Worth it? D&D 3.5 edition

[tedcahill2]

Which books should I absolutely own, which books are good to pick up if I can find a deal, and which books are just not worth it?

I know they updated to 3.5 in 2002ish. Are the books that came out prior to that, Song and Silence etc, still worth owning?

How about all the environment books, Frostburn, Cityscape, etc?

The race books?

The complete series is an obvious yes (right)?

Draconomicon, dragon magic, tome of battle, tome of magic, etc.

[Jack_Simth]

Which books should I absolutely own, which books are good to pick up if I can find a deal, and which books are just not worth it?

I know they updated to 3.5 in 2002ish. Are the books that came out prior to that, Song and Silence etc, still worth owning?

How about all the environment books, Frostburn, Cityscape, etc?

The race books?

The complete series is an obvious yes (right)?

Draconomicon, dragon magic, tome of battle, tome of magic, etc.

That is entirely up to:
1) The resources you can spend on your 'fun'.
2) How much 'fun' you have with any given book.
3) How much 'fun' your friends will have with any given book.

However: What is 'fun' is highly variable from one person to another. If you want to do a lot of adventures in any particular environment (Dungeons, Cities, Deserts, Oceans, Snow-capped mountains, et cetera), then the associated environmental book (Dungeonscape, Cityscape, Sandstorm, Stormwrack, Frostburn, et cetera) are worthwhile. If you are particularly fond of specific races (Humans, Gnomes, Elves, et cetera), then the associated Race book is likely worthwhile (Races of Destiny, Races of Stone, Races of the Wild, et cetera). If you're fond of melee, then Tome of Battle: Book of Nine Swords is great for you. If you're fond of Arcane casters, then Spell Compendium, Complete Arcane, and Complete Mage are great buys. If you're fond of Divine Casters, then Spell Compendium, Complete Divine, and Complete Champion are great buys. And so on.

You'll get a better answer if the first thing you respond with is the answer to "what sorts of things do you like in your game and/or on your characters?"

[GilesTheCleric]

I think Jack has this almost entirely covered. I'd add that it also matters whether you're more frequently in the GM's seat or player seat. I, for example, use a lot of SK material (fluff, mostly) since I GM, but would be hesitant to allow most of the crunch for folks new to my table. Same for SS, BoVD, and BoED. In that vein, some of the best books may not be 3.5 at all. There's all sorts of fantasy book series, older/ newer editions, or other TTRPGs with great fluff or system-agnostic material.

[KillianHawkeye]

FYI, the 3.5 Edition began during the summer of 2003.

As for 3.0 era books, I probably wouldn't bother with the class books (Sword and Fist, Tome and Blood, et cetera). The majority of the content has seen updates in various 3.5 supplements.

The Book of Vile Darkness and the Arms & Equipment Guide are pretty good, and the monster books (Monster Manual 2, Fiend Folio, Savage Species) can be useful if you're willing to update stat blocks. Manual of the Planes has a lot more fluff information about the D&D cosmology than 3.5's Planar Handbook, and all of it is still usable. The Stronghold Builder's Guidebook is likewise more or less just as good in 3.5, although you'd want to check that any of the spells and magic items it mentions haven't changed too much.

As Jack_Simth says, it really depends on what kinds of information you think you'd find useful.

[Mordaedil]

I have to also say Manual of the Planes might be very useful, if only because it's the closest we have to the Planescape setting in D&D 3rd edition.

There's also the Epic Level Handbook, but I'd only use it for the feats selection and advancement and ignore the epic spellcasting altogether.

Besides, who hasn't wanted to Persist Time Stop?

[Venger]

I have to also say Manual of the Planes might be very useful, if only because it's the closest we have to the Planescape setting in D&D 3rd edition.

There's also the Epic Level Handbook, but I'd only use it for the feats selection and advancement and ignore the epic spellcasting altogether.

Besides, who hasn't wanted to Persist Time Stop?

motp is a lot of fun and has some really interesting prcs and adventure hooks, but if OP is talking about buying print copies of the books secondhand, I'd advise against ELH, since it's available via ogl on the srd (http://www.d20srd.org/index.htm)

[Pugwampy]

The coolest and most OP feats n crap I ever found were in Races of Fearun , Players Handbook 2 and Miniatures Handbook .

