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This massive compilation is 226 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page ToC,1 page SRD, 2 pages of advertisement, 1 page back cover, leaving us with 219 pages of content, so let’s check this out, shall we?
The very first component of this pdf would be Jonathan McAnulty’s Divine Channeler-class, an agent of the divine much more closely defined by the domains he chooses than a regular cleric or oracle would be – not only can they take some from the new meta-channeling feats, there also is an entry for each of the domains that specifies the way in which channeling manifests itself visually, audibly etc. and each domain gets associated minor and major channeling powers as well as special combat channeling powers. Not only that, but many domains actually provide multiple channeling effects for the respective domains, further adding to the distinctness and versatility of the class. Beyond all the feats and domains, we go one step further, as is appropriate in a compilation like this: Jonathan McAnulty has created quite an impressive array of subdomain channeling effects and released them in various articles throughout the issues of Rite Publishing’s free monthly e-zine Pathways.
For the first time now, these articles, also sporting multiple holy books, feats, spells and similar supplemental material to ensure your gaming experience with the channeler is as awesome as it should be, have been collected in one massive tome, collecting a total of 70 (!!!) pages of material for the divine channeler. I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again – it takes to reads to realize how brilliant this class is. Humble unpretentious and at first perhaps not to shiny or exciting, slowly peeling behind the layers of the mechanics reveals a take on divine agents and an alternative for primary divine casters that is not only a joy to read, but makes encountering servants of different gods (or even different orders of the same god) a joy and a more unique and ultimately rewarding experience. A great, humble design, now properly collected and compiled. The only thing I have to complain about is that I wished the feats were all in one place, the spells all in one, the books all in one etc. instead of splitting them up according to topics as they appeared in pathways, but that’s a personal preference and YMMV.
Right after that, we delve into the Secrets of the Luckbringer, which back in the day when the original class apeared, blew me away. Building on Owen K.C. Stephens genius framework utilized in the Time Thief, the luckbringer is the only good take on a “fortune’s favored”-character I’ve ever seen, making the per se cool idea finally work by providing us a tricky, versatile and unique class with imho one of the best flavor-introductions Steven D. Russell has ever penned for such a pdf. The pdf also contains the supplemental material for the luckbringer in the shape of a version of the black cat burglar archetype, the 10 luckbringer feats released as a separate small pdf and a similar small pdf containing 10 magic items that work for any class, but work better for luckbringers. I’m at this point going to spare you the almost obligatory praise of the class that has featured in many reviews of mine when I needed to compare a class to the master-class of design, to the 5-star-plus-level – just let it be known that this imho is one of the best 3pp-classes out there right now and that in Rite Publishing’s “Secrets of Renegade Archetypes”, there’s a new archetype inside as well as a variant of the Black Cat Burglar. ‘Nuff said about this one!
Speaking of the first class of class-design – the following class has for a very long time been perhaps the single most ambitious class I’ve known in PFRPG – I’m speaking, of course, of the taskshaper. Taskshapers are children kidnapped to the courts of the fey of Auberyon –they are not the changelings, they are the replaced, groomed in the ever-changing realms of the fae to become an elite-force of deadly beings, constantly changing and evolving, for taskshapers may not only change their shapes – they may actually change skills, change bonuses to saves and even mimic combat capabilities and abilities they have witnessed, while also getting the powers to inflict destabilizing touches on the foes – oh, by the way: In the very first iteration of the pdf, the class lacked the neat and great fluffy introduction it now has. The separately released additional 10 feats that allow e.g. high-level taskshapers to rise from the ashes of their body as a literal phoenix have also been compiled herein. Oh, and if you need a good idea what a taskshaper could be: Take a look at the cover of this book! The class might take some keeping track on part of the player, but ultimately is a stellar and rewarding experience to play and with the feats now included and cleaned up as well as the expanded intro, the taskshaper has reached 5 stars + seal-level of awesome.
Now if you’re rather looking for a series of complex archetypes that are about battle control, teamwork and iconic and complex options, you might have missed the two “Secrets of the Tactical Archetypes”-releases by the two rising stars of crunch-design Will McCardell and Benjamin Rombeaut. Well, herein they are, again, neatly compiled into one offering that collects genius archetypes like the spirit-using Aetherurgist, the magic battery Magilith sorcerer (who can also leech it), the throwing weapon specialist Peltast or the benevolent circle warden witch – for the sake of brevity, I won’t go into detailed analyses here and instead point you towards my reviews of “Secrets of Tactical Archetypes I +II”, where I did take a look at all of them Suffice to say, I’m quite a fan of these interesting archetypes and the fact that they all have some distinct powers that truly make them stand out from the fray.
Now Gunslingers are one of the classes your either love or hate – I count myself to the former and thus welcome the inclusion of Secrets of the Gunslinger in this book, a pdf that originally provided archetypes to represent pirates, asian-style fire artists, gunslingers blending their arts with accursed hexes via cursed bullets and wandslingers for everyone who’d rather use wands than black powder. We also get new magic items, feats and a template to create an undead gunslinging monstrosity – Hell yeah! Speaking of cool classes and cooler supplements – the “Secrets of the Inquisitor” – to this date the most complex and imho best inquisitor supplement out there, thankfully has also found its way in here, providing not only a neat variety of archetypes but also GLORIOUS feats based on the stratagems of Sun Tzu/Zhuge Liang – these feats are especially suitable for solo-tactics and oh boy, do they make the inquisitor badass and all about deceptive warfare. Take these feats, read the carefully and never stop grinning. These feats were what made several of my recent NPCs truly stand out tactics-wise. They’re that good and this component thus constitutes another must-have in my book. While the supplemental material for the Magus released by Rite Publishing has also found its way inside this book and can be considered one of the finer supplements for the class, in direct comparison to the legendary inquisitor-pdf, it feels just like a very good addition – which is okay, after all not all releases can be strokes of genius!
The complete opposite, unfortunately, can also be found herein – David Mallon’s “Secrets of the Oracle” to this day remains the worst pdf Rite Publishing has released in my opinion and shows a distinct lack of rules-concepts, balancing and even unique ideas – just about any idea herein has been done in vastly superior ways in other sourcebooks and from ridiculous save-or-die abilities (pitiful amounts of damage, but fort-save or die? That’s not PFRPG-design!) to rays that blind on touch attacks sans save via darkness (disregarding darkvision and e.g. the ability of many creatures to see even in magical darkness) and abilities that simply violate central tenets of PFRPG-crunch design, the inclusion of this pdf in the book remains puzzling to me and actually hurts the book. Why the worst pdf Rite has published so far has been included in this compilation, I don’t know – while one or two good ideas can indeed be found herein, the overall execution is so poor that any sense of wonder at lotus-eater oracles is quickly lost in anger at the at best lackluster execution – if you get this as pdf, do yourself a favor and spare the ink of printing these pages out and skip to the next chapter.
Which is a great example of old material getting updated and not simply slapped together – when the “Secrets of Martial Mastery” was released, it was a groundbreaking collection of alternate combat maneuvers: From creating openings and bypassing armor to going corps-à-corps with foes, we get a nice array of updated material with what at first sight might seem problematic: Inflicting e.g. the “paralyzed”-condition on foes is very strong, even if only for one round. However, requiring a maneuver, dealing half damage AND allowing for a save is enough to balance the options and make them just that: options, i.e. choices that can be viable, but are not overpowering. Scaring, exhausting and parrying are covered in these pages and due to the release of UC, several of the maneuvers have been redesigned to work as a subset of options for the dirty trick maneuver, including low blows, tormenting attacks etc. There also are 3 new grapple-options as well as feats to avoid provoking AoOs – especially the latter is interesting, since thankfully we get a generic feat template called “Improved (combat maneuver)” instead of wasting space on x cut-copy-paste versions of the same feat for different maneuvers. Cool decision and a certain distinctiveness is still maintained by the “Greater” feats provided as well: Here we actually also get feats that look similar in that they enhance the respective maneuvers, but also provide additional benefits depending on the maneuver in question. Now if you want to play a trick fighter/mundane martial artist, then the “Master of the Art”-10-level PrC has you covered. A great chapter properly updated to reflect current rules-developpment, this was a pleasant surprise for me and represents the willingness to keep up the support for older publications – great to see!
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are very good, though I did notice a couple of editing glitches like a “mystieries”[sic!]-bookmark – overall, though, there is not an inordinate amount there, not enough to warrant a downgrade in any way. Layout adheres to RiP’s old rune-covered b/w-2-column standard with artworks being mostly fitting stock. The pdf comes with extensive, nested bookmarks.
I really enjoy the update the martial mastery-content got herein and I’m a big fan of both the luckbringer and taskshaper-classes, which imho are two of the best 3pp-classes out there and having their material collected in one book is a massive boon – more so true for the stellar divine channeler-class and all the supplemental material it has seen in various issues of Pathways. The magus and gunslinger options by Steven D. Russell ooze that peculiar brand of iconicity and eureka-effects that I’ve come to expect from Rite Publishing and the tactical archetypes have deservedly gotten their own rave reviews upon their release and established their authors as up-and-coming talents in the field. Oh, and then there is the simply genius “Secrets of the Inquisitor”, perhaps one of the best class supplements released for any APG-class by any publisher…
So all well? No. I honestly don’t get why the abysmal “Secrets of the Oracle” has been included – as mentioned, it is imho not only one of the worst oracle-supplements out there, it is infinitely beyond the quality of ANY of the other component pdfs that make up this massive compilation and the imho worst pdf RiP has ever released – and I own them all. If the design-sins of the original product had been remedied, if it had been redesigned back from the ground up (the only way to salvage at least some of the ideas) and then included, I would have probably cherished it – but taking this disastrously bad pdf on board actually somewhat undercuts the otherwise superb quality of the contributions herein.
