D&D Edition Wars

[Rinso]

I grew up on 2E and its what i'm familiar with and like the most. THAC0 or death etc. That said, its not perfect and there are altered versions out that that cherry pick some of the best things 3 brought. Having played a lot of 2E and 3.5, 3.5 is what really helped D&D grow from when i was in secondary school in the 90s as 2E took a lot of dedication to get into though i feel it provides a better experience for those who make the effort.

Not zealotry, just bias!

[Ratcatcher]

I enjoy 2nd ed. When I'm the player, that's the version I love to play the most. That said, the worst offenders in 3.5 and pathfinders are the class system, the feats and spells, in that order. Ofc we're not even taking the adventure modules/paths into consideration because, fuck those. There's decent stuff (Carrion Crown) but if you can write your own adventure, you'll be able to avoid 98.134% of pozz. Since my player group wanted to try a more modern system but retain the D&D feel and knowhow, I already had to perform most of what I talk about for my own use.

-The class system is the worst offender, being able to choose a different class each level is an issue, if you want that 2nd Ed feel. Most of the classes are simply unsalvageable, imho. There's too much difference in performance at the table, giving a group of newbs free reign is a surefire way to troubles because if the damage output of some character is too high or their defenses too strong, compared to the rest of the party, you're fucked when it comes to balancing play. This is an ongoing struggle for a GM ofc, as the group levels up and the power dynamics change but still, the output a Vivisectionist or an Arcanist can bring to the table can hardly compare with memetic classes like Witch and Death Knight. We talk damage or buffing on another magnitude level, differences in AC of 5-10 points or more, the ability to break some spells by casting personal effects on other characters. It's a tragedy. You're much better off simply ignoring all of those, break them down for effects and spare parts, create interesting items, NPCs or taylor specific mechanics for your campaign.

-Understand that some classes (Rogue, Fighter) lend themselves to multiclassing much better than other. Both from a mechanics and a narrative perspective. Place limitations, you just need your player to be aware of them before the campaign starts. Personally, I do not allow Paladins and Monks to switch back to said classes after mixing up and the early levels must be somehow justified by the setting and character backstory. Wizards and Clerics are usually part of greater collectives of learned or indoctrined individuals, levelling in those classes means you must have some sort of connection with said circles and probably some time at your disposal, for the initiation at least. Rangers and Druids demand a specific lifestyle (ignore idiocies like the Urban Ranger, plz), a good GM can easily arbiter if said prerequisites are met by the character. Sorcerers are innate casters and hardly lend themselves to dips still, have your player determine their bloodline and their connection with the world, this alone is usually enough but I also prefer innate caster to give me a rough idea of where they want to bring their characters, mainly to better personalize their gameplay and story, nothing wrong in playing some sort of gish, it can work and be fun (the most important thing), if a bit outside of a 2nd/3.5+ convo. Barbarians are mushrooms.

-The feat system must be heavily tweaked for the 2nd ed feel. Probably the most work-intense part. Any feat that allows a combat maneuver without provoking attacks of opportunity has to go. Everyone should be able to attempt a basic bull rush, disarm or trip. You can, if you want, repurpose some of those to give bonuses to said maneuvers like a specialization but you must also keep in mind they are not creatd equal, statistically, trip trumps all other maneuvers. Anyone should also have access to feats like deadly aim, power attack or lunge and they shouldn't be prerequisite for anything ofc. You can also give everyone basic or less performing versions of the feat and allow the vanilla feats to be taken on level up for the complete effect, point is, everyone should be able to trade accuracy for damage or get an increase in reach if needed. Anyone is able to perform such maneuvers in 2nd Ed, depending on circumstances, locking basic maneuvers under feats is one of the biggest mistakes of the system (and no, being able to perform those with a -4 penalty and provoking an AoO isn't the same) as it lock players into a repetitive and uncreative style, pnp is at its best when you force people to think outside the box (I use a pan from the table to deflect arrows, I swing across the room via the tapestry, I throw a loaf of butter at their feet).