[Coidzor]

Masters of the Wild is probably the only 3.0 class book I'd consider picking up, since it does have a few things that weren't updated, as I recall.

Frostburn, Sandstorm, Stormwrack, and Dungeonscape can all be pretty interesting, depending upon what environments one likes.

[Scorponok]

I love the Completes, the environment books, and miniature handbook. Those are such a fun read! I think Tome of Battle is essential to making melee great again, but for myself, it just wasn't a really fun read. I dunno what it was, maybe the way the book was laid out, or maybe the lack of illustrations I like, but picking up the book and reading it seems like a chore to me.

I think the answer to your question lies in how you like to play the game. If you love magic, then I'd get all the magic heavy books. If you like melee, the Complete Adventurer, Complete Champion, and ToB would be enjoyable reads.

If money isn't an issue, get all of them.

[Mystral]

First, you should look at pathfinder. Not only is it still around and supported, but most of the rules are actually free, so if money is an issue, pathfinder is for you.

I would advise to skip the 3rd edition books, much of the stuff from there is reprinted in 3.5, and those that aren't are sometimes incompatible and oftentimes just worthless.

Now, in D&D 3.5, I look at books as generally belonging into 4 tiers.

The first one is core (obviously), which you should get no matter what you're going to do. These books include the Players Handbook, the Monster Manual and the Dungeon Masters Guide, as well as Unearthed Arcana, the Magic Item Compendium and the Spell Compendium. This way, you have all the tools you need to run a game as a player or GM, while the other two books give you loads of customisation options and a very good bang for your buck.

The next tier would be what I'd call "player essentials". Those are basically the books you should own if you intend to play and have a rough idea what you're going for. If you know what kind of character you like to play, you should buy the accompanying "complete" book: Complete Arcana and Complete Mage for Wizard Characters, Complete Divine and Complete Champions for divine characters, Complete Adventurer, Complete Warrior and Complete Scoundrel for mundanes. Another important book would be the Players Handbook II. You should get these books if you have any interest in those categories whatsoever.

Third tier are the DM essentials. Those include the various monster manuals, Cityscape and Dungeonscape, as well as a campaign guide and players guide for the world you are playing in, if available. Also, Dungeon Masters Guide II and the Arms and Equipment guide.

The last set of books would be thematic books. Those books you should only get if the theme interests you, either as a player or a DM. If you are running a game in the planes, get the planar handbook and the manual of the planes. If you run a desert adventure, get Sandstorm, if you go to the high seas, go stormwrack. If you are interested in Horror, get the Heroes of Horror, for undead-heavy campaigns, get the Libris Mortis and so on and so on. All of these books are nice to have, but you don't really need to get them until you heavily invest in those themes. In a similiar note, only get the books of the "races of" series or other specialised class guides (like magic of incarnum, tome of battle) if you are really interested in them. There's a lot of cool information in there, but you have to specialise heavily to get a good mileage out of the Races of books, and the specialised class guides often don't offer anything you can't have with the essential set, as well.

[Deadline]

My Recommendations:

Completes - With the exception of Complete Psionics. I'm not sure CompPsi is all that useful of an addition. If money is no object, sure, but otherwise, meh.

Races of books - Most of these provide decent options and flavor, but probably aren't necessary. I'd recommend you guide anyone looking at Dragon Shaman to the Dragonfire Adept instead though (Races of the Dragon I think, or is it Dragon Magic?)

Alternate systems - Magic of Incarnum and Tome of Battle are best here. I'm honestly not sure the Binding system is worth picking up the Tome of Magic (Shadowcasting and Truenaming certainly aren't, IMO).

Environment books - Frostburn and Sandstorm have some decent resources in them. You could probably do without Stormwrack (unless you really want to do naval combat), and Dungeonscape is good resource for encounter design as well as a couple of neat resources for players. I don't think Cityscape is worthwhile.

