D&D 3.5

[pakman]

This week Friday, Dungeons and Dragons v. 3.5 comes to a local gaming store near you. I am excited about the changes, but also wary, as I am with all changes. Especially these. I play rangers mostly. My current character is not a fighter type as mention, he is more the archer. I like getting more skill points because now I get 7/level (6+INt modfier). I also like the new feat that will be available to me, many-shot, which allows me to shoot more than one arrow at a time, up to a max of four, with penalites. I can imagine being in a close combat situation where I say I'm using, many shot, multi-shot, and point blank shot. Wow, that is going to be cool. I like how I can get evasion, since I always saw this character as a stalker, and now, I think, rangers will be able to get HIPS (hide in plain sight).

This means, however, that I will have to go back and adjust a lot of stats on my character, along with my hit points. Overall, though, I can't wait until Friday when I can pick up my brand, spankin' new copy of the Player's Hand Book. And I can't wait to get back to school to continue the campaign with our updated characters.

[Tal]

Can't say I'm excited since I just went through the expense of purchasing the 3.0 rules. ;)

[pakman]

Sorry to hear that...I was going to finally buy them after using my friends' for the past year..but then decided to check the WotC site just becasue i hadn't done it all year..only to find out that 3.5 was in the works, I decided not to buy th 3.0 rules. lol

[Taem]

Hail Pakman

I too am extremely excited, however my gaming group is not! One of my group JUST BOUGHT the three main 3.0 books and is rather peeved. Our DM sees nothing wrong with the current system and refuses to convert. I could care less what they think, as I too play mostly rangers and am going to convert rather they do or not. Hell, we're supposedly in the Forgotten Realms in my DM's campaign, but he doesn’t even have the source book, so I've been researching everything about our characters and the campaign world... so sad.

I'm also excited because the Animals will get better skills and feats, which will make my Wolverine companion awesome. I have been raising his hit die with the sacred druid ability from the Masters of the Wild handbook and had him "awakened" with the spell 'awaken'.

I've said too much already. As you can tell, I'm more than excited about 3.5! I just hope 3.6 doesn’t come out with MAJOR necessary revisions immediately after ;)

[pakman]

Is a new Masters of the Wild book coming out for 3.5...or will it stay the same?

[Taem]

They said they wanted to keep all of their handbooks and resource material untouched. Basically only the core books (i.e. PHB, DMG, MM, MMII, maybe High-Level, etc.) will change while everything else remains the same - so they say. WotC has a far better track record than Blizzard, so I'm pretty sure this IS how its going to be ;) .

[Brista]

One of the problems I have with D&D marketing is the way that new add-ons are balanced

They are not

They don't even try

I started AD&D with first edition. They brought out the Unearthed Arcana. More spells, more powerful spells, weapon specialisation, and over-powered new races

I moved on to Second Edition. Those Skills & Powers books exacerbated the previous trend. Loads of new powers and completely customisable classes. I had a fireball specialist wizard in Plate Mail with Fighter hit points in my group all of a sudden

I moved on to Third Edition. Out came a series of books which to my great amusement were promptly labelled "splatbooks" by the online community. And they were. More spells, over-powered spells, loads more feats allowing extreme min/maxing and item creation feats that allow a power-gamer to take over the world. I read a forum report not long ago of an 8th level character doing over 200 damage per hit. Splat!

3.5 seems to me to be caught between a revision for balance and the time-honored tradition that the way to sell new books is to power up people's characters

Take the example of 7 skill points for a Ranger

Originally, in 3.0 the balance is this:
combat specialist, spellcasting specialist: 2 skill points per level
all-rounder, versatile characters including Ranger: 4 points per level
skills specialist: 8 points per level

Reading your posts here chaps it seems to me that you are rather falling for D&D's traditional marketing approach - buy this product and your character gets better

Not that there's necessarily anything wrong with that so long as you're both doing it with your eyes open

But I certainly think it's unfair to criticise your GM for not upgrading. From what I've read about 3.5 and my experiences with previous editions I think that the original product is likely to be a much better game than the souped-up one

[mageofthesands]

Gnomes favored class is now bard. WTF?

