A great add-on book for Legend. I would have liked to have seen some more mundane animals in here but this is a good start to the monster lore world.

Had to mark this down as you have to buy it if you want Legend statted creatures, I also find it very annoying that I can't add bookmarks to the pdf.

Wer sich von den bisherigen beiden Artikeln zu Legend (Grundregelwerk | Spielbericht) dazu hat verführen lassen, das Spiel einmal ausprobieren, dem werden ein paar ordentliche Monster gefehlt haben. Gerade, wenn man noch nicht so viel Erfahrung in einem System hat, ist das Improvisieren schwierig. Darum setze ich meine kleine Serie im dritten und letzten Teil mit einer Rezension von Monsters of Legend fort, dem Kreaturenbuch zu Legend.

Erscheinungsbild

Das Werk liegt mir als englisches PDF vor. Es ist, wie schon das Grundregelwerk schlicht gehalten, enthält aber alle paar Seiten über ein großes Monsterbild. Leider sind diese eher einfach und immer in schwarz/weiß gehalten, aber keinesfalls schlecht gemacht. Ich hätte mir nur inspirierendere Darstellungen gewünscht. Die Lesbarkeit ist durchweg gut. Einen Index gibt es leider auch hier nicht. Dafür steht das Werk unter der OGL, wie schon das Grundregelwerk.

Inhalt

Das Buch enthält - Überraschung - ein Monster nach dem anderen. Es gibt zu jedem eine kurze Beschreibung und alle nötigen Spielwerte. Insgesamt enthält das Werk 77 Kreaturen, die in die Gruppen Humanoide, Wirbellose (in diesem Fall meist einfach Insekten), Dinosaurier und Reptilien, legendäre Kreaturen (Fantasywesen, wie Werwölfe oder Zombies) und fallen. Mit dabei sind vor allem Klassiker, wie Bären, Wölfe, Orks und Medusen. Ein gutes Grundpaket also, um die Spielercharaktere ordentlich zu quälen oder sogar 6 Fuß tiefer zu legen.

Als ich einen Bär auf die Abenteuer gehetzt habe, fiel mir auf, dass Tiere keine Evade-Fertigkeit haben. In diesem Kampf haben wir mit vollen Regeln gekämpft und der Abenteuer im Nahkampf kämpfte mit einem Langspeer. Um daran vorbei zu kommen und den Gegner überhaupt angreifen zu können, brauchte der Bär allerdings genau besagte Evade-Fertigkeit. Nun kann es sein, dass Tiere nicht unbedingt viel Zeit ihres Lebens darauf verwenden gezielt auszuweichen. Eine Fähigkeit, die jeder Charakter ohne es zu lernen hat, und die eine zentrale Rolle im Kampfsystem spielt, sollte aber jedes Monster haben.

Zudem gibt es bei Legend Regeln für NSCs, die es dem Spielleiter erlauben, diese im Kampf einfacher handzuhaben. Dazu gehört auch die Möglichkeit, dass der ganze NSC nur eine einzige Trefferzone hat. Dafür hat er dort mehr Trefferpunkte. So ein Wert wäre für den normalen Standard-Ork hilfreich gewesen, fehlt aber in den Buch.

Am Beginn des Buches gibt es noch Erklärungen von Spezialfähigkeiten und Sonderregeln, wie z.B. Regeln für Geister. Es gibt auch einen längeren Abschnitt über Kreaturen des Chaos, in dem es eine Tabelle für chaosbezogene Eigenschaften und Körperformen (arachnid, vogelartig, ...) gibt. Was es damit auf sich hat, ist mir nicht klar geworden. Ich denke mal, es hängt mit dem Setting von Legend zusammen.

Insgesamt bietet Monsters of Legend solide Hausmannskost. Nicht viel Besonderes, aber als erstes Monsterbuch sollten auch zunächst die üblichen Monster abgedeckt sein, bevor es abgefahren werden kann. Trotzdem ist die Qualität nicht die Beste.

Preis-/Leistungsverhältnis

77 Monster für umgerechnet 8,95€ bzw. 14,92€? Da kann man nicht meckern. Aber etwas Farbe und schönere Bilder hatten dem Werk gut getan. Trotzdem ist es definitiv nicht überteuert. Der Preis geht in Ordnung. Einen Bonuspunkt gibt es an dieser Stelle für das Veröffentlichen unter der OGL.

