Back-porting PF to 3.5

[paladinn]

Hola all,

I know when PF1 came out, there were a lot of small things (and a few Not so small) that were done to the 3.5/D20 system to "enhance." I've been under the impression that those changes were mainly increases in power, extra "micro feats" and such, and giving out "new stuff" every level. A lot of those things were Not necessarily good IMO.

I've heard that skills in PF are handled better. What if anything was done in the way of streamlining, simplifying or clarifying? Are there any other things that might be useful in "back-porting" to a 3.5 game?

[Saintheart]

Hola all,

I know when PF1 came out, there were a lot of small things (and a few Not so small) that were done to the 3.5/D20 system to "enhance." I've been under the impression that those changes were mainly increases in power, extra "micro feats" and such, and giving out "new stuff" every level. A lot of those things were Not necessarily good IMO.

I've heard that skills in PF are handled better. What if anything was done in the way of streamlining, simplifying or clarifying? Are there any other things that might be useful in "back-porting" to a 3.5 game?

My understanding of the main change when it came to skills was that a fair number were merged. Spot and Listen were merged into Perception, Hide and Move Silently were merged into Stealth.

However, if you want the fuller story, as with everything in this forum pertaining to 3.5 except real, meaningful guidance on how to DM properly, there's a handbook for it: Saph's study of the changes between PF and 3.5 (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?136890-The-3-5-Pathfinder-Handbook&p=7609693).

[Kurald Galain]

I've heard that skills in PF are handled better. What if anything was done in the way of streamlining, simplifying or clarifying?
There are no more "half rank" skills, int increases are retroactive, and once something becomes a class skill it remains a class skill for your entire career. All in all this makes tracking much easier.


Are there any other things that might be useful in "back-porting" to a 3.5 game?
Sure. The polymorph rules now add to your physical stats instead of overriding them, meaning you can't just dump all your physical stats; this is more balanced. Combat maneuver rules resolve much faster. Sneak attack is much better because large classse of creatures (undead yo) are no longer automatically immune. Sorcerers and barbarians (and some other classes) get much more flavorful in their choice of bloodline abilities and rage powers, respectively.

And, notably, there are several classes that let you play a warrior/caster hybrid (aka "gish") that comes online at a very low level and without having to jump through several hoops and prestige classes, notably the Magus and Warpriest. You can backport those classes entirely, they're not at all overpowered by 3E standards (tier 3, both of them).

[Crake]

The easiest thing to do is take the pathfinder 3.5 character update guide and work backwards instead of forwards. Honestly, most things are very obvious when they need to be addressed, but a lot of things can stay almost directly in their 3.5 state without issue.

[Scots Dragon]

There are no more "half rank" skills, int increases are retroactive, and once something becomes a class skill it remains a class skill for your entire career. All in all this makes tracking much easier.

Easily one of the best all-out improvements to Pathfinder overall. I don't like all of the changes — do not talk to me about what they did to the elemental domains — but the skill and feat system alone are huge benefits.

[Faily]

Yeah, Skills in Pathfinder are way better than in 3.5

Putting skill ranks in non-Class Skills doesn't penalize you anymore. In 3.5 you were limited to how many ranks you could put in non-CS and they cost double. Now it costs the same, but if you have 1 or more ranks in a Class Skill you get +3 bonus to the Skill. Makes it worth to put one or two ranks in different Class Skills. As someone who likes to put ranks in random skills for flavor, I always hated the double-cost in 3.5.


Feats every other level instead of every third level was an improvement I liked too. It feels like it's less of a slog to invest in feat-chains, or that you can spare one or two feat slots for a less optimal feat choice (but one that you think is neat or flavorful to your character). Although PF1 did the mistake of splitting up the combat-feats further and adding on a lot of extra feat taxes for combat feats - because martials can't have nice things I guess. Overall I think they should've condensed the combat feats from 3.5 instead of splitting them up more.

[Tzardok]

I personally prefer the way skills work in 3.5. Skill points allow a more differentiated allocation, and the way cross-class skills work in PF you may as well remove the concept entirely.

Edit:

The easiest thing to do is take the pathfinder 3.5 character update guide and work backwards instead of forwards. Honestly, most things are very obvious when they need to be addressed, but a lot of things can stay almost directly in their 3.5 state without issue.
Where can this guide be found? I'd like to take a look at it.

[Scots Dragon]

I personally prefer the way skills work in 3.5. Skill points allow a more differentiated allocation, and the way cross-class skills work in PF you may as well remove the concept entirely.

Pathfinder has skill points.

It's just much simpler to keep track of them, and you get a +3 bonus to class skills.

[Tzardok]

Pathfinder has skill points.

It's just much simpler to keep track of them, and you get a +3 bonus to class skills.

Pathfinder has ranks which it puts into skills. 3.5 has skill points to buy ranks. I prefer the later, especially because the other is too "simple to keep track of".

[martixy]

The great improvement is that PF's skill system is commutative.
A+B = B+A

This is not true in 3.5e. In 3rd ed it mattered how you made your skill allotment. You needed to know the class progression. In PF you only need to know the final result to determine if the build was valid.

[RandomPeasant]

The polymorph rules now add to your physical stats instead of overriding them, meaning you can't just dump all your physical stats; this is more balanced.

I don't think that specific aspect of it is really more balanced so much as it incentivizes different behavior. Making it grant a bonus rather than setting a value means the floor is lower, but the ceiling is (potentially) higher. In 3.5, turning into a Black Bear doesn't do anything for someone who is already at 20 Strength. In PF, it does. It may be that in practice polymorph is weaker, but the paradigm of "give you +4 to a stat" is not inherently more balanced than the paradigm of "set your stat to 18".