[Count Duckula]

I've got close to $200 in various D&D books, from 1st to 3rd edition. The thought of spending $60 on the 3.5 core books alone makes me cringe. But then I remember that I follow mostly 2nd edition rules anyway, so I feel a bit better.

*kicks back with a cold Tropicana and watches the rest of the gaming communities*

[Dyntheos]

Our group will be purchasing the core books and probably others as they arrive ( beleive in 2004 a "Complete Fighter" book will be arriving, so don't know how that will affect masters of the wild or sword and fist...

The prices are a huge issue. When I started D&D over 20 years ago, it was the realm of teenagersa who could afford 20 bucks a book. Now in Australia the books retail for around 80, which is out of reach of most non working people, and even those with jobs. <_<

The changes look good on the whole, but as always use what you like, and change the rules or omit them as you see fit.

As to second edition and the unearthen arcana years. TSR was taken over by a women that had no interest in the game whatso ever and bankrupted it. The release of all the garbage in that era was all her fault, and is why gygax sold up. Just be glad now that wotc, has the riegns and is making alot of the rules open source and has players that love the game making it.

[pakman]

I think it all depends on the GM. If I had an 8th level character that did 200+ damage, he would have us be fighting Great Wyrm Red Dragons. He would kill us all because we don't deserve to be doing that much damage, besides, he would never let our group get that powerful.

I can't day anything about 1.0 and 2.0 because I only started playing a year ago. I thought the idea of D&D was character specialization...customize your character how you have invisioned it in your head. That's how I have played. An example of how our GM works:

I decided to track some goons we were after. I led them to a bridge which happened to be guarded trolls and ogres. The troll wanted a toll (sound familiar? ;)). Our group debated it and the stupid barabrian :P decided he wanted to fight and attacked the troll. As the ranger, I immediately stole away to the woods and shot from cover, only to be accosted by ogres. I downed them and reconcentrated on the troll. However, the fighter in the group, trying to save the stupid barbarian, promptly lost both arms because of the troll attacks. The cleric had one round to save him, and rolled lucky. The druid promptly died, and the paladin had one round to save him.

Our GM was fair, we were not supposed to fight that group. We are in no way overpowered.

I can see where you are coming from with years of experience. If I fall for them, then I'm doing it wholeheartedly. I would like to improve my character by the ways I listed in a previous post.

Oh, well...at least we can agree it's still a fun game :)

[Skandranon]

And the Diabloization of D&D continues.

Never got into Third, and despise many parts of it for varying reasons. I'll stick with my group's houseruled 2E, which, among other things, fits in under forty pages of text and rarely calls for die rolls outside of combat (which isn't too common, either).

[SteinHerz]

I believe Dungeons & Dragons will never become a perfectly balanced game.

I have a cousin whose specialty is playing elven wizards. He's always with an extra backup plan. When his clvl 12 Wizard / 6 Loremaster faced Lord Soth, he knew that the domain lord was full of SR.

So, what the hell did he do?

A mega-über spell combo that grant him an AC of 41 ( he used everything, even Cat's Grace! ) and faced the Lord with his Rapier+Weapon Finesse.

He plays since the red box. That's what I am talking about, a good rule advocate completely umbalances the game, and there's nothing a good DM can do except summoning the Demon Prince Orcus...

Well... Back to D&D 3.5

I definately agree that the Ranger lacked badly new advantages; and I was thinking on that feat-wisely; 7+Int bonus is d20 Modern stuff in my point of view...

But what most intrigues me are the new Prestige Classes...

That Mystic Theurge is a complete aberration!

Take a look at Andy Collins message board... He had a fight with Sean Reynolds; while one thinks the PC is very balanced, the other, like me, thinks it's a complete atrocity.

Any good gamer with condensed powerplay and levels in Mystic Theurge is capabe of completely destroying the fun of a game.

How about Tome&Blood's Draconian Disciple?

Heck, the class suplements from the third edition are just hideous!

Nothing compared to AD&D's red almost-hard covered books!

Lots of imbecile and horribly plotted Prestige Classes... Oozemasters, Draconian Disciples, they are all aberrations. Those cursed personifications of epic heroes shall never be a part of my campaign!

