Player's Handbook, Version 3.5 (Dungeon & Dragons Roleplaying Game: Core Rules) (Hardcover)

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

This Revised Edition (also called 3.5) of one-third of the Dungeons & Dragons trinity of core rulebooks (the other two being The Dungeon Master's Guide and The Monster Manual) contains errata, rules updates, and outright changes to the already-published Third Edition rules. The majority of changes are made in a quest for the holy grail of game rules: balance. To prevent boredom and enable creative choices, no single ability, spell, character class, or weapon should have an overwhelming advantage over another. So what has changed?

• The spells Harm, Heal, and Haste have been toned down. Other spells have been adjusted or renamed.
• Weapons are classified by the Size of the intended wielder, not the size of the individual weapons. A noteworthy effect of this new weapon size system is that Small characters can wield small-size greatswords, longswords, longspears (with reach), and other two-handed weapons.
• Classes have been tweaked. Bards and rangers received the most changes.
• New feats have been added (some original, some from the builder books), and some feats have been altered (a Power Attack now gives double benefit for two-handed weapons).
• Redundant skills have been rolled into one (such as sense motive and read lips) while others have been renamed (such as "wilderness lore" becoming "survival"). Skill synergies have been expanded and knowledge skills now include appropriate monster lore.

In addition to outright rules changes and tweaks, much of the core rule content has been clarified and updated with 3E errata. The combat section, in particular, is organized much better. Even the dreaded grapple rules are now relatively clear. A much-appreciated import from the D&D Miniatures game are new and simple rules for cover and line of sight, as well as clear photographic illustrations of the concepts of facing, attacks of opportunity, and reach.

All in all, 3.5 is a welcome update. The typographical errors are forgivable, given the extent of the update. The new options available to players (in the form of new class features and feats) make the play experience more fun. Veterans will enjoy re-learning the game they love and exploring all the new character possibilities. Perhaps more importantly, they'll find that introducing new gamers to the admittedly formidable D&D ruleset is easier with 3.5 than it was with 3E--call it a +2 circumstance bonus. --Mike Fehlauer

Product Description

Endless adventure and untold excitement await! Prepare to venture forth with your bold compaions into a world of heroic fantasy. Within these pages, you'll discover all the tools and options you need to create characters worthy of song and legend for the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game.

The revised Player's Handbook is the definitive rulebook for the Dungeons & Dragons game. It contains complete rules for the newest edition and is an essential purchase for anyone who wants to play the game.

The revised Player's Handbook received revisions to character classes to make them more balanced, including updates to the bard, druid, monk, paladin, and ranger. Spell lists for characters have been revised and some spell levels adjusted. Skills have been consolidated somewhat and clarified. A larger number of feats have been added to give even more options for character customization in this area. In addition, the new and revised content instructs players on how to take full advantage of the tie-in D&D miniatures line planned to release in the fall of 2003 from Wizards of the Coast, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Wizards of the Coast; 3.5 edition (July 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0786928867
• ISBN-13: 978-0786928866
• Product Dimensions: 10.9 x 8.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (127 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #9,472 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

251 of 270 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars I'd like to address issues raised in other reviews, June 3, 2004

By	M. Spielman (Albuquerque, NM United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

My gaming group has switched to edition 3.5 mainly becuase we started adding new players, and the 3.0 books were no longer available. Also, I'd been rough on my 3.0 books and they were falling apart. It was a matter of convenience.

It is not a perfect system. As a matter of fact, it's only margionally "better" than the 3.0 game it's replaced. It is not a new edition - that will be D&D 4.0. But it's changed more than a simple errata sheet could explain, so it's not really 3.0 any more either.

It probably did not need to be made.

That said, I think some of the reviews here have been rather unfair.

There's the "I've been playing D&D since the 70's and this sucks" reviews. Version 3.x is a different game. Get over it. You can still play D&D the way you like - nobody's stopping you. Dust off your old rulebooks and have yourself a good time. It's awefully childish complaining that the new version of the game isn't the game you fell in love with 25 years ago. Of course it isn't! When you complain that the things you loved about D&D have changed, you don't come off as a seasoned, intelligent role-player, you come off as a whiney old fogey pining for the "good ol' days."

There's the "how come they have to make everything balanced?" reviews. D&D has never made sense. No matter what edition you played, if you were a God and set up a world that followed the D&D rules, it would fall into chaos within weeks becuase things don't make sense. Why compain that wizards and fighters are now pretty close to each other in terms of power? Why does it "make sense" to do it some other way? This is, ultimately, a game, not some sort of simulation. All the players around the table deserve to have equal amounts of fun. It's no fun to have the player of a low-level mage being bored at low levels 'cause he only has one stinkin' spell to cast. It's no fun to have your high-level fighter overshadowed by a mage that can deal hundreds of times more damage than he can in a single round. The game is not about making sense, it's about having fun, and that's the way the rules should be designed. If you want to change it, you can house rule it. The 3.x default of equally-powerful characters is a good thing, and should have been done earlier.