As much as it pains me, with the minor glitches here and there as well as the presence of latter files, I can’t justify rating this pdf the full 5 stars, as much as I want to. I’ll instead settle for a dual final verdict: 4 stars + seal of approval if you take the abysmal 1-star-oracle-supplement into account, 5 stars + seal of approval if you choose to ignore the oracle and focus on the disturbing amount of stellar, excellent crunch herein. Sine I feel that the majority of awesomeness outweighs my gripes, I’ll round up the middle-ground verdict of 4.5 stars to 5 for the purpose of this platform.
Endzeitgeist out.
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The first installment of the second spin-off of the Dungeon Dressing-line is 17 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page advertisement, 2 pages editorial, 1 page ToC/foreword, 1 page SRD, 1 page back cover, leaving us with 10 pages of content, more than in most dressing-pdfs, so let's check this out!
Now what to expect? Instead of getting tables that depict individual trees, undergrowth, bushes etc., the supplement opts for a different way: Instead of detailing the forest, we get 100 different minor events that range from butterfly-swarms to hidden caches of bandit loot, painters currently painting nature, abandoned (or are they?) tree-huts, suspension bridges between branches, mad hermits, sleeping opossums and birds that weirdly track them, resulting in a nice, breathing array of beings that make the respective forest come alive as both a location and an eco-system.
Now instead of providing multiple small tables for components of woodland dressings, we instead gain one massive table of dressings that include gnarled trees with humanoid-looking trunks, rivers and ravines intersecting the paths, remains of old battlegrounds, soporific pollen-producing plants (substitute xtabay flowers if particularly sadistic...), streams with rotten tree-bridges, kudzu-like infestations, old houses surrounded by rune-covered trees - you get the idea. Rather than going into explicit detail with regards to multiple components, we get 100 "stages" or hooks, backdrops if you will, to spin encounters from, many of which also feature some short DC, rules-information and the like.
We also get a one-page table that details 12 different random encounters to insert into your game as well as a page of general features of woodland environments that sums up e.g. modifications to stealth and detection range, rules for trails and undergrowth as well as e.g. fallen trees etc. and their effect on you when encountered. Very useful and collected on one page for your convenience.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are top-notch, as I've come to expect from Raging Swan press - I didn't notice any glitches. Layout adheres to RSP's 2-column b/w-standard and the b/w-artworks included are atmospheric indeed. The pdf comes fully bookmarked and in two versions, one optimized for screen-use and one to be printed out, which is still great and something I'd love all 3pps to adapt, but oh well.
When I read the title of this installment of the Dressing-lines, I thought: How do they want to do this? Author Mike Welham has opted for one of the two approaches: Instead of providing you the tools to customize the forest per se (via percentages of leaf-carrying trees, tables for undergrowth, mosses etc.), we get a more general approach that brings the forest to life by focusing on its eco-system, its inhabitants and weird (or beautiful) locations. Less a cosmetic generator of how a forest looks like/sounds/feels, but rather a pdf depicting what the place holds surprise-wise. If you've been looking for a generator like the one I mentioned, then this pdf will not cater to your needs. What it does, though, is lending a hand with regards to sketched out adventure-hook-worthy ideas/locales to develop and add life to your forest. Especially when used in massive woods or to complement supplements like Kobold Press' "Tales of the Old Margreve", you'll have a whopping 200 descriptions to fall back on and lend credence and believability to your forests and bring back the sense of wonder journeying through the vast woods should entail. That being said, the table of random encounters, while useful, felt like it could have been better used for more details instead, but that's a personal preference. Now, for what it's worth, this pdf is a joy to read (quite a feat with list-pdfs like this) and features some exciting ideas that should spark all but the most dried-up creativity and for what it tries to be, it works. My final verdict will thus be 5 stars + seal of approval. However, I'm still hoping we'll see a sequel themed more on "Dark" woodlands, primal forests (not jungles - that would be a separate one!) where the light of the sun scarcely falls to the forest floor as well as a pdf that allows for customary forest generation - perhaps a "So what's that forest like, anyways?" to supplement this.
Endzeitgeist out.
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This mini-pdf is 3 pages long, 1/2 of a page SRD, leaving us with 2.5 pages of content, so let's take a look!
The Ghost of Ashenwood Road comes first as a legend and then with 6 different rumors circling around the elusive being. 5 different skill-check DCs to investigate the ghost are provided and then, the DM is told what exactly is REALLY going on - which I won't spoil here, in case players are reading this. The short story/character also comes with 5 different plot-hooks to draw the PCs in and on the last page, we get its CR 8 stats.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are top-notch, I didn't notice any glitches. Layout adheres to a printer-friendly, elegant 2-column standard. The original piece of artwork deserves special mentioning, as its professional quality is something rarely seen in pdfs of this price-point. The story provided with its rumors, legend etc. make this a solid offering indeed, enough to craft a sidetrek or even a full-blown module out of and the overall quality of the writing is nice. When you take the extremely fair price into account, you can't help but come to the conclusion that this is a) a nice first offering for the product line and b) worthy of 5 stars, with me omitting my seal of approval only since I would have loved to more skill-check etc. and the SRD on its separate page - as provided, half of the final page is the statblock, half the SRD, which results in unnecessary printer-drain by printing it out.
Endzeitgeist out.
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The second of Midgard Player's Guides is 31 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page SRD, leaving us with 28 pages of content, so let's check this out!
The Mharoti-empire is one of the most interesting nations in the Midgard setting: An empire in service to the elemental dragon lords, this vast nation is governed by a sultan(a) elected by the conglomerate of dragons in order to avoid the power-struggles between draconic masters. Hungry to satiate the draconic lust for treasure and power, the young empire is on the constant verge of expansion and looking to use its vast, draconic military to fuel its conquests. That being said, another interesting fact is that humans are actually second-class citizens that rank below the dragonkin and kobolds - after are, the scaled races are closer to their scaled overlords. But in fact, the social structure of the empire is more complex, as the entry on the castes show:
The Jambuka (or jackals) occupy the bottom ladder of the empire and consists of the non-scaled folks - with one notable exception: The sultana of the empire is actually a dragon-blooded human. Also, the legendary Harem Assassins of the empire are recruited from this caste as a kind of elite cadre of enforcers. Above the jackals rank the kobaldi, who make up the bulk of engineers, sappers etc. and beyond the kobaldi, there are the Sekban, the lowest caste of dragonkin, which also include a few humans with draconic blood. The shocktroops of the empire, the Edjet are a warrior-caste raised from birth to serve as the backbone and elite of the empire's vast military forces. Minor lords and light cavalry, the Akinji-caste is the home of dragonkin and drakes, whereas the highest strata are the Timarli (dragon dukes), Urmanli (scaled lords, a caste for dragons) and finally, tehre are the Morza, the grand dragons that truly rule the empire.
After all this great fluff, we're off to the crunchy bits of the guide, with a total of 43 (unless I have miscounted) traits being offered to show that your PC hails from glorious Mharoti. Among the regular traits, the vast majority can be considered balanced an well-conceived, with one exception: "Dragon Fighter" doubles your threat range versus draconic foes, which is imho broken even if you don't take into account that dragonkin and kobolds may or may not count as draconic creatures. This trait needs a revision. Among the racial traits, we also get a solid selection of traits, with many exclusive to dragonkin and drakes, though rules to play the latter are not included in the book.
EDIT: Broken Components from the first iteration of the pdf have been revised: Deep Seer has been upgraded from a trait to a feat, for example and a broken trait that expanded all threat-ranges for a weapon-category was nerfed to where it works as intended..
We also get 24 new feats, unfortunately also several ones with problems. While I like the options for kobolds and dragonkin to gain gliding wings and flying via feats, there are also issues: Climbing Claws nets you a +4 feat bonus to climb as well as climb speed at full movement with a -5 penalty AND retain your dex-bonus. The thing is, there is no such bonus as a feat-bonus in standard PFRPG and the benefits feel rather a tad bit too much for me.
EDIT: In the last version of the Player's Guide, the Breath Weapon-feat was broken adn it has been redone so it actually works and feels balanced - kudos! The completely broken Dragon Slayer feat has also been salvaged: Now you auto-confirm threats versus large or larger draconic creatrues. While I personally don't like auto-confirms, as a reviewer I don't complain about this feat's revised and much streamlined iteration.
"Roar of the Dragon Lords" has also been nerfed: It allows you to emit a 30 ft.-roar 3/day. Foes with less than 1/2 HD of you get shaken if on a DC 20-save and you also get +4 to intimidate for a one minute afterwards. Oh, now it can't be taken at first level anymore, making it a nice feat-choice, though personally, I would have preferred a scaling DC.
After that, we get new archetypes: Cavaliers may now become members of the Order of the Firedrake, who may choose draconic/reptilian mounts at the DM's approval and gain some inspiration-based abilities. The remnants of 4th edition-style designs have been purged from teh archetype and it now works as intended. Great!
Also: Dragon and drake mounts are HARD to balance and the lack of guidance is a major bummer for any DM. Super Genius Games have their Dragon Rider class and it's balancing is HARD as it shows how much to consider. Minor size-based balancing guidelines for reptilian/draconic mounts have been included in the revision.
Druids may now become Elemental Exarchs may get an elemental companion with which they can fuse and gain some elemental-based abilities. The fusing is a neat idea, though I wished they had wildered a bit regarding the summoner-eidolon rules, as the rest of the archetype is mostly what you'd expect from elemental druids. Sorry, but in spite of the cool temporary fusion with the elemental, I can't really get behind it, though that's a matter of taste and not something I'll hold against the player's guide.
Edjet Warriors are exclusively dragonkin fighters are specialists with polearms that may cleave-trip multiple foes. At high levels, though, the archetype's balance crumbles to dust. At 15th level, the edjet warriors get essentially evasion for fort and will-saves versus spell-like abilities and spells. That's "Mettle" with another name, an ability that was broken in 3.X and still is. This ability needs replacement. Furthermore, worse, at 16th level, the Edjet also gains evasion when using a shield AND may grant that to ALL adjacent allies. At 20th level that becomes improved evasion. Ok at the highest level, though somehow, my DM-senses tingle at that ability as well. Still not comfortable with this one.
