Recalibrating the 3.x designations.

[EccentricCircle]

I'm sure everyone reading this will be aware that Pathfinder is often referred to as the 3.75 edition of D&D. In reading the recently released Starfinder First Contact booklet it struck me that Starfinder is enough of a departure from vanilla Pathfinder to pretty much be considered a "second edition". (which makes me wonder whether it might be foreshadowing an actual second edition of pathfinder, but that's another matter entirely.)

This made me wonder what 3.x designation it should be assigned and it struck me that the entire system is a little odd to start with.

Back in the early 21st century WotC decided that the revised 3rd edition of D&D should be called 3.5. However this seems like an odd choice since there weren't really four iterations between it and 3.0. There have however been quite a lot of variations of the d20 system over the years. I'm sure this list is massively incomplete, so hopefully you will all be able to suggest additions and reorderings.

I thus present for your consideration the revised 3.x numbering system, which will under no circumstances catch on as it would be far too complicated to change what we call things now!

3.0: Surprisingly enough 3.0, the initial 3rd edition of D&D released in 2000.

3.1: The Star Wars roleplaying game released in 2000. (talking point; does the 2002 revision need a separate 3.x iteration? I've only played one of them, and don't know which).

3.2: d20 Modern the streamlined version of the d20 system released in 2002.

3.3: The revised 3rd edition D&D (traditionally "D&D 3.5") released in 2003. Considered by most to be the canonical 3rd edition of D&D, and the default work of the d20 system.

3.4: Saga Edition Star Wars. released in 2007 and again a streamlined version of the previous Star Wars game.

3.5: The Pathfinder Roleplaying game, released in 2009. A heavily house ruled version of 3.5 which has since become massively popular.

3.6: Starfinder, released in 2017, a streamlined version of pathfinder.

3.9? Thirteenth Age released in 2013. A d20 based game but not as compatible as most of the d20 system. It is however a kind of hybrid of 3rd and 4th ed ideas. It would logically seem to be the step between Saga Star Wars and 4th edition.

This is just putting them in release order though, in terms of system morphology they arguably form two lineages, the SW/d20 modern progression and the D&D/ pathfinder progression. Is there a better way to organise them?

Also what have I missed? Spycraft? True20? Mutants and Masterminds? where do they fit in the sequence. can we make 3.5 actually be 3.5? Did Wizards have a rational for naming it that which I have somehow overlooked?

Discuss

[Necroticplague]

It's called '3.5 E' because it's halfway between 3 and four. Also, because that's what WotC calls it (if you look at some books, it says 'this book uses material from the updated v.3.5 revision').

[Godskook]

3.3: The revised 3rd edition D&D (traditionally "D&D 3.5") released in 2003. Considered by most to be the canonical 3rd edition of D&D, and the default work of the d20 system.

Let's not purposely make conversations


3.5: The Pathfinder Roleplaying game, released in 2009. A heavily house ruled version of 3.5 which has since become massively popular.

Oh, let's make it worse? Yeah no.

Honestly, at this point, I don't call PF 3.75 because it has violated that monicker too hard. That's fine, but PF no more 3.75 than 5e is. Let's move on and start calling PF just PF.

[ahyangyi]

I'd gleefully call Pathfinder Unchained an attempt to make a D&D 3.875 game.

[EccentricCircle]

To clarify, none of this was intended as a serious criticism of the accepted names.
It just struck me as an interesting topic to make jokes about on the internet.

This thread is entirely tongue in cheek, although that's hard to convey on the internet.

[KillianHawkeye]

I don't think it works to call D20 Modern or the various Star Wars RPGs (or any other game that doesn't use D&D-style fantasy themes) as a version of D&D 3.x. Pathfinder gets called this because it took heavily from the legally takeable portions of D&D and ended up being a very similar game, so that's fine.

If and when Pathfinder comes out with a 2nd Edition, then maybe we can do like the software development business does (since the 3.5 designation itself was surely inspired by software versioning) and we can call it D&D 3.75.2 or something. But calling Starfinder as D&D 3.7.9 or whatever doesn't really work as well unless it turns out to be less sci-fi and more "D&D in space" (I'm honestly not sure about this since I haven't been following the development).

The most honest thing to do is just to refer to each product by its proper name, though. I mean, most people have no idea what the actual version number their Windows operating system is on (Windows 95 was actually Windows 4.0, while Windows 8.1 was actually Windows NT 6.3, but Windows 10 is Windows NT 10.0 because they decided to skip a bunch of versions internally to make them match up again for some reason).

Regardless, we shouldn't start calling D&D 3.5 some other version number, and under no circumstances should anybody refer to Pathfinder as D&D 3.5 unless your goal is just to confuse and upset people.

[icefractal]

If we're talking in terms of branching, I think we can consider the following as the primary branches (dashes indicate relative change):
1) 3e - 3.5 - PF
2) 3e - 3.5 ---- 4e -- 13A

The Star Wars games don't derive from each-other, they derive from different points along the main branches (and from d20 modern), but are similar because of the setting they share.

5e, I don't think of as a direct descendant of 4e; it's more like a mix of various editions.

Interestingly, late 3.5 can be thought of as the start of another branch that never flowered. It has several elements, such as unlimited healing outside combat and classes with powers that were entirely at-will, that evolved throughout the course of 3.5 but were dropped by both PF and 4E.

[VisitingDaGulag]

Agreed. PF doesn't evolve from 3.5 despite its claims. When prompting their forums with "what do we do about this borken part of 3.5 that isn't 'updated' in your system?" Piazo just says "don't play with 3rd edition material. Only play with our even more broken stuff"

Star wars and d20 modern are radically different games. For all the criticisms about 4e not really being D&D, its more true of star wars and the yucky modern stuff. I have no idea about CoC