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Enchanted Trinkets Complete--a hardcover book containing over 500 magic items for your D&D games!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="woodelf" data-source="post: 2054131" data-attributes="member: 10201">Well, here's where i come from: i love Arcana Unearthed. I'm not sure yet if i'm buying Arcana Evolved. AE is basically AU + Diamond Throne, + a couple new rules tweaks (new race, new class, extended classes and races to higher levels, probably a few new feats/spells, though i don't know for certain, maybe a few other little things). I'm really interested in the new rules. Diamond Throne has always left me cold. Also, i think AU is perhaps the best-looking D20 System book yet, with really awesome layout and art. I think AE is ugly, and i don't like the new design direction (I do like the new art). So, if you're asking if you should get AE instead of AU, i'd say only if you want a setting--if all you want is the rules, and don't mind not having every single latest innovation, save some money and get AU. If you're asking if you should get at least one of AU or AE, i'd say definitely. The variants are definitely cool and exciting. I think AU is "more 'D&D' than D&D3E". The changes to spellcasting, alone, are worth the price of admission--they're what got my group willing to give it a try (we've played D&D3E, and they won't touch that again). The magic keeps the upsides of D&D (codified, predictable), while losing most of the downsides (fire-n-forget, have to be prescient). The classes are better-balanced, and, IME, do a better job of fulfilling common fantasy archetypes. The selection of spellsi is more interesting, and ditches a lot of legacy cruft (like a 1st-level no-save, no-attack-roll, force spell). The feat selection is more interesting, better-balanced, and has more for high-level characters. The only way in which i think Arcana Unearthed is *not* superior to D&D3[.5]E is the combat chapter--where he made essentially no changes. And i wish he'd done some of the stuff he talked about in the design stages, like changing armor over to DR. Nonetheless, IMHO, every changed subsystem is an improvement, and that's most of them.Oh, and on the genericity: IMHO, there's no more setting included in AU than in D&D3E. It's just as easy, if not easier, to adapt to a particular setting. There will, of course, be much more setting included in AE, and i don't know how easily it'll be sidestepped.</blockquote>

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