I haven't played D&D in decades and came across the PH & DMG for both the 3.0 and 3.5. editions free (score!). I played avidly as a kid but it's literally been 25+ years, so I have no knowledge of the changes since then.
What are the most important differences between these editions? Are there any differences especially relevant to someone hoping to teach new players? (I'm hoping to teach my kids and fiancé to play.)
Best Answer
Here's a list of important differences between the two editions, though I will completely agree with KRyan, D&D 3.5 is just so much better, inarguably so than its predecessor.
Class Changes
Skill Changes
Feat Changes
Spell Changes
The following spells were added to the game:
Acid Splash, Animate Plants, Arcane Sight, Arcane Sight (Greater), Baleful Polymorph, Bear's Endurance (Mass), Blight, Bull's Strength (Mass), Call Lightning Storm, Cat's Grace (Mass), Command Undead, Cure Critical Wounds (Mass), Cure Moderate Wounds (Mass), Cure Serious Wounds (Mass), Daze Monster, Deep Slumber, Dimensional Lock, Disrupting Weapon, Eagle's Splendor, Eagle's Splendor (Mass), Enlarge Person (Mass), False Life, Fox's Cunning, Fox's Cunning (Mass), Glibness, Heroism, Heroism (Greater), Hold Monster (Mass), Inflict Critical Wounds (Mass), Inflict Moderate Wounds (Mass), Inflict Serious Wounds (Mass), Longstrider, Moment of Prescience, Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum, Owl's Wisdom, Owl's Wisdom (Mass), Polar Ray, Prying Eyes (Greater), Ray of Exhaustion, Reduce Person (Mass), Shout (Greater), Summon Instrument, Symbol of Weakness, Sympathetic Vibration, Touch of Fatigue, Touch of Idiocy, Undeath to Death, Waves of Exhaustion, Waves of Fatigue.
The following spells were completely removed or changed:
Animal Friendship, Emotion (Fear), Emotion(Friendship) became Charm Person, Emotion (Hate), Mass Haste, Negative Energy Protection became Death Ward, Nystul's Undetectable Aura became Nystul's Magic Aura, Polymorph Other became Baleful Polymorph, Polymorph Self became Polymorph, Symbol (Discord), Symbol (Hopelessness).
The following spells had their names changed:
On top of that, Many spells had their spell schools changed as well as some substantial changes to spell levels as well.
The spell effects of the following spells were changed:
Blade Barrier, Blindness/Deafness, Call Lightning, Endure Elements, Eyebite, Flame Arrow, Harm, Haste, Heal, Neutralize Poison, Otiluke's Freezing Sphere, Polymorph, Reduce Person, Righteous Might, Scrying, Scrying (Greater), and Wall of Force.
Along with those, many Domain spells were changed to either different domains or removed from domains entirely.
Damage Reduction Changes
Damage reduction was changed to allow many different types of things to bypass that damage reduction, Including Special materials such as Silver, Adamantine, and Cold Iron; Weapon Types, such as Slashing, Piercing, and Bludgeoning; Alignments, such as Good, Evil, Lawful, and Chaotic; Magic and Epic were also added to indicate physical damage reduction, and epic damage reduction. These factors were also combined to indicate monster weaknesses to certain aspects.
Equipment Changes (originally by Sean Mcmillian)
Equipment is now listed in small and medium-sized version for use by small and medium sized characters. The largest effect of this adjustment is the Shortsword/Small Longsword issue, which means that small characters will usually do one die-size less damage.
(The medium shortsword and small longsword both do 1d6 damage. In 3.0, only medium sized weapons were listed, and a gnome rogue could use the medium shortsword. In 3.5, our gnome needs to use a small longsword to get 1d6 damage, which requires martial weapon proficiency, or a small shortsword, doing only 1d4 damage.)
DMs should take this into account and make sure small characters can get small weapon rewards (or just house-rule it away.)
That's all of the changes that you'd likely be concerned about for just the basic version of the PHB from 3.0 to 3.5. The version change was indeed a greatly improved version of the original ruleset, and removed a lot of the cheese (Psionic's Handbook 3.0 Anyone?) as well as getting rid of a lot of useless skills and making a lot of classes very much playable compared to their 3.0 counterparts (Ranger and Druid spring to mind), Druid got a lot more spell access and animal companions are very nice in 3.5.
For those of you seeking a full version of all of the changes they can be found here on the wizards website.