Pf2e is a different system mechanically and setting wise than dnd 3.x, and this unfortunately got even worse with hasbro tried to flip the table on the OGL. That caused paizo to create their own irrevocable license and strip all ogl content from their future books now called pf2e remastered. I’m not sure your 3.x stuff would be of much use there without needing to convert things yourself.
But 3.x as i understand it was more closely aligned with pf1e. There might be some compatibility there but i never played 3.x or pf1 so I’m not sure
But… BUT… hear me out… all of the pf2e game rules, character options, and monster statblocks are available for free on archives of nethys, an official site so no high seas sailing.
Game setting info beyond some basic blurbs in those rulebooks are not published online for free, but those aren’t needed if you want to homebrew your own setting. Prewritten adventures also aren’t typically available for free, but a few are released from free rpgday . And they also have their version of adventuerers league (called pathfinder society) which you can get those adventures to run for free if you go through a participating game store (or convince a game store to participate).
All that is to say its pretty low risk to try it out.
And if you’re open to spending some money the beginner box is exceptional-- uses real rules and introduces rules to the GM and player when necessary. Available physical box, digital download, or in virtual tabletops
Game setting info beyond some basic blurbs in those rulebooks are not published online for free, but those aren’t needed if you want to homebrew your own setting.
There’s a caveat: there’s some extra character options in the APs, and not all of them are covered in Archives of Nethys. I had a new player join in on the Gatewalkers campaign I’m running and spent feats to pick up Verdant Core deviant abilities, which aren’t on the site.
Granted, the root cause was Pathbuilder not having any filter for which deviant feats a player can take, but not having it on Archives of Nethys or my physical copies of Dark Archive and Gatewalkers made it so much harder to unfuck
3.x was not some perfect, untouchable version of the game rules. PF2e isn’t either, but acting like 3.x is this finely-tuned specimen of the game is ludicrous. That game was janky.
If you like the game (and I did!), that’s fine! If you like the jank (and I did not), that’s also fine. But don’t act like 2e isn’t worth your consideration just because it’s a different game. It sounds just as ridiculous as refusing to consider a SNES because you poured “all this money” into an NES. Just say “eh, I like what I’ve got, it’s enough for me” and move on.
I mean, that’s part of why I preferred the Sega & NEC ecosystems in the 16-bit era, and why I preferred the 3DO later, but never bought the full console (I did have the 3DO Blaster). With a Genesis (not a Nomad), you could use the Power Base Converter to play SMS games, plus if you wanted, there were the CD & 32x setups as well. If Sega had looked at the CD & 32x the way they did the Mark 2 & Mark 3/SMS, and hadn’t been so damn beholden to Yuji Naka, it would have been much better. Then again, if they had done the SG-1000 / SC-3000 thing with the Genesis, we could have had another PowerPC based OS in the world.
Plus, the SNES was initially planned with backwards compatibility, but they ripped it out late in development. So, why should I give them money? It’s not like Ninja Gaiden Trilogy plays so much better than the NES carts.
They ripped it out because their “backwards compatibility” was literally just grafting an NES to the SNES. I think it even had a toggle switch you had to flip between the two. It was going to make the thing cost tons of money and nobody was ever going to use it, and anyone who cared could just plug their old NES back in whenever they wanted to use it.
But the people who didn’t upgrade never got to play Star Fox. Man, I love Star Fox.
Personally speaking, I find Star Fox (and most on-rails shooters) incredibly boring. Visually for the time it’s impressive, but I’ll play Corncob on my PC or any of the Jane’s games because they provide more gameplay.
As far as “nobody was ever going to use it”, that’s incorrect (as the success of the Retron series shows). My parents among others were highly resistant to buying me any console because we were a PC family - Genesis was the only one I could get them to even budge on because it had access to a library of cheaper games in addition to the expensive stuff. Part of the reason I didn’t get a 7800 was because they’d picked the TRS-80 CoCo over the 2600 and we didn’t have the library of software at the ready. If they’d included an NES on a chip, and I could have convinced at least two of my friends to let me borrow their NES carts in addition to SNES stuff, I might have had a SNES.
