Ultimate Showdown: 3.0 vs. 3.5

[Tequila Sunrise]

Support your favored sub-edition! Tell us why yours is the bestest, and why the other sux! If your memory is a bit rusty, here's a wiki link to the important differences between editions.

I myself marginally prefer 3.5 because a 3.5 DM is more likely to allow more options.

[TOZ]

This will only end in tears.

[Murtak]

I don't think either edition is clearly superior. 3.5 might be a little better than 3rd I guess. I don't like 3.5 though, because it was not necessary. 3.5 was change for change's sake, or rather for the sake of getting to sell all core books again.

So I don't like that 3.5 even exists, but it's not a worse ruleset than 3rd.

[MGuy]

I came in to gaming during the crossover so I don't really give a damn. I use material from both edition's splat books liberally. And I house rule it so much I might as well call it my own edition. In fact its for that very reason i just started to make my own homebrew game.

[hogarth]

I don't think either edition is clearly superior. 3.5 might be a little better than 3rd I guess. I don't like 3.5 though, because it was not necessary. 3.5 was change for change's sake, or rather for the sake of getting to sell all core books again.

So I don't like that 3.5 even exists, but it's not a worse ruleset than 3rd.

Not only that, but going from 3.0 to 3.5 didn't stop WotC from tinkering and fiddling around with the rules anyways. So we could have stuck with 3.0 D&D (+ 8 years of random tinkering) instead of 3.0 D&D + 3.5 D&D (+ 5 years of random tinkering).

[RandomCasualty2]

I don't think either edition is clearly superior. 3.5 might be a little better than 3rd I guess. I don't like 3.5 though, because it was not necessary. 3.5 was change for change's sake, or rather for the sake of getting to sell all core books again.

So I don't like that 3.5 even exists, but it's not a worse ruleset than 3rd.

Yeah, I think that's really how most people feel. The amount of changes in 3.5 were pretty minor, certainly not worth even having a new edition, but most of them were good changes.

[TOZ]

To actually answer the topic, all I know is 3.5 since I came in after the switch. Still, the more I read the more I alter, so I'm hardly any different than the rest of you houserulers.

[Username17]

A lot of kind of neat stuff was published for 3.5 that was never published for 3.e, and the reverse isn't especially true. The worst book (Savage Species) is a hybrid and counts against both editions. But really the problems are pretty much the same:

• There are a number of infinite and near-infinite power loops and combos that act as land mines to destroy all semblance of game balance or sense.
• Many of the character concepts that are supposed to be viable are not. Making a warrior of any type who doesn't feel small in the pants when a caster shows up is really hard, and becomes steadily more difficult as character levels increase.

3.5 made both of those problems worse. At its most extreme point, both The Wish and The Word were dependent upon world slaying powers that had mysteriously been added to core spells in 3.5. That was after, the entire point of those characters. Wish was given the ability to create magic items of unlimited value and Holy Word was given a free bonus scaling effect that allowed it to no-save kill gods in addition to banishing enemies. Very mysterious. Druids got even more of a power up. So much so that they announced how they were making Druids more powerful as one of 3.5's selling points (that's not even a joke).

A lot of subtle changes and not-so-subtle changes that you probably don't remember actually make and break a lot of character builds. But on the whole I think it's pretty clear that more warrior builds were nerfed into oblivion than added - even after the publication of literally a dozen new books that fiddle with build options. For every "Improved Trip now gives a +4 bonus and is awesome" there's a "we didn't reprint Knockdown so your character is really never going to be that good anyway."

Eventually 3.5 added the Book of Weaboo Fightan Magic and that helped. A lot even. But before they got around to doing that, what warrior types had they nerfed into oblivion?

• Archers (no double dipping arrow enhancements, all the archer PrCs suck now)
• Cavalry (Ride-by-attack doesn't work anymore, horses need 2 squares of clearance between allies to move, damage multipliers removed).
• Two Weapon Fightan (all TWF static damage bonuses removed. End.)
• Defensive Fighter (Devoted Defender and Knight Protector removed as options)
• The Samurai (RIP.)