[Kurald Galain]

Although PF1 did the mistake of splitting up the combat-feats further and adding on a lot of extra feat taxes for combat feats - because martials can't have nice things I guess. Overall I think they should've condensed the combat feats from 3.5 instead of splitting them up more.
This is largely an urban legend. The only combat feat worth taking in 3.5 that is split in PF is Improved Trip. In PF, you pay an extra feat (Greater Trip) to have trips provoke OAs, but they provoke from the entire party and not just from you. It's actually pretty good.

Having to take Combat Expertise first sucks in either version, though.

[Eldonauran]

As someone who jumped onto the PF bandwagon when it first emerged, I'll just say that tweaking 3.5 material and bringing it into the PF1 system is far easier and streamlined that the other way around. I've done a fair amount of conversions for my own Homebrew game and, more often than not, the 3.5e class simply integrates into the system with very little work needed outside of tweaking the skills, and to a lesser extend matching the HD/BAB. The Warlock was one such class that integrated well. Other classes can simply get access to some of the hybrid PF1 class features to help bridge any 'power' difference. Just a little flavor tweak here and there.

If you are going backwards, you simply need to do a lot more work.


Having to take Combat Expertise first sucks in either version, though.
Only if you never intend to use that feat. It is actually a fairly good feat, especially in PF1 once you combine it with fighting defensively (yes, both can be done at the same time) and with other feats or class features that reduce attack penalties involved with doing so.

[fallensavior]

The biggest problem with 3.5 skills is that no class had enough skill points. The best thing about PF1e skills is that they fixed this by condensing the skill list but giving out the same number of skill points.

You can simply use the PF1e skill list in 3.5 without too many issues. Or if, like me, you prefer the higher granularity of the 3.5 list, you can double the number of skill points each class gets to approximate the PF1e effect.

[martixy]

This is largely an urban legend. The only combat feat worth taking in 3.5 that is split in PF is Improved Trip. In PF, you pay an extra feat (Greater Trip) to have trips provoke OAs, but they provoke from the entire party and not just from you. It's actually pretty good.

Having to take Combat Expertise first sucks in either version, though.

That part is a urban legend, but "martials can't have nice things" isn't.

To fix that, my personal homebrew solution goes as follows:


You can "buy" certain feats with BAB. I.e. when you reach certain BAB you receive one free bonus feat. Each feat "costs" 3 BAB. Prerequisites must be met as normal. Choose from the following list:

- Improved Unarmed Strike, Dodge+Mobility, Combat Expertise, Power Attack, Point Blank Shot+Precise Shot, Quick Draw, Rapid Reload, Mounted Combat, Blind Fight, Endurance, Run, Any individual Improved Maneuver feat(e.g. Improved Sunder, etc), Weapon Focus(Single weapon), Weapon Specialization(Single weapon), Weapon Focus Ability(Single weapon).

The key points being:
a) These are all martial-focused feats and martials receive way more of them, due to their higher BAB.
b) All these feats are build enablers and so called "feat taxes".
c) For those that wonder what the end part of that list means: I have all improved maneuvers merged into a two normal feats (powerful and deft maneuvers), I use weapon groups, and the normal Weapon focus includes focus, specialization and a minor special ability for that weapon group to make it worth a full feat slot.

It's a modification of this well known thing: https://michaeliantorno.com/feat-taxes-in-pathfinder/

[Faily]

The biggest problem with 3.5 skills is that no class had enough skill points. The best thing about PF1e skills is that they fixed this by condensing the skill list but giving out the same number of skill points.

You can simply use the PF1e skill list in 3.5 without too many issues. Or if, like me, you prefer the higher granularity of the 3.5 list, you can double the number of skill points each class gets to approximate the PF1e effect.

One of the earliest houserules we added in Pathfinder was to increase Skill points for some classes. Classes that no got 2 SP get 4 instead, and 4 is the "lowest" standard. Let the Fighter put ranks in Acrobatics, Climb, Perception, and Swim.

[ngilop]

I like the quality of life bumps that pathfinder did.

My biggest example are the sorcerer bloodline. It annoyed me to no end that standard 3.5 was 'everything's coming up dragons' when the fluff even said that sorcerous powers could come from many different lineages. I actually backported about 12 or 13 bloodlines into my own campaign world and it works wonderfully.

The totems and rage powers for barbarians, and other such like that.

[DivineOnTheMind]

I think the majority of PF's choices are steps up, and if its most usable SRD didn't link to literally every publication ever made by Paizo or anybody else, I would probably be playing it instead by now (it's just way more than I want to present a casual newbie).

But the big ones I'd steal are CMB/CMD (just the uniform mechanic for special attacks; not the other changes that surrounded it), all the skill mechanics, sneak attack applicability, and most Core feat changes except splitting up the Improved X feats (in fact, I would even steal the Greater X benefits, to spice the Improved X line up and keep them all in line with Trip).

The only problem is that would end up being more houserules than I'd want to announce.

[thethird]

I think the majority of PF's choices are steps up, and if its most usable SRD didn't link to literally every publication ever made by Paizo or anybody else, I would probably be playing it instead by now (it's just way more than I want to present a casual newbie).

Archive of nethys works very well

[Seward]

I played Pathfinder long enough that it was shocking to do 3.5 builds again (for the iron chef stuff) after not thinking about it for a decade.

3.5 is stingy with skill points and has a zillion redundant skills that don't work unless you take like 4 of them.

(you need search and spot and disable device and open locks. Or you need hide, move silent, spot and listen. Or diplomacy and gather information and like 5 unrelated skills for synergy bonuses). In pathfinder most of these were reduced (Perception and Stealth is 5 skills in 3.5) and skill point allocations were the same.