Dargon Magi may deliver elemental damage vi their spellstrikes a limited amount of times per day and later gain elemental rays and blasts as well as 11 different arcanas.The first broken "Arcane Strike"-arcana has been streamlined into PFRPG-rules and no longer is broken beyond repair. Two thumbs up! The Breath Weapon option I ripped to shreds in my first iteration of this review now also works as befitting the system..
Monks of the Fiery Fist are essentially a fire-themed monk archetype - ok, but not too exciting. The problem of the monks of the wind palm has been addressed: Their unarmed attacks get a reach of 15 ft. - now a limited amount of times per day. The terrain-ignoring entry has also been nerfed to make sense and NOT invalidate x feats. Oracles may opt to take the mystery of the void. The mystery per se is ok, though I don't like the fact that there's one that lets you replace cha or wis for int regarding knowledge-skills. The mystery now comes with its final revelation.
The Greyscale-archetype for the rogue is specialized on infiltrating draconic strongholds and come with 6 new rogue talents and 3 advanced rogue talents and actually constitute one I don't have anything to complain about. Wizards may now opt to choose the Void Elemental school, which has an insanely broken arcane discovery, available as soon as 13th level, that allows you to throw someone 1/week on a failed will save versus DC 35 (!!!) into the void, trapping the being there forever (unless wish'd or miracle'd out) and having a good chance of driving the subject insane even if he/she/it is rescued. That's a capstone, not an arcane discovery. I don't get why this one has not been nerfed.
We also get the new Dragon Emir PrC, which gets d12, 4+Int skills per level, full BAB, 1/2 fort and will-progression and can be considered a commander-style PrC that allows for some powerful, warmaster-like commands as well as some nice synergy with cavaliers. A cool mounted commander option, nothing to complain here and in fact a great PrC.
The penultimate chapter deals with new magic and generally, the ideas of the spells are great, iconic and even the one spell I considered broken before has been remedied and fixed. (Coin Swarm should btw. be on the list of ANY dragon out there...)
The final chapter is fluffy goodness again, providing us with a cool plethora of animals and beasts to buy in Mharoti bazaars as well as exotic types of food like aboleth brain and the like as well as gear from draconic beings, magic items and magic carpets, complete with price-lists.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are very good, I didn't notice any significant glitches. Layout adheres to the drop-dead-gorgeous 2-column full-color standard - Marc Radle did an awesome job there. The pdf is fully bookmarked for your convenience and the line-drawings in b/w are neat indeed.
Kobold Press has gone up and beyond in this revision of the Player's Guide to the Dragon Empire, fixing almost all the issues of this pdf - while e.g. casting foes into the void still feels broken to me, the vast accumulation of problematic content has been purged and what remains could be considered a matter of taste/individual balancing of a campaign and nothing a DM can't do him/herself. The amount of fixing makes this pdf thankfully the book it should have been and while not perfect, I feel easily justified in rating this revised version of the book 4.5 stars, rounded up to 5 for the purpose of this platform.
Endzeitgeist out.
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This pdf is 29 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page advertisement, 1 page SRD and 1 page back cover, leaving us with 24 pages of content, so let’s check this out!
Kicking off with a rather grisly, yet aptly-written piece of prose we are introduced to the matter at hand on page 6, before we get to the content – killing 4 further pages in the process and making this pdf rather short, but onwards to the new plants introduced here:
Since the herbs here can be found in specific climates and need a survival-check to be found that is further modified if the character has ranks in Profession (Herbalist), Craft (Alchemy) or similar skills – beyond that, foraging of course also provides nice adventure-hooks: After all, what if the needed plant only grows in the graveyard of dragons or those haunted burial cairns?
Each entry of the respective plants comes thus with a foraging DC, a sample price for one batch and both a description of the physical form of the respective herb as well as multiple items that can be crafted from it as well as the required DCs. Growing your own herbs is also covered in an extensive one-page sidebar that provides concise rules. But what can these plants do?
The bulbous and insect-eating Balor’s Maw can be fashioned into an acidic splash weapon that sticks to targets and continues to burn, scent bombs to throw off e.g. hounds or other smell-based trackers or suregrip, which makes losing one’s hold, be it on ledges or weapons, less likely. Corpseroot can be used to make an incense that repels mindless undead, preserve a corpse for 24 hours with a certain balm, stagger or even paralyze foes with a mild poison or act as a concoction that hides the user from mindless undead. Death Man’s Head mushrooms can be made into a fire-accelerating paste or even a dried, albeit slightly unreliable volatile shroom-bomb or an interesting poison: Working only when ingested (and best concealed in spicy foods), the poison deals fire damage from inside to the victims.
Dragon’s Tongue, blood-red, serrated ferns can be made into a tonic, that, as long as it’s ingested for at least a week, provides a +1 bonus to fort-saves, but only as long as daily consumption is maintained. It coan also be used to create red smoke or a disgusting tar, which, while sickening and nauseating, helps afflicted to throw off infections by providing a substantial bonus to the next fort-save versus a disease. The plant can also be quite profitable, as a delicacy beer can be brewed from it as well! Golden-yellow flowers called Mother’s Kiss can be made into an incense that, when inhaled, deadens pain and helps to save versus pain-spells. The flowers can also be substituted as balm for using a healer’s kit and have yet another cool application: When mixed with mare’s milk, they may hasten natural healing of both hp and ability score damage, but also weaken the character while under the effect., reducing str and dex by 6 points for 48 hours or 1d8 hours after having fully healed. Finally, the dried flowers may act as a plaguefinder: When diseased people breathe on them, the flowers turn blue! From Nightroot, one may extract a non-flammable bioluminescent paste that works as superb illumination in e.g. gas-filled tunnels or work-environments with a lot of black powder. It can also be used to enhance sight, but this particular application is risky: While enhanced vision in shadows and darkness is neat, a botched dose means that the characters suffers from hallucinations that may see him/her jump at shadows and suffer from the shaken condition. It can also be turned into poison and blind others.
Polysap is harvested from chameleon trees, which look like the most dominant form of tree in a given forest to the untrained eye. The sap can be made into a balm that slightly hardens the wearer’s skin (+1 natural AC), used as a clay-substitute or as a kind of make-up to create masks and help infiltrators or actors with their professions and tasks. Finally, it can be used to stop bleeding or to enhance fast healing/regeneration, if available.
Sage’s Cap is a potentially dangerous, lethal mushroom, but one that can be made into weapon versus the incorporeal and it’s regularly already interesting poison can be refined into a different type of poison that induces horrid nightmares. Finally, the fungus can be made into a certain incense helping versus emotion-based effects, but also making the user sluggish.
The vine-growing weeping maiden can end bleed damage, be made into a draught that results in a particular deep slumber, grant a bonus to dying creatures to regain consciousness, or be made into a poison that increases bleed damage. Thin, red, extremely sharp grasses called Wizard’s Beard can be made into an incense that allows prepared spellcasters to unprepared spells, freeing the unused spell-slots for other spells, but it is taxing and also imposes minor penalties. One can also create a deadly poison that hinders spellcasting. On the risky side, the plant can be made into eye-drops that, while sickening, do allow the user to detect magic. If the herbalist botched, though, the users can see false auras, making the usage unreliable.
After all these glorious new plants, we are also introduced to 5 pages covering special materials that can be created by combining multiple doses of different herbs. Mxing these materials as well as DCs and market prices are also provided.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are top-notch this time around, I didn’t notice any glitches. Layout adheres to NNW’s 2-column standard with its parchment-like background and the artwork consists mostly of stock-art at the lower end of the spectrum. The pdf comes fully bookmarked.
It’s been years since 4 Winds Fantasy Gaming has announced the Apothecary’s Handbook, one of my most anticipated PFRPG-books right now and I’m still hoping it will be a milestone of quality similar to their equipment book. In the meanwhile, the necromancers Alex Riggs and Joshua Zaback have stepped up and created this. And honestly, after being disappointed by some of their releases, I did not expect too much from this one. I was oh so wrong. Tight in focus, extremely useful, oozing flavor and untold options for adventure, this is all but required for low magic or dark fantasy settings and campaigns and even for the others, there is so much goodness in here, the herbs being balanced and all, that these plants are guaranteed to enrich your campaign via the details they provide and the extra sense of believability paired with their wondrousness made this book one of my all-time-favorites of their oeuvre. Multiple uses, foraging and combined substances? Yes, please! In fact, I’d immediately slap 5 stars plus seal of approval on this pdf, were it not for one gripe: This pdf feels too short, with the fluffy introduction out of the way and some very spacious (and ugly) artworks in the text, we not even get 20 pages of content for a topic in which the necromancers obviously managed to shine very bright. This relative brevity means I will go down to 4.5 stars, but still round up to 5 since the ideas and content provided can be considered universally top-notch. I really hope the authors will grace us with a sequel or even a massive almanac/grimoire of more herbs: After all, it’s a niche no other 3pp is exploring at the moment and one the authors quite obviously know how to write for. Why not one for desert plants, arctic plants, jungle vines, aquatic plants etc.? Ahhh, one may dream…
Endzeitgeist out.
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This supplement is 6 pages long, 2/3 of a page front cover, 1 page editorial/SRD, leaving us with 4 1/3 pages of content, so let's take a look!
The idea of this pdf is simple, yet genius and overdue: The hexes contained herein are tied to specific patrons and may only be used by witches of said patron, making the choice matter more as well as serving as unique distinguishing elements that set witches of different patrons more apart. A great idea that I hope will be further developed in future supplements, but let's take a look at the hexes, shall we? I'll first give you the patron's theme/name and then what the hex does, so let's hit it!
-Agility: Allows the target of the hex to gain a massive bonus to acrobatics to avoid AoOs due to the boneless, wobbling gait as well as allowing the recipient use of the skill in medium and heavy armor. Disturbing and cool!
-Ancestors: Whispers from beyond the veil allow the retry of a failed knowledge-check.