Ouch. So what's left? Oh yeah. Great Sword damage build. Because Power Attack gives the Dwarven Barbarian with a greatsword 2 damage points per point instead of one. Of course, Rhino Armor is gone, so you basically lose more damage than that on the charge. Ugh.

And there are a lot of subtler changes that hurt fighters in the pants. The fact that all the "touch" range buffs and whole party buffs got shorter durations makes buffing the Fighter a much harder sell in play. And that makes the fighter's apparent output drop precipitously. The fact that they took all those weird incongruous SR 25s out of the book makes the number of times you're glad you have a beat stick a much smaller number. All those extra "SR: No" spells do the same. But the really painful one is that all the outsiders got giant piles of extra hit points and lost more than half their spell lists. This makes them individually much easier to pwn with magic and much more resistance to being smacked around with a sharpened rod of metal.

---

In conclusion: 3.5 has a lot to offer. Especially in terms of new content (Dread Necromancer, for example). But almost all of the interesting new content is more ways for spellcasters to hump your face that they honestly did not need. And if you took all the real changes (as opposed to additions) and rolled them back I don't think there's a single thing I'd be unhappy to see go.

-Username17

[RandomCasualty2]

[*] Archers (no double dipping arrow enhancements, all the archer PrCs suck now)

This was really only a boon to cleric archers, because they could get magic arrows for free with GMW. 3.5 actually had more useful feats for archers, you got improved rapid shot, ranged trip, ranged disarm, etc.

[*] Cavalry (Ride-by-attack doesn't work anymore, horses need 2 squares of clearance between allies to move, damage multipliers removed).

Yeah, ride by attack was fucked up. But 3.5 still has the cavalier, as well as shock trooper, if you wanted to make a charge build. The ubercharger was just as sick in 3.5 as he was in 3.0, if not more so. Honestly I'm not sure of the numbers in 3.0, but you can ubercharge for enough damage in 3.5 to basically instakill anything.

[*] Two Weapon Fightan (all TWF static damage bonuses removed. End.)

TWF never really worked in any edition except as a rogue style as far as I know. I don't even know what static modifiers you're referring to. The dervish PrC is actually pretty good for a TWF (though you're probably still better going two handed, I don't really know).

[*] Defensive Fighter (Devoted Defender and Knight Protector removed as options)

They both sucked anyway, so I'm not sure why anyone would care.

And as far as fighter options you got a whole lot more from ToB than anything in 3.0 gave you.

[Lokathor]

Book of Weaboo Fightan Magic

Favorite book. I wanna see more Fightan Magic classes, but I've never had the time to sit down and do it.

[Username17]

This was really only a boon to cleric archers, because they could get magic arrows for free with GMW. 3.5 actually had more useful feats for archers, you got improved rapid shot, ranged trip, ranged disarm, etc.

Improved Rapid Shot was in 3e (just not in Core). Ranged Trip and Ranged Disarm are embarrassing and someone who loves you should give you a good slapping. And the really important thing is that regular warrior archers could and did make use of the GMW that wizards and clerics cast on their arrows. Until 3.5 came along with its DMM Persistent weapon of the deity and Faith Casting and shit, there was no reason to not throw a 3rd level spell to give the 9th level Archer an additional +3 to-hit and damage with his next 50 attacks. 3.5 removed that option (both by making GMW weaker unless you were pulling the initiate cheese to pump your caster level and by making it also not stack with having a magic bow). But then it gave compensatory bonuses to Cleric Archers and didn't give compensatory bonuses to bow fighters.

Yeah, ride by attack was fucked up. But 3.5 still has the cavalier, as well as shock trooper, if you wanted to make a charge build. The ubercharger was just as sick in 3.5 as he was in 3.0, if not more so. Honestly I'm not sure of the numbers in 3.0, but you can ubercharge for enough damage in 3.5 to basically instakill anything.

This indicates that you have no idea of what you are talking about. The Cavalier in 3.5 is a non-option. Full Mounted Attack doesn't give you the lance bonus, so it's completely fucking worthless. Instead of charging across the battlefield skewering people you get to suck. And while they did leave in Frenzied Berserkers and added Shock Trooper, that's not available at level 6 the way Rhino Armor and spirited charge are in 3e. To make a charging death sphere you are pretty much stuck waiting until like 10th level to get your damage up and running - in which case you've been nothing short of a drain on party resources for four levels!

