What has 3.5/Pathfinder ever done for us?

[roko10]

3e and it's successors have oodles of problems; classes aren't balanced, there are too many dysfunctional rules, and melee does not get nice things.

Yet, however, people still play them a lot, despite their shortcomings. The question is, why? Is it just because most people are playing them? Or do they have several redeeming qualities?

[jiriku]

3rd edition offers wonderfully varied character generation tools, greatly superior to 1st or 2nd edition. It's also a very different kind of game from 4th edition. Many people who grew up on 1st or 2nd edition appreciated 3rd ed's robust chargen options, but felt alienated by 4e. Likewise, younger players who grew up on 3e recognize it as the D& they first learned to play, and likewise found that 4e was not to their taste. 5th edition has tempted me, because in many ways it has the simplicity and elegance that 3e tried and failed to have. However, many of us 3e players own literally scores or even hundreds of sourcebooks, and have invested hundreds (or in some cases thousands) of hours creating house rules and homebrew content. Why give up all of those resources to move to a game that doesn't yet have much splatbook support?

[Extra Anchovies]

System familiarity is a big one. I've heard good things about 4e, but I don't want to take the time to learn it and leave all of my 3.P system knowledge by the roadside. Even if it's a good system, what little of it that I've played has felt really weird, because it's so different.

Also, options. I personally think 5e/D&D Next is a better core system than 3.5. But there isn't (yet) as much that can be done with it. For example, if I want Mega-Man, I can build that in Pathfinder (Soulbolt/Aegis/Metaforge).

[Palanan]

I started playing D&D when "dwarf" was a character class and third level was as high as you could go. I missed 2E entirely, and only came back to the game just after 3.5 was released.

So 3.5 is the system I'm familiar with, and apart from Pathfinder I'm not likely to dive into another edition. I detest 4E and feel no attraction to 5E. Even if another system eventually comes out which outdoes them all, I simply don't have the time or interest in learning the ins and outs of a new edition from scratch. There's too much I want to do in life, both personally and professionally, to spend time on yet another reinvented game system.

Besides which, as jiriku says, I've collected quite a few supplements, mainly 3.0 and 3.5, and I don't have the space, interest or spare change to buy a whole new set of hardbacks.

[Uncle Pine]

I'll echo what others have said. Moreover, I've started playing with 3.5 and I don't know if I'll ever want to try another system.
There is literally no concept I've ever had that I couldn't replicate in 3.5 without resorting to homebrew. The amount of options the system gives you is that huge (especially if you're ok with reskinning things).

[Chronikoce]

3.5 can do so much and then even more when you add PF in. Playing with a group that agrees on optimization level fixes most of the problems and what is left can easily be remedied with some houserules.

The secondary concern is cost. I don't want to buy a whole new set of books.

Furthermore, rules memorization is a factor. I know almost all of 3.5 without having to look anything up. My only mistakes occur when I mix up a PF rule and a 3.5 rule. When I tried to read the 4th edition rules books I found them to be confusing and not fun to read (I read rules books for fun).

I can see myself learning 5th in the future but not until there is more support for it.

The final reason for not changing is that my long running campaign has characters built using PF and 3.5 rules smashed together. There is no way to easily replicate the classes that my players are using in other systems without making tons of small house-rules to retain their character identity.

[Killer Angel]

Many people who grew up on 1st or 2nd edition appreciated 3rd ed's robust chargen options, but felt alienated by 4e.

This. SO MUCH this, at least for me.
Plus, many people don't care about imbalance: if a system is fun to play, they play it, and 3.5 is fun. And it's even more fun when you exploit weak classes to make 'em worthwhile.

[Psyren]

It's easier to use an imbalanced yet fun system as a base, and add in a few tweaks/fixes that suit your group, than it is to come up with a completely new system that is wholly balanced yet still captures all the fun things you and your players used to be able to do before.

[Pex]

The "oodles of problems" are not universal. You may not like certain things about the system, but that does not make it true for everyone. People play the game because they just don't find anything wrong with it. They may house rule something here and there which is true for any game, but they don't get apoplectic about things you commonly find argued about here.

