Time to Reflect on 3.5 Disappointments

[Tsyr]

What was 3E?

A money grab and an improvement. In many ways so was 3.5.

While people can accept a money grab from time to time, too much too often becomes too much.

New editions need to be spaced out more. Find other ways to money grab please, ways that genuinly give us something new. The new mini line is a good example of a valid money grab, even if the random nature of it does ruin the product for me.

*nods*

It's not entierly what 3.5 is that bugs me (though I still think its not enough to justify a new edition), but just that it's too soon.

 

[BryonD]

Ok, first off, a lot of people agree with my assessment too. How does this change matters?

I agree that a lot of people agree with you. But your claims presume that WotC agrees with you. You called it a "pass off" as if this were accepted fact. That is FAR from true. When you make a statment that assumes an opinion to be generally accepted as fact, and that opinion is NOT generally accepted as fact, then your assumptions are faulty, and therefore your conclusions are faulty.

Hell, I know people who LIKE 3.5 who conceed its really just erata and bit of spit-shine.

So?

Ok, first... Of COURSE the designers at WotC agree with you! It's their paycheck you're writing when you buy the books. Of COURSE they think you should buy them.

So you are saying that they are lying simply to support their income?

My point, that obviosuly went over your head, was that I believe that the people who developed 3.5 think it is good on its own merits. The anti-corpation, anti-profit knee-jerks continue to reject this as even conceivable. As you have just done again by demading that profit is the only true basis of agreeing with me.

That said, you are making two (as I see them) incorrect assumptions:

1) The people who wrote 3.5 had much if anything to do with the decision to make it in the first place. In truth, I have heard that 3.5 was essentialy rushed out by the higher ups.

This has been disputed. You, conviently disregard the replies. Again, you simply choose to believe what you want. That is fine. But then you go around and start slamming people on the presumption that you opinion stands for fact.

2) That because you find value in the product and since WotC felt the need to produce it, there is therefore some undeniable statement therein that your view is right and mine is wrong.

Nope. You made one demonstrably wrong statement. You insist that other people motives MUST be driven by your views. In order for them to be "passing off" 3.5, then they MUST agree with you. So when you make that statement as a fact, you wrongly deny the possibilty that they honestly disagree with you.

Getting the obvious hypocricy out of the way, here is my answer:

If you see hypocrisy then you don't get the difference.

I never criticized your opinion. I criticized your demand that other people's actions assume they agree with your opinion.

2.0 was stagnating. New products were trickling off, and there had been a long duration between the release of the last edition and 3.0. Further, innovations from other companies and game systems were starting to be noticed by people more and more, and DnD was loosing players. IMO, I feel that 3.0 was timed "right". It stepped in when there was a hole in the market that it could fill.

3.5 didn't have a hole to fill, so it made one by shoving 3.0 out of the way. It consisted of little new material, only enough to make continuance to use 3.0 awkward. It is almost entierly recycled from 3.0. There is nothing core to the system in 3.5 that could not have been in a (Fairly short) erata file.

I mean, of course, from a logical answer, both are money grabs. It's a capitalist system and people are out there to make money. That said, 3.0 was one that didn't feel like being spanked with a wet towel and being told its good for me. There was a product in 3.0 that I didn't own, and felt more than willing to pay the money for. There is nothing in 3.5 I don't own except for, MAYBE, 5-10 pages of minor rules changes, if you cut the fluff out.

OK, fine. Your opinion is a piece of the market. If the overall market agreed with you, the 3.5 would have flopped. It has not.

I object to terms like "pass off" and "money grab". These reek of typical anti free market sour grapes attacks.

Nobody spanked you.
It was volunatary.

 

[barsoomcore]

And I can verify that the 3.0 PHB works just fine with the 3.5 MM, having gone the exact opposite route as 'core in my purchasing strategy relative to 3.5.

Just for the record, let me state that I haven't done any purchasing AT ALL of 3.5 -- my players gave me the new PHB.

I don't think 3.5 is worth the money. I mean, I think the new PHB is MUCH better than the 3.0 one, but since I already own the 3.0 one, buying the 3.5 one would mean doubling my expenses on a single set of rules. It's not that big an improvement.

So, Tsyr and maddman75, we probably agree on the value proposition of the new ruleset -- it seems we just disagree on the COST. It costs me nothing to have WotC release a new version. Nothing at all. And since they were cool enough to release an SRD, I can even use the new rules (the ones I like, anyway), again at no cost to myself. So I don't see that I have anything to complain about.