The weird "you must take a class with lots of skill points at L1 or you screw yourself out of half your skill points thing" was removed. Now 1 rank gives you a +4 to a skill, 2 ranks +5. So trained vs untrained is significant but you can "opt in" to a skill at any point in your development. I also just loved skills associated with each +2 of a headband of intellect. It meant non-wizards bought the thing. "This is my hat of lying jerk detection!" (+2 int with sense motive as the skill). The enhancement bonus skills were not mix and match, but if you bought a hat of Sense Motive, you have it maxed forever.

And I resent every single point spent on concentration in 3.5. It was just part of caster level in Pathfinder. (concentration is caster level+con bonus+feats/gear/effects. Period. Which means if you have the equivalent of Arcane Thesis, a signature spell, you also concentrate better on casting it, which makes sense).

===

Aside from skills, they just gave out more feats. You can argue whether that is good or not, bonus feats every odd level instead of every 3 gives visible power after about level 6, enough to need to adjust challenge ratings a bit on 3.5 content.

==

Finally - while they have prc's they're mostly a dead concept, except for dual-class-advancement stuff like mystic theurge or the rare prc that does something you can't get anywhere else (like boosting str at expense of BAB as Dragon Disciple does). All of that is done with archetypes, which is alternative class features on steroids, built into every class. And they work WAY better than any 3.5 equivalent at tuning your character to your mental image of it. No waiting 7 levels to finally begin to realize your character concept while taking unrelated feats and skills you never use just to BEGIN to get class features that fit your concept from a particular PRC. Most concepts can be formed mechanically in the first few levels, some at level 1. (I had a SAD dex fighter at level 1 in pathfinder with dex to damage and to-hit. Good luck doing that in 3.5. It had limits but she didn't have to suck for a bunch of levels before beginning to function as intended)

[Crake]

Edit:

Where can this guide be found? I'd like to take a look at it.

It's freely available on the paizo website iirc: https://paizo.com/products/btpy89m6?Pathfinder-Roleplaying-Game-Conversion-Guide

[Tzardok]

Thank you.

[smetzger]

Hola all,

I know when PF1 came out, there were a lot of small things (and a few Not so small) that were done to the 3.5/D20 system to "enhance." I've been under the impression that those changes were mainly increases in power, extra "micro feats" and such, and giving out "new stuff" every level. A lot of those things were Not necessarily good IMO.

I've heard that skills in PF are handled better. What if anything was done in the way of streamlining, simplifying or clarifying? Are there any other things that might be useful in "back-porting" to a 3.5 game?

I use the Unchained Monk in my 3.5 game and have found it to work nicely without being overpowered.

[paladinn]

I think the things that always put me off about PF were the micro feat bloat/chains/trees and the power creep (more like a leap) in general. I don't think that characters need to get something new and shiny every level (although casters get it anyway).

A good example is the differences in the paladin class between 3.5 and PF. While I like the added number of Smites (which has become the paladin's "thing"), in order to give something new every level, the concept of "mercies" was created. This just seemed a bit contrived, like, "Well we have to have something to put here." Same with the fighter: the armor training/weapon training every few levels, on top of a new feat Every Level, has just cluttered up what was always a straightforward, fairly simple class.

I do like the streamlining of skills and how they are gained/applied. Just trying to glean what else might be grabbed that won't throw everything into full PF-mode.

[Kurald Galain]

power creep (more like a leap) in general.
Perhaps surprisingly, Pathfinder has a lower overall power level than 3.5, mainly because a number of standard optimization tricks no longer work. For instance, DMM clerics; or dumping all physical stats for wildshape; or a number of stock "win the battle" spells.


just cluttered up what was always a straightforward, fairly simple class.
That is true. But I would never play a 3E fighter (or barbarian, or sorcerer) because of how mechanically boring they are; and I have really enjoyed playing these classes in PF.

[RandomPeasant]

It has a lower overall power level, but it has a higher average power level, because it does things like giving people (even casters) class features. In most games, where people weren't abusing the holes in the 3.5 rules, characters will end up being more powerful in Pathfinder.

[Eldonauran]

That is true. But I would never play a 3E fighter (or barbarian, or sorcerer) because of how mechanically boring they are; and I have really enjoyed playing these classes in PF.I find classes that have very little going on in the class feature area to be mechanically boring as well. Most of the classes in the PHB fit into this area. But, that doesn't stop me from playing them, though it means that I often multiclass a bit to keep things interesting. I've got a Fighter2/Cleric1/Ranger1 right now that I am having fun with. He's more suited to be a Fighter/Wizard die to his 16 Int and 13 Wis but optimization is not the point of the game I am playing in. If I was playing this character in Pathfinder 1e, he's have just been a Warpriest with a fairly decent INT score.

[Faily]

I'm sorry, but 3.0/3.5 Paladin was garbage. And I say this as someone who loves to play Paladins.

When I first read Pathfinder's Paladin, it was like an amazing discovery of how I had always felt Paladins should be.

Smite is much better in PF. Instead of one attack per day (which you can still miss on), it's one enemy per day. It also increases your defenses against that enemy (Deflection=CHA to AC).
Lay on Hands vastly improved, especially since they can also convert LoH to Channel like Clerics do. A Paladin can be a healer in PF.
Mercies build into the Paladin's "remove disease by laying on hands"-shtick from previous versions, but also expanding upon you. Now a Paladin can remove curses as well (so they can also remove Mummy Rot now), remove poison, etc.

[martixy]

I'm sorry, but 3.0/3.5 Paladin was garbage. And I say this as someone who loves to play Paladins.

When I first read Pathfinder's Paladin, it was like an amazing discovery of how I had always felt Paladins should be.