The additional books are things I'd probably recommend on a case by case basis mostly as GM materials, although there are plenty of goodies for players lurking in things like Heroes of Battle, Heroes of Horror, and the like. But the various Monster Manuals are decent for a cast of baddies that are likely rarely seen at many tables (if you want to try to recapture that whole, "the players have no idea what this thing is" bit).

After that you've got things like setting books, which are situationally useful only if you are playing in those settings. Sure, there are goodies for players who are willing to book-dive, but very few of those are really solid common options. Things like the Education or Song of the Heart feats from the Eberron Campaign Setting are the sorts of broadly useful things I'd recommend for folks.

[tedcahill2]

My Recommendations:

Completes - With the exception of Complete Psionics. I'm not sure CompPsi is all that useful of an addition. If money is no object, sure, but otherwise, meh.

Races of books - Most of these provide decent options and flavor, but probably aren't necessary. I'd recommend you guide anyone looking at Dragon Shaman to the Dragonfire Adept instead though (Races of the Dragon I think, or is it Dragon Magic?)

Alternate systems - Magic of Incarnum and Tome of Battle are best here. I'm honestly not sure the Binding system is worth picking up the Tome of Magic (Shadowcasting and Truenaming certainly aren't, IMO).

Environment books - Frostburn and Sandstorm have some decent resources in them. You could probably do without Stormwrack (unless you really want to do naval combat), and Dungeonscape is good resource for encounter design as well as a couple of neat resources for players. I don't think Cityscape is worthwhile.

The additional books are things I'd probably recommend on a case by case basis mostly as GM materials, although there are plenty of goodies for players lurking in things like Heroes of Battle, Heroes of Horror, and the like. But the various Monster Manuals are decent for a cast of baddies that are likely rarely seen at many tables (if you want to try to recapture that whole, "the players have no idea what this thing is" bit).

After that you've got things like setting books, which are situationally useful only if you are playing in those settings. Sure, there are goodies for players who are willing to book-dive, but very few of those are really solid common options. Things like the Education or Song of the Heart feats from the Eberron Campaign Setting are the sorts of broadly useful things I'd recommend for folks.
Thanks. These are the sorts of recommendations I was looking for. With over 50 books in the 3rd edition library I assumed they can't all contain valuable nuggets.

[tedcahill2]

First, you should look at pathfinder. Not only is it still around and supported, but most of the rules are actually free, so if money is an issue, pathfinder is for you.

The quest I'm on is more about rebuilding my childhood library of D&D books that I regret selling when I was a broke college kid. Pathfinder doesn't have the same place in my childhood nostalgia.

[rgrekejin]

I'm not trying to criticize your choices, I'm just quoting you to follow along your template because I think you divided up the available books quite nicely -


My Recommendations:

Completes - With the exception of Complete Psionics. I'm not sure CompPsi is all that useful of an addition. If money is no object, sure, but otherwise, meh.

I would also either strongly recommend or strongly discourage the Complete Champion, depending on how much you enjoy Munchkinry. That book came out at the very end of 3.5, and if it was ever actually playtested, I'll eat my hat. There's a lot of broken stuff in there. Complete Arcane is a must-have - the Warlock and Warmage base classes alone are worth it, and it also gets a you a bunch of fun spells and prestige classes!


Races of books - Most of these provide decent options and flavor, but probably aren't necessary. I'd recommend you guide anyone looking at Dragon Shaman to the Dragonfire Adept instead though (Races of the Dragon I think, or is it Dragon Magic?)

Dragonfire Adept is indeed in Dragon Magic. Races of the Dragon (and the Draconomicon) are probably both skippable unless you really, really like dragons. In fact, most of the Races of books are pretty skippable unless you really have a soft spot for a particular race. Races of the Wild is quite good, though. It has lots of options for nature adventures, and I just love the Raptoran race. If you're going to get one book from this series, get this one.


Alternate systems - Magic of Incarnum and Tome of Battle are best here. I'm honestly not sure the Binding system is worth picking up the Tome of Magic (Shadowcasting and Truenaming certainly aren't, IMO).

