What is 3.0 & 3.5 missing that previous editions had?

[Bagpuss]

I miss the _concept_ of speciality priests... though the execution of them itself was not balanced as some specialities were vastly superior to others. For 3.X, while the rulebooks say that PrCs can fill this role, for some reason, that still doesn't sit well with me... I just think they should be special from level 1. (just my two cents).

Have to agree 100% here they are the main thing I miss about 2ed. Although Domains help a little in focusing a priest on their chosen religion, the are pretty bland compared with speciality priests. And PrCs do little to fill the roll as they only tend to ADD abilities rather than remove them. A PrC of a God of Love that has nothing to do with warfare will still have access to Full-Platemail, Flame Strike and the like.

 

[Humanophile]

Heh. 3.x gave us everything we asked for. And now we bitch about it.

I will grant this. Arbitrary restrictions and "hands off, it's mine!" powers do tend to add to flavor, albeit at the cost that players tend to want said restrictions removed or said powers opened up to others. Certain powers and abilities tend to "feel" right, even if they're horribly balanced ("shouldn't my elf get bonus skills and feats, since he's been around so long?"), which adds to "soul" while driving a great many players up a wall. We asked for balance and wide-open options, and some flavor has to be lost in the balance.

I do also have to call myself more a fan of earlier art and writing than 3e's; although the chapter opening art in 3e has an immersive feel, pretty much everything else... well, has been discussed before. Yes, it's nice to have standardized language, and there are some more "soulful" books put out by other publishers that drive me up a wall with vague wording, but those books do tend to evoke plot hooks and character ideas far better than the current D&D crop. Probably because in those books, the rules follow the world, and devil take anyone who points out why it's less fun to play as a result.

I do wonder what would happen if someone put out a book that sidestepped all the things that make D&D "flavorless" now; keep in mind that the two places where restrictions are added for flavor reasons alone - multiclassing for monks and paladins - are probably the most house-ruled things in the game. If WOTC ever decided to put out a book where evocative prose beat out clear (if legal-esque) language, where pointless restrictions were added "for flavor", and full of unblanaced rules that "fit the setting", I'm curious how feverent the crusade against them would grow.

 

[Calico_Jack73]

"Newness" adds a lot to the whole feeling of nostalgia, but there's more to it than that - I just can't put my finger on it at the moment.

That is what I'm talking about... what is that something else that you can't put your finger on?

 

[Will]

A brief aside, wrt clerics being tricky in 3.X...

UA has some great ideas along these lines. My favorite approach would probably be the Spontaneous Divine Caster (combined further with a Cloistered Cleric). Having Spells Known be limited would go a long way toward focusing a cleric in interesting ways.

 

[diaglo]

That is what I'm talking about... what is that something else that you can't put your finger on?

it is the wording and context.

shellshock, combat fatigue, post traumatic stress disorder = the same thing.

but shellshock stirs up more emotion. yet that was the wording of the day. WWI; ...combat fatigue...implies just that a result of battle...WWII; post traumatic stress disorder...vietnam...sure it may be more clinical and describe the malady better...but it reads like....

wtf??? it doesn't even bring images of battle to mind.

edit: stupid MS spellchecker.

 

[S'mon]

I think 3e does lack a 'sense of wonder' that 1e & even 2e had - and I was no fan of 2e, so it's not just nostalgia. I think for me it's the DMing style of Monte Cook that permeates the 3e DMG, it just doesn't do it for me; the book is perfectly serviceable but lacks the magic ingredient. The 3e Monster Manual suffers from too many stupid monsters while leaving out too many classics, and again the presentation is awfully mundane I find. That's why I like Mongoose stuff - for all its many many faults, they still have that sense of wonder. So do many (most?) other 3rd-party products; there just seems to nbe something lacking in WotC's style.

 

[francisca]

I don't know what it is, but I think this is largely due to Gygax's writing style. It's very... interesting to say the least, but it definitely isn't boring to read at all.

Could be. But Gamma World 1E/2E are pretty easy to stay interested in. The Moldvay Basic set was like that too, so I don't it was just Gygax (though he was certainly the best read, in my opinion).

 

[Henry]

You are talking about "Player's Option:Skills and Powers". This was not 2.5 at all. It was an OPTIONAL book of rules.

To me, they ALL are - both Player's Option, 1E, 2E, AND 3E.

The new Unearthed Arcana, the Skills and Powers books, and the Old Unearthed Arcana share that in the respect that they are a mish-mash of options to plunk in, rather than a unified system. But a lot of people did indeed use most of the Skills and Powers rules in their game to get them the flexibility that 1E and 2E lacked on paper, and 3E drew heavily from both them and some of the concepts from the basic D&D rules - you can see many influences in both of these bodies of work.

 

[kamosa]

So you don't just do what the rest of us do? Just open the MM and look at the kobold listing, the mimic listing, and the bugbear listing? All the info is right there in the newly formatted and easy to read pages. Hours? You can't do this in seconds?

How did you do it in the previous editions, when the stats, skills, and saves were not even listed in the creatures' stats in the MM?

Quasqueton

That still takes time to look up. I used to keep the 5 key stats for any monster in my head. So, I didn't even need to open the book or refer to my notes during the game. If I'm writing a whole module, it does take hours to write out the NPC's and Monsters. In the old book, you'd just kind of fudge higher level monsters. Give em another 20 or so hit points, add a little to their ac, add damage to their attack, bang, insta badie. Now, I need to refigure the save advancement for that monster, determine it's increased skills, check to make sure I'm advancing it right compared to MM.

Skills for monsters were always fuzzy in 2e, which was a good thing for the GM. You could just say the monster was good at tracking and bang, it could track. Now you need to know it's tracking skill and it stats. While this isn't a lot to figure out, you have to do it for each monster. Time sink on the GM's part.

Saves all came off the fighter progression and were based on hitpoints. So, after a couple weeks, you had that progression memorized and you could roll the save for any monster without looking, as long as you knew it's hitpoints. Now, I spend several minutes per combat (aggregate) looking at the 15 to 20 bad guys looking for their save number.

I used to think it was just that I don't have the time like I used to, but I've been GMing 3E to 3.5 since day one and I haven't even come close to the speed of GMing I had under 2E in the first year of GMing. There is just a lot more to keep track of and balance. It just takes more time and effort as a GM. Time and effort I could spend working on plot and overall story lines for the players.

Easy to read page???? Are you kidding, I find the new format much harder to read then the old book. The print and kerning is much smaller and the backgrounds are distracting.

 

[Wolffenjugend]

I agree with those who said ARTWORK! When I look back at my old rulebooks and see Larry Elmore's awesome drawings, and then compare them to the crap I see today, it's disappointing and not at all inspiring. The whole cyberpunk-thing has gotta go. There's a lot to be said for a "realistic" drawing of a warrior.

The old artwork really got my imagination going. Now, it seems like a lot of the artwork is solely done b/c they need a picture of what X looks like. I think D&D should spend more time hunting down great artists.