-The spell system is simply different, you must adapt. Most of the rebalances all around, especially if you only consider spells from the core books, are pretty decent. It's a rebalanced 3.5 set and the work done by the early experts can be felt, the spells work much better than earlier editions imho but ofc this also means mages are toned down a notch in power and divine casters are brought up 2 or 3. After many years I learned to apreciate it but it will offend most 2nd ed purists AND there is some broken stuff lying around. Some spells like the very basic Web, are worded in ways that cause extreme confusion and can definitely be abused, in the right circumstances (a tiny or diminutive creature that saves against it, lacks the ability to exit the effects and is forced to save again and again, breaking the design rule of "you save once at first, you're good", dunno if I explained myself here) others are simply broken and clearly the result of some unholy custom spell used in some designer campaign (Scirocco, Ice spears). Grease trumps most level 1 effects and it alongside glitterdust can be upgraded via metamagic. I've seen some ultra sick low level spells build.


If you deal with all that and, believe me, it's doable, you're left with a systm that, in the correct hands, can easily give you dat 2nd Ed feel. The advantages are, the map and Area of Effects rules (huge) the CR system (this would need another post of its own, suffice to say it's a VERY gud thing, for organizing GM's work) and the smoothing of the "linear martials, quadratic casters" curve, it's still there but Fighters and Rogue feel much less useless at higher levels.

[Rinso]

2E always gave me a better, richer, and deeper experience with my friends while 3.5 seemed to be a smoother, more linear, shallower kind of game.

Now, these were the same people playing and DMing the games, so it could have been familiarity bias, but i always had the best games with 2E.

The best description i've heard is the difference between driving a manual and an automatic for 2E and 3.5 though some might disagree. They both get you to the end, but the manual gives you a more engaging and more controlled experience while you arent driving the automatic, you're just steering it.

My go to is dual classed fighter cleric for 2E and i have so much fun, but its just not the same in 3.5 with the enlarge meta.

[WhiteShark]

@J1M have you seen this?
https://sanglorian.github.io/orcus/

29 August 2023: Official launch of 4E-compatible, fully open-licensed Orcus tabletop RPG
After over two years of development, today the Orcus Hero’s Handbook and Orcus Game Master’s Guide have been released on GitHub and DriveThruRPG as free downloads and print-on-demand from Lulu.com.

Orcus is wholly compatible with the fourth edition of the world’s most popular roleplaying game and consists entirely of open content.

Players can combine classes, kits and feats to cover a wide range of character concepts – and thanks to the power system and tactical combat, swashbucklers, tacticians, knights and beastmasters can hold their own alongside demonologists, enchanters, elemental duelists and divinely-inspired priests.

• Print-on-demand copies of the books are available at-cost.
• The game features original and third party content, rather than paraphrasing content from 4E, but it is entirely interoperable with official 4E content.
• Flexible character creation is a priority, with the class, kit and feat subsystems interlocking to allow for a wide range of characters right out of the box. Martial arts, psychic powers, demanding incantations, poisons with out-of-combat functionality and familiars are all included.
• The novel “threats” system makes setting up tactical encounters easy, with a readily available list of level-appropriate terrain features, traps and events for each terrain type. Just add the monsters!

I just stumbled on this so I haven't read it yet but at the very least it seems like it may be an unexpected trove of extra 4E content.

EDIT: Just started reading to see what classes and stuff they added but dang, they went hard woke with the art. Somebody should have warned them that tiny indie expansions for dead RPGs don't get ESG bucks.

► Show Spoiler

[J1M]

Interesting! Artwork aside, would playing the classes they have in a videogame be as compelling as the 4e Fighter and Wizard?

[WhiteShark]

Interesting! Artwork aside, would playing the classes they have in a videogame be as compelling as the 4e Fighter and Wizard?

I've only skimmed it and I haven't played 4E proper in a long time, so it's hard to say, but at any rate it claims to be fully compatible, so they could be run alongside one another or mixed and matched. They had to use different language for copyright reasons so some of the mechanics have different names, but it's all supposed to be 1:1. I'll give a more thorough opinion when I've read more.

