NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="MoogleEmpMog" data-source="post: 1958170" data-attributes="member: 22882">I would like to see:10. Art from the 2e TSR cover artists, or from genuinely unusual line drawing stylists (like the concept artists for Warcraft).  I hate the dungeonpunk look, and some of the art just seems technically poor.  The latter could be a deadline issue, too, and isn't exclusive to 3e by any means.9. No core setting influencing the mechanics... or at least options and clear ways to change it.  This applies to the classes (paladin, RANGER!), but especially to the races (dwarven giant bonus).8. A focus in the DMG on non-site-based adventures, or at least on creating more interesting sites.  The DMG is the newbie DM's friend, or should be.  What I'd call a Final Fantasy mindset as opposed to a Diablo mindset.  Interaction, soaring vistas and epic combats, not dungeon crawling and stat mongering.  There's a place for the latter, but it takes far less skill to DM well.7. Base level limit higher than 20, with rules to match.  Stretch it to 30, 40, 50 or even 100.  Speed up levelling.  Spread out the abilities.  Just personal preference, here, and almost certainly the least likely of any of these suggestions to see the light of day.6. If minis support is the way WotC wants to go, non-collectible miniatures of the D&D icons that aren't OGL: the beholder and ilithid, for instance.  Also, an integrated scalable ruleset so PCs and NPCs could easily move from battlefield to skirmish to duel and have their individual abilities matter.  Something like Suikoden's army battle-party battle-single battle system, but with more attention to the individual PC in army battles.5. A removal of the "Improved" tree of feats (Sunder, Grapple, Bull Rush, etc.).  Those actions should be standard to the combat system.4. Stronger character abilities, weaker item abilities.  Just personal preference: I like to level up fast because I love new abilities, but I loath the idea of getting those abilities from disposable, exchangable items.3. Actions simplified so that a character gets only two actions per round - or even one action, with rounds becoming 5 seconds rather than 10.  Also, attacks of opportunity folded into the action structure.2. Ability scores removed in favor of ability modifiers.  This is a simple way to make the game more intuitive for new players and easier for GMs to prepare, and not really an issue in terms of either the simplicity or complexity of the rules.1. CHANGE THE MAGIC. I hate everything about D&D magic, to be quite honest.  I'd never play a full caster, and as a GM would at the least strongly, strongly discourage players from playing a full caster if I even allowed D&D magic.My biggest gripe is that it slows down gameplay.  I play with very experienced gamers, yet every spellcaster constantly bogs down combat and even non-combat encounters with reams of book-searching - even with just the PHB spells included.  I don't blame my players.  There's HUNDREDS of spells in the PHB, about 50% of which are irrelevant variations on the same theme (doing x dice of damage to target y).  And those are the simple ones!  No one should be expected to memorize or properly note the relevant information from a hundred, often complex, spells.The arcane/divine divide is a sacred cow.  I don't like it, since it doesn't gel with really any pre-D&D fantasy I can think of, but I can accept it.  Throw psionics in, too.  Personally, I'd like to see all three be purely cosmetic distinctions.In terms of solutions, I would essentially scrap the existing magic in favor of the psionic system.  The 3.5 psionics rules seem vastly more elegant; certainly the psions I've seen in have played smoothly, efficiently and effectively without the need to constantly reference their book(s).  It's not the players, since they've also played spellcasters.Now, from a flavor perspective, magic works in medieval settings; to many people (myself somewhat included), psionics doesn't.  A 'psion' is a sorcerer IMC.  He's an "arcane" spellcaster.  He's decent even with his natural still/silent spell stripped from him, if that's your bag.D&D's spellcasting sacred cows were also allowed to drive the power curve of 3e, although the other classes don't follow it precisely.  Level 1 to level 5 isn't the same as level 10 to level 15.  The magic item dependency (particularly of the non-casters) is yet another symptom of spellcasting driving the curve rather than conforming to it.This is one area where 2e's level structure, god-awful as it was, actually did work better.  Wish is still wish, shapechange is still shapechange.  9th-level spells are still the most powerful force in D&D, and they arrive relatively faster in the current XP structure.  That means that, rather than getting more hit dice, more skill ranks and a better BAB (in 3e terms), fighters, rogues et al simply get better hit dice, (perhaps) more skill points and a better BAB progression - and some special abilities that are individually often not as good as spells.I for one would like to see all spellcasting toned down.  Clerics with a smattering of buffs and healing can handle themselves with d8 hit dice, good armor, domain powers and two good saves; I'd prefer it if the core arcane spellcaster could do the same.  I'd prefer it even more if magic improved like feats and other class features: on a flatter curve, if not a straight diagonal.</blockquote>

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