Smite is much better in PF. Instead of one attack per day (which you can still miss on), it's one enemy per day. It also increases your defenses against that enemy (Deflection=CHA to AC).
Lay on Hands vastly improved, especially since they can also convert LoH to Channel like Clerics do. A Paladin can be a healer in PF.
Mercies build into the Paladin's "remove disease by laying on hands"-shtick from previous versions, but also expanding upon you. Now a Paladin can remove curses as well (so they can also remove Mummy Rot now), remove poison, etc.

I imported every unchained class, but decided to fix paladins via these boards
- Dawnblade(offensive): http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?190289-3-5-Dawnblade-the-duskblade-s-paladin
- Knight-paladin(defensive): http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?187700-3-5-Knight-Paladin-Remix-Knight-Paladin

[Maat Mons]

3.5 Paladin was a pretty awful class after the first few levels. I'm glad the Pathfinder version has things past 5th level that aren't "+1 Smite per day" or "+1 Remove Disease per week."

Mercies were a very logical addition. Paladin is meant to to be able to display basic competence in the healer roll. But the healer roll isn't just restoring HP, it's also removing negative conditions. It was a bizarre oversight in 3.5 that Paladins were so bad at handling one of the major aspects of their role.

Later in 3.5 Caduceus Bracers were published, which helped patch the hole, but a magic item shouldn't be required to do your job.

If I were to offer a complaint regarding Pathfinder Paladin, it would be that mercies don't go far enough. It should really cover more than 6 conditions at 20th level. Compared to the number of times a Cleric of that level could cast Heal, it just seems like they were really stingy with Mercies.



I wouldn't say I'm fond of Weapon Training and Armor Training on the Pathfinder Fighter, but the class needed something besides feats. Feats have always been a horrible mess of prerequisites and interactions that required dumpster-diving through obscure sourcebooks before they could compare to actual class features.

Pathfinder gave Fighters the most boring possible addition, numeric bonuses, but at least its something the player can't screw up by choosing one of the many, many terrible Fighter feats that both editions have.

And later on, Pathfinder added advanced Weapon Training and Armor Training options that are actually interesting, plus some archetypes that replace the features completely.



The abundance of uninteresting feats is, indeed, far and away Pathfinder's greatest flaw. But 3.5 wasn't innocent here either. In either edition, you basically need a guide or handbook to give you a short list of which feats are actually worth your time to read.

[RandomPeasant]

I will say that the 3e Paladin gets a good bit better with access to all sources. Though in that context it needs to be compared to the Crusader, which is still better overall.

[Faily]

I will say that the 3e Paladin gets a good bit better with access to all sources. Though in that context it needs to be compared to the Crusader, which is still better overall.

But it is a problem that to play a somewhat competent Paladin requires dipping into several splatbooks for ACF, and then abandoning the class after lv5 to go into 2-3 Prestige Classes.


@Maat Mons
Greater Mercy and Ultimate Mercy feats were a pretty nice boost to the Pally. Being able to ress folks with Lay on Hands is awesome.

[RandomPeasant]

"Abandon the class to PrC" is pretty standard for 3e. Compare it to something like a Hexblade or Swashbuckler, where your only hope of relevance is to PrC into something like Ur Priest that effectively replaces your character. It never gets to the level of the Wizard or the Druid, but like the Bard it does become possible to make a character who is reasonably effective and recognizably dependent on being a Paladin.

[paladinn]

The Pathfinder feat "model" was a big reason that they abandoned it in 5e. Getting a micro-feat every level just adds to the complexity and math without much real benefit, other than getting "something" every level. Guess that's the effect of having a generation that plays mostly video games. It was definitely one of the reasons that 4e bombed.

That said, I'm not sure I like how feats are done in 5e much better. It literally seems impossible to get a simple +1 to hit with a weapon of choice. A feat to do that ends up giving a lot more that you may not want, and it costs and entire ASI.

Just wish there was a way to bring balance to the Force.

[Faily]

The Pathfinder feat "model" was a big reason that they abandoned it in 5e. Getting a micro-feat every level just adds to the complexity and math without much real benefit, other than getting "something" every level. Guess that's the effect of having a generation that plays mostly video games. It was definitely one of the reasons that 4e bombed.

That said, I'm not sure I like how feats are done in 5e much better. It literally seems impossible to get a simple +1 to hit with a weapon of choice. A feat to do that ends up giving a lot more that you may not want, and it costs and entire ASI.

Just wish there was a way to bring balance to the Force.


5e feats on the other hand do bring a lot of "oomph" to the character overall. Choosing a Feat is a considerable boost to the character's capabilities. Problem is you have to choose between ASI and Feat.

Problem is as you say, yes, it's impossible to get those small bonuses to things (like Weapon Focus for +1 to hit), and Magic Items in 5e is a nightmare to deal with.

Overall I feel that Feats should always matter and have an impact (so I dislike PF2's array of miniscule bonuses in a bajillion feats you choose), and to come somewhat frequently. That way if you made a choice that wasn't that optimal at the time, it will be ok because you'll get a new one again soon. Which is even more important when it comes to Feat-taxes (another pet peeve of mine). If you need Iron Will to qualify for another Feat (or PrC in 3.5), it sucks to be stuck with a feat that probably won't matter much* for quite a few levels when others picked up more useful ones.




*=yes I know Will save along with Fortitude is one of the most important saves, but either your Will save is already terrible and a +2 won't change much (most martials because they have other stats to increase, and their Base isn't good) or it's already good so it just makes your best save even better and you're still going to pass almost any save (Clerics and Druids having high Wisdom and strong Base). IMO and IME, Iron Will and similar Feat taxes felt like such a dud because it rarely mattered.

