What is 3.0 & 3.5 missing that previous editions had?

[Calico_Jack73]

Personally, I never really saw a need for the CR system in 3E. The experience progression in the earlier editions was different. It took a lot more experience to make the higher levels than it does now. With that in mind, it adjusted itself just fine. A defeating a Troll in 1E/2E might give you a decent amount of XP when you are low level but that same amount is a drop in the bucket at high levels.

I do kind of miss the class specific XP rewards. One thing that they kind of messed up (IMHO) was that now there is even less of a reason to play a human since every race can play any class. So you get an extra feat and a few extra skill points at first level. SO WHAT? The abilites of almost every other race more than make up for it. Elves sleep less, have low light vision, skill bonuses, and can wield martial weapons regardless of what class they take. A human would have to waste his extra feat on the Alertness Feat to get the skill bonus or a martial weapons feat if he plays a class that doesn't get it automatically. Basically Elves get TWO feats (though they are chosen for the race) to the Human's one. I won't even go into the other races since I'd be writing all afternoon.

 

[Staffan]

i think some of those ADnD/D&D releases in the 64 you are using from 1993 also include things like...

the AD&D Collector card sets...3 of them to be exact. and the novels and other games.

if you want to lie with statistics you should at least post the complete lists

OK. 1993 saw the release of:

Book of Artifacts
Monstrous Manual
Magic Encyclopedia Vol. 2
Complete Book of Gnomes and Halflings
Complete Book of Humanoids
Complete Ranger's Handbook
Creative Campaigning
The Glory of Rome Campaign Sourcebook
Dragon Mountain
Deck of Magical Items
The Murky Deep
Swamplight
Tales of Enchantment
Thief's Challenge
Cleric's Challenge
The Ivory Triangle
Dragon's Crown
Black Flames
Merchant House of Amketch
Marauders of Nibenay
City-state of Tyr
Earth Air Fire and Water
Elves of Athas
Complete Gladiator's Handbook
Dwarven Kingdoms of Krynn
Player's Guide to Dragonlance
Leaves from the Inn of the Last Home, revised
New Tales, the Land Reborn
Book of Lairs
Ruins of Myth Drannor
Forgotten Realms Campaign setting, revised
Player's Guide to FR
The Shining South
The Jungles of Chult
The Dalelands
Code of the Harpers
Volo's Guide to the North
The Doom of Daggerdale
City of Delights
Assassin Mountain
A Dozen and One Adventures
Secrets of the Lamp
The Marklands
Iuz the Evil
The City of Skulls
Border Watch
Lankhmar, city of Adventure rulebook, revised
Castles Forlorn
MC RL appendix II: Children of the Night
Van Richten's Guide to the Lich
Van Richten's Guide to Werebeasts
Roots of Evil
The Created
Web of Illusion
House of Strahd
Dark of the Moon
Champions of Mystara
DM Screen/Escape from Thunder Rift
Creature Catalog
The Knight of Newts
Rage of the Rakasta
Poor Wizard's Almanac II

OK, that's only 62 - I might have missed something, and I'm not going to go through the list again (it's at http://users.rcn.com/aardy/rate/display.html if you're interested). I did include both AD&D and D&D - the last six items on the list are D&D, so if you don't count them it's "only" 56 items.

The list for 2003 is:
Arms & Equipment Guide
Book of Exalted Deeds
Complete Warrior
Draconomicon
Dragonlance Campaign Setting
DMG 3.5
Fiend Folio
Ghostwalk
Miniature's Handbook
MM 3.5
PHB 3.5
Races of Faerun
Savage Species
Unapproachable East
Underdark

 

[Calico_Jack73]

Personally, I never really saw a need for the CR system in 3E. The experience progression in the earlier editions was different. It took a lot more experience to make the higher levels than it does now. With that in mind, it adjusted itself just fine. A defeating a Troll in 1E/2E might give you a decent amount of XP when you are low level but that same amount is a drop in the bucket at high levels.

I do kind of miss the class specific XP rewards. One thing that they kind of messed up (IMHO) was that now there is even less of a reason to play a human since every race can play any class. So you get an extra feat and a few extra skill points at first level. SO WHAT? The abilites of almost every other race more than make up for it. Elves sleep less, have low light vision, skill bonuses, and can wield martial weapons regardless of what class they take. A human would have to waste his extra feat on the Alertness Feat to get the skill bonus or a martial weapons feat if he plays a class that doesn't get it automatically. Basically Elves get TWO feats (though they are chosen for the race) to the Human's one. I won't even go into the other races since I'd be writing all afternoon.

Paladins and Dual Classing kinda made up for it and provided a reason to play a Human. I'd play a Human Fighter until I quit getting full hit dice for gaining levels, switch over to play a Wizard, and by the time the Non-Human group made their next level my Wizard level would match my Fighter level so I could then fight with all the effectiveness of my Fighter AND cast spells as an equal level Wizard. The Elven Fighter/Mages would always be a few levels lower due to splitting their XP between the classes so dual classing was always the way to go.

Even though the logic was kind of messed up, level limits also made it worthwhile to play a human. With 3E it is a wonder that in most campaign worlds the Humans are the dominant species when every other race has numerous advantages over them.