It wouldn’t have been just an NES chip. It would’ve had to also include a separate PPU (in addition to the two already in the SNES), a NES cartridge I/O slot, a whole different video out architecture (the NES didn’t support composite out), and maybe more. Those are just the ones I know for sure.
Besides, the SNES was already going to cost significantly more than the Genesis. They were wary of widening that price gap still further when the owners of the older system still owned the older system and could easily plug it back in. Further, they were launching the SNES in North America with five launch titles and eight more on deck over the following month, with a total of thirty games coming out before that Christmas. I don’t think they were worried about having enough content for people to play on that new system.
What Nintendo was worried about is almost inconsequential compared to what American parents were worried about. And parents were very worried about the investment they’d made into games that still worked.
Not really, PF2E is its own system that is in the D20 family but no longer directly compatible with 3.X. However, since encounter balancing is easy, if you want to convert 3.X adventures to PF2E the work is pretty simple.
First edition Pathfinder should be. Second edition is more like 5e, but actually thought out. I don’t think it’s natively compatible with D&D5e though.
Oh, 1e Pathfinder is basically 3.75. I have the core book and a few others somewhere, and I lost the 3-ring binder with the thread from the GitP forum laying out the major changes between 3.5 and PF, as well as conversions for books that didn’t exist for PF, and some of the Green Ronin stuff.
Yeah. I don’t think 1e is underrated, but I do think it’s over-hated. It’s the system I largely got started with for TTRPGs. It’s really not that difficult, but it does let you make things very complex.
I know why people went for D&D 5e over Pathfinder, but I think it should have been seen as an entry point, not the place you stay forever like it’s become for most people. It’s dumbed down, but also with you having to remember a lot of exceptions and things because they dumbed it down too much and tried adding things that didn’t fit exactly into the rules.
Is it still compatible with all the money I wasted on 3.x Hasbro D&D?
While technically the answer is “no”, people who emphasize the difference don’t apply the “Rule of Cool” as liberally as I did.
I re-used all kinds of D&D 3rd Edition resources while switching to Pathfinder.
Sure, we absolutely shouldn’t just dogmatically use the numbers given in a 3E book with Pathfinder.
But I didn’t find it terribly hard to whip up Pathfinder monster and NPC number adjustments based on my 3E source books, more or less on the fly.
Many numbers given are close enough. Most abilities are easy enough to convert in a way that is fun. The Challenge Rating isn’t tuned as carefully, but i find the usual GM toolkit can address that. For example, throwing in a few extras baddies from over the hilldside can scale an encounter up, and awarding the players various story advantages “for good role playing” can scale an encounter’s challenge down.
If my napkin translation went too badly, I threw “Rule of Cool” at it, and just made sure the players were still having fun.
I will say, I relegated 3E stuff to filler encounters, just as I do with anything else I homebrew.
I don’t mind being on my GM toes for a quick encounter, or a short story arc. But I don’t like having something poorly balanced have a recurring role in my campaigns.
All to say I have used 3E source books liberally in my Pathfinder campaigns, and I’m not sure any of my players have ever noticed.
I responded separately but did want to point out this is a sunk cost fallacy. I.e. you said you wasted all this money on 3.5. That money is no longer relevant. The relevance is what you enjoy. If you enjoy 3.5 and don’t want to try anything else then that’s your cookie and you can eat it all you want. If you’re open to trying different things that might be better (or might not!) then the wasted money shouldnt be part of the equation
You’re probably right. But I prefer to play the games I’ve already got material and experience with. Though that may be because I tried Apocalypse World and Dungeon World after loving Dogs in the Vineyard, and dislike PbtA systems so much that I’ve gone out of my way to support K. N. Obaugh’s DOGS; and I’ve tried 5e. The only version I can tolerate of it is Black Hack. Shadowrun 6 sent me back to Anarchy, and there is no game that captures what GURPS 3 or Marvel FASERIP do.
Is it still compatible with all the money I wasted on 3.x Hasbro D&D?