[Tweed]

2nd edition is my favorite, but I learned to stop worrying and love the 3.5e as well. Either one works, but 3.5 always felt like a crutch for players who couldn't figure out how to play the non-magic classes most efficiently and always shrieked about quadradic wizards.

[rusty_shackleford]

2E is objectively the best because it maintains the spirit of AD&D while having a large amount of supplemental books to use. It might have hurt 2E at the time, but it has made it age quite well.

[Tweed]

I used to have almost every 2nd edition supplement and it's true, the stack is huge. You'd throw your back if you had to try to lug around. Even as a player it can get pretty burdensome. As a mage I had my own copy of the player's handbook, the handbook of mages, the necromancer's handbook (which is mostly for DMs, but our DM permitted me to have some of the spells), the tome of magic, the chronomaner's handbook (all for one spell), the high level campaign book, and probably a few I'm forgetting. You start to look like your fantasy counterpart, lugging around a stack of tomes to each session.

[Acrux]

2nd edition is my favorite, but I learned to stop worrying and love the 3.5e as well. Either one works, but 3.5 always felt like a crutch for players who couldn't figure out how to play the non-magic classes most efficiently and always shrieked about quadradic wizards.

I feel exactly the same way. Most games I run now are a house-ruled 3.5e and usually with E6 rules.

[Slavic Sorcerer]

Well, I was introduced to 5e (the one before WoTC thought to itself "wowza, mixed race is racist, half-orcs being dum and aggresive is a racist nigger stereotype even though 99.9% of people playing DnD don't see a nigger in a half-orc"), so that's what I'm familiar with.
I like casting spells so the introduction of cantrips is a welcome one

Currently playing the simplest system of all: Xtreme Dungeon Mastery

You have only one stat (or 3 if you really would like it), one dice, and you ether pass the check or not
I think the system is explained in less than 5 pages or something

[WhiteShark]

I like casting spells so the introduction of cantrips is a welcome one

These actually predate 5e. 3.5 sort of had this with reserve feats and 4e had it by default.

Currently playing the simplest system of all: Xtreme Dungeon Mastery

I was not aware this system. Is it related to the DM advice book of the same name?

You have only one stat (or 3 if you really would like it), one dice, and you ether pass the check or not
I think the system is explained in less than 5 pages or something

I can't really enjoy rules-light games. They offload too much work onto the GM and have little in the way of interesting or useful mechanics. Rules are useful.

[Tweed]

Cantrips have existed since 1st edition.

[WhiteShark]

Cantrips have existed since 1st edition.

Typically 5e people mean infinitely repeatable cantrips when they say that. As far as I am aware those didn't appear in any form until 3.5.

[Acrux]

3.5 sort of had this with reserve feats

3.5 definitely had 0-level spells/cantrips, although they weren't unlimited until Pathfinder.

I can't really enjoy rules-light games.

Same. I like some structure. I don't need or want rules for every single scenario or edge case, but so many of the newer OSR rulebooks try to reduce a huge part of the rules. I remember James would say that "if you don't have a feat to do something, then you can't do it", but I've literally never heard of any DM having a rule like that and it's definitely not the way I run games.

[Slavic Sorcerer]

Cantrips have existed since 1st edition.

Typically 5e people mean infinitely repeatable cantrips when they say that. As far as I am aware those didn't appear in any form until 3.5.

That is correct.
I forgot to mention free casting specifically, since "cantrip" for me is just a word for a spell that won't use spell slots and I can spam it to my heart's content.

[WaterMage]

2e is the best edition.

TL;DR list :

• High lethality. No "cr 2" monsters capable of soaking cannon balls like on 5e. Nor high level enemies that aren't threatening.
• Low easy to track numbers
• Class diversity with kits
• Class restrictions on races. Eg - Manlets like Dwarves, Hobbits halflings can't be glorious magic users
• The best settings was written for 2e. Mystara? Dark Sun? Ravenloft/Domains of Dread? Spelljammer? Planescape? A lot of glorious iconic settings comes on 2e. After WoTC bought D&D, the unique memorable setting that we got is Eberron.
• Kits instead of prestige classes
• No BS tier / power spikes
• Multiclass is discouraged.