There's the "this game is the best thing ever" reviews. Get some perspective people. It's not perfect. Unless you can admit to the flaws in the game, you're going to be interpreted as a clueless fanboy, mindlessly drooling over the next release.

There's the "version 3.x is for powergamers and is like D&D the video game" reviews. This is a bit unfair, but I have to admit that the rulebooks are very rules-heavy. In fact, there are virtually no rules for "role playing" becuase this is an activity that, by it's nature, can't be covered with rules. The quality and frequency of quality "role playing" (which means different things to different people anyway) is going to vary depending on the people in the group you've joined. It can take months or years to find a group with the battlegame-to-roleplay ratio your really like. This has not changed through the years.

Just for clarity's sake, and the sake of anybody reading these reviews, let me go over in brief some of the more contraversial changes from the 3.0 edition to the 3.5 edition.

1) Spells have been nerfed!
This is true. Several spells have been seriously reduced in power. Harm now allows a saving throw, Haste no longer lets wizards cast extra spells, and the stat-booster and invisibility spells are much shorter in duration (the stat-boosters, by the way, now increase a stat by a set amount, instead of rolling).

2) Rangers have been nerfed!
Previously, Rangers got all of their cool abilities at first level. To the savvy power gamer, there was no need to take more than one level of ranger. It was pointless. Now, their abilites are gained more slowly as they level up. Also, they get fewer hit points per level now. This changes their emphasis from front-line warrior to something more akin to a wilderness-oriented fighter-druid multiclass. You now get to choose, at second level, whether you want your ranger to specialize in archery or two-weapon-fighting. This essentially subdivides the class into two more classes, and a more elegant solution could probably have been found.

3) Bards have been increased in power
This is true. Bards in 3.0 were practically useless. Their spell progression was slow and their special musical powers useless at higher levels. To me, a bard is now a useful character and worth playing.

4) Somebody complained that Sorcerers are now overpowered compared to Wizards.
I don't see this. The major change to the Sorcerer class was to allow them to, when they level up, swap out a single spell already in their repitoire for a different spell of the same level. This change was made because people playing sorcerers would avoid certain spells on their spell list becuase these spells would become useles later on. A sorcerers primary disadvantages are still present. They get fewer known spells. They get 2 new spells per level that they can cast, and can never exceed this amount. Wizards can, conversely, scribe any spell into their spell book they feel like (for a price). Second, sorcerers have a slower spell progression than wizards. A 5th level wizard has access to 3rd level spells and a 5th level sorcerer doesn't. Wizards always gain access to the higher levels of spells faster than sorcerers do. A sorcerer's only compensation for this is the fact that they can cast more spells per day than a wizard, and they don't have to prepare their spells ahead of time.

5) Square monsters
This makes no realistic sense, but is the logical progression of the "no facing" rules introduced in 3.0. It is assumed that, in battle, a character is constantly turning around, assessing threats, etc..., and cannot be said to be "facing" a particualar direction. The rules support this concept by allowing the character to strike opponents on all sides without penalty, letting his shield bonus affect creatures on all sides, etc... No "facing" rules means simpler, faster combat at the expense of realism. But some creatures, dragons for instance, obviously have a front and a back. On a battle mat they are rectangular. Characters on all sides are still subject to all attacks, breath weapons, etc... This seems ridiculous when you have a rectangular critter. It would have to turn to point it's head in the right direction to bite or breath fire. But what if there's a character there and there's no room to turn? The rules say it can still do it, but it's silly. So they simplified the combat rules further and declared all creatuers, large and small, take up perfect squares on the battle mat. Horses take up 4 squares now instead of 2. Again, it was a sacrifice of a lot of realism for a little more ease of play.

6) Weapon sizing rules
This was an odd change. In 3.0, a longsword was a "medium" weapon, a dagger was a "small" weapon, etc... The size of a weapon depended on the physical size of the weapon. This has changed. Now, weapon size is defined by the size of the creature intended to wield it. There are longswords. A Large longsword is a longsword meant for for a Large-sized creature to use. A Small longsword is a longsword meant for a Small-sized creature to use. If you use a weapon too big for you, you suffer penalties. This change did not need to be made and needlessly complicated the process of buying equipement, as well as confusing existing players.