-Animals: +4 to Str and Con, +2 to will, -2 to AC for one round for an animal, longer at higher levels.
-Death: Touch dead foes to have them count as having been killed by a death-effect. Neat!
-Deception: Hallelujah! EPIC! Thanks! This hex acts as a minor form of non-detection that fools all detect-spells. Glorious to avoid those annoying scan-spells! Thank you on behalf of all DMs who hate the hell out of them.
-Elements: Change elemental damage for one round. Also: At higher levels synergy with other hexes.
-Enchantment: Distract others, hampering mental and dex-based checks by evoking dormant dark desires in others.
-Endurance: Grant temporary HP.
-Healing: Always count as having a heal-kit and allows you to treat caltrop/spike stone wounds as a standard action.
-Insanity: Force other creatures to babble incoherently, potentially ruining communication and spells.
-Light: Increase illumination and make such increased illumination count as light-spells with regards to e.g. darkness.
-Moon: Similar yet different from light, this patron grants access to witchlights that illuminate the witch's item. If she chooses, though, she can opt to be the only one who can see the light. Cool!
-Occult: Grant a creature a disturbing characteristic of undeath that translates into a minor bonus to a multitude of rolls.
-Plague: Sicken foes.
-Portents: 10 seconds weal or woe prediction. Nice for "which one to cut"-situations.
-Shadows: Grant minor bonus to stealth and make identification by sight impossible - very useful!
-Spirits: Allow one creature to attack and hurt spirits.
-Stars: Shaken foes.
-Strength: Increase carrying capacity - also very cool; E.g. to carry allies out of the collapsing dungeon, move vast objects like in the Necromancer Games classic "Chaos Rising".
-Time: Grant an extra swift action to a creature.
-Transformation: Disguise as other race and gain one of the race's qualities as determined by the hex.
-Trickery: Sleight of Hand as class skill + bonus to it.
-Vengeance: Use this hex to make a creature that strikes the witch provoke an AoO from the witch.
-Water: Breath water, bonus to swim and later swim speed.
-Winter: Grant creatures bonus cold damage to add to their attacks.
-Wisdom: Perception as class skill plus bonus to it.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are top-notch, I didn't notice any glitches. Layout adheres to SGG's 3-column landscape-standard and the artworks in b/w are ok. the pdf has no bookmarks, but at slightly more than 4 pages, I'm still willing to not hold that against the pdf.
As I've already mentioned, I enjoy the diversity and unique options that patron hexes bring to the fray and much like we've come to expect from SGG, these options are interesting, solid crunch and balanced well. What is quite interesting is that many of the hexes herein are of the utility/special-type that has no straightforward combat application, but when used smart could help immensely - this is greatly in line with my concept of the witch as the primary spellcaster for the versatile, smart and mystic, scheming bunch. The patron hexes tie the class more closely to the respective patron, which is also something I welcome: In my homegame, different patrons allow exclusive access to certain spells (no other class may cast) and thus, hexes like this, especially well-made ones, are neat complimentary options for the witch-class. That being said, this pdf is also VERY short, and honestly, I think two hexes per patron would not have been too much to ask - perhaps a sequel? Due to the relative brevity of the supplement when compared to similar releases by SGG, I'll settle for a final verdict of 4 stars. If you don't mind the brevity, get this - the hexes are worth it and their synergy with e.g. the cackle hex is neat and something that can be neatly expanded upon in future releases.
Endzeitgeist out.
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The latest installment of the FoTS-series is 25 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 2 pages of advertisement and 1 page SRD, leaving us with 20 pages of content - quite a bunch, so let's check this out!
Adhering to my format for reviews of this series, I'll kick off with telling you something about the supplemental information for this NPC, to be precise, first the templates. The Verminoid-template allows you to create humanoid beings from vermin via a template and also provides a sample spell to create further verminoids. The trickster-creature template and rune-carved creature template are also used in the builds of Vhulgus and finally, we get the rather complex eternal creature template , but the supplemental material doesn't stop there:
A total of 6 magic weapon qualities and 6 general magic items are provided to ensure you have everything to run the NPC in one book and we also get Vhulgus custom magic items and oh boy, they are interesting: While e.g. his amulet is a nice enhancer/stealth-item to prevent scrying, his belt not only enhances str and dex, but also teleports unused weapons of yours back into the respective loops. He also sports a unique circlet, a cloak that allows the casting of a ridiculous amount of spells, arrow-snatching enhanced gloves, a superb headband, two unique rings, a robe that helps with casting expensive spells, slippers that help versus falling and difficult terrain and a vest that can store potions. Better yet, his weapon is the bane of style-less clothing and armors and is not for nothing called "Stripper". This can lead to some rather cool scenes indeed...
We also get 3 feats to enhance crafting, caster-levels and metamagic to trip foes as well as the Bloody Raiment-spells (included in a regular and a greater version): This spell allows bloodstains of raiments to be soaked and teleported to predetermined containers to be used/consumed by e.g. blood-drinking creatures.
If verminoid, product description etc. were not ample hint, then let me tell you about the character behind the stats: Vhulgus is the fashion-mogul of the Colisuem Morpheuon - winning is not enough, it also requires panache and style and champions need to look good - that's where the immortal humanoid giant leech dandy ((!!!!) comes in: Armed with extensive spellbooks (the high-level one taking up a whole page!) for each iteration as well as an alternate version, each of the three incarnations of Vhulgus is interesting. The character's concept, though, and its implications are smart: Born from the lowest of the low, Vhulgus is a consummate trickster and combines his ample capabilities of potential foppish behavior with the intelligence and panache to properly back up his facade of superficiality. Beyond that, the product also constitutes a smart take on the term "dandy", which is per se defined as an androgynous existence that parasitically lives on other people, having them sin/experience things by proxy. As such, a dandy is sine nobilitate and leeches off the nobility. See what the character does there? Brilliant! Dreamburning information and tipps for the DM are of course included as well.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are top-notch, I didn't notice any glitches. Layout adheres to RiP's old rune-covered two-column standard and the artwork is disturbing and sophisticated and also provides some neat pieces for some of Vhulgus' items. The pdf comes fully bookmarked.
The FoTS-series has turned into one of my favorite, if not the favorite NPC-book by any publisher - while other pdfs provide one-shot NPCs, statblocks etc, FoTS goes further and provides you creatures beyond what you could create on the fly: Highly complex, smart and full of options, these characters blend Justin Sluder's excellence in the crunch-crafting department with Matt Banach's gift of creating truly evocative character-background serves the series well and Vhulgus is yet another clever, interesting character I'll love to introduce into my game. Speaking of Matt Banach: If you want more of his writing, I'd like to point you to Rite Publishing's Adventure Quarterly #3, where he provides a stellar module as well as the kickstarter for a novel set in dream currently running.
I forgot my final verdict? 5 stars + seal of approval - one of the best in the series, this installment has " nothing to declare, but its genius."
Endzeitgeist out.
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This pdf is 23 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page ToC, 1 page intro to AP plug-ins, 1 page SRD, 1 page author bios, 1 page back cover, leaving us with 16 pages of content, so let’s take a look!
This pdf is all about harnessing the powers of Ki and thus, we begin this pdf with a discussion on the nature of Ki and how varying classes use Ki. Among the suggestions are ways to redesign the samurai to utilize Ki as well for other classes – the suggestion is both elegant and neat: By taking one of the vows that correspond with respective far eastern virtues, characters can get access to ki-points. Beyond that, there’s also the option to utilize the new Ki-meditation-feat, which grants the character taking it access to one point of ki that also grants +2 to one skill chosen each time at meditation while it is not expended. Furthermore, the feat allows a character to expend said point for a +4 bonus on the skill aligned with the respective use of Ki Meditation. As such, the approach is somewhat similar, though different from Heroes of the Jade Oath’s usage of ch’i, but not to an extent that would make both takes on the concept incompatible. In fact, with minimal work on the side of the DM, they can be combined, which is neat indeed.
After these basics, we are introduced to a variety of different ki-feats: Body Control allows you to partially mitigate negative environmental conditions based on heat and cold as long as you still have ki-points in your reserve. Also rather cool: The feat allows you to hold your breath longer by expending ki-points. “Composure” is crafted along similar design-lines – as long as you have at least one point of ki in your reserve, you are harder to read via e.g. sense motive. The feats also allows you to spend ki to drastically increase the DC of sense motive versus you and use ki to mitigate fear-based conditions by spending one point per step to be mitigated and even avoid fear-based death effects à la phantasmal killer by spending 5 points of ki. Endow Ki is one of the most interesting feats in this pdf, allowing you to temporarily transfer ki to allies and granting them access to one of your ki-feats. Ki fuel allows you to burn physical attributes in 2-point increments to gain ki points.
Two of the more complex feats are plain genius: A new item-class is introduced via ki crystals, which essentially allow you to store ki points in crystals. If you think that monks will now carry those by the pounds, rest assured that tapping into them becomes progressively difficult. The second feat that allows for a sharing of power would be the option to inscribe Ki Tattoos: These allow the bearer access to one of your ki-feat abilities with a constant effect as if the user always had at least 1 point of ki. Interesting and thanks to the limitations still an option I’d consider balanced.
Ki Agility and Balance are the way to go for agile combatants: Granting bonuses to acrobatics and allowing for the option to grant bonuses to acrobatics and ref-saves by expending a point of ki and granting +1 AC to dodge and keep dex when using acrobatics as well as the option to spend ki to make an acrobatics-check to negate being dropped prone, they can be combined for additional fun. Ki Cloak is a must-have for stealth-based characters, allowing you to not only enhance your stealth, but grant you concealment and total concealment via spending ki-points.