Players play monks. Players cast evocation damage spells. They play fighters and druids in the same party. They heal during combat. They love it. They're enjoying themselves. They work well. If you can't understand why, that's not their problem nor the game's.

[Necroticplague]

Because it's very versatile. You can build a whole lot of different stuff and find interesting combinations in the rules. It has a ton of content for it that makes new things always being found out.

Admittedly, I still prefer point-buy systems that are even more open, but 3.x is the ones I'm most capable of finding.

[jjcrpntr]

I started playing in 3.5 about 2 years ago and switched to Pathfinder little over a year ago. I find I prefer pathfinder (though I miss some of the spells from 3.5).

I've been intrigued by 5th edition as I understand it is less mechanically restrictive and easier to roleplay in. Problem I think is my players tend to be power gamers and 5th's limitation on stats/magic items I think would drive them nuts.

[NomGarret]

As someone who grew up on 2e, I also appreciated how much cleaner 3.x was. I also enjoyed the alternate mechanic systems in play (psionics, incarnum, binding, etc.). However, once 4e rolled around, I immediately preferred it a a system. That said, 3.x still holds the biggest field of options and alternate styles of play. This is why I remain really meh on 5e. If I am in a core-only game, I would play 4e, because I would rather play a fighter, cleric, rogue, or wizard in 4e than any other addition. I can only play a totemist, aegis, or dragon in 3.x.

[Brova]

For me it's two things.

First, 3e goes up to 11 in a way a lot of systems don't. You don't have to play with shapechange, ice assassin or wish but the fact that the game has rules for those things gives it a diversity of play that is sorely lacking in other games. The rules of 4e and 5e don't support the kind of high power stories 3e does. That's not to say that high level play is perfectly balanced, or that it couldn't use a touch up, but it tries for a level of power that is almost unprecedented.

Second, the huge breath of options. There are published classes for every concept you can imagine in 3e, and even more homebrew material. There is likely more homebrew content for 3e made on this forum then there is published content for any game. Possibly by an order of magnitude.

[ExLibrisMortis]

My first introduction to D&D was actually the - at the time - new 4th edition. I read the core rulebooks at a friend's and I thought: "wow, this is really cool". Then I picked up the 3.5 core rulebooks (at the same friend's), and I thought: "wow, this is way cooler than 4e".

I think the main benefit of 3.5/PF - compared to 4e only - is that the 4e abilities feel arbitrary, disconnected from (real-)world concerns/fluff. You either got them or you don't, the individual powers have fiddly bits that don't seem the result of anything but designer whim (I'm sure there is a logic there, but it's hard to see at first). I mean, the pouncebarian + Shock Trooper + Leap Attack combo* builds up over the course of various abilities, as your base attack increases, as you gather feats and levels. Each ability is simple in what it does, and at some point the complex combination comes online. 4e didn't have that feeling for me.

The multiclassing/prestiging in 3.5 is at once smooth and crazy versatile, while 4e's multiclassing is rather unspectacular, from what I remember.



*Not that I saw Shock Trooper on my first read, of course, but the principle and the potential of combining varied and sundry abilities are right there.

[Susano-wo]

Yeah, people came to it because, despite the screw-ups, it really was a much more robust and, I think, better system than 2e. Removed a lot of the pain in the ass and gave you, even in teh PHB a lot of options for character customization.

And yeah, people stay with it or PF because 4E is a whole different animal, with a vastly different play style and philosophy, as is 5e.

Finally, I thought this thread was going to start out with "But apart from the aqueduct, the sanitation and the roads... "

[Bronk]

I like D&D... I like playing, I like DMing, I like easy rules, I like fewer restrictions on character choices and I like the accumulated lore.

I played through a number of great games and one awesome extended campaign with the AD&D rules, but I didn't get to play quite enough for the rules to gel for me. THAC0 was always confusing, level caps were annoying, barely anyone could ever play a paladin of all things, saving throws were weird, every character of the same class generally had the exact same abilities give or take, kits were usually iffy, and so on.

I didn't get to play for a while, but I started to get into the lore of the game, mostly through novels, and when 3rd came out I got to play again. 3rd was great... all the d20 rolls go in the same direction, THAC0 was gone, etc, etc, but mostly the lore was mostly preserved. A few things were updated, a few things were ignored, but by and large, it was all there. The lore wasn't overwritten.

