Flaws of 3.5 and how to improve them

a friend of mine used to dm 3.5 for a group of friends including me

after we were all busy for two years, he decided to once again make dm for us, but not on vanilla 3.5, but rather on a homebrew improved 3.5

he and i are currently trying to improve 3.5 and basically writing a new system loosely based on 3.5

so heres my question :
What are your guys biggests complaints about 3.5 ? How could those be adressed ? And what things from other tabletop rpgs could be implemented ?

Asking you fa/tg/uys here because we personally only played 3.5 and pathfinder and wanted some other peoples experiences too

Play something else. Anything else. Literally any other fucking system.

well what would you recommend for a mid 19th century high fantasy setting then ?

7th Sea.
Blades in the Dark.

What do you wanna focus on?

Combat and fighting with high action? Try 4e instead.

Managing companies and armies/nations? REIGN.

Adventure/Exploration/The Unknown? Probably something like Dungeon World though you might wanna look into other variants of the PbtA games.

If you just straight up want a toolbox to work with there's multiple games too. GURPS is one though if you absolutely NEED a d20 Mutants and Masterminds is there.

...

>PbtAdo you by any chance have a link to a mutants and masterminds pdf collection ?

The flaws of 3.5 are the FOUNDATION of the system.
Even the most basic mechanics, like the disctinction between standard actions and full-round actions, contribute to caster supremacy. The only way to fix 3.5 would be to rebuild it from the ground up.

To make a long story short: the best way to improve 3.5e is to upgrade to 5e. 5e is WotC learning from the mistakes of the past. 3.5e was an incoherent and unbalanced mess, a lot of people feel 4e was soulless, 5e is an improvement on all fronts. The only flaw I'd say is that the skills allow for less customization than in 3.5e.

But back to your original question: homebrew-fixing 5e. The biggest problem IMO is the balance between martials and (full) casters. At lower levels it's okay, but at higher levels martials are limited to underwhelming attacks (and most of them can't even full attack) while the casters can throw around fire and lightning.

My suggested fix for this is pretty easy:
>Ban all martial classes from core except the barbarian
>Use the Lion Totem variant barbarian in lieu of the core barbarian (lion totem barbarians get full attacks on all attacks, even if they have moved that turn)
>Replace the fighter, paladin and monk with warblade, crusader and swordsage respectively (all classes from Tome of Battle)
>Replace the rogue with the Beguiler (PHB II if I'm not mistaken).

There! All the old archetypes are still present and everyone can feel useful! Warblades, Crusaders, Swordsages and Beguilers fulfill the same roles as Fighters, Paladin, Monks and Rogues respectively except they're more versatile and stronger. Barbarians are solid, but adding auto-full attack makes them viable gore machines in melee. The casters will still outshine them, but they won't trivialze them. Everyone will feel useful.

Why resolve monks with swordsages? Swordsages suck at hand-to-hand combat. Otherwise why call them swordsages? Also why not just ban the casters when they're the classes unbalancing everything and forcing everyone to become re-fluffed wizards.

> Also why not just ban the casters when they're the classes unbalancing everything and forcing everyone to become re-fluffed wizards.
Because casters are half the problem. Casters are too strong and martials are too weak, even in vacumm.

The best way to play 3.5 is to ban ALL the core classes and only use Psionics+Tome of Battle+and some of the "focused" vancian casters like Warmage, Healer, Dread Necromancer, and Beguiler.
>Why resolve monks with swordsages? Swordsages suck at hand-to-hand combat.
Unarmed variant+shadow hand.

>Why resolve monks with swordsages?
Because there's literally an unarmed swordsage variant.

>Swordsages suck at hand-to-hand combat
So do monks.

>Also why not just ban the casters when they're the classes unbalancing everything and forcing everyone to become re-fluffed wizards.
Because you do not make a marathon more exciting by cutting off everyone's legs. You make it more exciting by only inviting those who are good runners.

>Ban all core classes and only allow overpowered psionics, tomee of weaboo fightin Magic, and retarded wizards.
Yeah. You just accomplished making the game not D&D.
Or you could just play lower levels or just cut back a little on the giant monster battles being solved by the quantum wizard.

>overpowered psionics
Psionics isn't overpowered. In fact it's the most balanced and fun magic system to come out of D&D.

>Or you could just play lower levels or just cut back a little on the giant monster battles being solved by the quantum wizard.
You mean E6? Because E6 is the shit.
10/10, would low fantasy again.

>Psionic boosts his strength by 20 and beats the fighter's strength checks.
>Psionic boosts his dexterity by 20 and out-stealthy the rogue
>Psionic boosts his constitution by 20 and survives the 2,000 ft fall.
>Psionic boosts his intelligence by 20 and suddenly out-classes the wizard on all knowledge checks
>Psionic boosts his wisdom by 20 and can heal himself with a impossible DC heal check
>Psionic boosts his charisma by 20 and convinces the dragon to fuck off.
Yeah. Balanced.

>Psionic character temporarily gets a bonus equivalent to common spell that doesn't stack with a common magic item, and most likely won't help them pass a check unless that stat is already high enough to beat the check anyway.
>he also spends a LIMITED powers known and power points to do a bunch a shit a simple ass magic item could have done ages ago.