Making a high damage build in the double digits is lame sauce because damage goes obsolete entirely in the low double digits no matter which edition you're talking.

TWF never really worked in any edition except as a rogue style as far as I know. I don't even know what static modifiers you're referring to. The dervish PrC is actually pretty good for a TWF (though you're probably still better going two handed, I don't really know).

So... you have no idea what you're talking about? Good to know.

Here's the skinny: TWF takes a huge pile of feats and sets it on fire and gives you an attack penalty. In exchange for which it lets you do the damage of a two handed weapon but divide it into twice as many attacks. This is fucking worthless unless you get some sort of "per attack" bonus damage. Like, for example, Power Attack. Which under 3e rules adds to TWF attacks and under 3.5 rules does not. In 3e rules the 3.5 Power Attack bonus is given to TWF people instead of to THW people. Also, all other similar bonuses were carefully removed from TWF.

They both sucked anyway, so I'm not sure why anyone would care.

Again and still, you have no fucking idea what you're talking about. All the stuff like Knight Protector and Knight of the Middle Circle was actually pretty bad ass in 3e. And more importantly, it was viable. You could make an AC turtle world character because you could grab the abilities that allowed you to redirect attacks to yourself and actually contribute something while doing that. In 3.5 you can't.

Seriously RC, name a good change. Just one. Not "They nerfed this spell" but an actual change to the dynamic of the game that made things better.

3.5 increased the number of infinite power loops, raised the power differential between Fighters and Druids, and got rid of a lot of functional builds. What did it give us in return as far as positive changes?

Favorite book. I wanna see more Fightan Magic classes, but I've never had the time to sit down and do it.

It's basically not worth doing is my take-home. The Weaboo Fightan Magic classes have a text to playable concept ratio that is really bad. The book is 160 pages and it introduces what, four playable archetypes?

Making a new class of that type involves writing a whole new spell list and spellcasting mechanic. The amount of work required could practically make you a new edition.

-Username17

[Josh_Kablack]

Stuff that changed in 3.5:

The stat buffs became a fixed +4 instead of 1d4+1, and were no longer eligible for empowering. The durations were also nerfed.

A lot of other buff-spell durations were also shortened so that "I extend that and walk around with it all day" was no longer viable. This was supposedly a caster nerf, but it made ambushes even more important.

Magic Weapon / Magic Armor granted +1 per four levels instead of +1 for 3 levels.

Harm was "fixed" in a way that made people unsure if it could kill on a save or not.

Haste was "fixed" into becoming a group buff.

Polymorph was "fixed" in that they added loads of text to it and broke it into Polymorph and Baleful Polymorph. Dragon Child's comment about "If I try really hard to put the square peg in the round hole" is one of the better summaries here.

Disintegrate became a heavy damage spell that made rez harder instead of the save or die it used to be.

Sleep was made slightly less awesome at low levels, and a 3rd level version was added.

Reincarnatie had the chart rewritten so that the target ended up a humanoid 99% of the time. No more coming back as a badger, hawk or centaur. It was however mysteriously still eligible for maximize or empower spell.

The much needed, actually useful 2nd level damage spell Scorching Ray was added to core

The absolutely crazy weaksauce overleveled Polar Ray was added to core

The scry skill was removed, and a bunch of scrying and divination magic was "nerfed" in ways that really didn't change a whole lot.

Arrow and Bow enhancement bonuses did not stack directly, so at the levels where that would matter, people got a +5 distance holy, axoimatic bow, then loaded up on chaotic and unholy arrows which their cohort had cast Keen Edge and various energy substituted versions of Flame Arrow on. Combined with the removal of any cap for Strength Bows, this made high level archers nearly as effective as in 3.0, but it required more sideways thinking to get there.

Having bardic music based on class level rather than skill ranks meant there was no longer any point to taking a one level dip of Bard. Making bardic music eat up standard actions meant there was a lot less point to taking any levels of bard.