To each their own, but in my opinion the Binding system alone from Tome of Magic is more worthwhile than the entirety of Magic of Incarnum. Binding is just soooooooo badass.


Environment books - Frostburn and Sandstorm have some decent resources in them. You could probably do without Stormwrack (unless you really want to do naval combat), and Dungeonscape is good resource for encounter design as well as a couple of neat resources for players. I don't think Cityscape is worthwhile.

Unless you're planning a campaign that overwhelmingly takes place in one environment or another, all these books can be skipped. And even then, they're often not that necessary - I bought Cityscape when I was running an urban campaign and still almost never used it. I concur that it's not a worthwhile book.


The additional books are things I'd probably recommend on a case by case basis mostly as GM materials, although there are plenty of goodies for players lurking in things like Heroes of Battle, Heroes of Horror, and the like. But the various Monster Manuals are decent for a cast of baddies that are likely rarely seen at many tables (if you want to try to recapture that whole, "the players have no idea what this thing is" bit).

Man, Heroes of Horror has a lot of really great content, though. The Archivist and Dread Necromancer base classes are awesome (and works well in any campaign setting, not just a horror-themed one). The Taint subsystem is really interesting, and the Grey Jester is one of my favorite monsters to throw at players because of the sheer creepiness it brings to the table.


After that you've got things like setting books, which are situationally useful only if you are playing in those settings. Sure, there are goodies for players who are willing to book-dive, but very few of those are really solid common options. Things like the Education or Song of the Heart feats from the Eberron Campaign Setting are the sorts of broadly useful things I'd recommend for folks.

Yup. Unless you want to collect a bunch of books from the same setting, most of these aren't really useful.

[Zancloufer]

The "Core" books (PHB, DMG and MM1) contain a lot of the base framework that you need. Also worth noting that while much of it is available on the SRD there are a few core things missing from a DM's perspective (especially in the DMG).

Complete Series (Adventurer, Arcane, Mage, Divine, Champion, and Scoundrel) add a lot of character options. PHB2 adds some nice new features and contains two solid classes for those interested in multiclass mages in one stop (Beguiler and Duskblade are your Magic Rouge and Gish done right with no fuss).

Tome of Battle is, really, freaking, good. Like "do you want mundanes that are effective AND interesting without jumping through all the hoops".

Lastly Spell Compendium. It's pretty much the bulk of non-core spells in one place. I just go with SRD + Spell Compendium for spell lists, makes it easy and you don't have to flip through 50 books to have a solid battery of magic.

There are some other nice books, but IMHO it gets a lot more niche in scope, or limited in overall quality afterwards. Don't get quite the "Bang for your buck" as the other books to with their sweeping quality content.

[GilesTheCleric]

The quest I'm on is more about rebuilding my childhood library of D&D books that I regret selling when I was a broke college kid. Pathfinder doesn't have the same place in my childhood nostalgia.

Then to you, "worth it" is whatever best brings back the nostalgia for you. What about D&D do you enjoy most? There's plenty of books with high valuable crunch density to recommend (SC, MIC), but maybe you've never played casters or had many magic items, and D&D to you is more about the grittiness of being stuck in a dungeon with wandering foes, low rations, and creative thinking to defeat traps. In that case, Cs or Ds could be a good "value" proposition.

[Grod_The_Giant]

I'd say, in order:
1-3: The core rulebooks, for obvious reasons, though you could probably skip the Monster Manual and DMG and rely on the SRD and its encounter calculator/your own experience.
4: Tome of Battle. Makes marital types strong, interesting, and simple to build, making it possibly the most important book in the gameline. PHB casters + ToB noncasters would make a fun campaign.
5: Magic Item Compendium. Everyone needs magic items in this game, and the book not only has lots of them, it has items that are both interesting and cheaply priced, so you can actually afford them.
6: Spell Compendium. Might as well throw the casters a bone; this plus the PHB gives you all the spells you'll ever need to care about.
7: Second-tier Completes: Complete Champion, Complete Mage, Complete Scoundrel. The overall quality level here is much higher than the earlier Completes, which tended to be too weak when they weren't wildly overpowered. You also get much more interesting PrCs, spells, and feats. CC gives you Devotion feats, CM Reserve, and CS gives you Skill Tricks-- all useful additions to the game.
8: Expanded Psionics Handbook. Because the strength of 3.5 is the sheer wealth of mechanical options, and Psionics are the best supported secondary magic system.