[gijoemike]

It takes less than 10 mins of reading the PHB to realize the in 3.0 the fighter with all their feats didn't actually have enough options available to them to actually do their job. So every splat book gave more and more options so people could customize their characters. 4th ed and pathfinder offered a LOT of options right out of the gate. Pathfinder actually made the correct choice by allowing people to specialize to a meaningful degree.


5th ed made a mistake by taking all those options away. The few options they grant you are powerful but that is one of the very few ASIs possible. More options > fewer options.

[Dante & Vergil]

In Pathfinder, I hear they didn't use prestige classes and replaced them with something akin to Alternate Class Features. Is there any of them that would be good to back port to 3.5?

[Kurald Galain]

In Pathfinder, I hear they didn't use prestige classes and replaced them with something akin to Alternate Class Features. Is there any of them that would be good to back port to 3.5?

Yes. For instance, fighter gets several with more skill points, and one that gives in-class flight at L7. Monk gets one that gives pounce at L5. Things like that.

On the more fluffy side, wizard gets one that can conjure any mundane object a couple times per day. That's hardly overpowered but it's very funny that you can now pull arbitrary tools out of your hat.

[Scots Dragon]

Has to be out of your hat, though. Otherwise what’s the point?

[Maat Mons]

To be perfectly accurate, prestige classes exist in Pathfinder, but there's much less emphasis on them, and much more emphasis on archetypes, which are the Pathfinder equivalent of alternative class features (and class variants, and I guess kinda racial substitution levels).

The challenge in back-porting Pathfinder archetypes is that, sometimes, the thing you give up to take an archetype is something the 3.5 version of the class doesn't have. For example a Sorcerer archetype might require giving up the free Eschew Materials feat that Pathfinder gives the class. Or a Fighter archetype might require giving up Armor Mastery.

You could fix this problem by back-porting the Pathfinder versions of the classes. Or you could play Pathfinder.

If you're set on playing 3.5 and looking for things to back-port, I suggest looking at Arcanist, Shaman, and Witch.

[Scots Dragon]

To be perfectly accurate, prestige classes exist in Pathfinder, but there's much less emphasis on them, and much more emphasis on archetypes, which are the Pathfinder equivalent of alternative class features (and class variants, and I guess kinda racial substitution levels).

The challenge in back-porting Pathfinder archetypes is that, sometimes, the thing you give up to take an archetype is something the 3.5 version of the class doesn't have. For example a Sorcerer archetype might require giving up the free Eschew Materials feat that Pathfinder gives the class. Or a Fighter archetype might require giving up Armor Mastery.

You could fix this problem by back-porting the Pathfinder versions of the classes. Or you could play Pathfinder.

If you're set on playing 3.5 and looking for things to back-port, I suggest looking at Arcanist, Shaman, and Witch.

I'd also add the magus because it's just a great class, but I'm biased.

Personally I'd use Pathfinder and just port-forward the material you want. The two systems are mostly compatible with some adjustments.

[Darg]

This is largely an urban legend. The only combat feat worth taking in 3.5 that is split in PF is Improved Trip. In PF, you pay an extra feat (Greater Trip) to have trips provoke OAs, but they provoke from the entire party and not just from you. It's actually pretty good.

Having to take Combat Expertise first sucks in either version, though.

Combat Expertise is an excellent feat, though that PF version... Getting a +3 AC boost at level 1 and +7 by level 5 (+8 at level 20 in PF) is nothing to sneeze at. Even the pathfinder version says nothing about fighting defensively and combat expertise not stacking which I think is why the feat got nerfed. I know everything is all about those pounces, but (at least in 3.5) you won't always have the option of pouncing and that extra AC helps you survive until you can unleash a full attack (great combo with whirlwind attack and, surprise, is likely the reason it's a requirement with dodge, mobility, and spring attack).

[Seward]

In PF, you pay an extra feat (Greater Trip) to have trips provoke OAs, but they provoke from the entire party and not just from you. It's actually pretty good.


Indeed. I had the pleasure of teaming with a whirlwind strike tripper while playing my dex based tank. We ran into a group of enemies that liked to swarmfight, and my character being who she was, she got surrounded.

He tripped all of them. And I got an AOO on each one. It was the only time my tank ever got more than 1-2 AOO's from combat reflexes in her entire career (this was not a character that normally had reach, barring some very short duration spells after level 12ish. At that level she had something like 8-9 AOOs when raging but it never usually mattered). I had actually been wondering how long it would take us to kill all of those dudes, as the party didn't have much in the way of AOEs. After the whirlwind tripper did his thing, the encounter wasn't much left to do, as while the enemies were all still alive, they were all prone next to me, and I got an action next which reset all my aoo's after I indulged in a full attack, and most of the rest died either trying to stand up or swinging in a futile fashion while prone until the whirlwind guy attacked again. That whole thing was a good example of teamwork though. It wouldn't have happened if the divine caster hadn't removed a "you can't act" status from the tripper before he got his action (every swarmfighter had some kind of power that forced a save. My tank saved on a 2, the tripper didn't have nearly as good a will save)

And yeah. We all know whirlwind attack sucks. The player took it as a personal challenge to do something fun with it. Most of the time he was a run of the mill martial with ability to get large and use a reach weapon, which made him decently effective vs most enemies. But sometimes....it was magic.

[Dante & Vergil]

So porting 3.5 to Pathfinder would probably be easier than backporting Pathfinder to 3.5.

[Scots Dragon]

So porting 3.5 to Pathfinder would probably be easier than backporting Pathfinder to 3.5.

Considerably so. The two rule sets are mostly compatible so a lot of stuff you can just eyeball or fudge as necessary.