Also, by the time a "Psionic"(Bear in mind only 2 classes get animal affinity. A varaition of Psion and a Warrior without spending a feat) can boost his abilities that high with a power.
>Everyone else most likely has similar stats via magic items that last all day long. The bonus does not stack.
>The rogue has cloaks of invisibility and stealth ranks.
>Everyone else can already do that
>The Wizard was already passing all his knowledge checks, and can easily discern what their fighting anyway
>The cleric could do that like 10 levels ago because SPELLS
>everyone else with a charisma/diplomacy focus could have done that 10 levels ago.
You're retarded. You know what, play 5e. You deserve it.

Nah. By that time he'll just mind control the party into giving up all of their magic items and they can't do shit against a DC 45 will save due to boosting his stats and skills up the wazoo because "I thought hard enough".

>an't do shit against a DC 45 will save due to boosting his stats and skills up the wazoo because "I thought hard enough".
And by that time the party already has immunity to mind effecting effects by the time he can boost his stats that high.

Also this fun little bit
> If you choose to increase the ability you use to manifest powers, you do not gain the benefit of an increased ability score long enough to gain any bonus power points for a high ability score, but the save DCs of your powers increase for the duration of this power.

So that also doesn't work, at all.

>, but the save DCs of your powers increase for the duration of this power.
Wait I fucked up, the DC is boosted. But the rest of my point still stands.

Why are people so psionicphobic?
It's a fun thing man.

Because people forget that you can't use more points than you have manifester level.

Poeple don't treat SR=PR despite the book saying BAD SHIT WILL HAPPEN IF YOU DON'T DO THAT.


Backlash from earlier editions where Psionics were overpowered.


Splatbookphobia, which is strange given all of 3.5's balanced content is in splats.

3e was always "not D&D".

The only reason to play 3.5 at this point is the nostalgia and charm of it. The characterfulness, warts and all.

If you're gonna try to scrape the warts off, just play something actually good instead. Hell, if you insist on 'good but still D&D' try 5.0.

I have been DMing 3/3.5 for over a decade and rarely do my casters reign supreme until after 15th level. I even do away with casting times on 90% of combat spells and they don't lord over the fighter or rogue til they get chain lightning or meteor swarm. The way my players tend to play them is all around support instead of DPS.

Run E6.

Or at higher levels, use the Magic Item Compendium, use the WBL guidelines as a minimum, and be fucking MagicMart with the loot availability and stores. Have the party shop in the City of Brass or the like.
This because lot of caster supremacy is in the combination of having "I cast whoopass" and "I cast solve problem" as class features taken for granted, such as casting Resist Energy of the type of your choice while everyone else discusses who gets to wear the cloak of fire resistance. MagicMart alleviates this issue to some extent by letting everyone else say "I open a can of whoopass" and "I bought protection from problem".

"I'm gonna fix the flaws of 3.5!" is a such a common doomed starement that it honestly reads like a joke after decades of hearing it. Try playing literally any other game; 3.5 is broken shit and you can't fix it.

>people think the caster problem in 3.5 is DPS
>DPS SPELLS AT THAT
This board really is retarded holy shit, no wonder you have such terrible experiences with 3.5.

>I even do away with casting times on 90% of combat spells and they don't lord over the fighter or rogue til they get chain lightning or meteor swarm.

I was going to say that's retarded because meteor swarm sucks and the fighter sucks worse if he lets meteor swarm lord it over him, but on second thought, I think perhaps God has blessed you with incredibly anti-munchkin players. Be grateful for this.

You could look up Trailblazer OP, it wasn't perfect but it seems like a decent base to start from and the guys that wrote it seemed to have some understanding of math, and even showed their work and detailed the reasoning behind the changes they made.

What I do when asked to run 3e unprepared is this:
-all good saves on warrior classes
-monk merged into fighter as an ass-patch, abilities scale with level and INT and work with armor and weapons
-base AC improves with BAB, armor gives damage reduction, crits go through armor
-no class or cross-class skills, buy what you want
-every character has a profession, which is a set of skills that improve in rank every time he gains a level
-no UMD, different classes can use all appropriate magic items by default, for example fighters can use offensive wands and rogues can use illusions and detect trap

Feats and core casters need to be reworked completely because they are so shit. I usually do that according to what the group prefers so I don't have a single unified patch list, but the best quick solution for core casters is simply to ban them. For feats, I usually rule that they give you a repeatable xp-powered reroll to whatever they modify.

>The wizard/cleric/druid was already doing that and more 10 levels ago

I would post the thing about POWER POINT LIMITS that everyone who whines about psionics seems unaware of, but Animal Affinity can ONLY give a +4 to an ability score.

Reason:
>Augment

For every 5 additional power points you spend, this power grants a +4 enhancement bonus to another ability.

>+4 enhancement bonus to another ability.
>another ability.
>enhancement bonus

No, Psionics are significantly more balanced than core spellcasting.

