Which D&D system do you prefer?
Akerhon
Member, Translator (NDA) Posts: 614
Which D&D system do you prefer? ^.^
I personally prefer the third, and perhaps D&D Next for BG3.
I personally prefer the third, and perhaps D&D Next for BG3.
- Which D&D system do you prefer?347 votes
- AD&D second edition51.59%
- D&D third edition38.04%
- D&D fourth edition3.46%
- D&D NEXT6.92%
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Comments
And honestly I would pick 2nd ed over 3ed if you start including all the ridiculous and bizarre source books you could get. Wotc were pretty aware of this though. As one of them said recently on thier design philosophy for d&d next:
"People would turn up to a session as a 'shardmind seeker' and nobody else but them would know what the hell that was."
The diversity of potential classes and races came at the detriment of the more iconic, and better designed ones.
But yah, definitely 2nd edition! Both for tabletop gaming and computer games.
But the third edition is done far better.
I vote for 3.5. It has a logical system (unlike 2nd Edition with seemingly random modifiers attached to random stats) but doesn't descend into generic videogamery (which I felt 4th Ed did a lot...if only by defining enemies by category like "striker" or "artillery"). The giant jumble of sourcebooks does allow for ridiculous powergaming, but if you stick to the Core plus Complete books, the system seems to work very well the vast majority of the time, despite some class design faults.
Pathfinder fixes those faults and tries to introduce a 'simpler' system (introducing the Combat Maneuver check was v. smart) but it fell into the same trap as the system it's based on. With a vast list of archetypes and their associated abilities, backgrounds, traits and flaws you can powergame and unbalance your character even more than in 3.5 while requiring way more bookkeeping. Core vs Core though, Pathfinder is the stronger edition.
Yes, there were a number of classes (paladin being the main offender) that had all their weight in the first few levels. Other classes (sorcerer, wizard) had no reason to stay in the class at ALL, save for familiar bonusses (and a feeew bonus feats for a wizard). Any prestige class that gave full caster progression was automaticly better than Wizard or Sorcerer due to the lack of anything special in the class itself.
Other classes (monk) pretty much had to go all the way in the class or they'd be useless.
Pathfinder did fix most of these issues.
4th has its advantages, but my two groups have been in it from the start... and we're still in our first campaigns, before epic levels! So yea, fights get dragged out way too long, but at least it's playable.
I never got around to Pathfinder because 4th takes too long.
Hopefully D&D Next will strike a nice balance.
Regards to 3e, you know something is wrong with the mechanics when you have to release hundreds of 'prestige classes' in an attempt to rectify the wonky multiclassing.
4e catches a lot of flak and I think it's largely unjustified. The biggest criticism is that it was too combat oriented which I find laughable as the roleplaying elements should not require extensive rules outside of skill checks (IMO). Personally I thought the classes were very well conceived, and different enough to warrant their existence.
Multiclassing was diluted down in 4e, yes, but after 3e people had forgotten what multiclassing was supposed to be. In 2e you don't play a Fighter/Thief because your character spends half his time bashing stuff in, and the other half is spent skulking about and stealing. A Fighter/Thief is supposed to play like a different class - it's a lightly armoured fighter with skills but cannot and should not be used on the front line. In 4e they turned the more popular multiclass combos into real classes and/or paragon/epic paths.
See Temple of Elemental Evil as a prime example.
I'd like to say that all D&D systems can be useful as long as the DM and players are flexible about some rules and are willing to make changes to them to enhance their game.
I paged through the 4e books, but it changed too many things in a way I didn't appreciate, so I never got into it.
D&D Next, however, is interesting. It's simple, modular, and provides a lot of the same customization from 3e. Its customization also feels thematically interesting, which I like. I'll be interested to see how it turns out in the final release, although I do think that Wizards will be making a mistake if they don't make at least the basic rules available online for free.
D&D Next gets my vote, although I play Pathfinder almost exclusively.