Well, hopefully I'm not going to have a seizure the day I read the updated rules...

[The_lost_soul36]

i havent hered anything on 3.5 yet i play online mostly becuse all the people i played with back home scatterd after graduation so online is the only way that we can play but if anyone wonts to play online go toRealm of Fate

[Brista]

I can see where you are coming from with years of experience. If I fall for them, then I'm doing it wholeheartedly.&nbsp; I would like to improve my character by the ways I listed in a previous post.

This is an approach I support whole-heartedly, have fun!

:)

[pakman]

Well, on Firday I picked up my copy of the 3.5 PHB. I have some questions for you GMs out there.

There are many dramatic changs to the ranger. No more ambidexterity in light armor or no armor unless you go with the two-weapon fighting comabt style. The other combat style is the archery.

Before 3.5 came out all my feats were geared towards the archer y style without know that I was going to become a career path for the ranger. However, many of the feats that I had chosen are freely give to me for just being a ranger. Feats like Rapid Shot and point blank shot, and I gain others later like Improved Precise Shot and many-shot (that's a lot of shots). My question is this: Would you as a Gm allow me toget rid of those feats I had chosen before hand that coincide with the ones that are freely given to me and allow me to pick other feats as long as they follow the archer style? Or would you say no? What would you suggest I do about this? Would it be wise to scrap this character due to the massive overhaul and just start a new one?

I also get a bunch more skill points to spend which I'm going to dump into Search and maybe Survival/Wilderness Lore (same thing) so I get synergy bonuses to Track.

[Brista]

Would you as a Gm allow me toget rid of those feats I had chosen before hand that coincide with the ones that are freely given to me and allow me to pick other feats as long as they follow the archer style? Or would you say no?

I would say Yes

As I said earlier I really don't like the effect of these books - they inflate the players but not the monsters

But if my group managed to persuade me to allow a book, then characters should be worked out as if the book had always been there. It is the world system now

Yet another good reason not to use the wretched things of course, but it looks like you and your GM have made your minds up :)

Incidentally did you ever see the Complete Thieves' Handbook for Second Edition. Of all of these books that was the one I liked the most. It emphasised thinking like a thief, different scams, some clever uses for basic gear like a crowbar or a stick of bamboo. The sort of stuff that makes a good player rather than a more powerful character

And the other advantage is that once you'd read it and learned to be cunning and crafty the GM couldn't really stop you from using what you'd read

Wish they'd do more like that instead of just bigger guns every time (so to speak)

[pakman]

No, I have not read that book. I am, however, starting to come up with some ideas I think are clever. Something like throwing out a rope, and then casting rope trick to tie around a bad guys' legs and hold him in the air while we interrogate him. Or using the rock to mud spell to turn a wall with bad guys on it into mud and they take damage from the fall and can't move because of the mud. But I haven't been playing that long so I don't think of everything clever or tricky that often. But as time goes on, I to will learn to be clever :)

[Ondo]

Reading your posts here chaps it seems to me that you are rather falling for D&D's traditional marketing approach - buy this product and your character gets better

Not that there's necessarily anything wrong with that so long as you're both doing it with your eyes open

Their characters don't get better because that's part of WotC marketing scheme. Their character get better because they're rangers. Not only was the ranger generally regarded as a weak class in 3.0, no powergamer would ever take more than 1 level in ranger. It was clearly a bad idea, as they got essentially all their abilities at 1st level. That has been fixed, and more flexibility has been added to the class. It's hardly simply a power up - the hit die has been dropped to d8 from d10.

Incindentially, "splatbooks" is what White Wolf's supplements for Vampire: The Masquerade that covered each individual clan in it's own book were called. They had similar books for their other RPGs. The explanation I've heard is that an asterik was used as a wildcard to replace the individual clan's name it the title, and people pronounced the asterik "splat", hence splatbooks.

[TheDragoon]

Keep in mind that you can always just download the list of changes and print those off and stick them in the books. It seems like the changes from 3.0 to 3.5 aren't particularly lengthy and so it should be easy enough to just stick in the appropriate rules in the books where they would belong. At least that's what I, as a cheap college student, am going to do. :)