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[tahujdt]

What, exactly is pathfinder?

[LordBucket]

What, exactly is pathfinder?

http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG

"D&D" made by a different company. There are a number of gaming companies producing rulesets to accomplish more or less the same thing. Wizards of the Coast just happens to be the popular one right now.

Kind of like how if you want a photocopier, you don't have to buy it from Xerox.

[Criptfeind]

Piff. Pathfinder. I guess you could do that. If you are a square.

[tahujdt]

If I'm going with 3.5, what will I need in terms of miniatures, maps, and miscellaneous goods?

[LordBucket]

If I'm going with 3.5, what will I need in terms of miniatures, maps, and miscellaneous goods?

See previous answer.

[Tack]

Piff. Pathfinder. I guess you could do that. If you are a square.

Are you calling me... A SQUARE?

[Kadzar]

I'm going to agree with Tack here. If you're playing by the SRD, 3.5 only includes the core rule book and a few other books, and excludes a lot of the fun stuff like Tome of Battle (which allows melee character to not suck) and anything to do with Eberron (which includes a playable robot race). It also excludes certain rules needed to create characters (good luck figuring out anything to do with wealth by level or XP). Plus, mundane characters tend to suck because they have less option than their magical peers.

Pathfinder's SRD, on the other hand, contains everything you need to know to play the game, along with all the books they've printed so far (or, at least, this SRD does, along with stuff made by 3rd party publishers (though you'll probably want to read through the previous SRD because everything in that one is sorted by book)), because Paizo is in the business of selling adventure modules rather than just trying to sell supplements. And mundanes get all kinds of nice things; it doesn't raise them up to the level of magic users, but, at least they have interesting things to do in a round.

[Zako]

In my personal experience as a new D&D player, I've found that 4th edition was a lot easier to understand and get into than 3.5, but 3.5 has MASSIVE amounts of custom stuff and spells that allows a player and GM to make someone or something really unique. 3.5 also has more rules to handle these sort of things as a consequence of this. Just something to keep in mind, but either edition is fine once you get into it.

[Wrex]

3.5 is also filled with traps that look good on the surface, but are really terrible options. Every non ToB melee class, for example, is a waste of space if your enemies are even somewhat optimized or intelligent. This dosen't excuse 4th edition for being rediculously generic and having two real builds per class, but it does mean 4th edition is much easier to learn.

[Phlum]

You might want too look up a forum that's more dedicated to RP games. But if you are having trouble making the choice between 4 and 3.5 go with 3.5. Four will just seem like any idiotic role playing Vidio game. For 14 year olds I would use 3.5 without the non spellcaster spells. IE. the abilities like "giant cleave" for fighters, else they wonder why they can't use your computer.

If they are anything like the 14 year olds I know, you could grab their attention by telling them it's a sandbox game. But that opens a huge drain for your mapping and npc generation.

What do you need in matirials in terms of matirials? Dice, and a rule book and a place to write. Minutures could be represented by graph paper and colored bits of paper. That's Probobly the minimum of a d&d setup.

If I had to give any DM advice, look at the rules as a way to keep your players from finding out that you are planing the untimely deaths of nonexistant dolls, and as guidelines for a fantasy world of your creation, don't be afraid to tweak the rules to fit your ideals.

[Heron TSG]

3.5 is also filled with traps that look good on the surface, but are really terrible options. Every non ToB melee class, for example, is a waste of space if your enemies are even somewhat optimized or intelligent.

Right, because something that can leap 90 feat straight into the air to deal 5,000 damage to a dragon in the space of three attacks can't be anything but a waste of space. (I'm looking at you, Leap Attack Shock Trooper Lion Totem Barbarian!  ) That's another difference between 3.5e and 4e: In 4th edition, they made fighters more like wizards and wizards more like fighters, so to speak. In 3.5, they're two completely different ballgames. On one hand you have the smug wizards and sorcerers and whatnot who assume they're better because they get a variety of powerful abilities handed straight to them, and on the other you have other classes that require a bit more thinking but can be every bit as good. (If not better. An Assassin with Hide in Plain Sight and Darkstalker can actually be harder to find than an invisible wizard. I've made one that was so good at hiding that it could hide in its opponents' shadow, make a Hide check good enough to stay hidden despite a casting of Glitterdust (A -40 penalty to the check) and proceed to shank said foe.)

Yeah, there are about 200 source books, counting pertinent Dragon Magazines. Perhaps 100 without. I've been playing for years and I've barely scratched the surface of just how much stuff they made.

Maptool is a good resource for playing the game. My meatspace game even uses a laptop for it. You can make a map, macros for dice rolls for each character, track monsters, draw maps quickly, etc. Fun stuff.

[Wrex]

3.5 is also filled with traps that look good on the surface, but are really terrible options. Every non ToB melee class, for example, is a waste of space if your enemies are even somewhat optimized or intelligent.

Right, because something that can leap 90 feat straight into the air to deal 5,000 damage to a dragon in the space of three attacks can't be anything but a waste of space. (I'm looking at you, Leap Attack Shock Trooper Lion Totem Barbarian!  ) That's another difference between 3.5e and 4e: In 4th edition, they made fighters more like wizards and wizards more like fighters, so to speak. In 3.5, they're two completely different ballgames. On one hand you have the smug wizards and sorcerers and whatnot who assume they're better because they get a variety of powerful abilities handed straight to them, and on the other you have other classes that require a bit more thinking but can be every bit as good. (If not better. An Assassin with Hide in Plain Sight and Darkstalker can actually be harder to find than an invisible wizard. I've made one that was so good at hiding that it could hide in its opponents' shadow, make a Hide check good enough to stay hidden despite a casting of Glitterdust (A -40 penalty to the check) and proceed to shank said foe.)

Yeah, there are about 200 source books, counting pertinent Dragon Magazines. Perhaps 100 without. I've been playing for years and I've barely scratched the surface of just how much stuff they made.

Maptool is a good resource for playing the game. My meatspace game even uses a laptop for it. You can make a map, macros for dice rolls for each character, track monsters, draw maps quickly, etc. Fun stuff.

Ubercharging is only good if you can connect, but it works just fine against mundane defences. It's contingent dimension doors that screw him up

[Heron TSG]

Generally speaking, a strong enough barbarian can withstand an Antimagic Field, whereas such things tend to inconvenience a wizard when unexpected. (Or really even when expected.) But I digress. It's an argument that rages across the internet every day.

[Wrex]

Indeed.  Anyway, go 3.5. Because you can.

[Tack]

I say pathfinder. Stops you from abusing the dex/wis stacking monk.