I'm actually quite interested in hearing what 4th edition is like, class wise, gear wise, stat wise etc and how much of the games mechanic has changed. Something which I've noticed since playing world of warcraft is that in 3.5 edition dnd the most effective party in something like ToEE would be someone with a lot of crowd control like a sorcerer or, mainly, a wizard will a million scrolls of grease, that invulnerability globe thing and fireball, two rogues - one of which is the lock picker and one which is the talker, and two monks. one of the meleer's should take a couple of levels in cleric for a few heals, but if you do things right you probley wont need much, with evasion. Also you should stack as much dex as possible, skills like tumble and feats like improved initiative, combat reflexes, combat casting and improved trip - basically anything which lets you go first, get AoO's and denies the NPCs their turn because they're prone or otherwise unable to attack and lets the rogues get a sneak attack in through flanking. Tanking classes (which in wow actually tank) are unnecessary because they they have no way of even gaining or holding agro (the mechanic which makes an NPC try to kill them over another player even if the other player the one actually hurting them) basically dnd 3.5 tanks, are just another form of melee damage. Also dnd casters suck donkey balls because of their limited casting ablities similar to the M72 LAW - once its been used its gone unless of course the caster isn't really casting but using all those scrolls and wands he burned his precious XP on making so you're only using one caster for his ablities at making the melee damage guys have lots of turns and keeping himself alive. anyway I spose in a pnp dnd game the dm wouldn't let things work out quite like how you can exploit the AI of ToEE but as things stand in 3.5 I don't feel that all classes get get a fair shot at things and are useful to the party pretty much every round.
@Cujo.. . Ahh... WoW.. like everyone, I will go back.. one day- that's what stole me from this little Gem of a game- and my Money for a year and a half. It was worth it. I quit right before the WotLK. In PnP DnD you had fewer spells and didn't have the ability to regenerate Mana so quickly as to cast them Sorcerer-style like because these things were not NEEDED. As evidenced by this game, a DnD caster above 5th level rocks. It's not a constant fight with enemies of many, many HPs, but usually a fight or two within a "game" week or even month, and sometimes -like in a dungeon, you have to use your limited resources wisely and even physically fight a bit if needed...
