Pathfinderish 3.5

[Pirate_King]

I'm starting a new campaign, and one guy wants access to ToB stuff, and I'm cool with that, but I was considering giving the other players the option of using the Pathfinder variants to the base classes, to solve balance issues. No one really wants to play a caster, so most of the magic will come from bad guys and the occasional NPC, and I won't have to worry about the altered energy channeling mechanic. Am I making a terrible mistake in letting my PC's use Pathfinder classes in a non-pathfinder game?

[Eldariel]

I'm starting a new campaign, and one guy wants access to ToB stuff, and I'm cool with that, but I was considering giving the other players the option of using the Pathfinder variants to the base classes, to solve balance issues. No one really wants to play a caster, so most of the magic will come from bad guys and the occasional NPC, and I won't have to worry about the altered energy channeling mechanic. Am I making a terrible mistake in letting my PC's use Pathfinder classes in a non-pathfinder game?

No. The classes may not be perfect, but they do beat the tar out of the Core 3.5 versions being much more interesting and somewhat more effective too.

[arguskos]

I'm starting a new campaign, and one guy wants access to ToB stuff, and I'm cool with that, but I was considering giving the other players the option of using the Pathfinder variants to the base classes, to solve balance issues. No one really wants to play a caster, so most of the magic will come from bad guys and the occasional NPC, and I won't have to worry about the altered energy channeling mechanic. Am I making a terrible mistake in letting my PC's use Pathfinder classes in a non-pathfinder game?

HELLS NO!!! I use them as my default at all times, since they are almost universally better than the PHB stuff. Personally, I really like the updated Fighter and Barbarian (rage points ftw!) and the Sorcerer with his bloodlines is pretty flavorful and awesome.

Go for it, you'll not regret it.

[Waspinator]

Luckily, Pathfinder is still 3.5ish enough that you can basically use it as a big book of house rules and borrow the bits you like while keeping the rest baseline 3.5.

[imperialspectre]

Pathfinder's pretty solid. It doesn't really solve the balance issues in 3.5, but it definitely mitigates them and can be house-ruled into something much more balanced than 3.5 Core. Good luck with your house-ruling.

[BobVosh]

We do this as default in our games. I mainly like the skills, but other changes it did were nice too.

[Dyllan]

So long as you don't mind the PCs getting experience a bit faster than core classes would, and don't plan on using unmodified 3.5 modules, you're fine.

The extra power level makes the average module a bit easier than intended. You can compensate but sending them through at slightly lower levels, of course.

Also, to challenge them you need to send stronger enemies, which means they earn more experience.

But those are really no different than what you run into with highly optimized 3.5 builds anyway.