 

[kigmatzomat]

As for changing the rate of awarding XP to address my power curve issue: That doesn't really do it. It is more than the XP/level that's involved. It's the modifiers from ability scores. It's the lack of name level and the associated change in the power curve. It's ability score increases. It's feats. Lots of things would need to be tweaked to get 3e's power curve to resemble 1e's. .... You ask me what is missing from 3e compared to 1e, I say: A shallower power curve.

Actually it sounds like what you want is a non-linear power curve. Let's face it, 3e has a fairly orderly progression. 1e had massive power leaps that appeared somewhat randomly. Many multiclass builds were designed to take advantage of those weird powerleaps.

You could always replace the universal XP chart. That's one easily implemented adjustment.

 

[diaglo]

OK. 1993 saw the release of

thanks, Staffan..

man i can't believe i bought all that. and just in one year.

how about you pick a year more closely related to my time.... say 1980, which would be the same difference for 1edADnD and the 2000ed. heck pick all the 1edADnD products released from its beginning until 1980. and then pick all the 2000ed products released from 2000 - 2003.

 

[Staffan]

thanks, Staffan..

man i can't believe i bought all that. and just in one year.

how about you pick a year more closely related to my time.... say 1980, which would be the same difference for 1edADnD and the 2000ed. heck pick all the 1edADnD products released from its beginning until 1980. and then pick all the 2000ed products released from 2000 - 2003.

That's not a very appropriate comparison, because the TSR of the late 70s was nowhere near the company WOTC is. I bet that they would have released a book per month or slightly more if they had only had the resources to do so.

And 1993 wasn't the "worst" year by any means. I think TSR's release schedule peaked in 1996 or so (I vaguely recollect counting the products that year and getting 90+).

 

[jasamcarl]

Personally, I never really saw a need for the CR system in 3E. The experience progression in the earlier editions was different. It took a lot more experience to make the higher levels than it does now. With that in mind, it adjusted itself just fine. A defeating a Troll in 1E/2E might give you a decent amount of XP when you are low level but that same amount is a drop in the bucket at high levels.

I do kind of miss the class specific XP rewards. One thing that they kind of messed up (IMHO) was that now there is even less of a reason to play a human since every race can play any class. So you get an extra feat and a few extra skill points at first level. SO WHAT? The abilites of almost every other race more than make up for it. Elves sleep less, have low light vision, skill bonuses, and can wield martial weapons regardless of what class they take. A human would have to waste his extra feat on the Alertness Feat to get the skill bonus or a martial weapons feat if he plays a class that doesn't get it automatically. Basically Elves get TWO feats (though they are chosen for the race) to the Human's one. I won't even go into the other races since I'd be writing all afternoon.

Uh, the difference is that humans get to CHOOSE their feats and skill selection. Given that pretty much every feat equivilant you can sight is suboptimal, I think humans are fine.

 

[Zappo]

Calico_Jack, I don't understand your comment about the troll giving a decent experience at low levels and a drop in the bucket at high levels. In 3E, it's almost exactly the same. :\

As for the races, your comparison doesn't hold. Just see how many people play humans versus how many people play elves. Humans are still the most played race, because they are one of the best races. The freebies an elf gets are very specialized; they are worthless for most characters.
Even if humans were neglected, and they aren't by far, the solution would not be forbidding people from playing race/class combinations.

 

[jasamcarl]

First of all, you've said that 2E was unbalanced many times. I would agree with this on a character creation level. Not all characters were even remotely equal in 2E. However, in a combat by combat basis, the balance between the players and the monsters was never an issue. You have a tough GM in 2E, you still have problems in 3E. You have a fair GM in 2E, chances are that didn't change.

However, many changes that were made didn't affect balance and weren't because the previous system was an incomplete hack.

Take the saves for instance. There used to be 5 and now there is 3, so why is it more incomplete in 2E?. As I said in the previous post, take spell casting. In 2E, the burden was on the players to keep their save for spells handy. One number, worked great. In 3E, the GM must not only calculate the save number for each level of spell, but must also determine on a per spell basis which save to use.

Does the fact that there are now three possible saves for any spell add to the game? I don't think so, but it sure slows down play. I still end up adjudicating an "insane" amount. However, now instead of looking in people's eyes, my head is down and looking at my notes.

Instead of making a ruling and moving on, we look for a ruling somebody else made, with no evidence that they spent any more time on or thought then we would have.

Uh, that is the lamest cop out i've ever heard. By that logic, you wouldn't need any rules, because, you know, your discretion is better anyway. Unfortunatly, that's not the case, simply by virtue of the fact that a player couldn't predict an outcome, so constant dm improv almost always leads to a clean sweap, railroading, or arbitrary tpks. And, besides what another friendly poster has mentioned (2e's COMBAT rules were filled with many more holes and inconsistencies than 3e, and combat in general was less balanced), 3e's rules actually intereact and have been playtested with a certain balance point, one I'd hazard you'd be unable to replicate by constantly pulling something out of your ass (though sometimes that is unavoidable.)

 

[hong]

I think Urbannen's point is incredibly insightful, personally, and summarizes a major difference between older versions and new.

I think if one of the requirements to "communicate with the collective thought of your ancestors" is that no black people are allowed, then those are probably not the ancestors you should be communicating with. Consider hanging up and redialing.

People, there are learned dissertations written up about how Star Wars captures the hero myth and whatnot, and that one has freakin' _spaceships_ in it. A mythic feel, for those who aspire to create one, should be able to survive superficialities like hairstyles or skin colour or fashion sense.


Hong "come back David Brin, all is forgiven" Ooi