>>Psionic boosts his intelligence by 20 and suddenly out-classes the wizard on all knowledge checks
That will certainly save him when the wizard teleports him into the sun

Savage Worlds

I like 3.5, too, user. But it doesn't work for guns n shit.

>I have been DMing 3/3.5 for over a decade and rarely do my casters reign supreme until after 15th level. I even do away with casting times on 90% of combat spells and they don't lord over the fighter or rogue til they get chain lightning or meteor swarm.

I smell a 6d8 Large Giant with regeneration.

>5e is WotC learning from the mistakes of the past.

You mean abandoning the lessons of 4e, overreacting to the lessons of 3.5, pandering to grognards who don't give a fuck about new editions, and pandering to SJWs?

5e is a decent game but it is still made by Wizards of the Coast. Lack f competition has made them suck complete shit at game design. They bring in 20 year old concepts and act as though they were new.

How.

>pandering to SJWs

boo fucking hop there's a black chick in my wizards and elf book

kill yourself

>and pandering to SJWs
You are seriously anal devastated by the presence of one paragraph in the book that, ultimately, amounts to "this is a game of imagination, so be imaginative as you like".

>abandoning the lessons of 4e
Would you care to elaborate on that? I'll also admit that I've never played 4e so please keep that in mind. Hence why I said that "a lot of people feel" 4e was soulless, I'm withholding my own judgement.

Enhancement bonuses don't stack either way so I'm not sure what your point is.

Oh look, it's another "I'm a fuckwit so psionics is unbalanced" post.

Hint: Psions can't do any of the boosts you listed. That's not how animal affinity works.

Hint 2: Even if animal affinity did work that way, you'd still need to be epic level to do it, because it's +4 for 5 points.

Hint 3: Even if animal affinity did work that way and you were epic level, those boosts still wouldn't do what you describe.

4e massively improved spellcasting structure and AC bonus. 5e just went to this weird bounded accuracy thing. Which is fine but I'd prefer something midway between 5e and 4e

Most of 4th was wack imo but it had some good ideas.

That was his point. That is a faggot and a retard because he's whining about a thing that psions cannot do, at all, ever at any level, because enhancement bonuses do not stack.

You missed the part where flags and trannies now have RAW ammo against the GM to force their sexuality center stage.

I don't give a fuck about black chicks in the book, WTF? that's been in DnD for years, eg Ember the monk from 3.5.

This. Some players are just not into mechanics, they just want to cast the cool spells. Not crunch the numbers to see that the best spells are not the especially flashy ones.

Oh ok. I misunderstood then.

My main issue with psionics is interactivity with magic. Psion absolutely BTFO monsters by ignoring their SR. And used his chameleon power like greater invisibility. See invisibility didn't do shit.

Of course the DM barely knew the rules so he tapered off Gming because this guy kept soloing the entire game. And unlike in my other group they'd just fly off and fight shit by themselves instead of maybe bringing some of us along. Thy even got fucked up by large numbers wen their SoDs failed but they still didn't learn their Goddamn lesson.

>My main issue with psionics is interactivity with magic. Psion absolutely BTFO monsters by ignoring their SR.
By default it does though. The XPH even says that "you can have Psionic Powers ignore SR, but it's a bad idea".
>Though not explicitly called out in the spell descriptions or magic item descriptions, spells, spell-like abilities, and magic items that could potentially affect psionics do affect psionics.

Futa elves have been canon since 1E

You poor dear, assraped by fags and trannies since the tender age of 29 and now forced to watch them in your escapist fantasy too. Because a DM can't ignore the rulebooks and people haven't been roleplaying fags and trannies for decades already without WotC's express written permission.

ctrl+f for pdf share thread

Futa elves aren't SJW, you nonce, futa brings things together instead of tearing them apart.

Try Savage Worlds, it works for anything, and if you really start to get into hombrewing it, google for Zadmar's Savage World Stuff.

Zadmar has a collection of small PDF books explaining how to hombrew all kinds of things about the system in a way without breaking the balance. The other half of his stuff is about ready made house rules and examples of how to best utilize the vanilla magic system and such.

It's all really useful and he understands the system like noone else. On that page there are also all kinds of simulators for combat. If you are not sure something you did is balanced, you can try to put it through his simulators and that things is going to test out your stuff against all kinds of enemies in 10s of thousands of rounds.

Even if you don't like Savage Worlds, I think itself and Zadmar's stuff can really help you understand the inner workings of systems in general and how to design them.

Alternatively, try out GURPS for a System that has EVERYTHING. It literaly comes with anything and the kitchen sink, all the while only using one easy to remeber core mechanic from which all other mechanics build. GURPS is more of a toolbox to build your own than a ready made game, at the cost of having a lot of frontloaded work for a newbie GM to actually build it and help the players build chars. It's basically the "for advanced use only" system out there.

5e really isn't like 3.5 or pathfinder. It's more like 2e, but revamped and streamlined.

>5e

>Not imposing a PG-13 rating at your table
>Inviting faggots who can't keep it in their pants to your table in the first place

The rulebooks have never once stopped me from not inviting / kicking out faggots before and they certainly wont now.

The smaller increments of 5e are way better than 4e. Super powers from class features = good, super powers from numbers only = bad.