[Kitsuneymg]

As a system, pathfinder is better. As a design philosophy “no dead levels” and “do your schtick without needing to multiclass” are both laudable. You can argue about how successful they were is meeting those goals, but IMO paizo did a good job with most of PF.

Pull forward the few feats you feel are missing and continue on with life. PRCs are a garbage mechanic, but if you need one, it’s not like you can’t port them almost as easily.

Then broaden your horizons to include Path of War and Spheres of Power.

[farothel]

5th ed made a mistake by taking all those options away. The few options they grant you are powerful but that is one of the very few ASIs possible. More options > fewer options.

I do not agree to this statement as being absolute. While you need a decent amount of options, both D&D3.x and PF1 have way too many. I don't like to have to go through dozens of books to find that one optimized feat, especially for PbPs. In our tabletop group, if we play any of these, we automatically limit the books we use mostly because people have the same books (or use them from the people who have them).

In PbP, if it's PF1 or D&D3.5, I will now only submit a character if there is a restriction to the books, as I don't have them all and I don't feel like getting them all either. And it's not fun if you make a nice character only to see that someone else who did have the time to go through all the books makes a character who does everything you can do much better, even if it isn't their specialisation.

That's one of the things I like about PF2. While that system has loads of feats, you only have to read the ones of your class/race and except for skill feats (and there aren't all that many of those) you can basically forget about the others.

[Scots Dragon]

I do not agree to this statement as being absolute. While you need a decent amount of options, both D&D3.x and PF1 have way too many. I don't like to have to go through dozens of books to find that one optimized feat, especially for PbPs. In our tabletop group, if we play any of these, we automatically limit the books we use mostly because people have the same books (or use them from the people who have them).

In PbP, if it's PF1 or D&D3.5, I will now only submit a character if there is a restriction to the books, as I don't have them all and I don't feel like getting them all either. And it's not fun if you make a nice character only to see that someone else who did have the time to go through all the books makes a character who does everything you can do much better, even if it isn't their specialisation.

That's one of the things I like about PF2. While that system has loads of feats, you only have to read the ones of your class/race and except for skill feats (and there aren't all that many of those) you can basically forget about the others.

The problem with that is the mindset that you have to find that one optimised feat. Do you actually need it to roll up to the table and have a good time playing D&D/Pathfinder?

Personally I'd say no. We really need to do away with the minmaxer mindset with these games.

[farothel]

The problem with that is the mindset that you have to find that one optimised feat. Do you actually need it to roll up to the table and have a good time playing D&D/Pathfinder?

Personally I'd say no. We really need to do away with the minmaxer mindset with these games.

I don't want to find that one optimised feat, but I also don't want to play if I'm overshadowed in my specialisation by someone else for whom it's only his tertiary thing. That's why I like it when there are restrictions on the books so I can be sure that wouldn't happen.

[Kurald Galain]

I also don't want to play if I'm overshadowed in my specialisation by someone else for whom it's only his tertiary thing.

I'm sure nobody does, but I've been playing Pathfinder for a decade and I've literally never seen that happen, ever.

[RandomPeasant]

It doesn't even happen in 3e. When a character gets overshadowed, that is generally because someone else has the same primary schtick and is better at it. Even if someone is better at something as a tertiary specialization than you are as a primary specialization, they will generally just not do that, because they probably don't care very much about their character's tertiary schtick and are perfectly happy to let you do your thing.

That said, I do dislike a lot of the huge content volume that exists. But that's because a lot of it is really bad, not because I don't want more content.

[Eldonauran]

I'm sure nobody does, but I've been playing Pathfinder for a decade and I've literally never seen that happen, ever.I've seen those kinds of things happen, though where I have seen them tend to be in a fairly specific subset of gaming tables or play styles. Of which, I tend to avoid at the first opportunity. I'm not so bothered by someone being better than my character at something, though. My playstyle leans towards a support character, and I am often happy to assist people in their actions rather than do something that gets my character a lot of attention.

[Seward]

So porting 3.5 to Pathfinder would probably be easier than backporting Pathfinder to 3.5.

Yes. Pathfinder's core is the 3.5 SRD. Most published 3.5 adventures work fine in Pathfinder with 3.5 statblocks if you adjust the expected party level or challenge ratings down a little (about -1 level per 4-5 character levels) due to increased number and variety of class abilities and faster feat progression. If you modify the monsters to be well designed under PF rules, you don't need to adjust the EL at all.


It doesn't even happen in 3e. When a character gets overshadowed, that is generally because someone else has the same primary schtick and is better at it.

Or you don't see the price they paid. Or possibly the player has higher system mastery.

Three examples from my 3.5/PF experience.

1. I am playing a bog standard wood elf arcane archer level 8, only unusual thing is he has weapon spec and sucked up multiclass penalties to get it. At the table is an optimized wildrunner archer who had spend more on his bow than I had. Objectively his attack mods and damage mods were higher than mine, at least when he screeched (hurting my elven ears, enhanced with a bat familiar).

But....I did a lot more damage. Because I had a laser focus on always volley firing (even if a spider is hauling me up a tree by a web..."am I prone? No? I full attack). That was half of it. The other half was situations arose that were unusual, but where my single wizard level and guided shot made a huge difference. One was having a flying mount killed out from under me 500' up. As feather fall was level 1 in my spell slot, I had 300' of falling where I didn't need that swift action and so I fired at our enemies, and hit with every shot (no range mod with guided shot). Next round I landed with feather fall, still tried to shoot but with range mods only hit once. The other guy spent his round falling drinking a fly potion instead of shooting, then couldn't hit much at that range. Other situation was an improved cover situation where he was eating -8 attack mods vs me+guided shot. The wildrunner player watched what I did and I noticed a sharp improvement in his play in later rounds, much less likely to get distracted out of using his full attack.