Pf2e is a different system mechanically and setting wise than dnd 3.x, and this unfortunately got even worse with hasbro tried to flip the table on the OGL. That caused paizo to create their own irrevocable license and strip all ogl content from their future books now called pf2e remastered. I’m not sure your 3.x stuff would be of much use there without needing to convert things yourself.
But 3.x as i understand it was more closely aligned with pf1e. There might be some compatibility there but i never played 3.x or pf1 so I’m not sure
But… BUT… hear me out… all of the pf2e game rules, character options, and monster statblocks are available for free on archives of nethys, an official site so no high seas sailing.
Game setting info beyond some basic blurbs in those rulebooks are not published online for free, but those aren’t needed if you want to homebrew your own setting. Prewritten adventures also aren’t typically available for free, but a few are released from free rpgday . And they also have their version of adventuerers league (called pathfinder society) which you can get those adventures to run for free if you go through a participating game store (or convince a game store to participate).
All that is to say its pretty low risk to try it out.
And if you’re open to spending some money the beginner box is exceptional-- uses real rules and introduces rules to the GM and player when necessary. Available physical box, digital download, or in virtual tabletops
There’s a caveat: there’s some extra character options in the APs, and not all of them are covered in Archives of Nethys. I had a new player join in on the Gatewalkers campaign I’m running and spent feats to pick up Verdant Core deviant abilities, which aren’t on the site.
Granted, the root cause was Pathbuilder not having any filter for which deviant feats a player can take, but not having it on Archives of Nethys or my physical copies of Dark Archive and Gatewalkers made it so much harder to unfuck
Oh, also, I don’t care about the setting. I don’t use Golarion anyway, because Forgotten Realms, Mystara, and Sigil exist.
3.x was not some perfect, untouchable version of the game rules. PF2e isn’t either, but acting like 3.x is this finely-tuned specimen of the game is ludicrous. That game was janky.
If you like the game (and I did!), that’s fine! If you like the jank (and I did not), that’s also fine. But don’t act like 2e isn’t worth your consideration just because it’s a different game. It sounds just as ridiculous as refusing to consider a SNES because you poured “all this money” into an NES. Just say “eh, I like what I’ve got, it’s enough for me” and move on.
I mean, that’s part of why I preferred the Sega & NEC ecosystems in the 16-bit era, and why I preferred the 3DO later, but never bought the full console (I did have the 3DO Blaster). With a Genesis (not a Nomad), you could use the Power Base Converter to play SMS games, plus if you wanted, there were the CD & 32x setups as well. If Sega had looked at the CD & 32x the way they did the Mark 2 & Mark 3/SMS, and hadn’t been so damn beholden to Yuji Naka, it would have been much better. Then again, if they had done the SG-1000 / SC-3000 thing with the Genesis, we could have had another PowerPC based OS in the world.
Plus, the SNES was initially planned with backwards compatibility, but they ripped it out late in development. So, why should I give them money? It’s not like Ninja Gaiden Trilogy plays so much better than the NES carts.
They ripped it out because their “backwards compatibility” was literally just grafting an NES to the SNES. I think it even had a toggle switch you had to flip between the two. It was going to make the thing cost tons of money and nobody was ever going to use it, and anyone who cared could just plug their old NES back in whenever they wanted to use it.
But the people who didn’t upgrade never got to play Star Fox. Man, I love Star Fox.
Personally speaking, I find Star Fox (and most on-rails shooters) incredibly boring. Visually for the time it’s impressive, but I’ll play Corncob on my PC or any of the Jane’s games because they provide more gameplay.
As far as “nobody was ever going to use it”, that’s incorrect (as the success of the Retron series shows). My parents among others were highly resistant to buying me any console because we were a PC family - Genesis was the only one I could get them to even budge on because it had access to a library of cheaper games in addition to the expensive stuff. Part of the reason I didn’t get a 7800 was because they’d picked the TRS-80 CoCo over the 2600 and we didn’t have the library of software at the ready. If they’d included an NES on a chip, and I could have convinced at least two of my friends to let me borrow their NES carts in addition to SNES stuff, I might have had a SNES.