While rangers got an additional style option, more skill point and a smaller hit die, there was far less point to taking a one level dip of ranger.

Ride by Attack was sage-adviced into not actually working. While this is theoretically a big deal, most groups I played with didn't even notice.

The weapon size rules were changed in a way that made them easier to explain to new players, but resulted in nerfing small fightier types and a couple oddball situations for us rules-obsessives. (what's the size category when I use a chair as an improvised weapon?)

Druids got a number of small powerups, that combined to form devastator Natural Spell was made core, they got to spontaneuosly cast summons, etc.

Fighters got superior weapon focus and greater weapon specialization. Nobody cared, as it was always better off to multiclass into the other +1 BAB classes than eat the dead fighter levels you needed to get there.

Most of the skill bonus items had their bonuses chopped in half.

Rogues lost proficiency with the sap, but then got it back in errata.

Skill focus now granted a +3 instead of a +2

A number of the "+2 to two different skill" feats made it into core.

The Mystic Theurge was introduced in the 3.5 DMG. The 98& of the WotC forums crapped their pants in fear of how overpowered they thought it was. The Moral: you can only trust 2% of the WotC forums.

Power Attack was "improved" to work better with 2h weapons and not work with light weapons. This made the high-str dagger specialist a lot less viable.

Sorcerers got the option to swap out obsolete spells between levels.

Whip ceased being a ranged weapon, and became a melee reach weapon - this oddly made it less useful, but more intuitive to understand

Horses were made round instead of rectangular

The cover rules were rewritten in a way that was supposed to eliminate ambiguity, but as you have to trace LOS from ANY corner of your square to ALL corners of the target's square these rules really encouraged everyone to walk around in a 5 ft by 5ft box with one corner folded inwards in a 1 inch by 1 inch square, and every group I played with just kept using the old "eyeball" "ruler" or "laser pointer" + DM call tests for cover.

Move Equivalent Action was renamed to just Move Action

Gnomes were changed to get a bonus to illusions, but have favored class bard.

The penalties to Manyshot in the 3.5 Core were increased from those in the 3.0 ELH to the point where Manyshot was now 9-times-out-of-10 inferior to alternating between round 1: full attack with rapid shot plus 5' step and round 2: double move. This is serious evidence that Monte is not as good at math as his thinks he is.

[Lago PARANOIA]

This was really only a boon to cleric archers, because they could get magic arrows for free with GMW. 3.5 actually had more useful feats for archers, you got improved rapid shot, ranged trip, ranged disarm, etc.

Okay, first of all, the removing of GMW arrows hurts the swordsman more than the cleric because clerics have more damage bonuses for their arrows.

Where's the bigger bulge of inequality? Two people who do 15 and 10 damage or two people who do 10 and 5 damage?

Secondly, 3.5E nerfed the Deepwood Sniper by not making keen arrows stack with improved critical, nerfed the hell out of the Peerless Archer because of the arrow enchantment thing, and completely destroyed the Order of the Bow Initiate. There is no reason to make a non-cleric archer in 3.5E.

Thirdly, Zen Archery. There was no reason to be a warrior archer after that.

Fourthly, out of all of those feats you showed only Ranged Disarm is actually worth anything. Ranged Pin and Ranged Sunder suck. Improved Rapid Shot did not even come close to making up for the loss of Order of the Bow Initiate or GMW.

Finally, 3.5E warrior archers never got their Manyshot + Full Attack combination back the entire miserable revision. 3.5E cleric archers eventually did because all of the extra-action effects were geared towards THEM.

Seriously, 3.5E completely killed and buried the idea of a fighter-archer. They used to be able to beat ROGUES for ranged damage. Now they don't. I find it personally insulting for anyone to state that what happened to the fighter archer Wasn't All That Bad. Wake the fuck up.

TWF never really worked in any edition except as a rogue style as far as I know.

TWFing did work in 3.0E because swordsman had more PrCs that gave attack and damage bonuses, didn't have the Power Attack nerf, and because the style had lower prequisites. Obviously you weren't going to be outdamaging the rogue but you would still outdamage other fighters.