Well, with regard to 3.5, anyway. Now, about the weather we're getting up here...

 

[Tsyr]

Okay, so there weren't enough changes to justify a "different version". Got it.

No, wait, there WERE enough changes to justify a "different version".

Am I the only one seeing some difficulties here?

Depends on how much you want to ignore of what I've said earlier, but just to clarify:

I don't feel there were enough needed changes to justify a new edition. There is plenty in 3.5 that I feel was either not needed or actually a step backwards/down/towards left field.

 

[BryonD]

Who gets to decide which volunatry transactions are "valid"?

I would suggest that the private parties make that choice on a case by case basis.

If it isn't valid to you, then great, you saved monoey for something else.


But, please, don't go attacking other people for either offering or accepting a transaction that you simply do not wish to participate in.

 

[BryonD]

Anyway, that's enough for me.

Yeah 3.5!!!!!!

Worth EVERY penny!!!!

One of my best gaming purchases this year.

 

[Pants]

Do people actually go off and fight Graz'zt? By the time you get there we're generally bored with the campaign and ready to go kill orcs again.

I'd LOVE to run a game where the PC's would end up confronting a Demon Lord or ArchDevil as the climax.
Also Sepulchrave II seems to be running his story hour with that in mind - a final confrontation with Graz'zt!

Also, I've been in enough of these 3.5 debates, suffice it to say, I'm sick of them. I will say that 3.5 has been worth every penny, especially since I am now using AoO correctly!

 

[Yellow Sign]

Well all in all, I didn't mind abit shelling out the $90 or so bucks for the 3.5. It presented the D&D rules just alittle clearer for the new gamer and at the same time retuned and fixed many of the problems of 3.0. While I know alot of people were upset at some of the changes (what do you mean my buff spell won't last all day?). But hey they fixed the Ranger, retooled the Monk, and alot of other things that I like. I have gamed along time (25 years +) and spent alot of money on my hobby. Heck I love what Wizards has done with the D&D franchise. It is stronger now that it has ever been. And no one is making you buy 3.5. If you love 3.0 so much then fine and dandy. DONT BUY 3.5! But don't worry or complain about those who do.

 

[barsoomcore]

Depends on how much you want to ignore of what I've said earlier, but just to clarify:

I don't feel there were enough needed changes to justify a new edition. There is plenty in 3.5 that I feel was either not needed or actually a step backwards/down/towards left field.

MeOW.

Okay, so you don't agree with some of the changes in 3.5. Sure, knock yourself out. But that's a very different position from saying there weren't enough changes to "justify" a version.

Why does a new version need to be "justified"? What justifies the new release of a Toyota Corolla every year? Nothing. But a company that doesn't keep releasing products, that doesn't keep its products at a high level of quality and satisfaction, won't last. And I continue to submit that the 3.5 rulebooks, regardless of any changes you may or may not agree with, offer more value to the purchaser for the simple fact that they don't require as much errata. Not enough more value to justify me purchasing them, but still, more.

 

[maddman75]

For my position, there is no contradiction. What I was interested in was 5-10 pages worth of changes, incorporation of the errata, maybe a couple new pieces of art. They did those, certainly. But they also threw in a ton of seemingly random changes. Every other spell had it's area of effect or range changed. It will never, ever, ever matter to me that stinking cloud now has a 30' radius instead of a 20' radius, or whatever. The only thing it will achieve is making the versions less compatible and more confusing. The weapon size changes are another example, fixing something that isn't broken. Yes, the rules are more logical and 'realistic'. But the old ones weren't causing any problems.

At the same time, it felt like the same game. It wasn't like going from 2e to 3e, where you were getting something NEW. You were getting the same old 3e, except the details were changed seemingly to make things as incompatible as possible. Like renaming skills for instance. I don't care that Pick Pockets is called Sleight of Hand. It will never mean anything except confusion when converting my several hundred dollars of d20 books to the new version.

And no, WotC thugs are not going to come to my door and take my old books. But any new books will have the new incompatible rules. Modules especially will suffer, as entire spell lists will need to be redone. Loading up with haste and 2nd level stat buffers isn't exactly a good idea in 3.5.

Personally I hope to see more companies go OGL and print under the 3.0 rules. Or even dual stat. I believe Monte said he will do this where possible. But it likely won't happen much. Heck, personally there's no way I'd publish under the d20 STL now, but that's a whole other rant.