It wouldn’t have been just an NES chip. It would’ve had to also include a separate PPU (in addition to the two already in the SNES), a NES cartridge I/O slot, a whole different video out architecture (the NES didn’t support composite out), and maybe more. Those are just the ones I know for sure.
Besides, the SNES was already going to cost significantly more than the Genesis. They were wary of widening that price gap still further when the owners of the older system still owned the older system and could easily plug it back in. Further, they were launching the SNES in North America with five launch titles and eight more on deck over the following month, with a total of thirty games coming out before that Christmas. I don’t think they were worried about having enough content for people to play on that new system.
What Nintendo was worried about is almost inconsequential compared to what American parents were worried about. And parents were very worried about the investment they’d made into games that still worked.
And as we all know, Nintendo suffered for their terrible decision. /s
I mean, yeah, it wasn’t the most consumer-friendly choice. I’m just saying I get why they made it.
No, but it is much improved and streamlined
That’s the 4e & 5e sales pitch. No interest then.
Not really, PF2E is its own system that is in the D20 family but no longer directly compatible with 3.X. However, since encounter balancing is easy, if you want to convert 3.X adventures to PF2E the work is pretty simple.
First edition Pathfinder should be. Second edition is more like 5e, but actually thought out. I don’t think it’s natively compatible with D&D5e though.
Oh, 1e Pathfinder is basically 3.75. I have the core book and a few others somewhere, and I lost the 3-ring binder with the thread from the GitP forum laying out the major changes between 3.5 and PF, as well as conversions for books that didn’t exist for PF, and some of the Green Ronin stuff.
Yeah. I don’t think 1e is underrated, but I do think it’s over-hated. It’s the system I largely got started with for TTRPGs. It’s really not that difficult, but it does let you make things very complex.
I know why people went for D&D 5e over Pathfinder, but I think it should have been seen as an entry point, not the place you stay forever like it’s become for most people. It’s dumbed down, but also with you having to remember a lot of exceptions and things because they dumbed it down too much and tried adding things that didn’t fit exactly into the rules.
While technically the answer is “no”, people who emphasize the difference don’t apply the “Rule of Cool” as liberally as I did.
I re-used all kinds of D&D 3rd Edition resources while switching to Pathfinder.
Sure, we absolutely shouldn’t just dogmatically use the numbers given in a 3E book with Pathfinder.
But I didn’t find it terribly hard to whip up Pathfinder monster and NPC number adjustments based on my 3E source books, more or less on the fly.
Many numbers given are close enough. Most abilities are easy enough to convert in a way that is fun. The Challenge Rating isn’t tuned as carefully, but i find the usual GM toolkit can address that. For example, throwing in a few extras baddies from over the hilldside can scale an encounter up, and awarding the players various story advantages “for good role playing” can scale an encounter’s challenge down.
If my napkin translation went too badly, I threw “Rule of Cool” at it, and just made sure the players were still having fun.
I will say, I relegated 3E stuff to filler encounters, just as I do with anything else I homebrew.
I don’t mind being on my GM toes for a quick encounter, or a short story arc. But I don’t like having something poorly balanced have a recurring role in my campaigns.
All to say I have used 3E source books liberally in my Pathfinder campaigns, and I’m not sure any of my players have ever noticed.
No
Then it’s totally useless to my interests or needs.
I responded separately but did want to point out this is a sunk cost fallacy. I.e. you said you wasted all this money on 3.5. That money is no longer relevant. The relevance is what you enjoy. If you enjoy 3.5 and don’t want to try anything else then that’s your cookie and you can eat it all you want. If you’re open to trying different things that might be better (or might not!) then the wasted money shouldnt be part of the equation
You’re probably right. But I prefer to play the games I’ve already got material and experience with. Though that may be because I tried Apocalypse World and Dungeon World after loving Dogs in the Vineyard, and dislike PbtA systems so much that I’ve gone out of my way to support K. N. Obaugh’s DOGS; and I’ve tried 5e. The only version I can tolerate of it is Black Hack. Shadowrun 6 sent me back to Anarchy, and there is no game that captures what GURPS 3 or Marvel FASERIP do.