Thoughts on 3.5 vs pathfinder

[SpacemonkeyDM]

I am running a pathfinder game, but the adventure I am running is the rise of the runelords. I own the 3.5 version, So I started to read more and more 3.5 as time is going on. I barely remember 3.5. I played 3rd when it first came out for maybe a year and then fell out of gaming. Got back into gaming around 2008 with 4th and then moved into pathfinder.
As I read over the 3.5 I find things I think it was better at.
Here are a few I noticed.
Clerics don't have channel positive energy and with the way death works, it seems to be a little easier to die.
Races have a +2,-2 so it feels more balanced in that regard.
Characters have fewer choices which seem to imply it is easier to both make a character and run a character.
The way skills are performed gives you a little more choice in them.

I am thinking of running the next campaign as 3.5, but is it enough of a difference to even bother doing that?

[Kurald Galain]

I am thinking of running the next campaign as 3.5, but is it enough of a difference to even bother doing that?
That depends entirely on what kind of game you want.

It's easier to die in 3.5; but that's not because of channel energy, but because 3.5 has spells like "fort save or die" whereas the PF equivalent is "fort save or take 80 damage".

Races getting one +2 modifier instead of two, that's a pretty tiny difference. Overall humans are the superior race in 3.5 for most classes (with some corner cases like Elven Generalist Wizard), whereas in PF the non-humans have better racial features to make them better balanced.

It is easier to make characters in 3.5 unless you intend to take prestige classes (as forum users would likely recommend), because you'd need to plan them out several levels in advance. Anyway, if ease of building was the goal you wouldn't be playing either 3.5 or PF, because they're two of the hardest RPGs on the market.

Yes, there are differences between PF and 3.5. No, your post doesn't really touch on them (because you write "a little bit this, a tiny bit that"). And you haven't specified yet what kind of game you want.

[Psyren]

As both editions are functionally finished (no new 1st-party content) I don't see any reason to not simply combine them and use the best of both worlds.

As an example, I prefer PF races because they are a bit stronger, which opens design space for making more of the 3.5 ones playable. Several races that would be LA +1 or even +2 in 3.5 are fine to play at level 1 in PF for example, because the core races are powered up across the board. But from 3.5, I take the "common slot" item enhancement rules that let you build extra properties into Big Six items for reduced cost, like combining the monk's Amulet of Natural Armor with their Amulet of Mighty Fists at a discount.

When doing this, we use PF as a base (i.e. defaulting to those rules unless we specifically decide otherwise) but it'd be purely based on what you find more comfortable/familiar.

[Crake]

As both editions are functionally finished (no new 1st-party content) I don't see any reason to not simply combine them and use the best of both worlds.

As an example, I prefer PF races because they are a bit stronger, which opens design space for making more of the 3.5 ones playable. Several races that would be LA +1 or even +2 in 3.5 are fine to play at level 1 in PF for example, because the core races are powered up across the board. But from 3.5, I take the "common slot" item enhancement rules that let you build extra properties into Big Six items for reduced cost, like combining the monk's Amulet of Natural Armor with their Amulet of Mighty Fists at a discount.

When doing this, we use PF as a base (i.e. defaulting to those rules unless we specifically decide otherwise) but it'd be purely based on what you find more comfortable/familiar.

I wholeheartedly support this notion. The two systems aren't receiving any future content from their publishers and developers, and pathfinder was designed to be intrinsically compatible with 3.5, so take advantage of that, and use both systems in tandem. I personally prefer 3.5 as a base system, but to each their own.

[Ramza00]

As both editions are functionally finished (no new 1st-party content) I don't see any reason to not simply combine them and use the best of both worlds.

Yes![/B] (Person outside the window with a sickos shirt on watching the thing inside happening)]

Add the good 3rd party on top of it as well!

[I](I think this is a good thing, but I can understand how to some people they will see the same suggestion and feel I have unleashed chaos energy and Tiamat plus Typhoon is born anew into this world)

[SpacemonkeyDM]

That depends entirely on what kind of game you want.

It's easier to die in 3.5; but that's not because of channel energy, but because 3.5 has spells like "fort save or die" whereas the PF equivalent is "fort save or take 80 damage".

Races getting one +2 modifier instead of two, that's a pretty tiny difference. Overall humans are the superior race in 3.5 for most classes (with some corner cases like Elven Generalist Wizard), whereas in PF the non-humans have better racial features to make them better balanced.

It is easier to make characters in 3.5 unless you intend to take prestige classes (as forum users would likely recommend), because you'd need to plan them out several levels in advance. Anyway, if ease of building was the goal you wouldn't be playing either 3.5 or PF, because they're two of the hardest RPGs on the market.

Yes, there are differences between PF and 3.5. No, your post doesn't really touch on them (because you write "a little bit this, a tiny bit that"). And you haven't specified yet what kind of game you want.

I never thought of what kind of game I wanted and ya you put it pretty clear that I should have thought out my questions more.

Thanks for the feedback.