And as far as fighter options you got a whole lot more from ToB than anything in 3.0 gave you.

Which... came in the last year and a half of 3.5E's lifespan? I like ToB and all, but seriously, whooptee shit.

[virgil]

This exchange between Frank and RC is oddly familiar, as if the two have tread the same ground before. The very fact it's being reiterated means we're due for a couple pages of them very much not changing their minds.

[Username17]

Josh, you're missing some:

All special maneuver feats substantially improved (bonus +4 bonus!)

Darkness replaced with Magic Circle against Rogues.

Hiding removed in errata.

Overrun removed in errata.

Cover guidelines replaced with a qv. for magical teaparty.

Long convoluted examples with squares created the 4'11" full cover box.

Charging with or near allies or chairs forbidden.

Innuendo skill removed (yay!)

ELH's nerfing of high skill results made core.

Diplomacy table moved to the PHB where you might find it, but without changing the page citations in the PHB, generating as much confusion as was saved.

-Username17

[Lago PARANOIA]

Josh:

Don't forget the Spell Focus/Greater Spell Focus line of spells.

Whirlwind Attack was nerfed from something nifty, even without Bag of Rats, to something almost completely worthless.

Hierophant got nerfed from 'barely usuable' to 'completely worthless'. Archmage went from 'awesome' to 'barely usuable' unless you count SLA cheese. Dragon Disciple PrC got even more worthless. Dwarven Defenders and Blackguards got a teensy-tiny boost. Red Wizard of Thay got completely reprinted as-is, which is a change in that the specialist wizard that 3.5E tried to nerf completely came apart at the seams with a higher spell DC. Duelist received a nerf that was ultimately meaningless but still rather tragic.

Specialization in a school became noticably more restrictive. Some spells got moved from transmutation to conjuration.

The TWFing chain had higher stat requirements. Which of course didn't matter at all to the rogue but kicked everyone else in the scrotum.

Standing up from prone drew an AoO. Thus tripping became crazy-hardcore.

Skill bonus items became much more expensive. Except for Diplomacy I didn't notice any of these that were a problem.

The Wings of Flight had a higher price tag slapped onto them because LotR is FUKKEN AWESOME.

Lyre of Building became more expensive for no reason.

Shurikens got nerfed from 'situationally overpowered' to 'completely worthless'.

The monk class once and for all destroyed the 'use two-handed weapon at flurry bonus' build. Which sucks because the Three-Section Staff was one of the few ways a monk could even attempt to keep up in damage with.

Shapechange became a huge pile of crazy. I'm not sure why Ed Stark wasn't immediately fired after that. The changes to Alter Self made the wizard much more powerful by giving them a 10 min/level +6 AC or MORE bonus.

The Blasphemy line of spells became ridiculously overpowered.

Righteous Might got changed in such a way so it that was still worthless to most clerics--except the CLERIC ARCHER, who just wanted the fairly substantial DR bonus.

Tower Shields got changed to make them worse at low levels, better at high levels.

Elemental resistance got changed to be 'per attack' instead of 'total damage' taken. This (of course) nerfed weapon fighters and made meteor swarm even more laughably worthless.

Confusion of dispelling supernatural abilities removed once and for all: you can't.

Half-elves and Half-orcs got minor changes to them that still left them worthless.

Small characters given a kick in the nuts for no reason. The small dagger-rogue got stealth-nerfed to oblivion. But small acid flask rogues, small spirited charger rogues, and of course small spellcaster rogues went untouched by these changes so what the hey?

Divine Favor got a small cap in errata. Not that it matters because by the errata came out Complete Divine and Player's Guide to Faerun reared their ugly heats.

Adamantine armor became significantly better for no real reason. Of course, you still used mithral armor.

Barbarians given a small boost that still didn't convince anyone to stay with them for more than two levels.

Paladins nerfed, especially as a multiclassing option.

Vorpal Swords and Absorbing Shields became completely worthless. I actually feel pretty good about this, because even though high-level fighters lost their last reason to be there the number of mechanics-bypassing attacks hurt 3E more than anything.