After that, I think it starts to get more subjective.

The first set of Completes (Warrior, Arcana, Adventurer, and Divine), are mostly only worth it if you want to complete the set of base classes. (Of those, Arcana probably has the best; Divine has decent-because-they're-full-casters-but-flatly-inferior-to-other-options versions of the Druid and Cleric, Adventurer has the Scout and Spellthief, and Warrior has nothing worth using). You can throw in Heroes of Horror (Dread Necro, Archivist) and Dragon Magic (Dragonfire Adept) to that set.
Magic of Incarnum and Tome of Magic round out the "alternate casting systems" set. MoI is a personal favorite, but possibly the weirdest and most poorly presented subsystem; ToM has three (Binding, Shadow Magic, and Truenaming), which have amazing fluff and their own problems-- which range from the Binder's "awkward progression at low levels" to the Truenamer's "never knew the loving touch of an editor" mess.
The PHB 2 and Dragon Magic are solid "something for everyone" books.
More Monster Manuals never hurt a DM

I don't think the Races of _____ pr Environmental books are particularly worth having, apart from a vague sense of completionism. There's some good stuff in them, sure, but they're overall... eh?

[OldTrees1]

Savage Species is a good book to have read (helps understand the purpose of LA and general ideas of how to calculate it) but usually not worth it as a reference book (WotC is usually worse at estimating LA than you are).

[noob]

I love spells and spellcraft(third party) for all the fun stuff there is in it.
But it needs a huge re-balance and I would not introduce it without allowing the martial characters to take a bunch of manuals boosting them.

[Jay R]

The quest I'm on is more about rebuilding my childhood library of D&D books that I regret selling when I was a broke college kid. Pathfinder doesn't have the same place in my childhood nostalgia.

Don't regret selling them. That kid needed that money more than you needed those books. Just decide that it's time to own them again.

And this focuses your question. Pick up those books that evoke the most nostalgic feel for you.

[Vaz]

In order;

D20srd.org > include many core and Uneaethed Arcana material rules, including Epic and Psionic for free

Expanded Psionics Handbook > most supported non core mechanic in the games
Pick up Eberron books for additional psionic heavy setting specific stuff.

All the Completes, even Psionic > bring any 3.0 Concepts to 3.5. A few psionic nerfs I'd ignore, but includes my favourite class in the game, the Ardent. Dig out the online Minds Eye Articles, specifically the Minds Eye 4 for the Ardent.

Tome of Magic > has the Binder. A very friendly class to play, multiclass, prestige class, and dip friendly class.

Magic of Incarnum > daily slottable powers that essentially let you rebuild you character daily? Check. My favourite subsystem in 3.5.

Tome of Battle; gives in combat fightan magic and makes nelee fun to use more than Ubercharger, Tripaholic, Duskblade, or Full Caster using Divine Power.

Oriental Adventures + Rokugan; my favourite setting. Includes a lot of 3.0 stuff, but the setting is extremely evocative, and vetoes many of the more powerful classes in favour of lower tiers classes based on sheer RP alone. Playing a Wizard or Cleric is going to relegate your party to gaijin, only slightly higher than Slaves in the eyes of the daimyo's etc. Very fun, very evocative setting.

Edit; heroes of horror, libris mortis, fiend folio's, lords ofadness and Book of Vile Darkness (and Exalted Deeds to some extent) make excellent antagonist books.

[Mordaedil]

People like Incarnum? That system where you get slightly less powerful magic items as a class feature?

[Venger]

People like Incarnum? That system where you get slightly less powerful magic items as a class feature?

Yes, incarnum is great.

[weckar]

Do not forget that some of these books are still available from select sources as box bundles. I got my Races Of bundle (Stone, Destiny, Wild) in a really nice box that is currently sitting next to my (rather beat up) core box.

