Why play 3.5 anymore?

[Teapot Salty]

Hey guys. So, I played 3.5 to death, but I know for a fact that I'm not the only one who was frustrated by it's poor balancing, and even the best possible martial classes (those being from ToB) were still considered overwhelmingly inferior to casters, while still feeling like casters themselves.

I do appreciate the sheer level of customization that it offered, but when so much of it was just plane bad it felt like you had to hamstring yourself to play an interesting character concept, or sacrifice your concept for a mechanical advantage. If you wanted to play at a high level with ranger fluff, you shouldn't be forced to play a Thri-kreen swift hunter.

Which brings me to my point: 5e is out guys, and it's good. Really good. It's balanced (more balanced than 3.5 anyway) and provides a boatload of cool character options. And I'd also like to point out, though my experience in it is virtually non-existent, that pathfinder is real, and is hailed as a direct upgrade. So my question is, for those of you who still play with the old angry man that is 3.5, which is a generally worse (IMO) system than 5e: Why do you still play this edition?

Spoiler: Off topic

Show

Now bear in mind, I don't hate 3.5, hell, it's still my baby, and with a good dm and smart players, it is, without a doubt, one of my favorite things, but on the surface, systems like 5e do appear to be straight upgrades.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Because of that crunchy, crotchety muddle of mechanical complexity. For those of us who like character mechanics, 3.5 is beautiful. I've never seen another system where you can have characters as mechanically distinct as a Warblade, a Totemist, a Cleric and a Truenamer in the same game, much less the same party. If everyone knows what they're doing, you can get the entire party playing at about the same power level, too.

3.5 also has lots of rules for PCs interacting with the world-- spells, crafting, leadership, undead and summoned minionmancy, wondrous architecture, the Landlord feat... there are clear rules for doing all sorts of classic fantasy NPC actions, right there in black and white, which is quite neat and not at all common.

(Also, Pathfinder is exactly the same as 3.5. I've played houseruled 3.5 games that were more distinct. 5e looks like a great system, to be sure, but it has a fraction of the customization level of 3.5-- intentionally, to be sure, but for good or ill it'll never have anything like the character creation depth that 3.5 did)

[Fable Wright]

Speaking as someone who plays 5e and hangs around with fans of 3.5:

When you all play at the same tier bracket, the game is fun. Everyone in tier 1 to 2? Have a fun romp being literal gods of war directing armies and playing politics. Everyone in tier 3 to 4? Have fun becoming Saitama, where you win if you hit it, but the problem is getting a shot. Everyone tier 5-6? You all know what you got into; have fun with your wacky hijinks as you proceed to not take the game seriously at all. Tired of being a god? Play E6, which still offers most of the customization of 3.PF, but means that you become legendary heroes and warriors rather than demi-to-minor-gods at the upper levels. Just remember to stay within the same tier bracket, even at E6, though.

Regarding why not Pathfinder: Because it's got the same balance issues at 3.5 with casters being superior, but with way less out there for the martials to catch up. Regarding why not 5e: Because sometimes, I want to be able to play as a monster. Or a build-a-monster. Or maybe I want to play as Cu Chulainn, or Heracles, or lead armies. Fifth edition is great for doing adventurers doing adventurer things, whereas 3.5 is a better system for playing as someone who can, has, or will have the power to personally seize control over the world. Unless you're playing 3.5 Forgotten Realms, in which case, you're doing it wrong.

[Pex]

Technically I moved on to Pathfinder but same difference.

I play it because I do not have a problem with the so called balance issues. I am absolutely perfectly fine with the concept of a fighter, wizard, and druid in the same party. The magic system does not bother me at all. There is nothing to resent. I enjoy the "fiddly bits" of +1s and +2s stacking. I am completely calm and contented with ability score enhancement items and +# buffs to saving throws and AC. The Tier System is worth less than used toilet paper to me.

Obligatory follow up question: Why Pathfinder and not 3E? Pathfinder takes a game I already like and improves upon it. It is a currently published game with new material coming out with new options to do stuff.

[VoxRationis]

Technically I moved on to Pathfinder but same difference.

I play it because I do not have a problem with the so called balance issues. I am absolutely perfectly fine with the concept of a fighter, wizard, and druid in the same party. The magic system does not bother me at all. There is nothing to resent. I enjoy the "fiddly bits" of +1s and +2s stacking. I am completely calm and contented with ability score enhancement items and +# buffs to saving throws and AC. The Tier System is worth less than used toilet paper to me.