Now a detailed explanation.

High lethality

I just don't get the point of low lethality on RPG's. Spending long rounds in a single encounter is not fun or engaging. A high lethality game will force the players to be more careful, think more and see enemies as a much bigger threat. Lets pick two level 16 "mages". On 2e, he would have 9d4 + 7 hit points and the maximum con mod is mere +1. At best, he would have on average 9(d4+1) + 7 or 38,5 hp on AVERAGE. on 5e in other hands, the same mage would have 16*d6+16*con mod. And with 18 CON, he would have 120 average hp(16*3,5+16*4). On 2e, Vecna, the demigod Lich in high epic levels had 150 hp. Enemies also has too much hp on 5e. And spells deal and weapons way less damage.

For eg, a Ogre on 2e would have 30 hp on average. On 5e, 59. Virtually the double. An siege weaponry on 5e like a cannon deal 10d6 damage. Meaning that CR 2 creatures can soak a cannon shot. I can get high level legendary creatures soaking siege weapons, but low level monsters? A player, a lv 6 "magic user" also can soak a cannon shot if he has high CON and rolled high on his hit dice rolls. That is insane.

When I see a stream about a lich fight on 2e, and the high level party is at fear, preparing escape plans before they even encounter the lich, laying traps and on 5e, a mid level party had no problem defeating a lich.

NUMBERS

Is much easier to track low numbers than high numbers. Mainly on P&P. The saves are easy to track. hit points and etc too. Many people complain about THAC0, but THAC0 is a simple variable to track. With the optional rule of different AC's for different types of armor, still easy to track. Is not like on 3.5e where you sum +2, +4, +1, +1(...) and if has 4 attacks per turn, has 4 different attack bonuses. Nor like 5e where the difference between a lv 1 hero and a lv 20 hero is just +4/20% more likely to hit.

Same with saves, at very high levels on 3.5e, you have things like DC 30+ VS a FORT save of +23. With 2e saves, you need to roll at least a number of a d20. Much easy to track. Some spells like finger of death makes the enemy do the save at disadvantage of -2. It also makes specializations for magic users more interesting. Since if you wanna a hard to resist finger of death, you must specialize in necromancy. You can't be a generalist wizard with two feats and get a harder to hit spell.

CLASS RESTRICTIONS :

Manlet races should't be allowed to be magic users. When I mean manlet races, think on classes that can't be over 6 feet tall, like halflings, dwarf and so on. Races that are a bit smaller than humans such as elves but some of then can be over six feet are fine. The exception to that rule is gnomes and 2e did it right. Gnomes must be illusionists. Because they are all about creating illusions to steal money from non gnomes.

It is a central point of certain conflicts and reason which some places in Mystara like Glantri threats this manlet races so bad.

2E BROUGHT THE BEST SETTINGS.

Dark Sun, a High fantasy mad max, Ravenloft for horror settings, in many different places(not only Strahd), high fantasy space adventures on spelljammer, sigil city and planar travels on planescape. Mystara with a lot of unique and interesting locations and Immortals instead of Gods? Everything made for 2e. The unique good setting brought by Wizards of the Coast is Eberron. 5e and late stages of 3.5e are extremely focused on Forgotten realms and even worse. In Sword Coast. Which is IMO one of the most boring places to adventure.

CLASSES

Instead of prestige classes used on 3.5e, 2e had the concept of kits. And of course, the DM has entire power to not allow a player to pick any kit, class or whatever. You can multiclass on 2e, but it makes leveling extremely slower. If Red wizards of Thay existed on 2e, they would be magic user kits. Same with sorcerers. In fact, warlocks and witches appeared firstly as a magic user kit on complete wizard's handbook.