[Scorponok]

So many people not mentioning Miniatures Handbook makes me sad. :(

[Grod_The_Giant]

People like Incarnum? That system where you get slightly less powerful magic items as a class feature?
Yeah, that's not even a little bit how it goes. Soulmelds can fill magic item slots, but they do their own unique things. You can grow four arms and make claw attacks, teleport, walk on air, raise a zombie minion, spit acid, stun people by screaming at them, cloak yourself in fire, speak any language, conjure magic weapons, become telepathic, fly, grab any sort of natural weapon, defense, or skill boost under the sun... And you can do it all differently the next day. All the "prep for the specific day" fun of the Wizard without the (potentially) abusive power of spellcasting.

[rgrekejin]

Yeah, that's not even a little bit how it goes. Soulmelds can fill magic item slots, but they do their own unique things. You can grow four arms and make claw attacks, teleport, walk on air, raise a zombie minion, spit acid, stun people by screaming at them, cloak yourself in fire, speak any language, conjure magic weapons, become telepathic, fly, grab any sort of natural weapon, defense, or skill boost under the sun... And you can do it all differently the next day. All the "prep for the specific day" fun of the Wizard without the (potentially) abusive power of spellcasting.

It's not the recommending of Incarnum I find strange so much as the recommending of it over the Binder, which does pretty much the same thing only with better fluff and a much less convoluted subsystem.

[Venger]

It's not the recommending of Incarnum I find strange so much as the recommending of it over the Binder, which does pretty much the same thing only with better fluff and a much less convoluted subsystem.

I love tome of magic and binding is a great subsystem. in a vacuum, I'd say get them both. when working with limited resources, however, I'd easily recommend MoI, since soulmelds are a resource almost any character can enjoy and it's much more dip/splash friendly than binder, which is largely best played straight.

[atemu1234]

I get a lot of mileage out of both BoVD and BoED, as well as Fiend Folio (though some consider Fiend Folio 3.5 material, in truth it kind of straddles the line). Monster Manual II is good, you'll need the update handbook for it though. It's free off of their website if they still have it up. If not, I'm sure you can find it somewhere, as it is still free content.

[Cosi]

As a player, get books for whatever interests you, generally in publication order (later books have really bad levels of bloat). The exception to this is Tome of Battle, which you should get if you want to play a martial character.

As a DM, get the Monster Manuals and Fiend Folio (FF > III > II > V > VI). Also the first three environment books (though Stormwrack can be skipped if you don't care about naval stuff).

Generally, probably:

1. Core
2. First Completes (Warrior/Adventurer/Arcane/Divine), PHB II, Spell Compendium, Tome of Battle (as applicable to your interests)
3. Fiend Folio, Monster Manual III, Monster Manual II (buy these above the previous as a DM)
4. Sandstorm, Frostburn, Stormwrack

After that, you can get stuff like the new Completes, the various "magic but not (good)" books, or other random stuff to taste.


5: Magic Item Compendium. Everyone needs magic items in this game, and the book not only has lots of them, it has items that are both interesting and cheaply priced, so you can actually afford them.

I don't like the Magic Item Compendium. It has dumb stuff (Diablo style weapon crystals) and broken stuff (amber amulets of vermin), but very little bang for your buck (the only things I really remember being worthwhile for the game are Runestaves and Healing Belts). The game doesn't particularly need more magic items so much as it needs affordable magic items, and that is probably better achieved with bulk discounts (also it needs the whole magic item system to be overhauled, but there aren't books that do that).


8: Expanded Psionics Handbook. Because the strength of 3.5 is the sheer wealth of mechanical options, and Psionics are the best supported secondary magic system.

Psionics may or may not be a thing you want to do, but there's no reason to spend money on it. It's part of the SRD, and you can have it for free.


The first set of Completes (Warrior, Arcana, Adventurer, and Divine), are mostly only worth it if you want to complete the set of base classes. (Of those, Arcana probably has the best; Divine has decent-because-they're-full-casters-but-flatly-inferior-to-other-options versions of the Druid and Cleric, Adventurer has the Scout and Spellthief, and Warrior has nothing worth using). You can throw in Heroes of Horror (Dread Necro, Archivist) and Dragon Magic (Dragonfire Adept) to that set.