Obligatory follow up question: Why Pathfinder and not 3E? Pathfinder takes a game I already like and improves upon it. It is a currently published game with new material coming out with new options to do stuff.

I agree with you very much. The tier system is over-hyped, especially for practical purposes where the party wizards aren't 20th level and haven't been able to custom-make magical items constantly. 90% of the work of the party ends up going to fighters and rogues, in my experience; wizards are great for those couple of fights, but then they have nothing to fall back on.

I too enjoy the versatility that comes with being able to distinguish between degrees of advantage, which 5e is bad at (though I am fond of the advantage system's ability to distinguish between maximum capability and reliability, which the d20 + X system does not).

More practically, though, I play 3e because I have the books, and the excellent d20srd, while the SRD for 5e is much more sparse, and I do not have the books on hand.

[JoeJ]

I've never seen another system where you can have characters as mechanically distinct as a Warblade, a Totemist, a Cleric and a Truenamer in the same game, much less the same party.

GURPS says "Hi."

To the OP: There's only one real answer. People play 3.5 because they enjoy it. Not everybody likes the same things. And there's no actual requirement that anybody choose; it's quite possible to enjoy playing both.

[Fable Wright]

I agree with you very much. The tier system is over-hyped, especially for practical purposes where the party wizards aren't 20th level and haven't been able to custom-make magical items constantly. 90% of the work of the party ends up going to fighters and rogues, in my experience; wizards are great for those couple of fights, but then they have nothing to fall back on.

Oh, when they're blaster wizards, it's actually all fun all around. It's when they just solve an entire encounter with a single spell and the rest is cleanup that things get boring for everyone else. Mob of enemies at level 6? Stinking cloud. Single target, low Will? Unluck, we're done here. Single target, low Dex? Grease, can we go home now? Oh, fine, I'll toss a Ray of Enfeeblement on there if you insist. Enemy Wizard? Well, I'll just cast Silence on the barbarian here, and he'll go grapple the wizard until it's dead. Problem solved.

[DigoDragon]

I play 3.5 because the tier thing isn't a big problem at low levels, and I like playing low levels. My old local group wasn't much into optimizing casters, so that also shortened the gap a bit as well. They gave up caster levels all the time and didn't care. :3

Probably make some optimizers cringe in their sleep.

[daremetoidareyo]

Oh, when they're blaster wizards, it's actually all fun all around. It's when they just solve an entire encounter with a single spell and the rest is cleanup that things get boring for everyone else. Mob of enemies at level 6? Stinking cloud. Single target, low Will? Unluck, we're done here. Single target, low Dex? Grease, can we go home now? Oh, fine, I'll toss a Ray of Enfeeblement on there if you insist. Enemy Wizard? Well, I'll just cast Silence on the barbarian here, and he'll go grapple the wizard until it's dead. Problem solved.

Who are these wizards who know the stats of the creatures that the DM throws at them? Maybe the real balance issue is DMs aren't putting enough class leveled enemies into the game...As far as I know, there is no way to know what a creature's ability scores are.

[Slipperychicken]

I used to like 3.x for similar reasons (I even made one or two contributions to the optimization community here), but after going through a few GMs, trying a few other systems, and finding other things to do with my time, I realized that I could have more fun without spending so much of my time or energy on it. Also, I had finally realized that the enjoyment I get out of a tabletop game has everything to do with the people I'm playing with, and our gaming philosophy and etiquette, and almost nothing to do with how many +2s I could stack up.


While I was playing 3rd edition, I assumed that every game in existence had exactly the same flaws, that spending months studying before your first session was acceptable, that the whole table should be slave to the exact wording of the book no matter how much it detracts from your enjoyment, and that a 2-minute combat taking 4 hours of RL time was as fast as it got. I figured that the mystical "other systems" people were talking about were just excuses for hipsters to troll 3.5 players, and that anyone complaining about its complexity and bloat (or heaven forbid, showed up with a character build that wasn't copied off the internet) was a filthy casual who needed to hunker down and learn some rules.