7) Cover and Concealment
These are combined into one concept: Concealment. Anything that in any way obstructs your view of your target provides concealment, from invisibility to hiding behind an arrow slit. I feel this change greatly simplified the Cover/Concealment rules, especially in cases where both applied.

All in all, I feel the people who complain that this revision was unnecceary are justified. The rules worked just fine before, and if you already have a 3.0 library there is no real convincing reason to change and try to convert everything. You might complain in that case that new products and whatnot that are printed with 3.5 rules are not compatible with your 3.0 game, but I have frequently used material from 3.0 and 3.5 interchangably and nobody has noticed or cared. The rules changes are so minor, and the odds of a player auditing the DM's NPCs and modules so slim, it works out just fine. Purists will cringe, but my last group had a new player join with a 3.5 bard, and I was the only person in the course of 4 months to have noticed that he had abilities our other bard did not.

So if you have 3.0, and have no need to upgrade, just don't. Go ahead and use new material from Dragon Magazine or online message boards just as if nothing had changed and it will somehow all be fine.

120 of 132 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars If it was broke, then it needed to be fixed., July 15, 2003

By	Adam Tabb (New Castle, Indiana United States) - See all my reviews

I've heard all the backlash before I got a chance to review this. I heard that this update was not only not needed, but an ill concieved attempt just to boost Wizard's profits for the year. I've heard numerous people describe the evils of the D20 system. I heard it all, and needless to say, I feel that critism was unfounded.

The Player's Handbook 3.5 does a fixes many of the problems of the original book. Wizards of the Coast came up with a much overdue and spectacular idea a few years ago when they opened up their game mechanics wth the open gaming license making source books for any type of character (gladiators, necromancers, and even shamans) easy to find, and it all fit together. 3rd edtion was the grandaddy that started it, and it gets an overhall.

Most notably, they change 3 of the classes. The Bard finally gets more skill points (6) so that he can more resemble the "Jack of all Trades" than a low rent, underpowered mage/theif that nobody wanted to play.

The Ranger, perhaps one of the most loved classes in First and Second Edition D and D was nearly unplayable in 3rd edition (past 1st level anyway.) This problem is fixed, with choices in specialization with the bow or two weapon fighting, more skill points, and increases in power more in line with the other classes. (No more playing for one favored enemy and a few cantrips you can cast at 8 level.)

The Monks are no longer cookie cutters of each other, as you have choices to make along the way so that you can do things that not every other monk you'd meet would be able to do.

Oh, by the way, now every race that has a special weapon (Dwarven Warhaxe) can fight with it without a feat. What an idea!!

The races have minor tweaking, with changes to the Gnome, Half Elf, and Dwarf the most notable.

Feats have been expanded, and some combined. Gone is Ambidextarity, which is now just "Two weapon fighting." Some of this is from the class books (Song and Silence), and some new. Cool feats that give you bonus to a few skills rather than one are a nice touch.

Skills have been combined. Gone is Intuit Direction and Wilderness lore. Hello Survival, that now does both. There are more examples like this. Slight of Hand, which is better, replaces pick pocket in one example of the new skills that are listed.

The combat chapter is rewritten and top notch, answering many of the questions that have come up since we first adopted 3rd edition.

All in all, I think this was a much needed update, and will be imediatly adopted in our playing group. I told a few of the changes at our last session, and all of the ones who "swore" they'd never get it, were already making plans to do so.

Highly Recommeded.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Really deserves the 3.5 title, July 14, 2003

By	"rarrais" (Rio de Janeiro, RJ Brazil) - See all my reviews

Wizards of the Coast made a good marketing move by releasing a revision of its most well known rpg, not only it can increase sales but it is supposed to make the game system even better. Thats not exactly what happens when you fire the original game designers and put new people to revise it. Its kinda like making some newbie fantasy author reviewing Harry Potter books and releasing updated versions. How can you really revise something you didnt create? Perhaps by talking with the authors, but not even that occured as Monte Cook said on his review.

Theres are lots of good news though, like the urgent fix on Harm, Heal and Haste spells; The downgrading on wizards power by reducing the ammount of spell DC augnment on bumping feats/class abilities; The total redisign on Ranger and Monk classes; and so on...

But... There are some terrible terrible mistakes. Like making weapons vary with size (like small longsword and large longsword, which in fact is the same as a great swrod); Combat rules even more tied to miniatures system (looks like a war game, and not everyone likes miniatures or can afford tons of them); Some weird racial abilities (half elves now gain bonuses to diplomacy skills because they "get along with everyone" ??);
Clerics got even more powers with mass healing/harming spells; etc...

Overall its 3.5 stars for 3.5 edition. But because you have to pay 90 bucks for the 3 books I give 3 stars.