How do you coax you 3.5 group to play Pathfinder?

[harmor]

How do you coax your 3.5 group to play Pathfinder?

[cpljarhead]

id start adding in components of pathfinder into u 3.5 game. start with the little things and then start with npc's and finally bring in characters.

[Arkhemedes]

Tell them the rules for combat maneuvers are much easier and characters get feats every other level instead one for every three, in addition to bonus feats (which means a feat every level for fighters). This is just for starters. Plus everything they like about about 3.5 - it's still there! What's not to like?

[Richard Littles]

What about $500 per player?

[Dark]

How do you coax you 3.5 group to play Pathfinder?

Let them play 4e? j/k

[Hoitash]

Alternate. Say "how about we do a short camapign in Pathfinder, so you see what its like firsthand, and if you don't like it we're done, but if you do, we can stick with it or switch between the two, I mean, we have all these 3.5 books, that cost thirty dollars each, and there are so. Many. Of. Them."

Sorry, that last point irks me. It would be cheaper to buy a cheap laptop then all those books, which I'll probably do. But I digress.

[Mestemeah]

id start adding in components of pathfinder into u 3.5 game. start with the little things and then start with npc's and finally bring in characters.

I like this idea. But I would not "sneak" it in. Tell the group what you would like to do. Make sure they are okay with it so that you don't "ruffle any feathers" with big surprises. If you can manage handling the differences on your own to demo what is possible with Pathfinder, the players might see you are right about the improvement Pathfinder would be.

My two cents,
Meste

[WhiteTiger]

you can always try whining, cajoling, threaten to leave the group, slash tires, blackmail, extortion, mass murder... whatever will work..

seriously, though, If you know the rules. you should be able to do a quick 15 minute run through of the new CMB / CMD system to show the how grapple, trip and bull rush work in pathfinder and how you calculate each one. If they like that then have them try out the new skill list. If they like that then it should be a piece of cake after that. The only question is... are the other members of the group into power ramp-up.

Pathfinder characters are generally considered to be more powerful than 3.5.

[wizarddog]

We exactly did not have a choice. The DM did not want to continue using 3.5 rules because the power creep that was happening with the wizard and cleric players (both good at optimizing). He wanted either to go core only, (which would not have resolved a thing) or try pathfinder

Of course we had some PrC, core classes not found in the Pathfinder book. Ultimately, our heros transformed from their original conception and some actually just remade new characters to make it work.

[Skunkape]

Alternate. Say "how about we do a short camapign in Pathfinder, so you see what its like firsthand, and if you don't like it we're done, but if you do, we can stick with it or switch between the two, I mean, we have all these 3.5 books, that cost thirty dollars each, and there are so. Many. Of. Them."

Sorry, that last point irks me. It would be cheaper to buy a cheap laptop then all those books, which I'll probably do. But I digress.

You could also see if they'll play a one off/single adventure game to find out if they like the rules.

[Swordnboard]

When we switched, I simply announced to my group that we were going to do it. They liked the change, and we never looked back (except to reference some of the additional sourcebooks ). Conversion didn't take too long, and gameplay is similar and faster.

[Jeffrywith1e]

As a player of 3.5 who wanted to move to Pathfinder, I offered to run a campaign in Pathfinder. Everyone agreed. My first time behind the screen (since the mid '90s).

[WhiteTiger]

As a player of 3.5 who wanted to move to Pathfinder, I offered to run a campaign in Pathfinder. Everyone agreed. My first time behind the screen (since the mid '90s).

and ??? curious GM's want to know what others think...

[Jeffrywith1e]

and ??? curious GM's want to know what others think...

We've had two sessions so far. It's a bit awkward still as I'm finding my legs behind the screen. The game is familiar enough that things run as smooth as normal. One of the players is new to our group and completely new to 3e all together. His learning curve is overshadowing our learning Pathfinder. We haven't had much with Combat Maneuvers yet. One character is using poisons which has opened up the differences in the rules there. Here's where we are with that if you're interested...

Poisons are looking like a big part of our campaign. So lets establish some rules. Pathfinder rules say this about poisions:

types: Contact, Ingested, Inhaled, Injury

So far we've only used injury...
1) Poison on a weapon cannot be delivered via touch since the weapon has to cut the skin.
2) When the victim makes his initial fort save against the poison, it removes that poison from the weapon regardless whether the victim made his fort save.
3) Multiple hits by the same poison only stack for extending duration - no further 'initial saves' are needed, only 'frequency saves'.
4) Any creature that makes its 'frequency save' is cured of all the same poison - even from multiple hits.
5) Every application of poison forces a 5% chance of poisoning one's self.
6) Rolling a 'natural one' on an attack with poison results in poisoning one's self.
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemasterin...ns---final#TOC...

What's not covered by Pathfinder (yet) is application on weapons. So we must default to the D&D 3.5 rules:

D&D 3.5 rules:
1) Application of poison on a weapon only lasts for 10 minutes.
2) "It is not possible to apply poison to any weapon in less than 1 dose."
http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#poison

So we're going to go with one dose per dart.

We're on the Council of Thieves Adventure Path which I think is fantastic so far.

[Zethallon]

Honestly, it wasn't a hard sell. Some of the players were already looking at Pathfinder and the GM was willing to convert the campaign over. One thing that was very nice was Paizo puts together a terrific conversion guide from their web site that you can get for free just for signing up. I can tell you it was less painful then going from 3.0 to 3.5.