Also, during that time I was not as mature as I am now. I often relished the chance to one-up other people (both at the table and on this forum) and I felt like my smirking abuse of this game system was evidence that I was somehow smarter or better than they were, rather than just someone who spent far too much time on a silly game. I still have a sig from my 3.5 days, and I think it kind of epitomizes the feelings of superiority and invincibility that I was going for back then. I can't hold a game system to blame for my attitude, but many parts of the game and its community encouraged that when I was just starting out.

[KillianHawkeye]

Who are these wizards who know the stats of the creatures that the DM throws at them? Maybe the real balance issue is DMs aren't putting enough class leveled enemies into the game...As far as I know, there is no way to know what a creature's ability scores are.

Maybe not, but you can make an educated guess. And if you're playing a wizard with 20+ Int, you should be pretty darn educated.

[Âmesang]

I "grew up" with 3.5 so it's certainly what I'm used to, especially with the dozens upon dozens of books and magazines that adds all sorts of little bits here and there to play around with; as such I played 5th during the beta test phase and I really couldn't get into it. It just seemed too simplified.

…and yet I had absolutely no problem with 4th Edition. Go figure. Then again 4th was quite a different beast all together as opposed to 5th's "3.5 lite" feel, so that might have something to do with it.

I've played Pathfinder before and I've nothing against it; I've had a low-level ranger I played for a bit that I imagine a perfect fit for Pathfinder, just as a I have a high-level sorcerer/archmage that feels more at home in 3.5.

Honestly if I could pick any other edition to play it'd be 1st or 2nd; I've been slowly accumulating stuff from the AD&D days and I'd like to see "how it all began," so to speak.

[Milo v3]

I keep playing 3.P because I cannot stand 5e's mechanics.

[Bohandas]

Mainly because I swore off buying new D&D products after 4e came out (and doubled down to no Hasboro products at all after the third season of My Little Pony)

As for Pathfinder, 3.5e stuff is like 95% compatible wih it so might as well keep using the material even if officially you're actually playing Pathfinder.

[PersonMan]

For me it's not about 'why play 3.5?', it's about 'why switch?'. Pathfinder doesn't offer enough for me to want to put in the effort of learning all the classes, and I'd want to use enough 3.5 material that it'd be a hybrid game anyways. When I play 5e I don't find myself thinking 'oh wow, this is so well-balanced and fun', I think 'why am I doing this when I could just use 3.5 for faster, easier everything because I already know the rules?' (I'm also not the biggest fan of the stat-caps, etc.).

When I play other systems it's because they do something different. 7th Sea, GURPS and such all have very different mechanics and do things that are difficult or impossible to do using 3.5's mechanics. 5e just feels like 3.5 but with a bunch of changes that make the game more of something I don't like as much.

[Bohandas]

They brought back stat caps? They're regressing...

[sktarq]

I used to like 3.x for similar reasons..... Also, I had finally realized that the enjoyment I get out of a tabletop game has everything to do with the people I'm playing with, and our gaming philosophy and etiquette, and almost nothing to do with how many +2s I could stack up.

While I was playing 3rd edition, I assumed that every game in existence had exactly the same flaws, that spending months studying before your first session was acceptable........

Wow, Thankyou. that makes me happy. also explains why I look forward to your posts so much now., they sound fun now....it has nothing to do with avatar similarities.. . . I swearz

For myself. It is a matter of switching would mean dragging players who are not deeply enough into the hobby to learn new systems or we have an idea that plays off a splatbook or setting we like. As for 5th....if I'm having fun with the 3.5 games and the Pathfinder games I don't feel the need to switch it up. Switching would require time and money from not just me but also my players, the other DM's etc. And the sunk cost is enough to hold me off as D&D is no longer my primary system anymore.

[Gamgee]

I don't play DnD anymore I never liked it honestly (Didn't know there were other RPG's in existence when I was young). I liked rpg's but I don't like DnD. Though I definitely appreciate what it's done for our chosen hobby. 5th made me run a short little game that lasted a year or so but mechanically and from a setting perspective just too generic.

[johnbragg]

Short answer is that WOTC blew it with 4E, big time. If 4E had never been published, we'd all be playing 5E, or playing WOTC's newest update anyway. 2E to 3E was a massive, obvious upgrade with feats and skill points and flexible multiclassing. 3E to 3.5 was a set of small tweaks, but most everyone went along and there was not much carping about the price of replacement books. Was the 3.5 game really, say $90 ($30 PHB, DMG, MMI) "better" than 3.0? Naaah. But nobody complained. PArtially because 3.5 *was* $180 better than 2E. PArtially because you had the brand loyalty.