2. Playing same arcane archer, I cleared an entire encounter except for one wounded enemy in the first round, after earlier saying "I'm good at killing animals" (it was a wolf encounter, he was a hunter before he became an adventurer and had favored enemy animals +2). Well, yeah, that +2 helped but the reason he cleared the room was that everybody else in the party was some kind of support person and they all went before me, so he started shooting with something like a +2 inspire courage, haste, prayer and some kind of short duration weapon buff. Plus got a lucky crit in there. Normally he wouldn't be able to dominate an encounter like that.

3. Playing an arcane "archer" (actually a wizard specialized in scorching rays using a bow focus variant in Pathfinder) she could routinely remove one enemy from any encounter in her first action, which did overshadow other ranged martials. She could only perform at that level for about 3 rounds a day, then had about another 5 rounds of "not quite as good as an average ranged martial" then was strictly inferior. But if you were an archer at a table where there were not very many combat rounds in a day, she might have been annoying, especially if all the fighting happened within close range (which was another big limit on her output). Usually though she didn't annoy anybody because the folks she killed were usually the minions, not the BBEG, leaving the primary martial characters to take and dish out damage to the main threat, while they could trust her to clean up the distractions.

None of these situations would have held up in a real campaign, as opposed to one-off convention games. People would see the range of capabilities of the character and where and when they perform better or worse, and know that their own attempt at a similar role would have its own strengths and weaknesses (and if I was playing in a party where my character overlapped another role as primary thing, we'd be quietly talking about planned character progression to either differentiate them more, or actively work them as a synergy stronger than the sum of its parts)

[Psyren]

The great improvement is that PF's skill system is commutative.
A+B = B+A

This is not true in 3.5e. In 3rd ed it mattered how you made your skill allotment. You needed to know the class progression. In PF you only need to know the final result to determine if the build was valid.

This!


It's freely available on the paizo website iirc: https://paizo.com/products/btpy89m6?Pathfinder-Roleplaying-Game-Conversion-Guide

Yep. Take this and run the PF classes through it backwards and you'll be most of the way there. (Be very careful with PF spells though, especially spells based on other spells that changed like Deeper Darkness or Greater Polymorph.)

[Dante & Vergil]

Funny thing is, I've always calculated skill points by backtracking Intelligence increases, because doing it any other way felt really dumb, and the rules couldn't be that dumb, right?

[RandomPeasant]

"The rules couldn't be that dumb" causes a number of things that are technically problems with the rules to never come up in practice.

[Scots Dragon]

Hilariously enough one of the advertised features of Dungeons & Dragons 3rd edition is that they'd be getting rid of the 'rules you never used anyway' from 2nd edition.


Given that Pathfinder did away with both level adjustment and the 'no retroactive skill boosts' thing, I think Paizo followed on in that tradition.

[pabelfly]

Given that Pathfinder did away with both level adjustment and the 'no retroactive skill boosts' thing, I think Paizo followed on in that tradition.

I don't know about level adjustments not bring used, our table pretty regularly features characters who take 1 or 2 LA without buyoff.

[Dante & Vergil]

Hilariously enough one of the advertised features of Dungeons & Dragons 3rd edition is that they'd be getting rid of the 'rules you never used anyway' from 2nd edition.


Given that Pathfinder did away with both level adjustment and the 'no retroactive skill boosts' thing, I think Paizo followed on in that tradition.

How does Pathfinder handle players playing monster races?

[Kurald Galain]

How does Pathfinder handle players playing monster races?

By reclassifying some of the monster's stronger powers as racial feats instead. So what you get at L1 is a monster with equivalent power and abilities to one of the standard humanoids.

Oh, and several non-human non-monster races have received a power boost to make human no longer the automatic pick for many classes.

[Dante & Vergil]

By reclassifying some of the monster's stronger powers as racial feats instead. So what you get at L1 is a monster with equivalent power and abilities to one of the standard humanoids.

Oh, and several non-human non-monster races have received a power boost to make human no longer the automatic pick for many classes.

Is this in the base Monster Manual for Pathfinder or in another book? I do remember other non-human non-monster races being much better.

[Seward]

Race in Pathfinder is mostly about where you put a +2 attribute boost. Humans, as always, get flexibility in that choice. One problem this solves is that if you want a high charisma, you actually have multiple LA+0 choices, plus Human. That's true of all 6 attributes.

Beyond that they get a cluster of abilities that often add up to a feat, plus usually a few race specific feats (eg, if you want to know how to do every profession skill untrained, you have to be an elf or a gnome. Halflings get a few feats that make them really, really good dex based tanks - boosting both defense and offense vs larger enemies if you go down that road. Half-orcs can get a bite attack which if combined with 2 levels of ranger with natural weapon combat type gives you a 24x7 extraordinary claw/claw/bite. I've used all of these options in actual play).

Sometimes they just flat give a worthwhile but fixed bonus feat (eg, half-elf instead of getting bonuses that add up to a +2/2 social skill feat simply get a skill focus of their choice, which means if you are interested in Loremaster, Divine Oracle or anything else with a skill focus requirement, Half Elves become Humans that also have lowlight vision and a few other minor perks).

All of this stuff is in the Players Handbook. I imagine the monster manual starts the process of noncore races, but some of that came out in supplements. Between PFSRD and Archives of Nethys, I tended to lose track of sources once I'd bought a PDF version to satisfy access rules in Pathfinder Society.

