Wait do you know what level adjustment ment? Look, level adjustment was how you played those races, Say I wanted to play a Teifling, that race was level adjustment +1. The racial abilities were equal to a class level on top of base race. So you would skip a level or take the next level requirement for that class to reach the new class level.
And that extra level was a "monster level," not a proper class's level. Similar to how bloodlines ate up a certain number of levels but weren't training as a cleric or such. The point is that they were still playable in 3.5. Even gold dragons.