They introduced Wild Armor. Say it with me: what the fuuuuuck? Why are druids now running around with an extra +8 to +10 to AC?

[Roy]

I play 3.5, but 3.5 made a lot of things worse than they were in 3.0. Like for example non Cleric archers. So many nerfs there.

And most of the 3.0 non caster material was fucking insulting. You got stuff like PRCs with high opportunity costs just so... you could protect an ally if they were standing right next to you. Because you totally need to be level 7 with highly specialized training to lean in and block the axe coming for your friend's head with your own face. Granted, most of the actual abilities of that 10 level PRC came in the first 2, but even so to demand that much for shit you should just be able to fucking DO if you want is beyond insane.

But what was more insulting was when the 3.0 stuff got reprinted in early 3.5. Just look at all the stuff that got ruined in Complete Warrior, for example. Almost makes it a good thing a few of the winners like Deepwood Sniper were never reprinted, though they still got nerfed anyways by the crit stacking and ammo stacking rules.

3.5 really didn't get good until near the end, when they finally got a fucking clue about balance and started making books like the Tome of Battle.

[RandomCasualty2]

3.5 increased the number of infinite power loops, raised the power differential between Fighters and Druids, and got rid of a lot of functional builds. What did it give us in return as far as positive changes?

Many of the spell changes were good. Remember polymorph other, with the laughable permanent duration? Harm was so powerful that in one module, they actually recommended a nerf when the adventure included a dragon. Maze had no save and no SR, meaning it was guaranteed to take something out of combat every time.

Some major 3.5 general paradigms that were good:

• Handing out immediate and swift actions to people. In 3.0, casters got that free quickened spell action that nobody else got to use. 3.5 with MIC and ToB let fighters in on this party. Which was a good thing.
• 3.5 toned down rocket launcher tag a bit. It really could have went farther, but it did a decent job in some respects. Warblades got moment of perfect mind to give them one autosuccess at a save per combat. Spell DCs were toned down, as were "we love spellcaster" feats like spellcasting prodigy.
• Monsters were less glass cannon and centered around cheese to be at all competitive. For all the bad shit about monsters that you said, lets remember that the colossal scorpion in 3.0 was even worse than it is in 3.5, and most of the outsiders like balors and pit fiends had to fight in completely odd ways because they lacked the power to go toe to toe with anyone. Yet they could do something totally weird like lay down infinite symbols or some shit. Mind flayers had astral projection... at will. Most of the 3.0 monsters, especially at high level were total pushovers in actual combat but had some crazy cheese tactic that would make them almost unkillable.

Now I realize that you may not like a lot of these paradigms, simply because you're in favor of taking rocket tag to the extreme and making acting first the most important thing in the game.

But I don't think that's the paradigm you even want to try for in a heroic fantasy game, especially not for high level people. Most people really don't want to see a duel between Thor and Hades come down to whoever gets off the first shot. I mean you mentioned the devoted defender and some bullshit, but honestly, I don't know why you'd care about pumping AC in 3.0. Monster melee attacks were for the most part pathetic. The only time the damage mattered at all was if they could full attack you. None of them were charge builds, so you basically just stayed at range, let them charge you (which won't kill you even if you've got AC 10), then on your party's action, you just rape them.

More so than 3.5, anything that attacked AC was a total joke. Hell, if a balor charged your wizard, so long as he didn't vorpal him, your wizard could pretty much laugh in his face. And whatever the balor might do on a full attack totally didn't matter because it was dead before its second turn ever came up.

I never got any enjoyment out of that style of play.

[Username17]

I ask for changes RC. You just listed some additions handed out 5 years later in the Book of Nine Swords to some non-core classes.

I'll take that as a concession actually. If you can't actually name a single improvement to play in the 3.5 PHB, that pretty much makes my case, doesn't it? I'm not saying Weaboo Fightan Magic was bad, I'm just saying that there's nothing in that book that required a new edition to be printed before it could be written.

-Username17

[RandomCasualty2]

I'll take that as a concession actually. If you can't actually name a single improvement to play in the 3.5 PHB, that pretty much makes my case, doesn't it? I'm not saying Weaboo Fightan Magic was bad, I'm just saying that there's nothing in that book that required a new edition to be printed before it could be written.