That didn't happen with 4th. From where I was sitting, the default world was completely new, and completely different... all of that great lore had been thrown out. Faerun and some of the other continuous worlds were rewritten in a way that overwrote or retconned most of the planar lore and I didn't like the new stuff. They turned my favorite exemplar races, the Eladrin, into weird elves. They called up a new planet opposite to the sun from Toril and smushed them together, finally ruining Spelljammer. The novels I read, even Salvatore's, while still well written of course, suddenly had stories that were were backpedaling, flashbacky wrecks that tried to keep up with the Faerun time jump and got through it just in time for the system to end. To me, accurate or not, the rules seemed computer gamey, which I didn't like, and it seemed like the game had backslid to fewer character options.

5th edition... who knows. With so few books, it seems not worth the effort yet.

You know, now that I think about it, another reason I like 3rd is that there's no preset limit for character growth. AD&D basically ended at 20, and I've never met anyone who used the various rules for going further, even though the Immortals sets seemed so cool. 4th ended at 30, and I'm not sure about Fifth. However, even though it was mostly restricted to just the Epic Level Handbook, that was enough to really have the potential to up the ante of any campaign. Very nice.

[Yora]

BAB was a good idea. Not a terribly briliant idea, but THAC0 was just unspeakably stupid.

More sensible names for the saving throw categories was also a good move, but other than that the changes saving throw system was not really an improvement.

Oh yes, and multiclassing was also a great idea.

But I think that's about all it does better than B/X.

[ngilop]

3e and it's successors have oodles of problems; classes aren't balanced, there are too many dysfunctional rules, and melee does not get nice things.

Yet, however, people still play them a lot, despite their shortcomings. The question is, why? Is it just because most people are playing them? Or do they have several redeeming qualities?

the open gaming license. To me that the major reason why 3rd/3.5 was the behemoth it was, and still is. Because whether you want to accept it or not, all pathfinder is, is a bunch of houserules for D&D that had a publisher behind them

[Zaydos]

Honestly I'd say jiriku and Extra Anchovies gave the best answers, but I will egotistically add my 2 copper pieces.

Because for all its faults 3.X has been my favorite system to play or to DM/GM. I mean I love B/X and 2e, and 5e shows promise that it might could be the best D&D system yet, but 3.X is just the one I've honestly enjoyed the most. It has problems, but it's just such a robust system, and it's fun to make stuff for (monsters it's less fun to make than older editions, but hey that's ok), relatively easy to make adventures for, and 99% of its problems are ones that I've never noticed in face to face games.

And 4e wasn't left out because it was bad. I started with Basic, and 2e is the system I first dove into head first so they get special note, and 5e might could be the best yet. 1e was left out because it is the one I'm least familiar with.

[Susano-wo]

BAB was a good idea. Not a terribly briliant idea, but THAC0 was just unspeakably stupid.

More sensible names for the saving throw categories was also a good move, but other than that the changes saving throw system was not really an improvement.

Oh yes, and multiclassing was also a great idea.

But I think that's about all it does better than B/X.

Well, multiclassing per 3E was a huge +. No longer having to fiddle with/abuse the dual classing rules or play non humans (or, like my group did, just allow humans to access multiclassing normally)to have anything outside of vanilla classes (many of which had no meaningful choices to differentiate them from other members of that class).

Speaking of which, I would add giving more, if not most classes (and nearly all characters) the ability to distinguish themselves from other members of that class, even without multiclassing. Spont. casters have differing spell selection, clerics have their domains, etc, etc. And there may be few effective fighter builds, but you have a huge ability to pick different feats to try to make a fighter that is different from others.

Also, skill ranks were a huge improvement over non weapon proficiencies, even if it might be too fiddly at times.

Finally, as mentioned before feats were a great concept(though perks or something similar would have been a better name maybe?), even if they weren't always implemented well.

So, even in the PHB, there is a lot to say for 3rd ed over previous editions.

Oh yeah, and I'll second the OGL, that was huge too

[DEMON]

It gave life to E6. Or, for me and my group, E7...

