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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tzarevitch" data-source="post: 1159218" data-attributes="member: 1792">I must admit I almost totally disagree with your conclusions.1. Playtester credits. I don't see how there is an exact corrolation between number of playtesters and time spent playtesting, and the quality of the playtesting. Playtesting is an imprecise art. Two years spent playtesting by 500 people does not mean that something was better playtested than 4 months and 100 people. More is not necessarily better especially since as has been pointed out, a great deal of 3.0 and 3.5 is the same. One could also easily argue that since 3.5 is a follow-on to 3.0 that it actually was playtested MORE because it could reuse much of the original playtest data or they could playtest less because they didn't see the need to make many wholesale changes (and they didn't). Failure to credit the playtesters is an issue between WoTC and those playtesters. I fail to see how that has anything to do with how good or bad 3.5 is (other than poor editing if the credits were forgotten.)2. Unnecessary rules changes. Weapon Sizing - This is a trivial change. If you DMed anything other than size M creatures in 3.0 you already had to deal with weapon-size issues, just under the 3.0 name. It has no impact pro or con on my opinion of 3.5. Damage Resistance - A change for the better in my opinion. 3.0's system was horrible. By about 12th level DR was useless under 3.5 because by then Greater Magic weapon would breach almost any DR you were likely to encounter. If you couldn't breach the DR for some reason then YOU were useless because the damage threshhold was frequently too high to breach at the levels you were encountering them. I could have lived with the 3.0 system if I had to but 3.5 is better.  It adds variety and actually makes having a DR matter. As for the oft-repeated "Golfbag of Weapons" argument, regardless of the complaints of some, it is not a huge handicap. Well prepared melee characters carry several weapons anyway, if nothing else to deal with creatures like clay golems with complete immunities to certain weapons. If you do think it is a huge handicap, get a bow and different types of arrows. It has the same net effect but is lighter.CRs - This needed fixing. The rule on CRs and advanced monsters in 3.0 was a mess. Personally I despise the CR system itself but at least 3.5 made it clearer and fairer. Paladin Mounts - I think the mount-summoning bit is stupid but it is not without precedent. There is a 3.0 psychic warrior power that does much the same thing. Subdual Damage/Non-Lethal Damage - Name change, who cares? (Enough said.)Spell Focus - This point I agree with. I do not see the change was necessary. However, I disagree that Greater Spell Focus was a problem. Major Spell Alterations - As far as I am concerned, most of these were necessary, the remainder were not crippling. I agree with the changes for haste, harm, heal and polymorph other. I don't think that the stat boost spells, hold person, disintegrate and a couple of others needed changes but I don't have a problem with the reasoning why they were changed. The change to the darkness spells however was just plain stupid. I also have issues with the changes to Freedom of Movement, and Death Ward. Other than that however, I find the spell changes overall positive if for no other reason than it removed the need for many DMs to house-rule changes. Fantasy Flavor Removal: I don't understand your point on this one. The rules don't give flavor. The DM and his setting give flavor. 3.5 has no more or less "flavor" than 3.0 did (or 2.0 or 1.0). Breakdown of Open Gaming: You are implying that 3.5 did not take into accound the requests of WotC's customers when in fact from what I saw they did. They heard the requests that most of us were making and made changes accordingly. I don't see the breakdown issue that you refer to. Tzarevitch</blockquote>

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