And a lot of the crap you mentioned was from splatbooks. Seriously if you're mentioning samurai and devoted defender, then it's bullshit to tell me I can't mention shit like the ToB, MIC and XPH.

You opened the door by talking about 3.0 splatbook material. Don't try to take that shit back.

As far as core stuff only:

• Sundering magic weapons got harder, since they get more hardness and HP.
• Spells changes: Haste, harm, divine favor, polymorph other, maze, improved invisibility, fly. Probably a few more that I can't think of offhand. It's been a long time since I played 3.0.
• No personal range spells in potions. (they're personal range for a fucking reason)
• Monsters in 3.5 are less about cheese tactics like laying infinite symbols on the ground, or astral projecting whoring mind flayers.
• Grappling. Remember FoM in 3.0 didn't let you escape grapples, meaning that all the big grappler creatures were instant death for you if they ever landed a hit. In 3.5, at least you have a way to survive that shit. It's not a great solution granted, but at least it's something.

[Tequila Sunrise]

It's amazing how worked up some of us can get over two mostly compatible sub-editions. I'll tell ya what: as an open offer to anyone, I'll freely concede that either sub-edition is superior than the other -- if you concede that 4e is superior to the other one.

I don't think either edition is clearly superior. 3.5 might be a little better than 3rd I guess. I don't like 3.5 though, because it was not necessary. 3.5 was change for change's sake, or rather for the sake of getting to sell all core books again.

Yeah, that's the only thing about 3.5 that ever stuck in my craw.

PS: WTF is fightan magic, ToB?

[Username17]

# Sundering magic weapons got harder, since they get more hardness and HP.
# Spells changes: Haste, harm, divine favor, polymorph other, maze, improved invisibility, fly. Probably a few more that I can't think of offhand. It's been a long time since I played 3.0.
# No personal range spells in potions. (they're personal range for a fucking reason)
# Monsters in 3.5 are less about cheese tactics like laying infinite symbols on the ground, or astral projecting whoring mind flayers.
# Grappling. Remember FoM in 3.0 didn't let you escape grapples, meaning that all the big grappler creatures were instant death for you if they ever landed a hit. In 3.5, at least you have a way to survive that shit. It's not a great solution granted, but at least it's something.

Random Casualty, THOSE ARE ALL WARRIOR NERFS!

What the fuck man?

-Username17

[Lago PARANOIA]

Sundering magic weapons got harder, since they get more hardness and HP.

Oy vey.

In 3.0E, you couldn't sunder magical equipment unless you were attacking with a weapon with an enhancement bonus equal to or higher than what you were targetting. Which means that even if you did get your equipment sundered if you won the battle you would at least be getting a replacement right away.

In 3.5E, while equipment does have more hit points, warriors are more vulnerable to having their equipment sundered.

PS: WTF is fightan magic, ToB?

Yup. I really hate that term.

Weeaboo Fightan Magic is a criticism of the book that handing out (or attempting to hand out) powers that can keep up with actual magic makes the game 'too anime'.

So you get to deftly avoid the issue of you being a douchebag who wants to keep your boot on the neck of weak classes by calling anyone who dares to oppose your douchebaggery a Japanophile.

It's one of the ugliest slurs in all of roleplaying.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Oh, yeah, 3.5E introduced one of the stupidest rules of all time, too. I can't believe we went so long without mentioning this either. But now we will.

The retarded-ass 'you fail a save on a 1' rule. I should mention that the massive damage rule institutes a save, too. I mean, the massive damage rule was always a barrel of dicks but 3.5E's change made it completely unworkable.

I think this rule ranks somewhere up there with racial level limits and psionics in terms of retardedness.

[Josh_Kablack]

Question here - since 4e have the 3.5 core books also become dirt cheap or has the larger print run of 3.0 core books kept the prices of 3.0 leftovers notably cheaper?

Because in the early days of 3.5, players being able to snag the 3.0 core books for like $5 each was a major advantage over the $90 for 3.5.