Then 4E came out. I don't want to re-start the edition war, but I think everyone agrees that 4E had design features and philosophy that a lot of 3E players did not care for. There was a massive "edition war" online. We didn't switch when 4E came out. BEfore a move, I owned 3.0 and 3.5 PHB, DMG, MMI plus a half-dozen 3.5 splatbooks. The people in my group with the most disposable income bought the 4E books, we looked at them and said, Feh. (I said feh. OThers said their regional equivalents.) We decided to become the old weird holdout groups we all remembered from our youth that didn't transition from 1E to 2E.

So WOTC abandoned 4E relatively quickly and came out with 5th edition. It sounds good. But we don't have a compelling reason to switch. And WOTC destroyed the implicit premise that newer is better and you should be playing the new, improved edition, because the last newer-and-better edition was flat-out awful, in our opinion. (PArt of that was a moral contract that we would pay WOTC for books and WOTC would keep our game alive and out of bankruptcy court.)

So you have groups that, after 15 years or so, know 3X. With old splatbooks and homebrew and workarounds aplenty for the problems the OGL architecture has, and PAizo still supplying new stuff to monkey around and tinker with. A huge knowledge base that, much like the QWERTY keyboard, becomes useless if you transition to a new, sleeker system like the Dvorak keyboard.

Why didn't we update from 3.5 to 5E? Because 4E taught us we didn't have to.

EDIT: Reread OP. A non-zero number of groups running PAthfinder will say they're running 3.5.

[johnbragg]

I "grew up" with 3.5 so it's certainly what I'm used to, especially with the dozens upon dozens of books and magazines that adds all sorts of little bits here and there to play around with; as such I played 5th during the beta test phase and I really couldn't get into it. It just seemed too simplified.

…and yet I had absolutely no problem with 4th Edition. Go figure. Then again 4th was quite a different beast all together as opposed to 5th's "3.5 lite" feel, so that might have something to do with it.

I've played Pathfinder before and I've nothing against it; I've had a low-level ranger I played for a bit that I imagine a perfect fit for Pathfinder, just as a I have a high-level sorcerer/archmage that feels more at home in 3.5.

Honestly if I could pick any other edition to play it'd be 1st or 2nd; I've been slowly accumulating stuff from the AD&D days and I'd like to see "how it all began," so to speak.

Running my campaign for my kids, I'm realizing how deep my roots in 2E are. Most important difference from pre 3E to 3E is the pre 3E assumption of "screw what the book says, I'm the DM."

[Scots Dragon]

The reason to keep playing Dungeons & Dragons 3.5e or Pathfinder is quite simple; that's the edition you like best, and it's the one that most appeals to you. Therefore you are still playing that edition out of enjoyment for it. The reasoning begins and ends right there.

There are people still playing AD&D 1e and AD&D 2e, sometimes interchangeably since they're more compatible than D&D 3.5e and Pathfinder.

There are people still playing with B/X and BECM and the Rules Cyclopedia.

There are actually people still playing, the original 1974 version of D&D.

There are, though I might dislike the edition myself, people still playing D&D 4e.

And of course there are those who have moved on to start playing D&D 5e.

Their reasoning is exactly the same. When it comes to tabletop games, one person's advantage is another person's drawback; games are immensely subjective from the point of view of the player for the most part. The one you enjoy most is literally all of the justification you'll ever really need, in any case. For what it's worth, I usually favour Advanced Dungeons & Dragons

[Reathin]

Hey guys. So, I played 3.5 to death, but I know for a fact that I'm not the only one who was frustrated by it's poor balancing, and even the best possible martial classes (those being from ToB) were still considered overwhelmingly inferior to casters, while still feeling like casters themselves.

I do appreciate the sheer level of customization that it offered, but when so much of it was just plane bad it felt like you had to hamstring yourself to play an interesting character concept, or sacrifice your concept for a mechanical advantage. If you wanted to play at a high level with ranger fluff, you shouldn't be forced to play a Thri-kreen swift hunter.

