tussock wrote:You've admitted to never even having read it, right? How the fuck would you know?
i never read 3rd or 3.5 books cover to cover, but FORCED to read some of it, sicne i had to play a few times.. and through playing those few times, i learned the concepts it had was shit.
mainly focusing so heavily on "building" a character as you play, rather than focusing on playing. and to aid this, the quicker you leveled, the quicker you could get to the next plateau on your build itinerary.
it lost playing which was in 2nd and prior, tot he same total bullshit as character points and the other crap from Player's Options.
i think i have C&T left, and have been lucky enough to give away all the copies of S&P and DM:O that i had.
i cant remove them from the core rules HLP file or program, but my "for use backup copy" has 2.5 removed in HTML and RTF format.
and 2nd only removed demons and devils and Gygaxian prose....well the explanations of linear and bell curve distribution of dice and a few other tidbits and DMG notes. but they are the same game.
4th isnt to 3rd, what 2nd was to 1st, because 2nd and 1st are compatible with a LITTLE level adjustment here and there, while 4th is something else all together.
again cant read 1st any better now that i have lost my copies to HDD crash that i painstakingly put into wordpad all those years ago.... so havent play BtB 1st combat in decades to compare to C&T.
but never really had any problem with 2nd combat, only 3rd as MOST DMs in this area sucked at math, but guess what.. they wanted spell angels of reflection in 3.x so i have to teach them or show them the angles every time because they wouldnt BUY or use the protractors i gifted to them!
NEPs started down a wrong wrong of trying to add and define too much stuff, and PO followed it...ergo i didnt like its parent product (2.5) so had no use for and think it (3.x) is crap.
same as with 4th, i had info up front, from Dragon, including the character generator that came with it. as the magic 8-ball said whether or not i would EVER like it... "Sign point to NO."
so MORe than one focus changed, which led to the greater emphasis on rules being law, when a greater number of players came with 3rd. this includes those wanting that who played prior editions.
D&D wasnt meant to be a set of strict rules. you CAN play it that way, but it was designed for each group to make D&D their own, which pretty much means that D&D, not the game you play or the one i play, CAN be strict rules, or a set of guidelines. one such guideline being PALY HOW YOU WANT.
that being the case... Oberoni cannot apply unless you ALTER the game from its set of guidelines to strict rules.
and ALL editions (OD&D~4th) state, except within tournament play, that the "rules" should be followed until they cause a problem with YOUR playstyle.
which is why i have been against the RPGA and tournament style play since early 80's as it defeats the purpose of D&D to be an open and mutable game.