For characters truly into ki-feats, Ki Focus allows you to increase numerical values of your ki-feats a limited amount of times per day, while ki insight increases your sense motive and allows for the expenditure of ki for a massive bonus to the skill or a bonus to will-saves. Ki Resiliency is an interesting option as well, allowing you to spend ki to get 1d6 x number of ki-feats you possess temporary hitpoints. Ki sprint enhances your base speed and allows you to spend ki when charging or running to add even 30 ft. bursts to your movement. Mental Feedback allows you to counter mind-influencing effects with non-lethal damage depending on the amount of ki you expend, whereas Mind over body allows you to delay the onset of select negative conditions. Perfected Performance allows bards to enhance their performances with ki. Sap Ki allows the character to negate other nearby ki-feats and drains ki from foes that successfully hit you. Sense Ki allows you to better perceive living creatures and allows you to temporarily gain blindsense limited to living beings. Swift Recovery is all about faster healing from regular and ability point damage and allows you to use ki to heal more ability damage or directly use ki to heal ability damage.
Strength of will is a feat I’m not comfortable with: It allows you to spend ki to change fort or ref-saves to will-saves and even with the ki-cost, for my conservative tastes this goes a bit too far. Really iconic and the last one of the general ki feats, the Yogic levitation allows you to levitate for quite a while as well as feather fall. VERY cool! After this, we’re off to the second chapter, which details ki-feats that also count as combat-feats. Sticking to maximum usability-guidelines, base-classes like barbarians, rangers etc. also get short paragraphs that allow them to e.g. take a feat from this chapter in place of their rage powers, mercies, combat style feats etc. – commendable!
Align Ki is the first feat I’d consider boring, since it allows you to align your unarmed strikes – been there, done that and all too often. Anticipatory Advance allows you to substitute wis for dex to AC with regards to AoOs, even combine them versus a creature and add wis on counterattacks versus said foe. Flowing Stance would be the defensive AoO-feat to the offensive anticipatory advance. Disruptive Ki allows you to deal 1 point of damage to all physical attributes via your ki. Evade Charge increases your AC versus charges and allows you to punish foes charging you with attacks, whereas felling strike allows you to increase your tripping efficiency and shattering strike does some analogue for sundering. You can also use Focused Strikes to get wis-mod to atk and damage for a round, but at the cost of 1 round of ki-feat-power suspension – interesting when combined with offensive and defensive attacks and great to make combat more fluid.
It should also be noted that there’s a rather extensive Kiai-feat tree that goes beyond the 3 standard-improved-greater versions of the feat: Starting as a powerful scream, the feat-tree allows for additional sonic damage etc. at higher feats and even stagger, stun etc. foes. Very cool! Rapid Recovery allows you to regain limited hp when reduced to 0 or below HP and Ki Rush can make you sprint with a 90 degree-turn and move through allied squares and difficult terrain. With heightened precision, you may reroll 1s of sneak attacks and also have better chances of getting past precision-damage negating powers like fortifications. On the bad side, we have Ki Touch, which is imho BROKEN: It lets you spend ki to resolve your attack as a touc attack and can be combined with e.g. Vital Strike. On the awesome-side, there now is a rather complex and cool Hadouken-feat that not only increases the power of your crits, it also has a nice synergy with the djinn-styles and allows you to use the iconic blasts.
The final chapter of the pdf makes ki useful for casting classes and allows for options of all the casting paizo-classes to substitute some of their powers for ki-feats. The feats herein allow you to increase DCs of your spells, spell-like abilities and spell-triggering abilities, help maintaining concentration when defensively casting or casting within swarms, substitute ki for metamagic-level-increase, hit foes as AoOs with low-level spells and even bloodline abilities, hexes etc., hasten item creation by using ki and also modify touchspells via metamagic to work as potential reflexive AoO-casts. Prepared casters may spend ki to spontaneously convert a spell into another one and spontaneous casters may now use ki to cast metamagic spells without increasing their casting time. You may also transcend language barriers with language-dependant effects and implants spells in your subconscious that target yourself, even working when dazed, feebleminded etc. – rather cool.
What’s not so cool is that two feats go imho beyond what I’d consider a feasible power-level: Recapture energy allows you to spent ½ spell-level ki points to regain a spell you just cast as a standard action, retaining spellslots and spells you would have otherwise expended. While this one just rubs my conservative tastes the wrong way, the second feels a bit more problematic: Destructive Force allows you to reroll 1 die of damage per damaging die you roll as part of your spell – per se ok. What’s not so cool is the fact that for 1 poit of ki, you may reroll ALL damaging dice of a spell. Even with the caveat of only influencing damage and not ability damage etc., this feels a bit strong. Again, though, the feat is not strong enough to be considered truly broken.
The pdf concludes with a massive 2-page table of the new ki-feats introduced in this pdf.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are very good, though not as perfect as other Legendary Games-products: I e.g. noticed a prerequisite called “Wist”, which should read wis, but the glitch remains solitary and does not impede one’s enjoyment of the pdf. Layout adheres to legendary games’ 2-column landscape standard and is presented in the drop-dead gorgeous, stellar standard used for the jade Regent AP-plug-ins. I can’t comment on the portrait-version of the pdf since I don’t own it and don’t buy pdfs twice. The original full color artworks by Frank Hessefort are beautiful as well and up to the highest standards. The pdf comes in two versions, one being more printer-friendly than the other and both are extensively bookmarked with nested bookmarks.
This is the crunchiest pdf released by Legendary Games so far and it is up to the quality I’ve come to expect from the all-star team of Legendary Games – the crunch is solid, innovative and interesting, making ki feasible for all classes as well as greatly enhancing your options, often with rules that, beyond immediate benefits, result via their implications in more dynamic combats. While a few of the feats herein are a tad bit off regarding balance for my conservative tastes, overall, this collection of feats is definitely one I’d recommend you check out. While personally, I prefer the way ki is aligned and possibly assigned to chakras in Heroes of the Jade Oath as well as its notion of a focus over the “as long as you have 1 point remaining…”, both collections of feats can be used to complement each other and I’ll probably just take the feats herein and modify them along these guidelines to make them fit better with the ch’i-feats, but that in the end is personal design preference more than any valid point of criticism.
That out of the way, while some of the feats herein feel slightly less inspired than others, the overall quality of the content herein should still be considered at top-brass level and thus, I’ll settle for a final verdict of 5 stars, only omitting my seal of approval due to the fact that I would have liked more unique abilities à la Hadouken, the yogi-levitating etc. Still, a great collection of complex feats.
Endzeitgeist out.
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This pdf is 13 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page advertisement, 2 pages editorial, 1 page ToC/foreword,1 page SRD, 1 page back cover, leaving us with 6 pages of content, so let's check this out!
So this pdf is the second collection of riddles by author Liz Smith, and after some more classic ones in the first installment, we start off with riddles based on creatures - from riddles on vampires, werewolves to some on humble snails, these riddles are both clever and usable, though some are a bit on the easy side. I immediately knew answers to quite a few of them.
The second page is all about people and jobs and is something for sadistic DMs who put timers on riddles, for some of them lead you to hasty (and wrong) answers, whereas upon contemplation, the correct answers should be apparent. Again, neato!
The third page is one of my favorites: Riddles based on logic and numbers, something all too scarcely present in adventures. Better yet, while one is based on language, it can easily be converted to a non-English language: Great for people like me who don't play in English. This page is GOLD.
We also get two pages of riddles on objects, one on tangible and one on intangible ones and better yet, many (though not all) work as well in other languages, so again: Kudos!
The final page would then be about places and locations and again, while most riddles work independent of language used, there also are some that might require a tad bit of work for translating them to another language, they actually DO work.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are top-notch, I didn't notice any glitches. Layout adheres to RSP's beautiful two-column no-frills standard and the pdf comes fully bookmarked as well as with two versions: One for screen use and one to be printed out. Part I was good. Author Liz Smith has surpassed herself with the second one, providing not only lesser known riddles, but also ones that translate well to other languages and tie in with concepts existing in the gaming world. For the fair, low price, you get an AWESOME little compilation of great riddles to bring some brains back to all the dice-rolling brawn at your table. My final verdict should come as no surprise: 5 stars + seal of approval - this is not only useful for English-speaking tables!
Endzeitgeist out.
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This pdf is 63 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page SRD, 1 page ToC, 1 page kickstarter thanks, leaving us with 58 pages of content, so let’s check this out! (There is also a portrait-layout version that is the base for the print version and clocks in at 115 pages, more on that in the conclusion.)
Interspersed with an interesting, well-written narrative, we are introduced to the topic of this book, namely making the rogue more unique: With trapfinding being nerfed over the editions, archetypes like detectives, urban rangers and the (overdue) power-gain of the bard, it’s high time that someone devoted a book to providing the often-neglected rogue some new tools to set them apart from other classes and that is exactly what this book is about. Much like class-specific other supplements throughout the edition, we are introduced to the matter at hand via some general observations about what constitutes a rogue (profession vs. personality type), rogues in different general setting like cities, wilderness etc., alignment, backgrounds and reasons to “go rogue” grouped by social status as well as the most common motivations.
After that, we delve into the new content, which begins with new additional abilities that serve to make the rogue stand out more: Rogues built with this book get proficiency with stealthy weapons like sword-canes, blade boots and switchblade knives. The rogue now also gets access to a class feature called guile pool, which grants you ½ class level + cha-mod points that can be spent as part of a skill check to grant +2 to the skill, +4 at 10th level. Guile points may also be spent as swift actions to get a +1 circumstance bonus to atk, +1 per 4 levels to a maximum of +5. Also, as long as they have at least one point in their pool, they are treated as if under the effect of the improved feint feat. Starting at 3rd level, the rogue may now also declare any attack s/he makes that deals sneak attack damage in a surprise round an ambush: This attack gains a bonus to damage equal to her/his level as well as requiring a save on behalf of the victim to avoid being temporarily sickened. On higher levels, the negative conditions get uglier. This set of abilities is added to all rogues. When the pdf wants to make a distinction between this and the standard rogue, the rogue with the new abilities is called Glory Rogue.
