The Best & Worst of 3rd Edition: WotC Core Rules & Bestiaries (Winners Announced)

[TerraDave]

First Results: with 132 voting:

Top ten most liked

Unearthed Arcana I LIKED 71.21%
Draconomicon I LIKED 59.09%
Spell Compendium LIKED 58.33%
Fiend Folio I LIKED 57.58%
Monster Manual II I LIKED 56.06%
Magic Item Compendium I LIKED 55.30%
Libris Mortis: The Book of Undead I LIKED 54.55%
Lords of Madness: The Book of Aberrations I LIKED 51.52%
Oriental Adventures I LIKED 50.76%
Manual of the Planes I LIKED 49.24%

The top ten most dis-liked

Epic Level Handbook I did NOT LIKE 53.03%
Weapons of Legacy I did NOT LIKE 44.70%
Deities and Demigods I did NOT LIKE 43.18%
Magic of Incarnum I did NOT LIKE 40.91%
Psionics Hanbook I did NOT LIKE 38.64%
Book of Exalted Deeds I did NOT LIKE 34.85%
Monster Manual IV I did NOT LIKE 33.33%
Enemies and Allies I did NOT LIKE 32.58%
Miniatures Handbook I did NOT LIKE 31.06%
Tome of Magic: Pact, Shadow... Magic I did NOT LIKE 30.30%

Only real surprise for me is Monster Manual II, which seemed to have a pretty so-so reputation. At least on these boards.

 

[Arnwyn]

I love Faiths and Pantheons (was that the title? thought it was something else).

And you're right - the 2e book was called Faiths & Avatars. And it is also my favorite D&D book (along with its companions, Powers & Pantheons and Demihuman Deities. We never reference the lame 3e Faiths & Pantheons book.

Of the poll, my favorites include:
- Oriental Adventures (still my favorite 3e book)
- Lords of Madness
- Fiend Folio

 

[Nonlethal Force]

My top book of all times for 3.x would be the Draconomicon.

It would quickly be followed bythe XPH, PHB II and UA. I do not run games without those four.

I also enjoyed (in this order): CArc, CM, DM, MotP, BoED, CAdv, CW, Lords of Madness, CD, Libris Mortis

Did not enjoy: Races of ... series or the environment books or CS

Especially did not enjoy: Complete Psionic. [And BoVD, but I don't do evil parties, so that isn't really fair]

 

[Greg K]

And you're right - the 2e book was called Faiths & Avatars. And it is also my favorite D&D book (along with its companions, Powers & Pantheons and Demihuman Deities. We never reference the lame 3e Faiths & Pantheons book.

Oops. I meant Faiths and Avatars (along with Powers and Pantheons). It's been a long time since I have seen those books.

 

[TerraDave]

The player supplement poll is here:

http://www.enworld.org/showthread.php?t=216084

 

[CanadienneBacon]

OK, amendment for me. It's Demihuman Deities of which I'm so fond. Totally 2e, but I still love it. That's the book I meant. I don't know why I can never remember that title. It sits perched on the shelf at my home but for some reason I often have trouble recalling its title. Not like it's an unusual title, either.

 

[Voadam]

I am still dumbfounded by the sheer number of folks who dislike Deities and Demigods. I used that book all the time and loved it. I know I'm in the minority, though.

It was a significant level below my expectations on everything except art and that affected significantly how much I liked the book.

1e was some cool art and mostly statblocks. 2e legend and lore had more info on individual gods and specialty priests for every god, an improvement over 1e. 2e FR god books had extensive info on every god, their church, specialty classes and unique spells for their followers, an improvement over the 2e L&L. 3e DDG had stat blocks, short descriptions and some cool art, a retrogression to 1e standards when I was expecting 2e FR stuff applied to four of the L&L gods and the Greyhawk pantheon.

The Living Greyhawk Journal gave me more information on the greyhawk gods (minus stat blocks) than DDG did.

Without the history of the 1e, 2e, and 2e FR books to compare it to for standards of usefulness, I probably would have thought it was an OK supplement (though needing CRs for avatars they expect PCs to fight).

 

[krissbeth]

Am I the only one who likes Complete Scoundrel?

The PrCs are a yawn, but I love skill tricks. And hidden weapons.

 

[Ulrick]

I am still dumbfounded by the sheer number of folks who dislike Deities and Demigods. I used that book all the time and loved it. I know I'm in the minority, though. Still, if I coulda voted more'n once for both Manual of the Planes and DD, I would've. Heck, I'm not even a Planescape DM. I just liked them because they were all kinds of awesome and so very useful when I was designing my homebrew.

I think part of the reason Deities and Demigods is dislike so much is simply because it wasn't as good as previous incarnations and stats for gods aren't usable for most campaigns. That book didn't have as many pantheons as previous editions.

The Manual of the Planes was okay, though it annoyed me that a lot of the material about the planes ended up in the 3.5 DMG.

 

[Arnwyn]

Without the history of the 1e, 2e, and 2e FR books to compare it to for standards of usefulness, I probably would have thought it was an OK supplement (though needing CRs for avatars they expect PCs to fight).

Oy... please don't remind me. What the heck were they thinking, not including (at least) the avatar CRs? Yeesh.

Major hate for D&DG, for me. As the kids like to say on the internet these days, that book was made out of fail.