Which brings me to my point: 5e is out guys, and it's good. Really good. It's balanced (more balanced than 3.5 anyway) and provides a boatload of cool character options. And I'd also like to point out, though my experience in it is virtually non-existent, that pathfinder is real, and is hailed as a direct upgrade. So my question is, for those of you who still play with the old angry man that is 3.5, which is a generally worse (IMO) system than 5e: Why do you still play this edition?

Spoiler: Off topic

Show

Now bear in mind, I don't hate 3.5, hell, it's still my baby, and with a good dm and smart players, it is, without a doubt, one of my favorite things, but on the surface, systems like 5e do appear to be straight upgrades.

Sheer, unbelievable amount of available material is one reason. If you want to build something in 3.5, odds are there are at least a few options specifically tailored to whatever crazy specific thing you want. Some others were put off trying 5th edition after being burned by 4th (which, yes, isn't terribly fair but comfort zones exist). Some don't like some of the things done in the name of "balance" or they simply don't want to learn a new system.

Personally, I like 3.5 and Pathfinder a LOT. The idea of switching, even to a system that's supposedly much better balanced, doesn't terribly appeal to me. The primary argument I hear against 3.5 is that of balance, where whoever picks Wizard is a walking demigod and whoever picks a fighter is just sort of sitting there, picking their nose all the time. I've never experienced that discrepancy. If anything, I always get the opposite; where casters have neat options, but at the end of the day the fighter's still doing the heavy lifting. There's no artificial balancing in play, no deliberately holding back. It's just that the tier system's hypothetical scenarios never seem to play out in practice, game after game. And I assure you, my DM's are far more interested in story than mechanically balancing every little detail, so it's not happening behind the scenes either.

Our current party, with a Cleric, a Druid, a Gunslinger, a Rogue, a Fighter, and a new guy who admittedly just got introduced and I don't know his class? The fighter's damage output is HILARIOUSLY higher than the rest of us. If the DM actually lets him take a decent combo, he's going to be two shotting lesser gods. The cleric and druid are nice, but no CodZillas like we're supposed to keep expecting. In the end, I think that some people simply don't notice the tier system because, for whatever reason, it doesn't really come up. So why bother learning a new set of rules when you're so invested in an old one?

[Clistenes]

If you want to keep things simple, play a typical party of adventurers raiding dungeons and such, 5th is probably better. You can rise to to high levels and your characters still feel human heroes. Also, it doesn't get as complex as 3.5, with characters piling obscure feats, templates and magic items and crafting overcomplicated super-optimized builds...

However, if you want to be something other than your typical party of mortal adventurers, you have to go for 3.5. It lets you build literally any character you can think of. You can be a cyborg half-plant priest of a dead god who travels the universe in a dimension-hopping spaceship with a crew of magical robots in search of the pieces of the artifact that will alllow you to resurrect your dead patron. You can be paladin-priest who became a half-celestial and later a saint, conquered a layer of the Abyss and ripped it out of it. You can be a wizard who lives in his own demiplane and has become a magical creature who lives on magic only and doesn't need to breath, eat or sleep. You can be a dragon-riding warlord of a gigantic army...etc.

[Amphetryon]

The reason to keep playing Dungeons & Dragons 3.5e or Pathfinder is quite simple; that's the edition you like best, and it's the one that most appeals to you. Therefore you are still playing that edition out of enjoyment for it. The reasoning begins and ends right there.

There are people still playing AD&D 1e and AD&D 2e, sometimes interchangeably since they're more compatible than D&D 3.5e and Pathfinder.

There are people still playing with B/X and BECM and the Rules Cyclopedia.

There are actually people still playing, the original 1974 version of D&D.

There are, though I might dislike the edition myself, people still playing D&D 4e.

And of course there are those who have moved on to start playing D&D 5e.

Their reasoning is exactly the same. When it comes to tabletop games, one person's advantage is another person's drawback; games are immensely subjective from the point of view of the player for the most part. The one you enjoy most is literally all of the justification you'll ever really need, in any case. For what it's worth, I usually favour Advanced Dungeons & Dragons

All of this, right here. Well said.