Fazit

Monsters of Legend ist ein eher schlichtes Buch für den kleinen Geldbeutel. Es gibt einem das an die Hand, was man zunächst braucht, um in einer Fantasywelt loszulegen. Wer Legend spielen will, der sollte es sich einmal anschauen. Auch für „Selbstschreiber“, die Regeln für ihre Welt suchen und dabei Legend in Betracht ziehen, lohnt sich ein Blick. Sie können sich viel Arbeit sparen.

Unsere Bewertung

Erscheinungsbild „3/5“ Schlicht, aber keineswegs schlecht. Inhalt „3/5“ Es sind einige Monster, doch die Qualität lässt ein wenig zu wünschen übrig. Preis-/Leistungsverhältnis „4.5/5“ Mit dem aktuellen Rabatt gut, sonst würde ich einen halben Punkt weniger geben. Zudem gibt es einen Punkt Bonus für die OGL. Gesamt „3.5/5“ Ein solides Werk, das einen Blick wert ist.

Originally published at: http://diehardgamefan.com/2012/01/24/tabletop-review-monsters-of-legend/

If you read my previous review of Legend, the FRPG from Mongoose Publishing, you may recall that one of my primary concerns with the game as released was the lack of any sort of information on non-humans. The base rules not only left out monstrous bad-guys, but there also weren’t any non-human player character races. It didn’t even have any normal animals that might be encountered, either in the wild or in gladiatorial combats. Monsters of Legend steps into that void and provides very nearly everything I would have hoped for in a monster supplement.

The introductory chapter provides a good deal of information that fits in with a broad range of the included creatures. Every entry includes not just statistics for an average example of the species, but also a set of die rolls to be used to generate a random one – even to be used as player characters. As at least one chapter is full of humanoid creatures, which will come in handy for any GM who intends to play a more conventional D&D style world, with players taking on the roles of dwarves, elves and the like.

A small section is devoted to the very important distinction between creatures with a die roll for INT and those that have a fixed value – fixed value creatures are not sapient, and should both not be played as PCs, nor should they be played like a player character.

Other information is provided to explain the various advanced powers and abilities associated with the creatures in the rest of the book, as well as a long table of random “chaotic” features that can be assigned to creatures – though there is no direct reference in the text to when that might be appropriate, other than the entry for the Cockatrice. I think it would make a great randomization table for summoned demons, however, even if you’re not planning a world where Chaos = the bad guys (another hold over from RuneQuest). A secondary table provides a random roll for the appearance of the chaotic creatures, again adding some interest and intrigue around what manner of creatures might be encountered.

Finally, a short section on spirit combat is added – a nice complement to the free Spirit Magic add-on PDF that Mongoose released after Legend was first available. Between the two, it addresses most of my prior concerns about spirit magic and interacting with same.

Now, on to the monsters!

The critters are broken down into Humanoids, Invertebrates, Dinosaurs and Reptiles, Creatures of Legend, and Natural Life.

Humanoids provides a GM with a handful of the standard two-legged adversaries you’d expect from a fantasy game. Purists will like having official stats for elves, dwarves and halflings. Enemies can include orcs, ogres, trolls, giants and goblins. It’s not an extensive list, but it is representative, and gives a GM plenty of options to tweak to create other creature templates. This section is also great, in my opinion, as it’s where we start seeing some of the better art from this game series. They are nicely done, and evocative of different types of settings, from the ironclad dwarf to the very tribal, tattooed and pierced giant.

There’s something satisfying, and again iconic, about slaying giant bugs, and that’s what Invertebrates gives you in spades. All manner of crawly, nasty things, scaled up to Clash of the Titans scale, are made available to you, and in a tribute to how much we all freakin’ hate spiders, you get multiple sizes and associated nastiness to choose from.

The Dinosaurs and Reptiles section is, while important, a bit odd – several perfectly normal creatures like snakes and alligators appear here, rather than the section on Natural Life. Without them, the section would be entirely dinos, and while that might be useful to some GMs, it’s definitely a small niche. I’m not a paleontologist, but I think they’ve stuck with many of the standard interpretations and myths about many of these beasties, so if that might break the fourth wall for you, you might consider giving these guys a miss.

Creatures of Legend is where this book really turns into a Monster Manual equivalent. The lead-in picture is of the all-important dragon, so you know what you’re in for. They’re in there, in more than one form, cheek against jowl with the undead, and a good many of the standard creatures from Greek mythology, including centaurs, satyrs and medusae.