I don't know why you recommend the new Completes over these. The new Completes have massive bloat, and are mostly not as interesting. I also disagree that Complete Warrior is worthless. The sections on fantasy warfare are actually quite good, and are one of the only times WotC seems to have realized that D&D is not generic fantasyland.


People like Incarnum? That system where you get slightly less powerful magic items as a class feature?

Incarnum is dumb, but it's not really "magic items as class features". It's basically four levels of extra complexity on top of a perfectly workable resource management system, with results that are underpowered and fluff that is dumb.

[Zaq]

It's not the recommending of Incarnum I find strange so much as the recommending of it over the Binder, which does pretty much the same thing only with better fluff and a much less convoluted subsystem.

The Binder is rather more limited in scope, especially at the early levels. High-level vestiges are badass, but it's easy to forget that you can only bind one vestige at a time until ECL8, which is actually pretty darn high up there for a lot of games. So you've got exactly one prepackaged set of abilities at once for a good chunk of your career, and while those prepackaged sets are useful, there aren't that many low-level ones that stand entirely on their own, which can feel constraining.

Incarnum, on the other hand, offers a lot more flexibility early on. It's easier to build a set of melds that fit your unique needs than to find a vestige that does everything you want all at once, and the offensive stuff comes online earlier. I feel like you've got more useful choices to make with an Incarnum-user than with a Binder, at least for the first half of the game.

I do agree that if you're only going to take a single class and you're starting at a high level (maybe 12-15), then yeah, Binder all the way, at least for many character concepts. But I'd rather be a low/mid-level Incarnum user than a low/mid-level Binder if I want a flexible and dynamic set of powers.

Of course, one of my very favorite characters I ever brought to a live game was a multiclass Binder/Incarnate (who eventually went into Chameleon, because of course I did), so the two can play nicely with each other if you don't mind some bookkeeping.

[weckar]

As a whole I would recommend MoI over ToM, if only because MoI gives you a whole book to use rather than ToM's third of a book and 2 thirds of dead weight.

[gooddragon1]

Outside of the core 3 I'd say tome of battle, the expanded psionics handbook, and phb 2.
ToB: Gives mundane nice things (exception: mundane archers, who are still shafted to this date without serious optimization, and even then). Lower power DM'S may not appreciate this.
XPH: New types of characters. Some DM'S don't like psionics.
Phb2: Dragon shaman 1 level dip for unlimited out of combat healing up to half health.

Dragonfire Adept is good, can't remember the book. Warlock from complete arcane is okay.

Most value for cost in my opinion is Tome of battle (ToB) and expanded psionics handbook (XPH). Not psionics handbook which is 3.0 and horrible.

Just my thoughts on this stuff.

A little wheat and blisterwort make a healing potion. We have plenty of ingredients for sale too... we have plenty of homebrew available in the homebrew section on these forums too...

[rgrekejin]

Dragonfire Adept is good, can't remember the book. Warlock from complete arcane is okay.

Dragonfire Adept is from Dragon Magic. I'm sure you probably know this, but repeating for the benefit of OP - those two classes are basically the same. Dragonfire Adept is essentially a Warlock with Dragon-themed fluff and slightly less splat support. Yeah yeah, I know, entangling exhalation. :P

[weckar]

and expanded psionics handbook. Not psionics handbook which is 3.0 and horrible.
Complete Psionic also seems like the only Complete book that's a bit of a trap...

[Mordaedil]

Complete Psionic also seems like the only Complete book that's a bit of a trap...

I bought Complete Psionics hoping to add more options to my psionic characters and instead I got entirely new psionics that looked hard to play and weren't as fun with religious doctrines and otherwise sort of drowning them out as concepts.

Like, is a holy psionic really anything that needed to be explored? And it doesn't even have anything decent for psionics from the other books, everything is for the classes published in the book it came with! At least Complete Arcane and Complete Mage offered more for existing classes.

[jywu98]

ToB, ToM, XPH, SpC, MIC are probably the books that I would recommend over all the others