[eggynack]

In addition to a lot of the stuff that has been mentioned, I like 3.5 in part because of how screwed up it is, rather than in spite of it. I love really digging deep into something, having crazy arguments that sometimes touch on obscure semantics related points, or finding new and novel ways to break the game in half. A "perfect" game, one without these flaws, wouldn't be able to engage me in nearly the same way. The problems of the game give it an almost fractal like quality, where you can just keep going further and further into the system's minutiae, and keep finding new and interesting things. When it comes to actual play, it's possible that a less flawed game would have advantages, but where it comes to creating a real long term hobby, you really want something with some crevices to explore.

[Geddy2112]

Also, options. I personally think 5e/D&D Next is a better core system than 3.5. But there isn't (yet) as much that can be done with it. For example, if I want Mega-Man, I can build that in Pathfinder (Soulbolt/Aegis/Metaforge).

I second this wholeheartedly. From a mechanics and gameplay standpoint, 5th/next is fantastic. However, me(and my group) LOVE to have options. We like coming up with interesting and off the wall concepts, and pathfinder caters to that to no end. You can build almost anything and find a set of mechanics to cater. A monk sorcerer luchador wrestler?! Done. The evil hunter from Jumanji?! Done.

[Forrestfire]

Also, options. I personally think 5e/D&D Next is a better core system than 3.5. But there isn't (yet) as much that can be done with it. For example, if I want Mega-Man, I can build that in Pathfinder (Soulbolt/Aegis/Metaforge).

Actually, about that... Mega Man can be built incredibly well in D&D 5e thanks to a quirk of the Blade Warlock. At level 3, they get the ability to take a a magic weapon and bond with it, gaining proficiency in the weapon and storing it in an extradimensional space as their pact weapon. The ritual takes an hour to do, but thankfully, with an allied spellcaster around casting Magic Weapon (it lasts an hour, so with good timing, you can do the ritual with just one casting), you can bond with any weapon you find, including the normally nonmagical monster weapons like ogre greatclubs, ice devils' awesome spears, or anything else you come across. Sure, you can only store one weapon at once with this, but you've got an at-will eldritch blast buster shot to do other stuff. :smallamused:

I agree with the rest of your point, though. 3.x's strength is its massive versatility and the wealth of options available.

[MyrPsychologist]

I'll echo points about the flexibility of 3.5/PF and how much creativity an individual can put into the system. As well as negative feelings about the changes with 4e and the like.

But personally, the robust SRD for pathfinder is a big reason I continue to use it.

[OldTrees1]

Level by level muticlassing with prestige classes and alternate class features allows for a great deal of fine detail customization without losing the simplification benefits of a class/level based advancement system.
Skill points were a great idea for allowing fine detail customization of a character's skills.

[Mendicant]

I love 3.X for its raw ambition. 3rd tried to build a unified, rational system to simulate and resolve a really wide variety of conflicts, which does an immense amount of heavy lifting for you. A lot of it you barely notice until you're using a less robust system, and then you're suddenly getting bizarre outputs or you're just making stuff up from whole cloth that may or may not be satisfying to players. Even in the places where the rules break down, you've got this helpful benchmark to build your own rules around--you're rarely if ever just flying blind.

[Hrugner]

It requires some negotiation with regular groups, and you tend to come to gentleman's agreements not to break the game but aside from that the system works. Players can cook up weird schemes with unexpected consequences, share weird rules and argue strange interpretations and generally screw around with the rules themselves when there's no time to play. If I was looking for a game with a good flexible and reasonably realistic model, well I'd go play GURPS. If I wanted something that was just easy, I'd probably just do a ruleless narative model using dice to decide edge cases and severity. for everything else, the huge collection of 3.5/pathfinder material is good fun with a side of metagaming juice.

[PlatinumVixen]

Admittedly, I don't actually think 3e is a very good system at it's base. Speaking as someone who was away from D&D for a long time and came back to it, it honestly feels inelegent and clumsy to me in a way that's hard to contextualize sometimes.

But the fact is that 3e has more options than pretty much anything else on the market - sort of - there are definitely more freeform systems that arguably have more options as far as your imagination goes. But D&D has more official options than anything else which counts for something. People have done some really neat things with it.

