Not counting computer games, of course.

Yesterday was our first gaming session playing 3.5.  We played for about 6-7 hours, and had 3rd level characters.  I played an archer cleric (with zen archery), and we had a barbarian, bard, fighter, and rogue.  The adventure was Forge of Fury.  Most notable moment?  We found the chimney with smoke coming out, plugged it, and waited for whoever was in the caverns below to come out and investigate.

1st group were 6 orcs.  When they got to the chimney, we ambushed them and killed them quickly.  Then hid the bodies.  2nd group: 6 more orcs.  Same thing.  3rd group?  12 orcs with a leader and organized.  We managed to kill them too.  I'm hoping that means we thinned out the occupants in the actual rooms, and don't have a DM that will just respawn them ala Gauntlet

Impressions?  Combat moved a lot slower than we're used to because we had to keep looking at a lot of modifiers each turn for all kinds of stuff.  I suspect that will quicken when we get more used to the rules.

We ignored a lot of the more tactical rules, like keeping track of exact movement, etc.  In fact, we didn't use a grid at all and just winged it.

The most "powerful" classes so far in combat were the fighter and barbarian.  The fighter by far because he had plate mail and a shield and could never get hit, and both were dealing out more damage than anyone else.  Maybe we'll see this big shift at higher levels. Who knows.  But traditionally we retire characters long before they reach super high level (by name level in AD&D) so who knows.  With 4 1st and 2 2nd level spells, I certainly didn't feel anywhere near as powerful as the other two.  But I didn't dwell on it either.  I noticed we paid more attention to the flavor of our characters rather than keeping track of who was better in what situation.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;560345Impressions?  Combat moved a lot slower than we're used to (...)

Just to be able to put that into perspective: what were you used to?

The combat speeds up once you got the system down.  The real key is what suppliments and options you let in.

Quote from: Dirk Remmecke;560360Just to be able to put that into perspective: what were you used to?

D&D wise?  AD&D.  With 3e, everyone was, "OK, I'm going to use X feat, which is + this and + that, then since I'm over here, I get + this, but I'm doing action Y, so - to that.  OK, now I roll and add and subtract everything."

Quote from: Sacrosanct;560378D&D wise?  AD&D.  With 3e, everyone was, "OK, I'm going to use X feat, which is + this and + that, then since I'm over here, I get + this, but I'm doing action Y, so - to that.  OK, now I roll and add and subtract everything."

I've had whole combats finish up faster than one 3.x round.

How long did it take you to create a character? I've only had one 3.5 experience, and character creation took about 2 hours (and I never actually finished). Never actually played the game.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;560345The most "powerful" classes so far in combat were the fighter and barbarian.  The fighter by far because he had plate mail and a shield and could never get hit, and both were dealing out more damage than anyone else.  Maybe we'll see this big shift at higher levels.

Don't worry, according to the 3.5 experts, the Fighter will become completely irrelevant at 5th level.  Let us know when it happens.

Quote from: CRKrueger;560386Don't worry, according to the 3.5 experts, the Fighter will become completely irrelevant at 5th level.  Let us know when it happens.

Obviously, the Wizard hasn't cast charm on every NPC and monster in the campaign world yet.

Quote from: StormBringer;560389Obviously, the Wizard hasn't cast charm on every NPC and monster in the campaign world yet.

N00b

Quote from: StormBringer;560382I've had whole combats finish up faster than one 3.x round.

To be fair 3.0 is far faster than 3.5. I never knew anybody to run 3.5 gridless tell me how it works out.

Everloss, takes me around 30 minutes but that's because I mostly play wizards, sorcerers, clerics, and gish concepts like Pathfinder's Magus.

Quote from: CRKrueger;560390N00b

I am working on it.

I am having my Druid wildshape into an Ancient Dire Vampiric Demonic Draco-lich.  Do I win?

Quote from: Marleycat;560392To be fair 3e is far faster than 3.5. I never knew anybody to run 3.5 gridless tell me how it works out.

I'm fairly convinced this is almost not possible.  I have heard people who have done it, people whom I trust and respect, but I would have a difficult time with it personally.  Unless I ran it like AD&D, but that would require a lot of guesstimating on my part for AoO, line of sight, blast radii, and so forth.  I'm comfortable running combat like that, but I can see how it would conflict with the various fiddly bits in 3.x combat.

That roughly matches my experience of 3.0 ed D&D, which I played twice in the level 1-4 range.  

I thought in general it worked pretty well compared to my AD&D1e experience. I liked having more options for individualizing characters, and having an actual skill system.  

In my first game, I played Sorcerer with one level of Fighter, and that single Fighter level was damn useful.  There was some tension as the DM reacted to my multi-classing as being a rules-lawyer / char-op-er / whatever - but it wasn't a huge deal.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;560378D&D wise?  AD&D.  With 3e, everyone was, "OK, I'm going to use X feat, which is + this and + that, then since I'm over here, I get + this, but I'm doing action Y, so - to that.  OK, now I roll and add and subtract everything."

Yup, that is a drawback. 3.x/Pathfinder is slower than earlier versions. I cannot deny that.

Quote from: StormBringer;560389Obviously, the Wizard hasn't cast charm on every NPC and monster in the campaign world yet.

Obviously the player is clueless and doesn't know the "rules". Also the DM an asshole.

@Jeff, I concur but experience with the system helps alot.  But no matter what 0/1/2e are faster.