This basic new suite of powers out of the way, we delve into archetypes, starting with the chemist. Chemists get slightly diminished sneak progression, but compensate this by gaining increased throwing capacity. It the name of the archetype has not been ample clue: Chemists gain access to a limited array of alchemist’s bombs and may even add sneak attack to their thrown weapons. They also may smuggle bombs on foes via sleight of hand or the steal combat maneuver. Finally, they may select from a limited array of discoveries. Nice archetype that should answer the prayers of the splash-weapon-throw-plus-sneak-crowd without being unbalancing. Much less complex, the Dungeon Runner deals d8 sneak attack versus undead and constructs, + level damage versus oozes, but all other foes only get sneaked for d4 instead of the usual d6. They also replace either ambush (or 2 skill points) with gaining the blind-fight feat-tree as bonus feats. Fences also get 2 skill points less than regular rogues and gain quick black market connections as well as very soon access to an organization to do your bidding, information gatherings etc. – these people can be developed and, while not adventurers, they are gold in any urban environment/to do tasks that do not require a group of adventurers. Have I mentioned that you gain money from your underlings (though they require you to pay them for jobs) since you fence their goods?
Nice archetype, though personally, I would have loved for a more complex fencing/guild-running system or e.g. an adaptation of WotW’s evil organization rules, the Great City’s tong-rules or something akin to that. After that, we get the imperial flanker, who represents more closely the concept of lightly armored skirmishers in military. They get access to the cavalier’s Tactician-quality and stack their levels with respective levels in the cavalier-class. The write-up also refers to the Tactician-class, I assume either a glitch or a pointer towards Dreamscarred Press’ tactician-class, but honestly, I’m not sure which is correct. The archetype gets 2 skill points less and instead of trap-related abilities gains access to martial training, medium armors and even the option to still use evasion when in medium armor. Mageslayers are also interesting: Gaining at 4th level already the Magebane attack advanced rogue talent as well as imposing half their level as a penalty to defensive casting, this archetype is the nightmare of casters and a gleefully satisfying experience to spring on those spellslingers. Medics will probably see much use in low-magic settings: These rogues may treat lethal wounds faster and increase the efficiency of the usually rather underpowered heal-skill. They may even get rid of negative levels and in combat gain an interesting alternative to sneak attack: Surgical precision grants +1 to atk at every odd level for a max of +10 at 19th level instead of the bonus damage sneak attack usually offers. Finally, medics may create salves that grant temporary hp.
The Pet Trainer sacrifices 2 skill points for an animal companion and teach them the grab-trick, but at the expense of the guile pool or trapsense/trapfinding. Stalkers are a relatively straight ranger/rogue blending, getting access to favored terrain, trap training and advanced trap training as bonus rogue talents at the expense of 2 skill points. Street Magicians are interesting in that they get a VERY limited access to sme wiz/sorc-spells they can cast as spell-like abilities. As rogue talents, these guys can also get familiars, bonded objects etc. and as an advanced rogue talent, there's a nice blend of the new ambush-rule combined with spellcasting – nice way to represent street-smart dabblers in the arcane.
The Street Urchin gets skill bonuses to represent street smarts as well as an ability that hits a pet-peeve of mine: They may, with a glance, size up a target, learning class, level and ability modifiers. This kind of metagame-information is strictly banned in my home game and something that always breaks immersion for me. Additionally, the ability fails to specify whether the ability shows their modified (by magic items, diseases, afflictions, curses…) ability modifiers or their unmodified ones. They also thus are very focused on the target, gaining bonuses versus them at the expense of penalties versus targets not their mark. I get what the ability wants to do and it works, but personally, I would have wished for a more abstract form of information to be thusly uncovered.
Now true professionals may choose at first level to either be even better with skills, get more proficiencies and count as ½ level fighter to qualify for feats or limited spells. They also replace sneak attack with bonus feats, ambush with more skill points and an interesting capstone.
Urban Ninjas represent the only archetype that requires the optional guile pool-class feature, gaining both guile pool and ki pool as well as access to both rogue talents and ninja tricks. Finally, Weapon’s Experts don’t gain sneak attack and trapfinding, but instead get weapon training and the option to count as fighters as well as again, the option to use evasion in medium armor. What I’ve failed to mention so far in this array of archetypes is that each and every one of them comes with an aptly-written, nice fluffy mini-story instead of being just dry crunch. Nice!
Of course, this book not only features new archetypes, but also new rogue talents and advanced rogue talents. On the side of the former, we get the power to run and even charge at -10 while using stealth, the option to deal ambush damage via grapple as lethal or non-lethal (great for TRUE professionals and campaigns like mine, where killing ANY humanoid is usually not considered as “good”), armor and maneuver mastery (the latter granting a massive bonus to the chosen maneuver), flank nearby foes with ranged weapons, feint with ranged weapons, become extremely adept at using ropes, wilder in the bard’s and alchemist’s territories, roll an attack twice as a standard action and the expense of 1 guile pool point (great when alone on reconnaissance and needing to make that hit count), spend guile to treat foes in melee combat as flat-footed, bluff lie-detecting spells, run up walls Prince-of-Persia-style and so much more. On the side of advanced talents, rogues may choose swift poison application, increased prowess with wands and scrolls, quietly dispatch foes (VERY useful!), feint all foes she threats, treat all 1s, 2s and 3s as 4s when sneak attacking, deal con damage, hamper spellcasting, slow foes and gain access to mutagens, improved familiars etc.
Where there are new talents, there also are, unsurprisingly, new feats are also in here - a total of 16 of them, to be precise. They allow rogues to use non-magical ventriloquism (Much more useful than you’d think, especially with another feat that allows you to non-magically alter your voice!), master weapons like bladed boots and climbing claws, dabble in fortune-telling (and have it actually work sometimes). On the coolest side, though, would be the feats that allow a rogue to disable ongoing magical effects and items with their disable device-checks as if the result of their skill was dispel magic. These feats are genuinely brilliant and EXTREMELY useful at all levels. The greater version of the feat even allows you to work a trap into an existing magic and even disable curses. Very, very cool and should ensure that at low levels, when dispel magic is a rare or non-existing commodity, groups the rogue will shine and continue to do so at higher levels – after all, disable device is not a resource that depletes…
We also get 6 new traits before we check out further alternate rules: The first is a nod to Rite Publishing’s excellent “Secrets of the Tactical Archetypes II” and says so directly in the text – nice to see the nod. I’ve already covered “opportunities aplenty” in my review of that book, though. What really rocks, though, is that the Drop Dead Studios-team has taken Paizo’s proposed and then discontinued stealth-rewrite and expanded it with abduction, perception, bluffing, creating diversions etc. as well as updates for blindsight, blindsense etc. These variant rules look on paper VERY concise and cool and in fact, better than the regular stealth rules. If you need an idea of how the rules work: There are different conditions: Observed, located, detected and undetected. Observed means the creature knows exactly where you are or can see you. Located means a creature can't see you, but knows where you are. Detected means that a creature knows that something is going on. Additionally, you may be hidden, as per a new condition, thus influencing the former concepts. As a system and presentation-wise logical, easy to grasp and concisely presented.
I can’t yet comment on how they work in-game, but I will do some extensive playtesting and definitely try them – the system remedies the problem of stealth vs. special sights being completely useless, though admitedly requiring more skill and planning at low levels as well as the DM using Perception by the book, i.e. with distance penalties etc.. For me, though, it works and I'll use the system in my next campaign, due to start next month. Kudos!
Another innovation of the book would be Delnor Crystals, special crystals detecting magical pulses from magical traps. These crystals require rogues to use them via trapfinding and make it possible for trapsmith rogues to manipulate magical traps – not only disable them. Ranger traps are cool – but oh so limited in by who they can be used. Rogue Glory’s solution is interesting: Attach them to Craft (traps) and make them available for anyone, with a trapper ranger archetype being thus changed. We also get 7 new ranger traps, multiple environmental traps and respective DC-tables, triggers and construction rules, taking existing feats like Cunning Trigger and Quick Trapsmith into account as well. Nice and neat to add some versatility to not just the rogue class. Sleight of Hand gets variant rules for placing objects instead of taking them away and the repercussions of using the revised stealth rules herein on the application of e.g. feigning death etc. are covered.
Beyond these, we are also introduced to a rather intriguing array of new equipment: These tools of the trade include hilt-daggers, climbing claws, 10-foot poles with hooks, collapsible bows (sniper hitman, baby!), needle launchers (deliver those toxins), hollow books, lead lining enhancements to other compartments, parachutes, 13 new traps (and an alchemical trigger to spring them) and, of course, magic items: These are no less useful than their mundane counterparts and include magically rigged dice, daggers for assassins, pellets that let you vanish (à la batman and x ninjas in fiction) and rings that grant the massive social bonuses of the glibness spell. Beyond these, we also find new artifacts and interesting ones indeed are there: Take Saphire, the most famous thief ever and his/her legacy: These are essentially concepts, not items that can be taken, given, lost etc. and grant fractions of this mythological beings vast power. Cool as an idea to pass on to PCs (or NPCs), with all resulting hijinxs – or perhaps the PCs want one, but how to steal an intangible thing? There is also a two-faced coin that can alternately grant 20 as bonus or penalty and which would make for a truly interesting item in the hands of a two-face-like foil. Beyond these, we get an assassin’s blood-filled cup and a powerful dagger as well.