NO BS POWER SPIKES / TIERS


5e bought the concept of tiers, from "local heroes" to heroes of the world. Which is completely BS. A lich can be a threat to a small village and be defeated by high level adventurers, high level adventure doesn't need to be save the world adventures. In fact, levels varies a lot among the different "realms". For example, Lord NAsher is extremely powerful in Neverwinter as a lv 12 fighter. A lv 12 fighter in Dark Sun can't even dream on dealing with the servants of the Sorcerers kings. 2e uses "acomplished" to refer to many lv 13~16 casters like Strahd in domains of dread book. What is high level in one adventure can be low level in another. In Mystara, in order to ascend to a Immortal, the PC needs to be at least lv 36.

The first edition decided to establishes that when a magic user reaches lv 11, he gains a "title" of Wizard. It was dropped in the 2e cuz what is a high level in one setting can be a mid level or even low level in another. And other problem of this tiers brought by 4e into 5e, is that it creates huge power spikes. You get more power from lv 4 to 5 than from lv 1 to 4 on 5e. When I asked about low or mid level in a thread, many people used 5e to say that high level sucks and used the tier system of 5e as argument that high level are godlike adventures. This idea of tiers and high level = larger conflict will hurt RPG's from a long time...

The ART of 2e is much better.

Just compare the same module art on 2e and on 5e.

► Strahd on 2e

► Strahd on 5e

[Acrux]

t best, he would have on average 9(d4+1) + 7 or 38,5 hp on AVERAGE

Yuropeon detected. Opinion discarded.

JK, 2e's cool.

[Tweed]

Low lethality is popular now because most people playing are pure avatar players, there's no distinction between who they are and who their character is except it's a mary/gary stu of themselves so they take it personally when they die in one round or really if they die at all.

[Slavic Sorcerer]

Low lethality is popular now because most people playing are pure avatar players, there's no distinction between who they are and who their character is except it's a mary/gary stu of themselves so they take it personally when they die in one round or really if they die at all.

I had it the other way around during my last Descent to Avernus.

One dude from my (former) TT group had beef with me.
Nothing specific, we just didn't share the vibes and interests.

At least that's the current theory. He is friends with my bf, and even he doesn't know what was wrong.
The dude was like that when we met, I acknowledged we won't be friends.

He didn't see my Cleric, that shared the deity and similar backstory with his Paladin (not intentional, we just hade the same idea considering the campaign), as a character I played, but as me specifically.
Instead of having nice interactions between the characters, he chose to be stingy, snarky, and kinda toxic overall; even more than outside the campaign.

This went for a few weeks, with me barely entertaining his behavior, until I had enough

As for low lethality - I see nothing wrong with a healthy dose of escapism.
It's nice to be the main character with a sprinkle of plot armor for 4-5h from time to time.

I enjoy the process of creating a character, and I would be pissed too if a character I've spent hours writing and creating ref sheet for them died session 1 round 0.

I guess it all boils down to the compromise between the GM's vision and the Players' wishes.

While I would be happy to craft a campaign that includes the Players' backstories (so low lethality unless asked for it), I would probably kick out a Player that has a tantrum because an NPC doesn't find them attractive, like them, or because they had to struggle for a moment

[Tweed]

Nothing's worse than players who can't leave it at the table.

[WhiteShark]

I enjoy the process of creating a character, and I would be pissed too if a character I've spent hours writing and creating ref sheet for them died session 1 round 0.

That's the problem. Characters shouldn't take that long to make. People write these voluminous manuscripts for their as yet totally unplayed level 1 paper men and get absurdly invested before they've even done anything. I'm not saying you shouldn't care about your character at all, but they should develop organically at the table. Writing the equivalent of The Odyssey for your backstory is the narrative version of planning your build from one to twenty prior to session one.

I'm guilty of this, too, so I speak from experience. I once wrote a whole homebrew nation into my character's backstory inside an established setting. Boy did I feel silly when the game lasted all of two sessions before collapsing.

[WaterMage]

I remember when watched a Dark Sun stream in 5e.

• Pronouns in char sheets
• Lv 1 wiz spamming firebolt left and right(maigc is hated and should be used discretely in Athas)
• They fought 7 templars + 2 half giants at lv 1 and won with zero casualties
• They found a democratic progressist city state in Athas ruled by ... I'm not joking A female DWARF PRESERVER!!!
• They got a sandship at lv 1 and proceded to explore the world with no worries asbout supplies and water

IDK what happened next. They are clearly playing Desert Fantasy Commiefornia and not Dark Sun.