[General Sajaru]

As has already been noted, 3.5 offers more options than any D&D system before it- and thus far, since. And while other games I've played have more ability to come up with new options, not everyone is creative enough to do that; 3.5 has tons of options already made for players to use.

[Milo v3]

It's a system with tonnes of options without it being complicated because of how it's organized, and without it lacking substance that occurs to free form games.

[Psyren]

the open gaming license. To me that the major reason why 3rd/3.5 was the behemoth it was, and still is. Because whether you want to accept it or not, all pathfinder is, is a bunch of houserules for D&D that had a publisher behind them

Well yeah, but when you get right down to it, you can describe any game that way :smalltongue: Literally all of them are "get together with friends, describe your actions, and use this conflict resolution mechanic that keeps it from being cops and robbers." Any game system that goes further than that is the result of someone putting their houserules to paper and then asking to be paid for them.

[Pluto!]

The only reason I play it is that other people tend to already know it. Same reason that I also play Red Book.

If 4e, GURPS, Vampire or Rifts were the big systems that most people I game with knew how to play, I'd run them instead, even though I don't exactly love any of them either.

Additionally, I used to love fiddling around with the character-building mini game on the internet, which is a lot more fun in a puzzley way than something like Fate or Unisystem, where there aren't really deep synergies, combos or complex build components to try to piece together.

[HurinTheCursed]

I began D&D after having played a lot of other systems and I don't find 3.5 that great compared to these. I prefer more fluid systems that favor roleplay, gritty settings lower on the epic scale, things 3.5 don't convey that well. Pathfinder is better IMO but still way behind my personnal favorites.

However, I was a long time high level warhammer battle player. Without the time schedule needed to spend hours and hours painting, modeling, I wasn't happy with bank accounts depletion and lack of room associated with addiction to games workshop's product. When an edition increased many balance issues, I decided not to follow it which severly limitated gaming opportunities, D&D was my fix. I have always been found of optimization (which offsets my usual bad dice) and tactics, I'd rather play an optimized weak class class than a unresearched strong class. D&D gives me this RPG "imagination is the limit" feeling but shares this very tactical wargame focus that I found in Warhammer battle, more than Warhammer RPG or dark heresy if you ask me (despite I found both systems better to my liking for roleplaying).

There are few grat/experienced DMs around me willing to master a D&D campaign because it's so rule-heavy. However, semi experienced DMs among us love to run written modules because it's easier and less time-consuming than making all your own, you can pick existing stuff that is reknowned to be good. 3.X / Pathfinder are great at this since there is so much content.
This isn't a system for everyone IMO, it favors ruling, rolling, long term optimization, tactics, epic gameplay. Some settings are a bit blant, it's full of videogamey dungeons archetypes, not the best suited for intrigue and politics... buts it's fun and if you accept is shortcomings, there's plenty of good stuff in what it does well.

[Mcdt2]

3.X/PF, and the d20 system in general, draws me because of how many options there are. Even disregarding houserules and homebrew (no small feat; I had to make an entire wiki just to store the ones my group uses) and even just sticking to core, there are so many ways to make characters feel distinct mechanically, even if they have the exact same race and class combo. It's a very fiddly system, true, but that's part of why I love it. It reminds me of Wizard of the Coast's other big game, Magic: the Gathering, which I enjoy mostly for the deck building process. I like sitting down with dozens, if not hundreds, of small choices to make. I like tinkering with the same character build for over a week until it's exactly what I want. And yet, despite how incredibly complex character generation is, the system has a fairly simple resolution mechanic in play. Virtually everything is just 1d20 plus modifiers.

When I think of the d20 system, I picture a massive, almost Rube Goldberg-esque monstrosity of gears and cogs and other things. It's not as pretty as the classic car next to it (1e/2e), nor as fine-tuned as the racecar (4e). It doesn't have the simple elegance some of its competitors have, but somehow, it still manages to move forward because every part is working in harmony, more or less, towards a certain goal. Sure, sometimes a part goes bad, but we got a team of mechanics (homebrewers) to fix it up, better than new.

Overly poetic analogies aside, I'm probably gonna jump ship to 5th Edition very soon. My party usually sticks to fairly archetypal fluff, and what they can't manage, there's always homebrew for. I'm usually on the DM side, and I like how simple it is compared to DMing 3.5. When I get the fix to tinker with things I'll either make some more homebrew myself, or try to find somebody willing to play Legend with me. Still no luck on that front, but I'm sure it will happen eventually!

