Players Handbook :D&D 3ed D20 Books

Pros: Easier to remember what to roll for what
Cons: Got to buy new books!

About a year ago, the long-awaited 3rd edition rules of the classic role playing game (RPG), Dungeons and Dragons was released. It features all kinds of additions and revisions to the old character classes, as well as new classes, skills, options, and...

Pros: Greatly simplifies the game system
Cons: Game seems to be a little one-sided at times

At long last, the TSR group of games has gotten around to moving into the present gaming market by taking a step back and fixing almost all of the bugs that were left over from the base set of Dungeons & Dragons. I was a play tester for both the Base set...

Pros: Easy, straightforward, amazing skills and feats
Cons: A little confusing at first (see below)

My friends and I have been playing 2nd Edition D&D for 3 or 4 years now, and we've always had a great time, and a few laughs due to in game crazy happenings (such as soiling one's armor to provide a distraction). I picked up the Players Handbook after...

Pros: Assassins, monks, half-orcs, sorcerers, skills, feats
Cons: Formatting, errata

I am a veteran of role-playing games. I cut my teeth on the boxed edition of Dungeons & Dragons some 25 years ago and it's been downhill ever since. So what were my feelings when I heard that a new edition was being released?

Well, to put it...

Pros: Almost everything.
Cons: Spell access doesn't quite make sense most of the time.

Where do I start with this one? Every session, I feel like I'm in a dream, it's so good.

Classes
Fighters are just like they were before, only better. Have you ever watched the 13th Warrior, seen the awesome maneuvers those guys...

Pros: Streamlined rules, easy to learn, simple multi-classing, Open Gaming License
Cons: 1st printing has numerous errors, addicting

The new version of Dungeons & Dragons is so easy to learn, I think I could teach it to a monkey. Gone are all of the confusing charts and ridiculous things like THAC0. Using the new "d20" system, the 3rd Edition finally delivers what Dungeons & Dragons...

Pros: Skills, feats, more balance
Cons: Skills are limited, not a lot of sense

I've been roleplaying since the original D&D (as in Basic, Expert, Companion, etc). I have never been a huge fan of the AD&D system, with 2nd edition being so broken it was laughable in many respects. I tried 3rd edition at the urging of a friend and...

Pros: Greyhawk! Simpler than earlier editions but more flexible, popular, familiar, excellent production value
Cons: Odd art, derivative, D20, the magic system (on most counts)

For a little background, I started in the gaming hobby with Dungeons and Dragons, the original $10 white box with little books, on Labor Day weekend, 1978. As a junior in high school, I attended the Phoenix Fan Convention because of a SF&F habit a friend...

Pros: First major revamp of this antiquated system.
Cons: As the system becomes more modular it becomes more complex.

I started playing D&D in 1987. An era of change and growth in the world of D&D (or more properly AD&D), but still firmly planted in the first edition. I felt that the second edition was an abomination and really unnecessary. It didn't do much to improve...

Pros: Excellent, streamlined rule system, glamorous, bang for your buck
Cons: Another edition? I'm already broke as it is. Hey! This smells like Diablo 2!

I, like many others, was woefully disappointed by the fact that TSR was coming up with yet another edition of Dungeons & Dragons. I do not appreciate having to re-learn the rules to an already complex game, and I do not like the idea of putting down...

Pros: Less cumbersome game system
Cons: Buying a new set of books to replace earlier editions

Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) has been around since the 1970's. Since that time, there has only been one "new" edition - although technically D&D was broken down into Advanced D&D (1st and 2nd editions) and Basic D&D. The 2nd...

Pros: Beautiful Book, Easy to Pick up.
Cons: Feel too simple in some ways, 3 books needed to play

This is the fourth edition of the Dungeons and Dragons game, and with the dissapearance of the the original Dungeons and Dragons it can finally drop the title "Advanced".
It's a big hardcover book, and very visually attractive. All the...

Pros: Full color, perfect bound, catchy artwork, streamlined rules, great new ways to customize any character.
Cons: Spells listed alphabetically instead of level. Difficult to look up only available spells.

The chapters are as follows:
1. Abilities
Pretty straight forward. Now all abilities run from the same bonus chart making it considerably easier to know at a glance what your bonus or penalty for any given action based on an ability would...

Pros: Glossy, visually attractive.
Cons: Hard to read because of type layout. Need all new books.

Was this really necessary? Was 2nd edition all that bad? I never met a serious AD&D gamer that didn't like 2nd edition, and I haven't met one yet that likes 3rd. I bought it (and the new DMG and Monster Manual), but I'm not going to convert my...

Pros: 302 Pages of Gaming Bliss, Destroys Old Edition
Cons: 1st Copy edition of book has many errors.

Players Handbook by Jonathon Tweet, Monte Cook, and Skip Williams. The so called "Indispensible manual of fantasy role-playing", and they aren't kidding. I bought this book in September of 2000. We had our first session, and it was pretty bad, but thanks...