Now that all crunchy components are covered, we are in for a section that should intrigue especially, but not only, novice DMs and players, for the following chapter discusses how communication between DM and players is important so that they create the right type of rogue: Social rogues are no fun if there’s nothing for them to do, sneaky ones that can’t infiltrate due to playing in a war-campaign face the same problem. The advice given is sound, especially when it comes to traps, trap-description and reason to implement them in the game – and how to properly use them. Though I’d like to add one piece of advice: Consciously, as a DM, deviate from the detect-disable-done-formula: Make traps, at least once in a while, complex and, when sprung, give the whole party something to do to escape imminent death. This makes it all the more rewarding when a rogue manages to be levitated across the room, while the barbarian and fighter hold doors open that would slam shut so their friend can disable the deadly death trap from the other side of the room. Suggestions for encounter- and gold-based XP are provided as well before we delve into the final chapter:
We get 5 sample thievish organizations, all of which come with fully statted sample NPCs, prestige benefits and range from apocalyptic cults to a counter-thieves guild that steals back what was taken and acts as a kind of elite security force. The book concludes its survey of rogues with 5 seeds for whole campaigns and arcs as well as a table of 20 short adventure hooks for you to develop.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are very good, though not perfect: I noticed two glitches in particular, on page 11 and 30 respectively, of false words. Generally, though, the book is surprisingly glitch-free apart from aforementioned hick-up. Layout of the electronic version adheres to a 3-column landscape format with full-color borders and original artworks that are ok, though ranging from nice to a bit wonky. Layout is also the weakest spot of the pdf – here and there, there are disjointed underlinings in the text and e.g. spell-names are not in italics. Beyond that, the pdf is hyperlinked to d20pfsrd.com, with the latest update getting rid of an at first problematic usage of the hyperlinks. The pdf also comes with extensive nested bookmarks in both versions.
It should be noted, that the print-version and the pdf based on that version is something completely different: It is 115 total pages long (minus cover and the like), adheres to a 2-column standard with an artwork-border and looks VERY tidy.
Rogue Glory is an interesting book in that it takes a class that is deemed by now one of the weakest and adds some oomph to it: Additional, easy to use rules, nice options, interesting archetypes, a stealth-system that, while hard on low-levels, especially at mid-to-high levels works much better and all those nice tools and ideas conspire to make this a truly impressive little book that shows awareness of other 3pps, rules-discussions etc. and overall manages to succeed at its task of making the rogue a more unique character class that can compete with its fellows. Full of great ideas, solid crunch and options galore, Drop Dead Studios has created a second book that is on par with their crunch-mastery as displayed in “The Artisan” and shows that the former was no exception – their standard remains high. Thus, I whole-heartedly recommend the print version/print-version-based-pdf (since at least at my table, this book will see a LOT of use) with a final verdict of 5 stars plus endzeitgeist seal of approval - with the now revised version of the electronic version, without any regrets.
Endzeitgeist out.
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This solo-adventure (no GM required) is 14 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page back cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page author's note, 2 pages SRD, leaving us with 8 pages of content, so let's take a look!
This being a module for strictly one player, I can't give away any of the content without spoiling the ONE person who will play it, so...I won't. Instead I'll tell you what to expect in the broadest terms:
In the style of the choose-your-own-adventure-novels, we get "if x, then read z"-formulae. There are a total of 21 different entries to read and in contrast to Kobold Press' "Party of One"-series, combat works via fully provided statblocks and the usual rules instead of any slimmed down version. That being said, there is not that much combat going on and while you hire a fully stated hireling to help you.
The module per is the definition of a short dungeon-crawl and has nothing too exciting going for it, though the maps overall are impressive at this price-point: 3 full color maps and one b/w-overview of the area schematic map are provided in the module. Now where the concept unfortunately falls a bit flat of its own premise is in its lackluster use of skills: The module railroads you much more into a given path than required: You can't e.g. opt for stealth and the module clearly presumes a rogue as pregen, but sans providing one: You have multiple times the option to pick a lock, but no DCs are ever given, neither is the option to use stealth being taken into account.
While a given base of railroading is inherent in such a book, this one in particular feels more linear than it should be. Additionally, if you opt to play this with a spellcaster (no pregen, remember), then the whole thing comes apart at the seams.
Conclusion:
The overall production values of this solo-module are actually quite good, with nice cartography for the price and a commendable lack of editing and formatting glitches. Layout adheres to a printer-friendly, no-frills two-column standard and the pdf has no bookmarks, but its "if then"-sections are linked for your convenience, which is a GREAT idea for a solo-module. The story of this solo-adventure left me rather cold and not much in the terms of characters to identify with, which is also reflected in the fact that no-one in the module seems to have a name: Neither NPCs, nor monsters. The overall flow of the module works, though it is very constraining regarding your actions and their results, more so than feasible. The additional lack of options to take specific basic behaviors like "stealth" into account and the lack of pregen further hurt what definitely has potential. After playing through this, I felt positively surprised by the production values, but terribly underwhelmed with regards to story-telling/linearity. So much so, that it kind of spoilt the whole module for me. The line has definite potential and future modules may be better, but I'll settle for a final verdict of 2 stars on this one.
Endzeitgeist out.
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This module is 44 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 blank page, 2 pages advertisement, 1 page SRD, leaving us with 38 pages of content, so let’s take a look!
This being an adventure-review, the following text contains SPOILERS. Potential players may wish to jump to the conclusion.
All right, still here? This is the second part of the Saatman’s Empire-adventure arc after A16, Midwinter’s Chill, in which a white dragon cast a frosty swath of destruction into the Klavek Empire. While not required to run this module, the metaplot also ties in with A16 and thus, groups playing multiple modules of the arc may start to see a pattern: The once glorious empire of Saatman seems to have an heir apparent and said dragon is gathering his kin to systematically dismantle the empire. The second part of the puzzle being the eponymous dragon Storm. Contend for as long as people remember to only pick of those ships that straggled in her territory, she has gone on to destroying a trade-route. When the PCs arrive at Cherr’s Landing (complete with settlement statistics), the once thriving coastal port is in a desolate, half-empty state.
In order to end the incursions, the PCs will have to charter a boat towards the island’s around the notorious Devil’s Point, where “there be dragons”. Instead of the culprit, abandoned warrens and a crippled, small dragon, actually Storm’s grandmother awaits. Once she has been dealt with (or bypassed) the trail will lead the PCs sooner or later to Shipwreck Cove, an island littered with shipwrecks picked up by Storm and smashed on the rocks. Now inhabited by Cecalia, slaves to her mate, the island is anything but empty and, among other things, also contains two kobold-heralds of Saatman’s heir, who are anything but push-overs with 12 levels.
Also nice: The Cacelia use the armament of the ships to their advantage: PCs may actually get shot by ballista-bolts! Also, a new being called a titanic globster (including the template) is part of the challenges here. In the end, the Pcs will have to attack Storm’s nest, where her mate, the brine dragon waits. Now his tactics are actually smart for once, keeping his distance and blasting PCs and, more importantly, fighting in the open sky, not some cramped cavern. Having an island full of minions also helps. Once he has been vanquished, the hoards stolen and the eggs of the pair either smashed or stolen, the PCs will probably be on their way home and think the module is completed.
They’re wrong. Storm, a titanic black dragon, will be VERY angry and her tactic to destroy the ship with the PCs on it is simple and brilliant: Take it, lift it into the air (about 200 ft.) and let it crash down for a nice TPK. PCs will have to be smart thinkers, fast in dealing damage and armed with hopefully enough utility magic. And hopefully, they’ve rested and deduced that the brine dragon was not big enough to wreck this destruction.
The module also features a new deity-write-up as well as two new magical items.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are top-notch, I didn’t notice any glitches. Layout has been further streamlined, with the excellent cover (also featured as a gorgeous full-color 1-page-illustration in the pdf) being a shaded background on the pages – unobtrusive and nice, yet printer-friendly. I’m also a fan of the less stark boxes used for read-aloud text-boxes, skill-boxes etc. Where the layout FAILS in my opinion is with a particular decision: Usually, we had separate appendices for the combat stats of the respective characters and monsters featured in a given module – one for 3.5, one for Pathfinder. You just had to print out the stats you need. Instead of this separation by system, we now get the creatures in alphabetical order, with both stats. This means I have to waste toner/ink to print out stats for a system I don’t use when running the module, which SUCKS and is not particularly useful. I hope AaW will change back from this decision. Another thing I missed from this book was the player-friendly maps. All other AaW-modules usually feature player-friendly, key-less maps to print out for convenience – this one doesn’t which, again, is a bad decision I hope will not be continued. If that’s the price for the new layout, I’d rather have the old one back and I sincerely wish for the system-division statblocks and player maps to return/be added.
If all my reviews of modules by author Michael McCarthy have taught me one thing, then that he knows how to write locales dripping with iconic flavor. Unfortunately, also one of his weaknesses is present in “Storm’s Wake”, albeit not in as jarring a way as in “Midwinter’s Chill”. What good is a great, iconic backdrop when it doesn’t influence combat/skills etc.? It’s just that, a backdrop, when it could easily be used to make combat so much more exciting and unfortunately, that’s also true for this module: Yes, here and there are minor specialties like aforementioned ballista, but what about climbing in riggings of smashed ships? Sniping from crow’s nests? More complex tactics for the BbeGs and other creatures, terrain that actually influences combat in some meaningful way – if these two had been added, we’d have a legend of a module on our hands. Without them, the iconic locales lose some part of their magic and thus fascination. The lack of consequences of terrain/unique areas make the module more sterile than its 5-star-ideas would make you believe.
In fact, it feels like 10 to 20 pages have simply been cut from the module: The search for the culprit of the trade collapsing and location of the culprit is sketchy at best and feels like it could use an overview map of the islands/coast to help the DM portray the whole search. What is left of this section, especially the battle with the first “boss”, feel sketchy and cut down to a minimum and evoked the distinct feeling of SOMETHING being missing. I maintain that, with about 10 pages of additional content to properly flesh out, this module could rank among the finest – Some for the beginning, some for the main locale, some for the tactics of the antagonists, some for the BbeG’s tactics and there we go – one legend of a module. As written, as much as I hate to say it, “Storm’s Wake” falls short of what it could easily have been. Combined with the lack of printer-friendly maps its predecessor still had as well as with the user-unfriendly statblock-presentation with mixed systems, I arrive at a score that hurts me more than lower ones I’ve given: Due to the ideas and potential, I’ll settle for 3 stars, but only if you’re willing to develop the module further. If you want a go-play module, then this one is not what you’re looking for. For now, I’ll sink back and hope for a revision and the ability to rate this as high as its concept deserves.
Endzeitgeist out.