[Scheming Wizard]

Well when you have 15-20 books you bought at 29.99 a piece over 5 or 6 years it is kind of hard to drop the system and move over to something else. You're also familiar with the system, because you have read or at least parsed through those 15-20 books.

The main thing is finding a group to play with and there are just more groups playing 3.5/pathfinder than any other system. A system could be really well balanced and super fun, but if nobody else plays it it might as well not exist.

You can't tabletop rpg by yourself.

[Flickerdart]

3.5 is not a good roleplaying game - but it's an excellent character building game. It is the sort of game where you build a puzzle from pieces that came in 20 different boxes, in order to best assemble the picture that you want. Playing the character you have built is merely a trial to determine how well you built it. If you didn't play the character building game well, your character is weak and not fun; if you played the game well, your character is powerful and entertaining.

[Kurald Galain]

classes aren't balanced, there are too many dysfunctional rules, and melee does not get nice things.
Frankly, 3E has been over-analyzed on forums far deeper than any other TTRPG. If you'd over-analyze any other game in this fashion, you would also get a long list of "flaws". The key to understand here is that the vast majority of players never notice any of these flaws.

It's also worth noticing that most players don't care one whit about game balance in a TTRPG.

[Morrolan]

3.5 was the first edition of D&D I played. 4th was too far removed from it, so I never picked that up. It even took me quite a while to pick up Pathfinder, despite it being so similar to 3.5. As many have said before me, its familiarity and options that keep us at 3.P. Haven't even really looked at 5th, because I don't feel like I need a new system at the moment.

[Morty]

Inertia and not being quite bad enough for people to let it go, I'd say.

[kalasulmar]

Versatility. Ease of adaptation. New material still being produced. OGL. The balance issues are fairly easily solved at a real table. Supports both role and roll playing aspects of RPGs.

[Bullet06320]

I first came to DnD as first edition was changing over to 2nd, enjoyed it to the point it was an obsession, bought every book I could get my hands on, discovered a love for the Forgotten Realms, a hatred of Dragon Lance, but always felt limited by the rules, 3rd edition brought new optimization levels and was limitless on the possibilities of characters. Then the OGL brought even more, one of the best moves for any game out there IMHO. It allowed so many others to get in on the action and take the game in the directions many players wanted to, extending into pathfinder as well, altho my experience is limited there, we have been picking and choosing some pathfinder material at our table recently, as new to us 3rd party books are far and few out there.

4th felt like a bad attempt to make a tabletop game out a mmorpg, which I do not like anyways, so aside from the core 4th and the few Forgotten Realms books they published, it was totally abandoned by my group.

5th is being boycotted specifically because WOTC screwed up with 4th

[The Viscount]

Well first there's the fact that 3.5 has enabled this site to exist, and thus enabled us to have this conversation.

As for other reasons, 3.5 and Pathfinder individually have certain appeals, and so appeal to different people. For Pathfinder, it's the fact that new content is being produced, so there's still things that feel fresh. 3.5 is complete, so you don't have to keep playing catch-up.

I will repeat what others have said because it bears repeating: 3.5 is an excellent system for character generation; there's almost nothing you can't make. How many threads on this site alone have we seen where someone asks to create a concept, or recreate a fictional character, and had those requests fulfilled? I've seen someone build Santa Claus in a completely RAW legal way that can do all St. Nick can in a single night.

The variety of character races, classes, feats, and other options means that you can have entirely different play experiences, and rarely will any two be alike. To this day, we're still running optimization and creation contests like Iron Chef, Junkyard Wars, and Zic Saucier, and sometimes they result in new tricks.

Finally, and I think most appealing for me, 3.5 is a system that absolutely rewards system mastery. If you know how this class (say Hellfire Warlock) and this feat (shape soulmeld: Strongheart Vest) interact, then you can make a build more powerful character as a result of it. If you have sufficient knowledge to use a demanding, finicky class (wizard) then you can do fantastically at it. A system that rewards mastery is one with an inherent incentive to keep playing it.