The book closes with the section that I insisted was the most important piece missing from the core Legend rules – normal animals. Even if you’re playing an entirely realistic game that eschews magic and wouldn’t ever be home to a dragon, this section will provide you with the sort of creatures that your adventurers might encounter in the wilds. It’s a shame that they didn’t put it in the core rules, where I think it belonged, but at least it’s there for you now when you need it.

This book covered fully eighty percent of what I’d hoped we’d see. It is still occasionally marred by references to things that are very RuneQuest specific – notably the Chaos features. That said, those features provide one of the only sops to my other concern – the creation of custom creatures. The core rules don’t mention this at all, and Monsters doesn’t really either, but between the random table for those odd features, and the list of creatures it contains, you have plenty of places to start from, and to modify, to suit your own game and temperament.

Once more, this is not a book for anyone who already owns the Monster Coliseum volume from back when Mongoose held the rights to RuneQuest. Many of the same creatures are presented here, and many others that were RuneQuest specific (and some, oddly, that weren’t) have been excised from this book.

If you’re just getting started with the system, however, this book is very nearly as essential as the Monster Manual was to the PHB and DMG when playing D&D. You can play an all-human game if you so choose, but this provides you the tools you need to play a game that resembles the games you’ve come to expect out of fantasy role playing.

(originally reviewed at TenkarsTavern.com)

If somehow, someway you missed out on the Legend RPG Core Rulebook from Mongoose for a buck (still a buck, so you can grab Legend here - I'll wait). Got it? Good. Now, that core book does not include the standard fantasy races (or any race besides human) nor does it include your monstrous adversaries. This is where Monsters of Legend comes in.

Dwarves? Check! Elves? Yep. Pretty much your standard fantasy good and evil races are included.

The book is broken down by the following categories: Humanoids, Invertebrates, Dinosaurs and Reptiles, Creatures of Legend and Natural Life. It's enough to start you off, but if you are used to the huge encyclopedic source of monsters nearly every edition of D&D has had, you might feel that it's a little light. That's to be expected, as it is the core monster book. I expect there will be further volumes later.

The artwork is very nice. I'm no expert, so I can't tell if it's washed inks or charcoal (I think it's mostly washed inks) but it is very evocative. It's all black and white, no color.

The PDF itself is bookmarked, but just the sections. So you can go to the start of the Invertebrates section, but you can't go right to Crab, Giant.

It's basically a catalogue of monstrous adversaries for your players. It fills that role well. I just wish it was filled with a bit more.

Oh, and for the OSR crowd, it features a nice Chaos Creature Feature Random Table. I'm going to yoke this.

Highly recommended. The recently-updated version includes Chaos features and rules for ogres, though it comes at a smaller file size and the covers, sans the covers of the Legend Spirit Magic book.

One thing I wished they could have done - a "build your own monster" chapter. All, perhaps, in good time.

This little gem comes to us from the good people at Mongoose. Featuring monsters and races from myth, fantasy literature, horror, and even the real world with top notch descriptions and superb artwork. Including rules for playing a few of them as PC's! It's the perfect gift to get for any DM this holiday season.

With the withdrawal of the Runequest II material, this book is now the primary source for creatures in the Legend game. Monsters of Legend has the same monsters that appeared in the previous Runequest II monsters book, with the removal of the chapter on arenas and any Gloranthan monster.

On the positive side, the book does have enough creatures to get you started, and the layout is good, with one monster per page. The digest format makes it a good size to carry around along with the main rulebook. Almost every creature has enough information to be used as a player character, if that is your thing, although the writers advise against choosing non-sapient animals for obvious reasons.

Unfortunately, it is not as well edited as it could be. The description of the Lamia is missing some important text regarding it's kiss weapon, and there are references to Beastmen in the examples, even though there is no representative creature for the Beastmen any longer. Some of the creatures do not have artwork and the table of contents does not list every creature in the book, making it harder to navigate.

The rules for spirit combat were not in the Legend core book, and are included here. A full version of the spirit magic rules, including spirit combat, have since been posted on the Mongoose site.

In summary, it's a useful book that's let down by less than stellar editing. It will be interesting to see if a future version corrects the missing entry and the references to Gloranthan monsters that no longer "exist".