[Cluedrew]

I started a thread called "Why is 3.5 still so popular?" in the D&D 3.0/5/PF sub-forum some time ago. It got 11 pages of responses which I will attempt to summarize here:

• Familiarity: One of the big problems with the game is the amount of start up work you need to put into it. However once you have done that (for the base systems and however many splat books) it isn't really a problem anymore.
• Timing: 3.5 was the last addition before the massive re-work that was 4e. I'm not saying that one is better, but for completely subjective reasons some people didn't like 4e, so they stated with 3.5 for that entire edition. Which compounded the above point.
• Variety: Of the customisation triad: The game is not uniform throughout, although this means there are some balance issues it also means there choices for everyone within the same game.
• Details: Of the customisation triad: The level of rules supported details that you can embed into your character is incredible. Even individual personality traits sometimes have rules for the mechanical differences that trait makes.
• Options: Of the customisation triad: Finally, let us not forget the amount of material you have to choose from. GURPS may have it beat out but other than that few systems even come close.
• Build-Up: The other side of options, but instead of for characters I'm talking about campaign settings, assorted lore, DM & player aids and help guides.

And that is just what I can remember off the top of my head. OK, not quite of the top of my head, a few posts crept in while I was writing.

But D&D 3.5 is a good game, I like it with only two notable complaints:

1. It would be nice if it were faster.
2. What if I want to play a non-combatant?

You here 1 a lot but 2 is... well hardly unique to me but less common.

[Âmesang]

Running my campaign for my kids, I'm realizing how deep my roots in 2E are. Most important difference from pre 3E to 3E is the pre 3E assumption of "screw what the book says, I'm the DM."

I had a couple of older players who were of that mindset… but only to the point of making $#%& up just to make things easier. "Oh, of course you can do that!" 'Cause Heaven forbid the thief get within 30 ft. to sneak attack (that's what greater invisibility is for!).

Me? I'm lazy. I like going strictly by the rules 'cause then I can just look stuff up without having to keep track of it too much. "I wrote it in my diary so I wouldn't have to remember!" I also feel more clever if I can piece together something with my character from this source or that source without resorting to the referee just making $#%& up wholecloth, and if I do make something up, I at least try to stat it out properly (usually using the custom item creation rules or converting up a couple of 2nd Edition spells). Though I can understand having to fill in the gaps here and there (such as giving 3.5 white and black slaadi DR 15/epic and lawful and DR 20/epic and lawful, respectively, to replace what the 3.0 versions had—since they're not updated on the SRD due to copyright reasons).

It might also be because I've played as the same character across multiple groups before, so it's just easier for me to use book/magazine-stuff than homebrew stuff 'cause then I won't have to sit there explaining everything; as such, I've grown accustomed to providing book/magazine and page number resources for easy look-up.

[Anonymouswizard]

Because of that crunchy, crotchety muddle of mechanical complexity. For those of us who like character mechanics, 3.5 is beautiful. I've never seen another system where you can have characters as mechanically distinct as a Warblade, a Totemist, a Cleric and a Truenamer in the same game, much less the same party. If everyone knows what they're doing, you can get the entire party playing at about the same power level, too.

Top of my head? GURPS allows a large variety of abilities right out of the box, without going into splats, or even the core magic system. Allowing one splatbook (Thaumatology) we can get:
-A mage who builds up to complex spells from utility spells (core magic)
-A mage who casts magic based on sets of spells (path magic)
-A mage who casts magic by drawing or placing runes (rune magic)
-A mage who speaks spells in a language of magic, making them up (verb/noun magic)
-A psychic with telepathic powers (core psionics)
-A medium who gets powers from being possessed by spirits (modular abilities, probably cosmic power)

Also, Anima: Beyond Fantasy. In the rulebook there are rules for Ki Manipulation, Gift Magic, Summoning, Psychic Powers, and Élan. All work with different systems, and are relatively balanced (but normal marshals are still weak, so most martial classes have Ki Manipulation). I haven't seen them introduce the wide array of classes 3.5 has, but a Warrior could theoretically serve as a D&D Fighter, Barbarian, Marshal, or any other nonmagical combatant. Although new magic systems would require every class to be redesigned.

I don't have my 3.5 anymore, because Anima gives me what I want from it, and I prefer it.

3.5 also has lots of rules for PCs interacting with the world-- spells, crafting, leadership, undead and summoned minionmancy, wondrous architecture, the Landlord feat... there are clear rules for doing all sorts of classic fantasy NPC actions, right there in black and white, which is quite neat and not at all common.