Such travesty would be IMPOSSIBLE in 2e or 3e.

Characters shouldn't take that long to make. People write these voluminous manuscripts for their as yet totally unplayed level 1 paper men and get absurdly invested before they've even done anything. I'm not saying you shouldn't care about your character at all, but they should develop organically at the table.

Well said. No need to write novels and novels for a low level nobody.

[Slavic Sorcerer]

Writing the equivalent of The Odyssey for your backstory is the narrative version of planning your build from one to twenty prior to session one.

Heh, for me it's also part of the process
I learned it really streamlines the "Level Up" part of the session.
Oftentimes I was just sitting there, while the rest of the table was bashing their brains picking an option

I never deluded myself I would reach level 20, but it was fun to plan ahead.

I enjoy the process of creating a character, and I would be pissed too if a character I've spent hours writing and creating ref sheet for them died session 1 round 0.

That's the problem. Characters shouldn't take that long to make. People write these voluminous manuscripts for their as yet totally unplayed level 1 paper men and get absurdly invested before they've even done anything. I'm not saying you shouldn't care about your character at all, but they should develop organically at the table.

I do approach writing my character as If I was writing a novel with this character as the main focus
Backstory, motivations, goals, character traits etc
Then sketches, then a "promo art" + maybe a ref sheet with spells - which probably took the most of my time creating a character

In my case it's a motivation to even pick a tablet and draw something, open the word document and write a story no matter how short it is.
Something I started lacking in recent years.

My GM praised me for being invested in his sessions, which in turn motivated him too. It was also an intel for him how to approach my character and what things could be fun to include

I guess the root of the problem is not how much time you invest creating a character, but how attached to the character you are.
Yeah, I admitted I would be pissed, but things that were created during the process I can later use to fill my portfolio.

[Slavic Sorcerer]

I remember when watched a Dark Sun stream in 5e.

• Pronouns in char sheets
• Lv 1 wiz spamming firebolt left and right(maigc is hated and should be used discretely in Athas)
• They fought 7 templars + 2 half giants at lv 1 and won with zero casualties
• They found a democratic progressist city state in Athas ruled by ... I'm not joking A female DWARF PRESERVER!!!
• They got a sandship at lv 1 and proceded to explore the world with no worries asbout supplies and water

IDK what happened next. They are clearly playing Desert Fantasy Commiefornia and not Dark Sun.

Such travesty would be IMPOSSIBLE in 2e or 3e.

Yeah, normies and wokies invaded the space they criticized for decades prior
Calling us nerds and pulling wedgies for simply having fun with math and dice

If a Player handed me a chart with pronouns on it, I would kick the Player off the table. They made pronouns politicized, and it has no place when I'm the GM
Same would go for tranny characters. With so many spells and abilities in Faerun, trannies wouldn't exist; you would just Polymorph the bitch or some shit

While I'm okay with low lethality, I'm not with unbalanced encounters - which party of 1lvls facing 7 templars and 2 half giants is.

>Magic is hated
>spams firebolt
Yeah, that's the book definition of Mary Sue/Gary Stue - no consequences for their actions

Cant comment on sandship. I never had a campaign with other means of transportation than a horse - and just for the sake of justifying fast travel to focus on more important matters
Our GM also threw of supplies and ammo during his sessions, claiming he preferred to not to focus on tracking everything and focus on the story

It's not everyone's cup of tea, I get it, but again - Players' and GM's wishes.

[WaterMage]

I'm not with unbalanced encounters

I think that if the PC's where stupid to throw themselves into a no win situation If I'm the DM, I would't protect them from themselves. The party trying to find information and plan a strategy to face a much more dangerous enemy also can be interesting.

