Weird question: Complete Adventurer or Arcana Evolved?

[Turanil]

Well, I have just read the Which Complete book is the best? thread, and it seems that if i am going to ever buy one of these books, it will be the Complete Adventurer.

Now I am interested in buying another crunch/PCs book, but not dozens (or even two) of them. And now comes in my hesitation: It seems that Arcana Evolved is going to be an excellent book, and I was considering buying it. However, I don't care for the Diamond Throne setting, one of the main addition to this book compared to the precedent version: Arcana Unearthed that I already have both in PDF and printed version. Note that in any case, I would use Arcana Evolved in the contxt of a D&D 3.5 campaign.

So I don't know what to choose...

Any comment that would help me?

 

[Gez]

OK.

Arcana Evolved is AU+DT+"epic" level stuff (level 21 to 25 for each classes) plus a new AU class and a new AU race and a few more details about the setting. And shiny (I hope) pictures in pretty (I still hope) colors.

You've already said you don't care about the DT setting, that's a half of the book that's useless. I have the feeling you prefer grim & gritty to epic swashbuckling, so the expanded levels are also of no interest. You already have the AU PDF and book, so all that there is for you is:

1. One new class
2. One new race
3. Pretty pictures with shiny colors (I hope)

That is maybe a bit not enough... Especially given the work of integration one would have to do, as AU is a slightly different ruleset to D&D 3.5.

With CoAd, on the other hand, everything was designed to fit directly in D&D 3.5, so even if one may want to do some house-rules and adjustments to things, there's more bangs for your bucks.

 

[Turanil]

Well, you convinced me I can spare my money on the Arcana Evolved book. So there is this Complete Adventurer book... Hum, will have to think more about it.