For fun, I'm going to look through the Anima corebook for such rules:
-spells: lots of utility spells, although it's possibly even more slanted towards combat than D&D. Psychic Powers are a bit better though.
-crafting: not a lot, a little bit that let's players forge metal weapons.
-leadership: not really in the corebook.
-summoning: yep, entire chapter on it.
-undead: looking at the necromancy list, there's Raise Corpses, Control the Dead, Summon the Dead, Raise Spectres, Necromantic Chimera, Lord of the Dead (Gnosis 40+ only), and The Awakening (Gnosis 45+ only) for creating, controlling, and summoning minions. Also Necromantic Modification for improving a minion. It's easy to start with Raise Corpses and Control the Dead (take Natural Knowledge of a Path for necromancy). I have a lot to say here because necromancers interest me, and they're the better balanced minion archetype (summoners can vary wildly in power based on player intelligence).
-wonderous architecture: rules for this?
-classical fantasy NPC actions: not as much, but that's due to a focused skill list.

(Also, Pathfinder is exactly the same as 3.5. I've played houseruled 3.5 games that were more distinct. 5e looks like a great system, to be sure, but it has a fraction of the customization level of 3.5-- intentionally, to be sure, but for good or ill it'll never have anything like the character creation depth that 3.5 did)

This is fair, I'm not a fan of Pathfinder because it's so similar, and I don't like 5e enough to run it.

Might try converting Dark Sun to Anima.

They brought back stat caps? They're regressing...

They fit with the design goal, which is that PCs aren't gods.

[nedz]

I actually missed 3.0 because we were still playing AD&D - we went straight to 3.5. I have tried sounding people out about going back but they weren't interested.

We have all of the 3.5 books so investing in a new system is an avoidable expense.

I haven't played 5E but it does look a lot like how I used to run AD&D. Some bits look interesting, but not interesting enough so far.

[Segev]

What most here have said remains true: 3.5 is a far more customizable D&D system than 5e, at least right now. And there is a lot of fun to be had in the very crunchy, well-defined (if thus prone to strange rule interactions) rules of the game.

One thing they're not mentioning directly is the simple fact that, for the most part, 3e represented a huge step forward in game-rules technology. 5e is its child, definitely, in that respect. But 5e also does something better than 3e that has little to do with specific mechanics: in a lot of ways, 5e is a love sonnet to 1e and 2e, borrowing and improving upon 3e's technological upgrades to capture not just the "old feel" of D&D that 3e retained, but really pull hard on that "feel" from the earlier roots.

But the main thing about 3e is that it really is a broader system than 5e, at least right now, and I am unsure 5e will ever quite achieve the same flexibility because it is built to be tighter. The areas 5e is clumsy are the areas 3e is most adaptable, so there will always be space for both, depending on the sort of game you're running.

GURPS says "Hi."

Eh, what you were responding to said that the system allowed for many different MECHANICAL feels in the same party. BESM is one of my favorite systems, and like GURPS, can do all those disparate genre-types together (and does it better than GURPS, in my opinion, because it doesn't require such specific variants on powers while still functionally calling on the same mechanics). But both of them functionally have the same core mechanical system(s) adapted to all those different character designs. BESM balances it by only caring about your end result; GURPS tries hard to tell you that how you do it makes a difference, but fundamentally uses the same few subsystems on all characters.

3e creates dramatically distinct subsystems to handle spellcasting, incarnum, binding, etc., and heavily varies them for martial maneuvers and psionics. That actually is one of 4e's biggest "sins" to most who stuck with 3e and PF: EVERYBODY used the martial adept subsystem. GURPS does have multiple subsystems, but they somehow lack the fundamental difference in FEEL behind their mechanical differences. Partially because they get too hung up in creating different points costs for different approaches without making the way they play all that different.

[YossarianLives]

I play 3.5 for several reasons.

1. I despise 5E. I know it sounds harsh, but I hate the lack of mechanics and advantage/disadvantage is literally the worst mechanics I've ever seen in an RPG. Great way to make bonuses completely redundant. This also eliminated the concept of a wizard who buffs their party to godlike levels of power. For shame.

2. I dislike Pathfinder. In my opinion, it's not a bad system by any means. But it feels artificial to me, I can't quite describe it but it just doesn't feel as organic and 3.5. It also lends itself to a much higher power level which I dislike. One of the advantages of 3.5 is the many different levels of power that it can be played at.

3. I like 3.5. That's it.


Of course, I'd rather be playing OD&D but none of my friends want to.