One of the hardest encounters which I had in my old 3.5e group was when my party got too cocky by being high level, pissed off a noble and the noble hided assassins to hunt us down. The assassins waited till we where out of spell slots and just tried to kill us with longbows + poisoned arrows which attacked us while we where sleeping while hidden by a gnome illusionist buffing him and when we managed to find them, their gnome trowed a freaking anti magical field from a scroll given by the noble as our party was mostly casters, we had no option but to run till we got alway from the anti magical field and them our druid shapeshifted and ran alway, our paladin died from poison, I as a Wizard trying to hide in the grass while severely wounded. The party sorcerer also died and din't inflicted a single point of damage on them.

Hunting them down after it and discovering who hired them was a huge adventure.

---------------------------------

Anyway, people where talking about the linear martial X quadratic caster but this is only hafl truth. Sure, is a big problem in 3e, but in 2e, caster power level is tied to the campaign.

What I mean by that? Being a Wizard in Athas is extremely hard, spell scrolls are extremely rare, reagents for spells too. And as magic is hated, he needs to disguise his spells as psionics. Preparing spells is another hell. The sourcebook Preservers & Defilers : The Wizards of Athas introduces the Shadow Wizard which can prepare spells natural energy, by connecting with the shadowfell. There is a problem, this is too dangerous and he literally can die while preparing spells.

So if I'm playing a mage in Athas, I do expect a extremely hard time. Now, a Wizard in Glantri(Mystara) will have a much easier time.

You can expect a lv 12 wizard in Glantri to have lots of magical items and a entire arsenal of spells to cast. If the Athasian Wizard in other hands have in his spellbook a single tier 6 spell, he is extremely lucky.

Now, in 3.5e, Wizards get spells by merely leveling up. If the DM don't wanna you to have stoneskin in 2E, you will never find a scroll of stoneskin. In 3e, you can pick stoneskin as leveling up. That is as broken as allowing fighters to magically materialize weapons and armor with any propriety that he wanna as longs have certain constraints.

[Slavic Sorcerer]

I'm not with unbalanced encounters

I think that if the PC's where stupid to throw themselves into a no win situation If I'm the DM, I would't protect them from themselves. The party trying to find information and plan a strategy to face a much more dangerous enemy also can be interesting.

One of the hardest encounters which I had in my old 3.5e group was when my party got too cocky by being high level, pissed off a noble and the noble hided assassins to hunt us down. The assassins waited till we where out of spell slots and just tried to kill us with longbows + poisoned arrows which attacked us while we where sleeping while hidden by a gnome illusionist buffing him and when we managed to find them, their gnome trowed a freaking anti magical field from a scroll given by the noble as our party was mostly casters, we had no option but to run till we got alway from the anti magical field and them our druid shapeshifted and ran alway, our paladin died from poison, I as a Wizard trying to hide in the grass while severely wounded. The party sorcerer also died and din't inflicted a single point of damage on them.

Hunting them down after it and discovering who hired them was a huge adventure.

That sounds exciting
I can already see a good story brewing from that point. It does look like the main turn to the actual story of revenge (for something the party inflicted upon themselves, but that's even better)
Anti-magical field was such a dick move expected of assassins, I like it


My party for 5e was made of a Gnome Ranger (with min/maxed build made by her boyfriend, she wasn't useful that much as it was her first DnD), her boyfriend-and-dickhead-I-mentioned Zariel Tiefling Paladin, a Halfling Eldritch Knight, my boyfriend as a Half-Orc Zealot Barbarian, and me as the Divine Soul Sorcerer (posing as a Cleric, but I changed classes later on as a part of the story).

Our encounters looked like this: my first turn was to cast Bless on everyone, and then either heal, Guiding Bolt the main target, CC crowds, or reroll dice.
Outside of combat, I was the face of the party (the Paladin did not have proficiency with Persuasion or Deception) and was the one, most of the time, to gain intel

And our combat was cool. GM had fun throwing enemies at us, cause we had good strategy

Turns out their combat skills drastically fell off once they lost their Bless-and-Heal bot

I was told they were decimated by one banshee scream, after which they paused the campaign and started another

[WaterMage]

When a 5e high level caster sees a 3.5e high level caster.