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This pdf is 4 pages long, 1 page editorial/SRD, 1 page item-cards, leaving 2 pages for the item and its history, so let's take a look!
The Daemonwatch Blades are wicked greatswords that are utilized by the gevet temple guardians of Var Shaal. The fluffy entry is written like the diary of a perished servant of the sanguine covenant and ranks among the best flavor-texts of the line. Rules-wise, the blades are +1 unholy everdeath greatswords that allow the wearer to use locate creatures on foes damaged for 12 hours, making them deadly tracking devices. They also help with +2 when dealing with gevet in social situations.
The new everdeath weapon quality is part of the pdf, at +2 bonus it requires a DC 20-caster level check to heal damage dealt by it and a DC 25 check to raise the dead killed by them. They also work especially well for bearded devils.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are top-notch this time around and I didn't notice any glitches. Layout adheres in both the regular and the printer-friendly version to LPJr Design's respective beautiful two-column full-color standards and the pdf has no bookmarks, but needs none at this length.
A solid class of swords with a cool artwork, a new weapon quality that is nice and solid rules to back them up - nothing to complain about, a nice offering to the line and consequently a 5 stars verdict.
Endzeitgeist out.
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This installment of the Fantastic Maps-series by Jonathan Roberts is rather different from the other installments of the series in that it does not come as a pdf and depicts another type of map:
Whereas the series usually depicts some area with grids to use as combat/environment maps in the small scale, this instead takes one massive island as you'd depict it on a detailed treasure map from a bird's eye's view and provides an overview of an island.
Beyond the high-res jpeg of the island per se, we also get one version with icons. Icons? Yes, 16 .png icons are part of the deal: The brown icons range from anchor, axes, caves, 2 city-icons, 2 keep-icons, a ruin, a flag, a serpent, a skull, a sword, a wreck and icons for temples, towns and villages.
These icons are present on the 3 alternate versions of the high-res jpegs of the island - there is one sans any grid with the icons, one that also sports hexes in addition to the icons and a b/w-version of the map with the hexes and icons.
Conclusion:
The map provided by Jonathan Roberts depicts a beautiful island rife for the population by the DM, be it with or without icons. In any exploration/nautical context, this map should come handy, whether it is for skull & shackles, razor coast or journeys to the west - this place should be interesting for you. However, I also have something to complain about: What if the Dm wants to print out the map of the island, treasure map-style (you know, glue it together, give it the coffee-treatment, go all the way), there is no way to do that. In contrast to other Fantastic Maps-installments, there is no blown up version of the map. While I get how that is usually intended for use with miniatures, I think a hex-studded version of the map, blown up (perhaps so its entirety spans 4-8 pages) and made into a massive, real treasure map would have greatly expanded the usefulness of the installment. Due to the lack of said feature, I'll only settle for a final verdict of 4 stars for this installment.
Endzeitgeist out.
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The third in Raging Swan’s print collections of critically-acclaimed TRIBES-supplements is 114 pages long, 1 page front cover, 1 page advertisement, 2 pages editorial, 1 page author bios/foreword, 2 pages ToC by TRIBE (containing a short poem for each tribe), 1 page statblocks by CR, 1 page SRD, 1 page advice on reading statblocks for novice DMs as well as 1 page back cover, leaving us with 103 pages of raw content, so let’s take a look!
Following the maxim of usability, we start with compiled lists of feats (including the information where it can be found), compiled alternate class and race features, a table for new monsters & templates as well as a table containing the magic items and a list of the new spells, though the latter lacks information which tribe it features.
The very first TRIBE we’re introduced to is one of my all-time favorites – not only of the series, but of all monster-centric pdfs out there: The Bugbears of the Frozen Tears. Terrors of the icy regions, these guerilla warriors are headhunters that can make the decapitated heads of their victims into shrieking warning mechanisms, adding their eternal screams to the chilling winds of the white cliffs, where their eternal matron resides: Serving Vhen Nhar, an elder evil/demon encased in ice, the crone and literal mother of the bugbear-tribes schemes and her surprisingly intelligent daughters spin a deadly web of intrigues, while her giant-sized son comes like a titan upon the settlements of the weak soft-skins and the headless victims of the raids become the vessels for the demonic will of the tribe’s patron – I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again here: John Bennett has created a tribe and a locale with the white cliffs that is iconic, smart, disturbing and rife with potential to the point where I’d personally consider it one of the highlights and a definite must-buy. In fact, I’d heap more praises and superlatives on this, were it not for the next component of the pdf:
The Cultists of Havra-Zhoul, more commonly known as the order of the Dictum – working best when slowly introduced into a campaign, the order is actually a force that cold work WITH the players. Working best in a cesspool of corruption, the order actually consist mostly of just and righteous members who seek to bring order into a society – first quite probably improving the situation in the town in which it operates, even recruiting PCs and working with them. It is only slowly that the rather harsh and unflexible, brutal side of their extreme lawfulness surfaces and when watchmen armed with supernatural power and even members turned devils (via the new rituals) show up, the PCs should be aware that something is going wrong. This cult is worth a whole campaign. There, I said it. Pierre van Rooden, brilliant author and published across multiple editions, has with this cult created an organic, plausible, multi-facetted organization of stellar appeal and complexity, interwoven the narrative with intriguing and believable characters and managed to create book that poses the very real question how much of our freedom, how much of our rights, we are willing to sacrifice for security and where the line should be drawn. This supplement is imho the crowning achievement of the whole TRIBES-line, is my favorite cult released for PFRPG and belongs into the arsenal of any GM. Even if you don’t get this book, get this pdf – oh, and Way of the Wicked-DMs could easily take the quotes from the Dictum to quote from a fictitious holy book of Asmodeus. A must buy in the line if there ever was one.
Now John Bennett’s second contribution can in my opinion not completely stand up to the former two, but it’s close, damn close in fact – the Duergar of the Obsidian Citadel are brilliant smiths, genius enchanters, but even more so than others of their kind, they carry grudges and will retaliate every real or imagined slight by activating curses of their otherwise stellar wares. In such a supplement, we of course not only get the regular merchandise one would expect, but also new magical items as well as a wide variety of new curses to unleash upon those who wish to cheat the dueragr or stand in the way of the one thing they truly crave: Beauty. These grey dwarves are notorious slavers and their prices may be met in flesh…
The Frost-Giant Pirates of the Icy Heart, Ben Kent’s contribution to this compilation, is also interesting and what I’d consider a high-concept contribution: Powered by white dragons under the command of Flashfreeze, their eldest and manned by a dread Frost-Giant Jarl and his men, the Iceberg-fortress is essentially a ship-destroying beast powered by the ambitions of a single human female and her not all-too-evil lover, who keep the careful equilibrium of power in check. Per se I love the idea and the artwork provided for the Icy Heart (whose caverns are btw. also home t a special remorhaz) is glorious – though I’ve already seen the idea of an iceberg-fortress before, this is the first time that “magic did it” was not the answer when it came to means of propulsion, so kudos for that. What I can’t really fathom, though, is why the one central gripe I had with the original pdf has not been addressed: The iceberg lacks nautical stats. I mean, come on – we’ve had these now for quite a while. Skull & Shackles is all about naval combat and being piratey. This, though, manages to, of all things, omit said statblock – again. What a wasted chance to give this component the last piece it needs to be considered legendary. Oh well.
The final tribe of the compilation, the Orcs of the Eternal Zenith, though, are once again up to the task – oh boy are they up for it: Imagine what happens when a missionary of Saranrae or a similar sun/flame-deity manages to convert a tribe of orcs – in all the wrong ways. There you have these orcs – fanatically devoted to the sun, these green-skins have shed their light-fearing ways and now seek to bring an age of eternal light, an age of glorious, scorching, unflinching radiance that burns all infidels and lesser creatures to a crisp. Have I mentioned their salamander ally, the artifact-device that can actually open portals to the elemental plane of fire and which is powered by imprisoned, evil fey or that the tribe’s last conventional shaman may actually be the best chance for the PCs to infiltrate what has become a chakram-wielding, weapon igniting horde of highly-trained zealots bent on destruction? Well, now I have and let me add that these orcs should be considered yet another most-buy for anyone looking for not only statblocks, but also a cool and unique tribe that is distinct, awesome and could spawn a multitude of modules worth of adventures.
Conclusion:
Editing and formatting are top-notch, I didn’t notice any glitches – quite a feat at this length! Layout adheres to RSP’s gorgeous 2-column b/w-standard and the original pieces of artwork provided for multiple locales and people throughout this book tend to be gorgeous. The compilation is fully bookmarked with nested bookmarks and comes for your convenience’s sake in two versions, one optimized for the screen and one to be printed out.
I need to get this out of my system right now: If you haven’t checked out the TRIBES-series, do so NOW, by buying this book. It contains my 3 personal highlights of ALL the tribes-supplements and each of them, if my ample praise was no indicator, is worth every single cent of their asking price ten times over. Now add to that the fact that the other two tribes herein are not bad at all and in fact, can also be considered very good, though a bit short of the genius of the bugbears, orcs and cultists and we have a compilation that is by FAR the best of the 3 TRIBES-compilations. The tribes herein are evocative and interesting enough to spark numerous adventures, if not whole campaigns each and should be considered top-of-the-class-offerings that make me bitterly regret that the TRIBES-line of supplements is thus concluded and on halt for now. Let’s hope that if/when there’ll be new ones, they will manage to once again reach these lofty heights of quality. Let’s hope we get to see more of Pierre van Rooden’s SUPERB writing. And let’s complain one last time about the LACK OF NAUTICAL STATS FOR THE ICE-BERG. Okay, perhaps I finally have it out of my system now.
If you only own one or even 2 of the component pdfs, this is still a definite buying recommendation for you – even with 3 and if you like print, this should still be considered must-buy material. My final verdict for the (so far) heights of awesomeness to which the series has ascended will be easily-given 5 stars + endzeitgeist seal of approval and the hope that we get to see much, much more from this talented cadre of authors.
Endzeitgeist out.
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