, a sash of many pockets, the spellbook one, a couple wands. As a high level magic user however the real personal treasure was the spells I made deals with other MUs for. At the end I had every core spell for levels 1-6, a good assortment of 7-9 spells, and a ton of non core spells including ones other PCs had researched.

 

[Staffan]

I would agree with a lot of the other posters.

Some factors I haven't seen discussed much:

System mastery applied to both sides of the table. A DM with strong system mastery of the system could create encounters that could absolutely steamroll any non-optimized party, without ever straying outside the bounds of the encounter guidelines. Granted, doing this would make for extremely lengthy session prep.

I should post my mind flayer monk (using the XPH psionics rules) some time. It was quite nasty: nearly unhittable (due to +Wis to AC as well as the up-leveled psionic version of mage armor), great grapple bonus (which it needed for snack time), and (because it was Eberron) DR 5/byeshk.

That's when I realized that the rules for adding class levels to monsters... let's just say they had lots of potential for improvement.

 

[James Gasik]

They networked and got training with an assassin's guild/individual assassins in Nulb and elsewhere. They had access to poisons they could buy and then training on making it.

Sorry, that was kind of a joke, obviously it didn't land. Gary was so hyperbolic about player Assassins not being allowed to know that this was a potential class feature of theirs I always wondered how it would actually go in play.

I only ever played with one Assassin at the table, and they quickly accepted an assignment to go off and do some solo mission (?) which took them away from the party for the whole session, so I have zero real experience with what they could do other than "uh, they were kind of like Rogues, but could use shields, and they have special rules in the DMG".

 

[Voadam]

Sorry, that was kind of a joke, obviously it didn't land.

It was also early on my end when I replied.

Gary was so hyperbolic about player Assassins not being allowed to know that this was a potential class feature of theirs I always wondered how it would actually go in play.

For mine it was access to poison markets through the guilds and training mentors.

I only ever played with one Assassin at the table, and they quickly accepted an assignment to go off and do some solo mission (?) which took them away from the party for the whole session, so I have zero real experience with what they could do other than "uh, they were kind of like Rogues, but could use shields, and they have special rules in the DMG".

The assassination ability never directly came into play and I never gave them solo assignment type things. They were adenturing renegade evil grugach brothers in a mostly evil party.

The first game was kind of funny as the then-good ranger drow before he fell and became a CN fighter asked them what they were, and the one with a trident and spiked butler said, "We're thieves." Neither had thief class abilities other than backstab for two more levels. Which were very slow in my game. Well they did have set traps at two levels higher than a comparable thief could disarm a trap, but they also had an automatic set snares ability from being a Grugach. Also the stealthy elf stuff which was pretty big for actually doing some thief things.

In practice in the game they were mostly what you would expect from chaotic evil elven thieves.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Another factor was WBL. If the DM didn't follow WBL or simply didn't award useful treasure (and didn't let you trade in your useless items at a magic shop), the game could be MUCH deadlier than the baseline. There was a pretty huge power disparity between a WBL party that had access to anything they wanted at the local magic shop, vs a party that was significantly below WBL, or was technically WBL but only had an assortment of randomly rolled magic items.

One person in our group ran their first game under the impression (from the wizards boards) that magic shops made no sense and then used the treasure tables to exclusively roll treasure. We someone how came out both way, way way above WBL, but also completely worthless thanks to having zero weapons or armor we could use or that had effects that mattered.

 

[Deset Gled]

I view this through a slightly different lens. The biggest thing about lethality in 3.X was resource management.

3.X was very non-lethal compared to earlier editions if you made sure to manage your resources carefully. The two most critical resources being equipment and spell slots. First, your healer (cleric, most likely) could manage spell slots to plan for healing for the whole party. Second, with the advent of easily accessible wands, potions, etc, the player could make sure they had ways to heal themselves. As long as you did that, you were always much safer in 3.X than my experiences in 1e.

OTOH, 3.X viewed through the eyes of 5e is basically an accounting horror story. 5e gives you free healing at night; in 3.X you had to account for almost all of it. 5e gives you free hit dice of healing each day; in 3.X you had to remember to stock up on your own potions (etc.). For all the talk of 3.X being a "magic Walmart", this was huge balancing factor. You couldn't just spend all your money on cool armor and weapons. You had to manage how much you would budget for consumables vs permanent items. And in 5e everyone gets access to the easy healing; in 3.X it was the domain of divine casters (mostly clerics). This means that the healers spell slots aren't just for combat, they need to be managed to keep the party alive and healthy. If players failed to manage any of these things properly, death was waiting nearby.

FWIW, I miss some but not all of the hefty resource management from 3.X. Concepts like being worn down over time or finding amazing wealth in the form of a trove of healing potions are basically gone from 5e. There's a reason people call 5e "easy mode", and lack of need for resource management is a big part of it. But I also don't miss my spreadsheets managing gold, perishable items, and weight. YMMV.

 

[Reynard]

In my recollection (it has been 20 years, after all) the biggest issue was monster damages were high and criticals made that damage astronomical. An ogre power attacking with a two handed great club was a thing to be feared by more than low level characters. if it critted, you were done for.

 

[James Gasik]

One person in our group ran their first game under the impression (from the wizards boards) that magic shops made no sense and then used the treasure tables to exclusively roll treasure. We someone how came out both way, way way above WBL, but also completely worthless thanks to having zero weapons or armor we could use or that had effects that mattered.

Oh no "somehow" about it. This is actually typical. You can't randomly roll treasure in 3e or PF1 and expect it to come out balanced. It doesn't help that a lot of classic items have bloated costs if they do more than one thing, even if the individual functions are not that great- just look at how much a Rod of Lordly Might costs.

While a "magic shop" doesn't make much sense (I mean, how do you afford to keep anything in stock, let alone security?), in my games, I extrapolated the existence of guilds that would have crafters able to make things to order, with half the money up front. Players could either wait for items to be finished, or hope to pick up their upgrades between adventures.

And if they didn't return, well, the cost of the item was covered, so it could theoretically be sold to someone else.

(In one adventure, the players actually discovered the secret of how the guilds could afford to BUY magic items- they had a pet Rust Monster that, after it destroyed a metal magic item, left behind magic dust that could be used to make other items. I got the idea from White Wolf, since Changeling and Mage have ways to find raw magic in solid form, which is called Dross or Tass, but I eventually adopted the 4e term, "residuum").

Of course, the real problem was PC crafters. The xp cost was not really a deterrent when you realized you could outfit yourself in magic swag for half the cost, and if you ended up lower level than the rest of the party, you'd get more xp from adventuring. Busted!

And then Pathfinder thought "well, we'll get rid of xp costs, and just force people to make difficult Spellcraft checks". Poor, innocent, Paizo, failing to realize how easy it is to get a bloated skill check, lol.

 

[Vaalingrade]

In my recollection (it has been 20 years, after all) the biggest issue was monster damages were high and criticals made that damage astronomical. An ogre power attacking with a two handed great club was a thing to be feared by more than low level characters. if it critted, you were done for.

Let's not forget the All-Star cast of Pounce, Rend and Swallow Whole, which are all different ways of saying 'screw this character in particular'.