Siberys wrote:That's the problem though, "on a technical matter" is a bad thing due to D&D being a roleplaying game, not a rollplaying game.
To be honest, and this isn't meant as an assault, that's a load of bull. D&D is both a roll and role playing game. I won't say if any of these is better than the other, but if it's a game, so it has rules. That makes the rollplaying as much part of it as the roleplaying. Since it has rules, those rules can limit roleplay, which they will do by their very nature. They impose limits. Thus, any new additions that further clarify or enhance rules, can only serve to enhance the roleplay.
A rather simplistic example:
You want to play a gunman in D&D. That's impossible, since there are no rules for guns. However, if we take the DMG section about Renaissance weapons in to account, you can.
Now, you might argue that a good DM would have no qualm putting in place rules for gun-use. However much I might agree with that, it's a mood point: wether the DM or Wizards (the "über-DM", so to speak.) implements the new rules, you can't deny that new rules have been established.
So, we have two aspects (probably more, but they don't matter now.) to D&D: one about rules, and one about active roleplaying and background setting. (Passive roleplaying, so to speak.) One without the other is pointless. I feel that, based on my experience with Saga, that D&D 3.5 rules can be made much more user-friendly without any loss of roleplaying-value, on the contrary. (For example: By simplifying rules, you might over-simplify and thus take away some depth. On the other hand, if you make rules to complex to simulate too much, you end up with endless rolling, rules-referencing, and discussion.)
However, the roleplay-experience will be kicked in the nuts and thrown out in the dirt, since suddenly, from one day to the next, the entire universe (Greyhawk in the case of the PHB) gets turned upside down! Suddenly, Tanari look differently. There's no more Plane of Water and all of a sudden Erinyes and Succubi are the same thing. No matter that "yesterday" (the previous game session) your Cleric battled a Tanari with human features, named Grank, on the Elemental Plane of Water. Today, that Tanari looks a lot more bestial and you battled him on another place. Luckily, you have Greater Restoration to cast, since your mind would have turned itself inside out by trying to comprehend what's happening.
To Syberis personally: I know you like Eberron as well, do you think they'll mess that cosmology up as well? It would be rather messy of them, don't you think?