One of my many shocks in transitioning back to 3.x after over a decade of not playing it to engage in iron chef challenges wasn't the skill point consolidation, nor the slower acquisition of feats. It was just how limited ACF/Variants were for both races and classes. Every pathfinder race and class comes out of the box, core, with useful stuff that is easily leveraged and swapped for different abilities as supplements come out. It is MUCH easier to turn your mental image into a viable character that works properly from level 1 onward, because even that first class level and racial choice and the 2 traits everybody gets gives you a lot to work with.

[Kurald Galain]

One of my many shocks in transitioning back to 3.x after over a decade of not playing it ... wasn't the skill point consolidation, nor the slower acquisition of feats. It was just how limited ACF/Variants were for both races and classes. Every pathfinder race and class comes out of the box, core, with useful stuff

I wholeheartedly second that.

[Aotrs Commander]

Since I'm on this part of the forum today, I suppose I ought to mention I spent (amd still spending dotting the "t"s and crossing the "i"s) an unreasonable amount of time hybridising 3.5 and PF and taking and standardising (what I considered) the best idea out of both - as sometimes I didn't 100% agree with PF's changes - along with a few ideas stolen from even 4E and 5E. (And in some cases, c.f. Power Attack, my solution to "3.5 or PF" was "both.").

(Though my approach to rules is that the more pieces the LEGO set has to play with the better, so if you think PF1 was power creep, 3.Aotrs definitely is, since it draws stuff from both.)



I swiped most of PF's skill system wll before starting on that major overhaul, however, since it was SO MUCH BETTER than 3.5's it wasn't even funny.

I will point at the wasted hours spent on 3.54-ising Die Vecna Die! and the stupidly large number of wizards there, and sorting out the skill points and sorting skill synergies. So when PF came along and, nevermind the consolodation of skils, punted non-retroactive skill changes and synergies out the window, I snapped it up instantly.

[Dante & Vergil]

Since I'm on this part of the forum today, I suppose I ought to mention I spent (amd still spending dotting the "t"s and crossing the "i"s) an unreasonable amount of time hybridising 3.5 and PF and taking and standardising (what I considered) the best idea out of both - as sometimes I didn't 100% agree with PF's changes - along with a few ideas stolen from even 4E and 5E. (And in some cases, c.f. Power Attack, my solution to "3.5 or PF" was "both.").

(Though my approach to rules is that the more pieces the LEGO set has to play with the better, so if you think PF1 was power creep, 3.Aotrs definitely is, since it draws stuff from both.)



I swiped most of PF's skill system wll before starting on that major overhaul, however, since it was SO MUCH BETTER than 3.5's it wasn't even funny.

I will point at the wasted hours spent on 3.54-ising Die Vecna Die! and the stupidly large number of wizards there, and sorting out the skill points and sorting skill synergies. So when PF came along and, nevermind the consolodation of skils, punted non-retroactive skill changes and synergies out the window, I snapped it up instantly.

How much of this project did you finish?

[Aotrs Commander]

How much of this project did you finish?

Not counting the stream of minor "bug fixes" (typos, clarification changes - the usual stuff that's come up as we actually started USING it) and that I have only been completing the cleric domains as and when needed, and the races, Generic Bestiary and PrCs on a case-by-case basis as needed (as I tweak adventure paths) like... All of it, to the tune of 1500 pages or so. (Fundementally, I'm still finding I'm dragging stuff over into the Master Rules for a clarification overhaul.)

(I actually pretty much finished exactly as lockdown one hit and then killed everything stone dead for 18 months, so when it became possible to re-start, I HAVE forgotten half the time what bits got swiped from where...)

Not everything from 3.5, not everything from PF, obviously, but there's like... 50 base classes or something, for example, and something on the order of 2000 feats. (No, I have NO idea how many spells there are.)



(Notably, Path of War from PF hasn't been looked at, since at the time, I did not feel like re-balancing the entirety of ToB AND re-printing out all the maneouvre cards. Also Pathfinder psychic magic has been entirely ignored, since psionics is a thing... And none of the psychic magic classes even looked very good. By comparison, PF's (third party) psionics Soul Knife was so good it fundementally started the ENTIRE porject off again.

To my great sadness, I will almost certainly never get to play one though, since with the death of one member of the group last year I am now basically the forever DM... Assuming that my gaming group of 30 years will even have enough members left in another year or so to render the point entirely moot anyway.)

[Dante & Vergil]

Not counting the stream of minor "bug fixes" (typos, clarification changes - the usual stuff that's come up as we actually started USING it) and that I have only been completing the cleric domains as and when needed, and the races, Generic Bestiary and PrCs on a case-by-case basis as needed (as I tweak adventure paths) like... All of it, to the tune of 1500 pages or so. (Fundementally, I'm still finding I'm dragging stuff over into the Master Rules for a clarification overhaul.)

(I actually pretty much finished exactly as lockdown one hit and then killed everything stone dead for 18 months, so when it became possible to re-start, I HAVE forgotten half the time what bits got swiped from where...)

Not everything from 3.5, not everything from PF, obviously, but there's like... 50 base classes or something, for example, and something on the order of 2000 feats. (No, I have NO idea how many spells there are.)



(Notably, Path of War from PF hasn't been looked at, since at the time, I did not feel like re-balancing the entirety of ToB AND re-printing out all the maneouvre cards. Also Pathfinder psychic magic has been entirely ignored, since psionics is a thing... And none of the psychic magic classes even looked very good. By comparison, PF's (third party) psionics Soul Knife was so good it fundementally started the ENTIRE porject off again.

To my great sadness, I will almost certainly never get to play one though, since with the death of one member of the group last year I am now basically the forever DM... Assuming that my gaming group of 30 years will even have enough members left in another year or so to render the point entirely moot anyway.)

Sounds massive. I'm also sorry to hear about your loss.