D&D 3rd Edition cRPGs

D&D 3rd Edition cRPGs employ Wizards of the Coast's Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition ruleset (either 3.0 or 3.5), lore and campaign settings. As a rule of thumb, in terms of rules, concepts and design D&D cRPGs are more complex than AD&D 2nd Edition cRPGs. However, outside of modding the added complexity didn't translate into better cRPGs. As can be seen below, BioWare's Aurora Engine and Obsidian's Electron Engine are the dominant platform for D&D 3rd Edition cRPGs.

List of D&D 3rd Edition cRPGs

• Icewind Dale 2 (3.0, Infinity, Black Isle Studios, 2002)
• Neverwinter Nights (3.0, Aurora, BioWare, 2002)
• Hordes of the Underdark (3.0, Aurora, BioWare, 2003)
• Temple of Elemental Evil (3.5, Troika, 2003)
• Neverwinter Nights 2 (3.5, Electron, Obsidian, 2006)
• Storm of Zehir (3.5, Electron, Obsidian, 2008)
• Mask of the Betrayer (3.5, Electron, Obsidian, 2007)
• Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannor (3.0, Stormfront, 2001)

Now, as it pertains to faithfulness to the ruleset, nothing beats ToEE. And Storm of Zehir offers the most flexibility in character building by far.

D&D Builds vs. AD&D Templates

Rules-wise, D&D 3rd Edition cRPGs are famous for their character builds, aka cRPG Builds.

While potentially complex and necessitating thought and planning, a build is nothing more than a number of levels taken in one or more classes, along with the cRPG stats, feats and skills chosen (in the case of Bards and Sorcerers, spell selections are also part of the build).

In AD&D 2nd Edition, and in the cRPGs that employ the ruleset, we don't so much as build a character as we do choose a class template and level it. With the exception of dual-classing the nature of the character does not change from its template as it levels; it just gets more powerful or capable.

A Fighter, for example, will always be a Fighter, and will auto-gain THAC0 and saving throw reductions as well as +HP and +ApR -- about the only player-made selections are weapon proficiencies and thief skill ranks.

But in D&D 3.x Edition (D&D 3.0 and D&D 3.5), along with BAB and other basic auto-gains, that Fighter can mix in different classes as well as choose between a selection of skills and feats offered by each class chosen. Thus, there is much more flexibility and potential in a given character (though some restrictions still exist).

Take a basic NWN Fighter, for example. While laughably basic in terms of 3.x it is far more complex than an AD&D "template" Fighter, and there can potentially be an immense difference between one Fighter and another when we factor in the depth of the feat and skill pools. Now, check out the Grim Reaper which employs multi-classing and shapeshifting...

D&D vs AD&D Spellcasting

In AD&D (BG2 spells) the effectiveness of spells usually scales with caster level, but in D&D (NWN spells) spell effectiveness is not only dependent on caster level but also on the caster's spellcasting attribute and feats.

To give an example, in the case of AD&D Mages the Fireball spell inflicts damage based on the level of the mage that casts it, but in the case of D&D Wizards not only their level but also their Intelligence score, spell focus feats and elemental feats determine the effectiveness of that Fireball.

In addition, selection of those elemental feats is dependent on ranks in the Spellcraft skill. On top of that, D&D introduces meta-magic feats such as Extend Spell and Empowered Spell, which allow us to cast lower-level spells with longer durations or that inflict more damage, though from higher spell circle slots. For example, an Empowered Fireball, a Maximized Fireball, a Widened Fireball.

D&D Iterative Attacks vs AD&D Duplicative Attacks

In AD&D multiple attacks are duplicative whereas in D&D multiple attacks are iterative. What that means is, for AD&D Warriors that have THAC0s of 2 and 5 ApR, all five attacks are made at THAC0 2 whereas for D&D Warriors each extra attack has its attack bonus penalized by 5 points.

Thus for example:

• 5 attacks in AD&D = 2/2/2/2/2 (duplicative)
• And 5 attacks in D&D = 46/41/36/31/26 (iterative)

In essence, that means all AD&D attacks have the same to-hit chance whereas the fifth D&D attack is far less likely to hit than the first, depending on enemy AC. Thus, when going up against AC Lords D&D Warriors want to buff AB in order to maximize iterative hits, but AD&D Fighters don't need to. 

At 15 Base Attack Bonus (BAB), D&D Warrior attacks are 15/10/5 or 3 "ApR" but at 16 BAB they are 16/11/6/1 or 4. The 1 on the fourth attack is awful, right? But that's just the BAB. When factored in bonuses can turn that 1 into a 20.

So basically, there is more to D&D attacks than AD&D ones. And we haven't even talked about attacks of opportunity and the like...

Breakdown of one attack in Temple of Elemental Evil that shows how AB is modified by bonuses:

Multiple iterative attacks in Icewind Dale 2:

In Neverwinter Nights 1:

In Neverwinter Nights 2:

D&D 3rd Edition cRPGs are also notable because NWN and NWN2 came complete with toolsets, thereby kicking off the cRPG modding revolution. This eventually resulted in the best D&D cRPG of all-time.

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